Leave a comment at the end of this entry of a question that you’d like to ask me. It can be anything. It can be about me, or about what I think about something or anything that doesn’t even have to be about me.

Then I’ll go through some of the questions and pick 3 of them that I will answer in my next blog entry (unless I find less than 3 questions that I think I can or want to answer). How’s that?

Ok so ask away guys 🙂

I looked at the date on my phone today and it has finally dawned on me (after a few days), that 2010 is here and here to stay. 2009 seem to fly by so quickly for me so I took the time to go through my blog archives to kind of see what it is that I had done in 2009.

That’s the great thing about blogging if you ask me. There are two things I love about blogging. The first thing is reading the comments that I get after each entry (although in recent months for some reason you guys have started leaving less and less comments eventhough there are more of you reading my blog now than before. Why??? Do you guys find me less approachable or something now?)

Anyway the second thing I love about blogging is that your blog kinda acts like a personal diary of your life so every once in a while you can go back into your blog archives and read your old entries. You can then have a peak into what you did in the past.

So here are a few cool things we did in 2009.

1) Met Lolo

1) Princess and I attend Andrew and Jayen’s wedding.

2) Nuffnang Turns Two!

3) Held Princess’ Surprise Birthday Party which was quite a success!

Princess and I go to Manila.

We went for a bit of sight-seeing.

And I had quite a bit of work at the Nuffnang Philippines office.

Was the peak of our spitting exercise then.

1) Found my horrid Secondary School Report Card

Saint Xaviers Boleh!

2) Went for the Nuffnang Music Bash

1) Kena Dengue.

Haih… FTS.

1) Went to Phuket with Princess.

2) Attended the Media Specialist Awards where one of Nuffnang’s campaign won a Gold thanks to the people at GroupM.

1) Attended Pierre and Lay See’s Wedding.

2) Visited my Aunty Nancy who brought me up.

1) Won the JCI Young Creative Entrepreneur Award

2) Put up our first Nuffnang Philippines signage in Manila.

3) Revamped the look of our Nuffnang site.

1) Went to Melbourne to visit Nuffnang Australia’s office.

2) Project Alpha’s First Episode Released.

1) Attended the Nuffnang Asia-Pacific Blog Awards

2) Princess and I celebrated our One Year Anniversary.

1) Released the Nuffnang Milestones videos (Video about the Nuffnang Story).

2) Appeared in some media. On Astro Awani, on Personal Money magazine etc etc.

3) Went to Hong Kong Disneyland again ! Woohoo!

1) Went to Tokyo ! Yay!

2) Attended the Mister Potato Fiesta

3) Had our Annual Christmas Dinner with the Nuffies

Whew… it was one heck of a year.

Hope this year will be just as great!

Happy New Year Everyone!

How did you spend your New Year’s Eve?

The first half of mine was spent at an airport waiting for a flight back to Penang. Then just a couple of hours before I was in Penang at a friend’s house for his annual New Year’s Eve party.

It’s funny how Annual New Year’s Eve party at a friend’s house starts to be a tradition. My friend Gin just started having it for the first time many years ago. He invited a few close friends to come over, have drinks and play cards or do some other stuff. It wasn’t meant to be one of those wild parties with strangers all over. Just his close friends.

Then because everyone had fun each time, over the years it became a tradition. This year though, Gin was almost not going to have a party but I managed to convince him to.

Here are the few pictures I manage to take that night.

Some of the guys there.

I was trying to eat the slice of cake in my hand when suddenly the guys started crowding around me saying “Come come picture picture!”

So while everyone was being cool and had drinks in their hand in each picture, I on the other hand had a slice of cake. Haih… I guess it goes with my “fat image”. Princess will be pleased since she now makes it a point every day to remind me how fat I am.

This is Yong Lin. Can you guess what she works as?

Come on come on try.

Lawyer, accountant, architect… anything…

Guess…..

Well…

She’s actually… a doctor!

Doesn’t give off the “doctor look” right? Can’t imagine her in a white coat treating a patient.

Some of the girls that night. Including Princess.

And a last picture that night with Princess and me.

The rest of the night after that was a blur.

Thanks for the great party Gin!

Haha.. Happy New Year everyone!

How did you spend yours?

