Verbal Abuse

I came across this post in G+ and thought of sharing it here. It's true unfortunately. Majority of the time, we're doing this unintentionally. But IMO, respect for the other person should ALWAYS be given, no matter who you are or what kind of relationship you are in!

5-day Juice Challenge

It all started when I watched a documentary film called "Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead". It's all about an Australian guy who's battling from obesity and some sort of an autoimmune skin disease. He's at his 40s, almost 300 pounds and taking a lot of meds for his skin condition everyday. He came to a point thinking of becoming healthy enable to lose weight and at the same time to stop taking any meds. That's when he started his juice diet.

Juice diet is, as what the word suggests, drinking just juice made of fresh fruits and vegetables. Yes, this means your brekky, lunch, dinner and even snacks are all liquid! So after watching this documentary, I challenged myself to go through the same process this guy has been. I am neither obese nor suffering from any kind of disease but what made me accept the challenge is that I felt really inspired with this guy's story. He did his juicing for 60 days which is, for me as a food (esp meat) lover, CRAZY!

Anyway, the day after watching this film, I decided on getting myself a juicer. Man, there are loads of juicers in the market to choose from which depends on person's needs! I bought the Kenwood 700-watt centrifugal one. And to be honest, I never thought I would really love and enjoy using it! This is specially made for lazy pips like me. :P So I started juicing September 1, after knowing that my body fat is 1kg over! Lol. Yes, I went to some electronic health device in a mall which measures your BMI, body fat and so on. That really helped me decide on doing this challenge.

Trial day: I bought loads of veggies and fruits the night before. Being a newbie, I cut and prepared everything that I bought and slammed them all in the juicer. I have created a pitcher (1 liter) of juice and started on drinking it. The taste is... well of course, like veggies! I put the rest in a separate container and brought it with me in the office. This juice contains: carrots, celery, green apples, baby spinach, cucumbers and some lemons. Refreshing but not to be considered a tasty juice. Then I started searching for recipes online. I was immediately hooked and started researching more about this juice diet. There are numerous amount of positive feedbacks on juicing up, although there are some risks of being in this type of diet. I actually don't know what to believe but I am still convinced on continuing my diet plan. After doing a lot of readings, I found out that drinking your juice fresh from juicing is best. The longest time you can keep it is 3 days otherwise you won't get any nutrition out of it anymore. For me, drinking it right there and then is hard but the best I can do is to drink a freshly-juiced glass of fruits in the morning and juice up more to bring with me to work for my lunch and do another fresh one for my dinner when I return from work. So far, it's working perfectly fine with my schedule. Honestly, I was quite impressed of myself getting up as early as 6 in the morning just to prepare my brekky and lunch for the day. People who really knows me would think this is quite an achievement, knowing that I really hate getting up early. So here goes my 5-day juicing recipes.

Day 1: brekky is 4 fresh oranges. Leftovers from trial day as lunch. Dinner is 10 medium-sized asparagus, 4 carrots, 2 apples, 2 cucumbers and 2 tomatoes.

Day 2: brekky is 1 pack of strawberries, a handful of raspberry and a handful of mint. Lunch is 6-7 leaves of kale, 2 green apples, 4 stalks of celery, 2 cucumbers, 1/2 lemon and a thumb-sized ginger. I call this the "mean green juice". Super yummy and very healthy too! Dinner is 4 cucumbers, 1 apple, a handful of baby spinach and 1/4 beetroot.

Day 3: brekky is a pack of strawberries, 1 green apple, orange I call it "strawrangeapple". Lunch is 1/2 beetroot, 2 carrots, 1 cucumber, a bunch of watercress, 1/2 pear, 1/2 lemon and 1/8 purple cabbage. This made me 1 1/2 glass so I treated myself with a snack out of it. Lol. This juice is well-known for cleansing your liver. Not really my favorite as it tastes like earth but knowing that I'm drinking something to clean my liver, well, bottoms up! Dinner is another glass of mean green as so far, this is my favorite!

Day 4: brekky is 5 green apples and a handful of mint. Lunch is 1 bunch of cilantro, 1 bunch of baby spinach, 1 stalk of broccoli and 1/2 ginger. They say this is a healing juice - helps heal your wounds fast. I doubled the quantity of this healing juice to make me self another glass for dinner.

Day 5: brekky is 1/2 pineapple, 2 cucumbers and 6-8 pieces of mint. Man, this was the most refreshing drink I've ever tasted in my entire life. I am not a fan of pineapple but I did changed my mind because of this recipe! Lunch is 2 handful of baby spinach, 4-5 pieces of romaine lettuce, 1 cucumber, 2 stalks of celery and 1 pear. Dinner is 1/2 pineapple, 1/2 beetroot and 1 bunch of watercress.

