Time for changes

I've been driving my old Toyota since my uni years, now 2 years after graduating, I think its time for an upgrade. Not because that I dislike my current ride, well, I do dislike it and love it. It is fun to tackle a corner with, it has a reasonable good torque, enough for the spirited daily city drive. But it is rather old, I believe its about 2 year +- younger then me. Leaking could happen during downpour, and sometimes even during carwash. Squeaking sound here and there, parts breakdown every now and then.

Now, before moving forward, lets talk a little more about my family and Toyota. My dad had a Toyota which he passed down to my elder brother after changing to a continental ride. After some time, it gave him a little too much problem and my dad finally went back to Toyota for a new ride. My bro totaled the Toyota given by my dad, and now he got himself a second-hand Toyota. My brother-in-law drives a Toyota, I got a Toyota during my uni years.

When thinking of getting a new car, one of the car that I really wanted was a Forte. A lot people have been telling me that this brand is no good etc. But these people are talking about the past, and its definitely not base on experience, even if its from experience, I could bet none of the experience came from Forte itself. From the people that I know who drives a Kia Forte, the feedback is nothing but good. Its a great car, value for money. If only I could afford it, it'll cost me around RM100k. So I had to turn elsewhere and start looking for a reliable second-hand / used car. And when looking into this segment, we can't go wrong with the Toyota, in this case, the Vios.

The above is the older generation of Vios which I kinda like, while the below is the newer version of the Vios which should be better as the wear and tear is still not that serious yet, in other words, I can use it for longer and sell off for higher.

I think I can safely say that Vios is a rather reliable car in Malaysia, having sold the highest volume for god knows how many years in both the new and used markets. Since so many people are still going for Vios, that will only mean that it is a really good car in some way or another. But if we are looking at the highest sales category, the Kia Forte is also among the vehicle which achieve a high sales number in Malaysia, I hope you get what I'm pointing at. But it remains a dream, where as my GTR-35 lies in the dream of my Forte's dream. Lol, what the **** am I saying.

But another car that I had had a crush before, which also belongs to the Toyota family, of course Supra is in the list, the dream list, but the crush that I had was for Altezza. The looks is simple, a little weird to some, but special to me, and with a simple bodykit upgrade, its a fabulous ride!! Definitely something to stand out in a crowd of Vios.

But end of the day, with my current wage, I really need to step up on my game in order to really make my dream come true, once the dream comes true, then the dream in my dream will be only 1 dream away.


Link, link, link, link, link, link, link, link, link

LTE network in Malaysia? When?

To those who have been using DiGi should have noticed that their network is not really improving even after doing the network swap to LTE. DiGi is the first telco in Malaysia, ahead of Celcom & Maxis to implement this system, but even though we have an LTE ready towers, is the technology available yet in Malaysia, especially when both Maxis and Celcom are not doing anything yet. BUT NOW

Celcom has came up and announced their turn to do this swapping, I wonder, will they face the same complications as DiGi or will they be smart enough to have tackled the problems before hand, but thing is, there is always the on the ground issues to pop up, now we will see how well Celcom's management is by how fast/efficient they tackle the problems that will arise.

Now for the more interesting question, how will Maxis capitalize on this when both DiGi and Celcom is still in this transition period? Making more lucrative plans and locking down their postpaid subscribers with at least 12 months contract, that would be a good thing to lock in the unhappy customers from DiGi and Celcom, and doing so, prevents these customers to leave Maxis when it is their turn to swap. This would be a typical marketing move, but I'm hoping to see something much more different.
Another thing is, could it be possible that Maxis has already started to do the swap, at a slower rate so to ensure minimal interruptions to their network? If that is the case, then WOW, but I kinda doubt that.
Anyways, it would be great for us to see how the LTE swap affects all telcos.

Currently the standings:
DiGi is the first to make the swap, and could possibly the first to finish it.
Celcom is the second to make the swap. (more news on this @Celcom)
Maxis could be monitoring and planning what is the best move here.




Off track a little, while looking for images, I came across a rather funny pic, to me at least, to be able to spot my cousin in a random pic. No, not the guy.

Image from link, link, link, link

Restart blogging?

This year has been full of ups and some downs for me. Just a little recap:

I had a great boss that was patient and caring, gives great life lesson which I am applying it to my work nowadays (I feel its better instead of coaching directly on our work skill). Our entire team had a great time together when he was around, he took us out for R&R and food trips every now and then, this greatly boosted our morale and tighten the bond and teamwork in the team. Of course there were stressful times, but I consider it as a good stress.