Princess and I have this thing about presents. We’ve always agreed that we don’t need an occasion to buy presents for each other. Be it Christmas, Anniversary or anything like that. We just decided that whenever we see something that we think the other person would like, we buy it there and then. It can be any time of the year. So we don’t expect Christmas or Anniversary presents from each other. Except for Birthdays though. We still expect birthday presents haha!

So I’m not sure if I should call this a Christmas present because it isn’t exactly one. What I can call it though is my “Best Present of 2009”. All it was… a photo album with the pictures of Wombeh & Domokun.

Oh Princess and I refer to each other now as Wombeh & Domokun. Me being Wombeh (which comes from the word wombat because when she saw a wombat in Australia she thought it was cute). I on the other hand refer to her as Domokun because she sometimes goes “RARARA!!!”. I’m sure the names we call each other will change in the next 3 months so don’t get too used to it.

Okay back to the album Princess gave me.

In case you’re wondering, the 10th of October 2008 is the estimated date that we got together as a couple. The exact date is still a mystery for us because I didn’t exactly ask “Will you be my girlfriend?”. We just… somehow started treating each other like bf/gf and I guess one day we both understood that we were in a relationship.

The great thing about photo albums with pictures in them is that they never grow old. I will never get bored of receiving photo albums with pictures in them because I think it takes a lot of effort to hand pick each picture. Besides, when someone gives you a photo album with pictures.. you’re not just getting a “photo album with pictures”. You’re getting a whole condensed book of memories you’ve had with that someone.

That makes photo albums such great gifts! I’m sure some of you guys out there have done it at least once before for your other half. If you haven’t then do it! I think it makes a great gift.

Princess’ photo album was a page by page story of us. The story of “Wombeh & Domokun”. She put in each picture and some captions on which period of our relationship was that picture taken.

With Princess’ permission, I’m going to share a few of them with you guys. Notice the captions she wrote on each page.

This is the first picture.

Yep… this picture was taken at the start of my Paul Frank craze. I now have like an entire wardrobe of Paul Frank t-shirts.

Princess and I have this thing about presents. We’ve always agreed that we don’t need an occasion to buy presents for each other. Be it Christmas, Anniversary or anything like that. We just decided that whenever we see something that we think the other person would like, we buy it there and then. It can be any time of the year. So we don’t expect Christmas or Anniversary presents from each other. Except for Birthdays though. We still expect birthday presents haha!

So I’m not sure if I should call this a Christmas present because it isn’t exactly one. What I can call it though is my “Best Present of 2009”. All it was… a photo album with the pictures of Wombeh & Domokun.

Oh Princess and I refer to each other now as Wombeh & Domokun. Me being Wombeh (which comes from the word wombat because when she saw a wombat in Australia she thought it was cute). I on the other hand refer to her as Domokun because she sometimes goes “RARARA!!!”. I’m sure the names we call each other will change in the next 3 months so don’t get too used to it.

Okay back to the album Princess gave me.

In case you’re wondering, the 10th of October 2008 is the estimated date that we got together as a couple. The exact date is still a mystery for us because I didn’t exactly ask “Will you be my girlfriend?”. We just… somehow started treating each other like bf/gf and I guess one day we both understood that we were in a relationship.

The great thing about photo albums with pictures in them is that they never grow old. I will never get bored of receiving photo albums with pictures in them because I think it takes a lot of effort to hand pick each picture. Besides, when someone gives you a photo album with pictures.. you’re not just getting a “photo album with pictures”. You’re getting a whole condensed book of memories you’ve had with that someone.

That makes photo albums such great gifts! I’m sure some of you guys out there have done it at least once before for your other half. If you haven’t then do it! I think it makes a great gift.

Princess’ photo album was a page by page story of us. The story of “Wombeh & Domokun”. She put in each picture and some captions on which period of our relationship was that picture taken.

With Princess’ permission, I’m going to share a few of them with you guys. Notice the captions she wrote on each page.

This is the first picture.

Yep… this picture was taken at the start of my Paul Frank craze. I now have like an entire wardrobe of Paul Frank t-shirts.

Ever since Nuffnang started, it has always been a Nuffnang tradition that every year end, the Nuffnang team would have a Christmas dinner together just to get together at the end of the year.

