36th!

Every year on this day, I try to reflect on my life so far. By reflect, I mean I go through the past year again in my head, identifying the big, defining moments, the struggles and how they were hurdled (if at all), the small and seemingly inconsequential moments that filled the days. At least those that I can remember anyway.

I go through this exercise because I want to remember as much as I can about what has transpired in my life. In the daily hustle and bustle of living, it can't be helped that days are sometimes counted and marked out on calenders only as a way to get to a particular date coinciding with work deadlines, the next payday, the next vacation or the next trip home. I tend to do that too, sadly, a habit I'm trying to curb. For who was it that said that life is what happens when you are not looking?

I also reflect to 'look' for moments I may have forgotten or overlooked that should make me ever more grateful for the blessed lot I have been handed. From my stormy growing-up years, through severe insecurity, early tensions and despair over academic difficulties while in college (ack! Engineering! in UP! Don't even ask.), heck, I've come a long way, baby!

So, for giving me material comfort, where there could have easily been dire want, for a life of quiet joy and contentment where there could have been desperation and helplessness, good health where illness instead, love, care, acceptance and friendship where loneliness could have been, I walk around with a grateful heart -- most of the time. (Who doesn't get whiny every once in a while, huh?) And so to stock my heart's armory with big and small instances that inspire gratitude to the Giver on days when I can't help but be difficult, I scour through years gone by for my own ammunition -- countless proof of blessings.

I also have this habit of trying to kill myself trying to remember exactly what I did last year, on this very day. Of course I always get frustrated because I am someone who can't even remember what I did this day last week! I always attempt to start a diary too, to save me the trouble of mental calistenics next year about today's events, but so far, all I have are unused nice notebooks and a few diaries that have barely anything written on them lying about in my bedroom.

Towards this end, let me just say that I remember that on this day in 2005, I had a huge chocolate cake with lots of fluffy white icing from my hubby (then fiance) which we finished eating only after about a month. (Ew! Too huge! And I didn't want to throw it out.) He got me a sexy, red divan too, which he said was to be my throne after a long day at the office, but which became his favourite chair instead until it gave him bad backaches. So now I get to sit there finally. The 18th last year was a Sunday, so we spent the day together in town meandering about.

This year, he got me a smaller cake, a mango torte, a light, yummy creation that is not cloyingly sweet. I reckon this one will be polished off in 2 weeks tops.

I went to work today though, this being the eve of the 2-day IMF and World Bank annual meetings here. So no fancy dinner date. The hubby did come by my office bearing a special takeaway dinner for me and promised a better meal this weekend.

Looking forward, I hope for 3 major things this year: having a baby and going on a proper honeymoon, whichever comes first. And world peace, of course.

Cheers!

Where does the time go?

From that initial online chat with some of my old high school friends a few weeks ago, the group has now expanded to include a few more people who had just dropped out from everyone's radar to 'resurface' now after so many years.

My amazement at how we've managed to be located in so many parts of the world has just grown. Ah, the wonder of technology really. I may never live to see all these names in my Yahoo Chat box in the same physical room again, but at least online, we are able to gather like high school kids again every few weeks to chit-chat and reminisce.

Those who can't be online when we gather write-in via email and what wacky emails they send. You know you're old(er) when you can't remember half the stories that are told about happenings in high school, and its specially strange but a bit melancholy too to hear a friend now living in UK sing to you via Yahoo Voice your alma mater song that you've completely forgotten about.

As Julia Fordham sings so plaintively in a song, I likewise ask: Where does the time go?

Off to HK!

I'm off to HK with girlfriends for an impromptu trip. It will just be for the weekend, from early Saturday to late Monday to be exact. I don't have an agenda while there really, will just bum around, hopefully with ad-man extraordinnaire Lester for a while.

The girls I'm travelling with are former HK residents so they know where to eat while in Hong Kong. And I can't wait to have dimsum!

I'm so excited! And I just can't hide it! :)

Photo credit: BLOOMBERG

A case for saving

Whoopeedoo! I have an extra $6,000 in the bank!

No, I didn't win the lottery nor the sweepstakes. A never-known rich uncle didn't die and left me with moolah. And nope, I didn't have to hock my furnitures or my baubles for extra cash either.

The money is from a designed-to-be-forgotten automatic savings programme that I committed to just a little over two years ago. And why is the money out of the savings programme and into my bank, you ask? In my bank where its oh so easy to access via direct debit in stores?

Okay, relax. This post is not a confession about an imminent shopping frenzy. (I haven't done anything remarkable these last few months to merit a shopfest. And I'm not depressed too, my trigger to go crazy.) From the title of this post, you can see that this is my testimony to saving.

Over two years ago, I was whiling my afternoon in Borders here, and as is my wont, I soon found myself with a financial self-help book titled The Automatic Millionnaire by David Bach.(I'm such a sucker for these kinds of books!)

After speed-reading through the book, the author had convinced me that I could save money without hardship if I capitalise on the automation of the ways of today's society by setting up a savings plan that I can forget about. This is done by allowing a bank or a financial institution to deduct a specified sum from my payday account, for example, every month without fail, right on the time when pay is banked in.

By doing this, saving is made automatic -- eliminating the usual excuses to not saving, like the Oh-I-don't-make-enough-to save or the I-just-don't-know-where my-money-goes, to I-forgot-to-transfer-the-money excuses. The rationale is, you won't miss the amount that is not even in the account that you work with every day. The author said this is the practical application of the Pay Yourself First motto of saving, which essentially means that one must pay oneself first (by saving or socking away an amount) before one pays the utility company, the credit card company, the grocery, the car company, etc every month.

And so, I soon called up my insurance agent to ask if they had such an automatic savings/investment plan that I could sign up with. She said yes, they do have it, asked me how much I was keen on saving a month, and voila, a few days later, I actually signed the paperwork for the scheme.

True enough, I soon forgot about the $250 that was deducted from my account every month since then. Until recently, when I remarked to my insurance agent-friend that I was financially gearing up for my first balloon payment in Sept for a condo we are paying for in Manila.

May: 'I think you have enough in your investment plan with me to pay about half of the P500k you are preparing for.'

Me (all agog): 'WHAT?!!! I do?'

May: 'I'm sure. Just do your sums. $250 over more than two years.'

Me: 'It's been two years since then? I can't believe that.'

May: 'Time flies when you're having fun, my friend.'

WOW! And just like that, I have an extra $6,000 in the bank! And it's all going toward an asset too!

Reflecting on this later, I couldn't help but be grateful and awed at the blessings I have been provided. I'm in no measure financially rich, but I have been blessed tremendously and right at the opportune moments too to have more than enough in the pocket to cover all of our requirements. To all these, I say, Thank You, My Lord. All glory and honour be unto You.

:-)