I finally picked up basketball in the first half of 2012, the end of the world almost came for me twice. Busted my knee and after MRI, founded that I have a partial torn tendon/ligament (can’t remember which), mild arthritis, bone bruising and internal swelling. This happen somewhere during mid year, and my second major knee injury just happened last week, Oct. So my current plan is to recover and build my knee, lose at least 10kg before I begin my game again.

Went on to several working trips, Ipoh, Johor, Kuching in April, Kota Kinabalu in May. My happy traveling days kinda ended here as this was also when my boss left us for a better future, good for him! Anyways, the next travelling was to Genting in August and Johor in Oct. When I first joined this job, I was really hoping that were more traveling involved, mainly for the claims and new place, sadly, I am suppose to handle stuffs from HQ with minimal to no traveling. How am I suppose to improve w/o being on the ground more???

1 happy and sad thing was that my contract status has changed, to better of course. Now I have better medical and dental coverage, but with it, my OT claims etc have since disappeared w/o salary increment.

I finally was able to hit the gym consistently, at least until my knee was injured. This contributed to about 3kg off in a month, which is a good/healthy progress for me. 

Image from link, link, link, link, link

Getting fit

After some issues with my knee, I came to worry about what will be of me 5 years down the road. Having said that, I am a little more health conscious, I won't say very, and definitely no where near average level, but just a little more then usual. Its a start. 

I know that healthy eating is the most important part of healthy living, and its definitely the most essential part when you want to slim down or simply just to be healthier. Like I said before, I am little more conscious, but I still can't sacrifice all my food, maybe just 10-20% of the food I love and change up my food choices to healthier option by another 10-20%. 

But what I'm including now is extra exercise! Basketball recently has become too on-&-off thing, primarily due to the weather and headcount. So what I did was add in more exercise and some light weight/Tabata exercise at home (occasionally).

Let's hope that I can shed a few extra kilo and gain some extra friends

[Source: link, link, link, link]

iPhone 4S deals

Well, iPhone 4S is officially launched in Malaysia!! But what is the best deal available? W/o looking at any offers from any telco operators, I already know the cheapest, value for money, best deal for this device here.

As most of you would have known, the 3 major telco had their launching at the below locations:

Maxis

• Venue: Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre, Ground Floor, Exhibition Hall 1
• Date: 16th December 2011
• Time: 12:00am – 3:00am

DiGi

• Venue: DiGi 360° SoHoKL outlet, Solaris Mont Kiara
• Date: 16th December 2011
• Time: 12:00am

Celcom

• Venue: La Bodega, Bangsar Shopping Centre, Kuala Lumpur
• Date: 16th December 2011
• Time: Queue starts at 9am (15 Dec), Sales start at 12am (16th Dec)

Everyone is crazy on getting the best bargain for the iPhone 4S, which will be the case for at least a few more weeks. 

My simple plan on getting the best, or rather cheapest iPhone 4S in the long run, the plan is to just simply buy an iPhone 4S w/o contract. Trust me, in the long run, or just few months down the road, you are actually saving more then signing a plan with 12/24 months contract. Another thing with contracts is that you gotta pay an early termination fees or also known as premature fees. So there you have it. 

Here is some good reads if you want Comparing iPhone 4S plans between Digi, Maxis, Celcom & U Mobile

Busted!!

If by reading the title led you to think something such as a disclosed scandal and the likes, well, congratulation, you are just one of the usual tabloid reader.

Anyway, the busted that I meant is something about me, and no, its not a scandal. Well, I wish it was, but my life is rather boring, other then the new 42' tv I just bought to replace my 19' monitor.

Ok ok, enough with all the small talks, what really is busted is my knee, well, at least I think it is. If I climb a flight of stairs too fast, I can feel the pain in my right knee.

So I don't even need to tell you what happens when I go for basketball!! The damned part about this is that I can't do anything about it, usually with a sprained ankle, I can massage it when the pain hits, and I know it will go away eventually. Most likely its because I injured my ankle, but for my knee, I don't even know what or how the pain is caused.

When my knee hurts, I tried massaging it, I can almost pinpoint the area where it hurts, but upon massaging/pressing, I don't feel any pain, well, apart from the one that I'm inflicting on myself.

Hopefully it will go away soon!!

[Source: link, link, link, link, link, link]

My little niece!

Her name is Hazel *ong,
sometimes called hazel nut,
nutty as she might be,
she is nuts about animals!

Hazel NUTTTy