Last year instead of a Christmas dinner we did a Christmas lunch and it was held in Singapore.

This year however we held it in KL.

And this is the one THIS year!

The table seems to get longer and longer each year. Today there are some 40 people who work at Nuffnang all over the region but due to the logistics and depending on everyone’s personal schedule not everyone makes it down for the dinner.

This year some 20 of us made it.

Here are some of the Nuffies that made it that night.

Raine, Michelle and Rina

I was at the Mister Potato Fiesta last weekend. It was Mister Potato’s first really big foray into an event that aimed to engage bloggers in Malaysia and it was something my good friend Pierre had always wanted to do.

So Princess and I made sure we were there to support him. Heck even Ming came down from Singapore just for the event at Mist Club, Bangsar.

Here are some pictures from the night.

1) Liang was the emcee that night and once again he pulled off one hell of a show. I remember many people that night tell me that Liang was just freakin amazing. Really funny and spontaneous… always manages to get the crowd going!

2) Say hello to Princess and Mister Potato!

3) Even the real-life Mister Potato from the TVC made guest appearance. His real name is Sham but that night, we all knew him as Mister Potato.

4) Pierre giving a speech on stage wearing his sombrero.

5) He brought me a sombrero too. See?

That’s my sombrero and me with Beautifulnara.

6) Me, Princess and Redmummy.

7) Some of the winners that night who went home with a total of RM20,000 in cash.

The winners were from the Mister Potato blog contest and also the best dressed that night.

The person who won the best dressed was this lady here.

And this is the blogger who did the best entry and won like RM5,000 that night.

RM5,000! I remember all of us looking at each other on how we could really use that money ourselves 🙂

8) Myself with Mr and Mrs. Pierre Pang.

You guys remember Mr and Mrs Pang right? Remember… the …. *grumble* perfect couple…

9) And those two faces you see on that cardboard body of a Mexican band is… Princess and me.

10) As if Liang’s emceeing and people dressed in Mister Potato outfits dancing around wasn’t enough fun for the night, Mister Potato even got Hujan to come perform.

I’ve always heard a lot about Hujan but never once got the chance to see or hear them perform. They were great… so energetic and they really knew how to engage the crowd.

I loved the part they sang the Mister Potato jingle. Everyone went wild!

11) Some of the Nuffies that were there that night.

12) This is a group of us who were there that night after the party ended. Ming in the blue shirt was already tired from all the excitement earlier. Yawning away.

13) And our last cheers to celebrate the end of the night.

Ah what a great night.

When in Tokyo, Princess brought me shopping twice.

The first time at Shibuya, at this mall called Shibuya 109.

Now Shibuya must be a girl’s shopping paradise but if it’s that to a girl, it’s a disaster for a guy who likes to shop. Why?

Simply because just about every shop in the entire huge mall was selling only stuff for girls. Nothing for guys. So I spent an hour or two in there just walking around with Princess and looking at the other pitiful boyfriends who were doing the same national service for their girlfriends.

It was terrible I tell you.. terrible! At one point I even wanted to go to the toilet and I couldn’t find one for guys. All the toilet signs let to a single door that had the female toilet logo on it.

A mall with shopping only for girls and toilets only for girls. That’s like saying “fuck off guys!”. Then again maybe the gents toilet did exist but I was just too blur to find it.

After Shibuya though we went to Harajuku and there.. while they had a lot of girl things there, they also had a LOT of guy stuff.

The guy clothes they had there weren’t expensive. About the same price for a shirt that you would pay in Malaysia but they were a lot nicer, had very unique designs too. If you guys are interested then comment at the end of this entry and maybe I’ll post a blog entry with some of the nice shirts I got from Harajuku.

I love the trains in Japan. It’s not just the bullet-train but even the public transport.

The trains come so frequent and they’re very very punctual. The bullet-train of course is… totally out of this world.

The commuters in Japan often eat these kind of packed meals on the train. So trying to act like local, we bought some ourselves.

Here’s what’s on the inside.

The food was cold but nice nevertheless.

They move so fast you feel as if you’re on an airplane.

I took the bullet-train from Tokyo to Hakone and spent the night there. Hakone is a place in the mountains not far from Mount Fuji.

It’s a little hot springs resort village where people go just to relax.

We stayed in this Japanese-style resort that was really nice and had some really traditional Japanese elements to it.

The rooms for example were all Japanese-styled with tatami mats and all.

The whole point of going to that resort is just to relax, chill, eat the good food they all prepare for you and then go sit in the hot springs (Onsen).

The Onsen is a whole new different experience. There are outdoor and indoor Onsens but its divided by gender because nobody is allowed to wear anything when they go into the Onsen. Not even swimming trunks.

Being a bit shy and not wanting to compare cocks or anything like that, I opted for the private Onsen where I had the whole thing for myself. It was an outdoor one so first you go out in the open all naked when it’s like 0-5 degrees out there. Then you take a quick shower in the open and then slowly go into this pond of hot water.

Being so hot you sometimes have to gradually go in toe by toe but when you do get your whole body in. It feels just great.

The one last thing I love about Japan is the people. Even coming from a developed country like themselves, they’re all so humble and obliging. A lot of the people there didn’t speak English but even the ones who didn’t, always made a bit effort to help us out and try to understand what we were saying in order for them to help us.

This is a picture of two of the resort staff that was with us in the Hakone resort.

I will miss Japan. I told myself though that I probably won’t be able to go back there in the next 5 years because it’s just too expensive. With the money you spend on a trip to Japan, you can probably afford to go anywhere else in the world.

I highly recommend that if you have the chance… go ahead and go for at least once in a lifetime. It is worth experiencing Japan.

I’m coming back to KL today after having spent almost a week in Japan. It’s been such a great holiday. I knew it was a great holiday when one day during the trip, I totally forgot what day of the week it was. That was when I knew… I was truly on a holiday.

I gotta love Japan. Apart from everything costing a bomb (made worse by the strong Yen now), I love it. Here are a few things I love about Japan.

The food in Japan was amazing. We had a lot of great meals in Japan.

Everything from Shabu Shabu to Teppanyaki

Sushi and all but my favourite of all was from this little underground restaurant in the middle of Tokyo. It’s so easy to miss when walking on the street. All you see is a small sign and a staircase that leads downstairs.

When you do go down, you find a small restaurant that can fit something like 20 people in there.

They serve some chicken ball or shitake mushroom skinners but the highlight for me is this.

Salmon with rice.

You can have almost the same thing with chicken but salmon was my favourite. All they put in there is rice, salmon and some sesame but it all tasted so good.

My Dad found out about this place from his Japanese friend. According to my Dad, this is like the Japanese version of “Economy Rice”. Cheap (relatively) but good food 🙂

They’re everywhere and they have all sorts of really cool drinks, both hot and cold.

Allow me to illustrate in pictures how much I love vending machines.

This is me buying a drink at a vending machine in Tokyo.

This is me buying another drink at another vending machine in Tokyo.

This is me buying….

well it goes on.

And this scene was repeated no less than 10 times throughout the few days I was in Tokyo.

My favourite drink from the vending machines is this.

Not sure if I spelt that the way it’s meant to be spelt but let me explain what that is. In the bathrooms in Japan you often find a bathtub right next to the shower head. Unlike Malaysia where the shower head is normally right on top of the bath tub, the shower head this time is placed on the floor area right next to it.

I learned from Princess that the whole reason for that is because in Japan, the Japanese first shower at the spot right next to the bath tub. Once they’re done, they soak in the bath tub of warm water for as long as they want to warm the body up so that when you do eventually get out of the bathroom you aren’t jumping around in the cold.

I decided to live the tradition of soaking in the Ofuro throughout my whole trip and I found sooo addictive. Sooo relaxing.

Plus filling the tub is so pain-free because of technology. In some places there is a panel on the wall where you can just set it to the temperature you want to set it to and the tub will automatically fill itself.

I love this feature! Just as much as I love the bidet in the toilet and the sinks where you have automatic soap, water and hair dryer all just by putting your hands in different parts of the sink.

So awesome.

Ahh love the technology in Japan.

The other one thing I love about Japan or more specifically Tokyo is… the city lights at night.

Look at how beautiful it looks at night.

I’ll write about the remaining 4 things I love about Japan in the next part.

Until then… see you guys 🙂