After this 5-day juicing, I went back to check on my weight and surprisingly, I lost 1.6kgs! Wow! The best part is that I have never felt nauseated or weak or hungry although whenever I see my favorite fast-food chains, I have this urge of getting myself everything I can order! But overall, I feel great! Also, I need to mention that I have so much relied on water during this 5-day period. My coffee intake was down to 1 cup a day from 3-4 cups.

So what I did after this 5-day juicing? Anyone who have not heard of a cheat day is a complete moron! Well, kidding aside, yeah I did my cheat daysss. Lol. I am craving for solid foods so I decided to have my weekend as my cheat days. After eating my favorite steak, veal chops, kofta, and teriyaki yakisoba (with small portions if course!), I head back to check again my body composition analysis. So far, everything is normal and optimal.

Anyway, I just want to share this experience to you. I am recommending this diet but be sure to check with your doctor first to see whether you are fit to do this diet plan. I have decided to continue this for another week to reach my desired weight. So, wish me luck! Ta-ta!

Hello 30!

It's almost midnight and I'm almost 30. Truth is, I don't know if I'll freak out or just accept the fact that I really am that old. This-very-moment sucks, BIG TIME! Sitting outside my balcony, hearing how busy the street while celebrating the eve of my birthday (alone) by drinking a bottle of beer makes me wonder, contemplate on life and write this blog.

In the past 29 years of my existence I must say I've been a lucky person. Lucky enough to still be in a normal state of mind, having a decent job, money to spend, very supportive family, and a loving kid to raise. I won't say I can't ask for more because there are so freaking much to ask. I'm ambitious, I tell you. I'll be lying if I'll say I'm not. I guess this is human nature. We all can't be satisfied on whatever it is on our plate.

When I was 26 I told myself "I'll be a millionaire when I reach 30!" That... didn't happen. Nevertheless, I am happy on where I am and where will I be. Okay, maybe not that happy but someone once told me, there are a lot more better things that's gonna happen in my life. I was quite skeptical to believe that. I have loads of things on my mind that I wanna do, that I wanna accomplish (career-wise) but there are also gazillion of reasons that I'm being held to do that. Reasons that I can easily bend but with sacrifices.

Love life? I'm trying not to get into that but I know you know how juicy this is to talk about. Well, for almost 3 years I thought I have one or at least HAD someone to trust my stone-cold heart with; apparently, I'm still a sucker in terms of lurve: naive, easy to manipulate and helpless. I now doubt the saying, "Actions speak louder than words." As far as my honest opinion is concerned, all men are exactly the same. They'll give you the moon and stars, you'll hear them say all the sweetest poems in the world but it all goes down to their one true intention - they'll break you into pieces. Tear your life, and worst, your heart apart. Love is such a joke. A delusional thing!

Yeah, yeah, I guess 30 is hitting me hard though I have all the reasons to be thankful for and be satisfied with. I should prolly give credit to those people who hated me, people who accused and judged me of what I'm not and people who bullied and mocked me - without these implicit stereotypes around, my life will be boring as hell. So, thank you a-holes!

Okay, enough of the pathetic lamentation and sentiments. My blog says, "Hello 30!" Should I challenge it? Definitely! Despite of struggling events happened I wanna be hopeful. Good things do come from the bad times. So cheers and hello 30!

Yield

Nobody can ever explain why we can smile all day long but cry on ourselves to sleep at night. How pictures remain the same but people in them do not. How your best friend can become your worst enemy, and your worst enemy becomes your new best friend. How forever turns into a few short months. How the people who once wanted to spend every second with you, think a few minutes of their time is too much to spare. How people make promises despite knowing how common it is for promises to be broken. How people can erase you from their lives just because it’s easier than working things out.

Sometimes, there is nothing to be said. Sometimes, nothing should be said. We all want to find someone who will not run away. Someone to look us in the eye and tell us it’s okay. That things don’t always go right. That this is how life works and how it will always work. That it’s not going to be easy today, tomorrow, the next day, but it will somehow get better. However, there will come a time, a time which neither one of us can control. That someone will walk out of our life and because we love them so, we will need to let them go. Many of us say there’s no use in wasting our time on people who leaves us. What we make of ourselves and our future are no longer tied to them. You will miss them, yeah but always always remember that you were not the first one to give up.

Letting go doesn’t mean giving up. It means accepting things that weren’t meant to be. No one ever gets tired of loving. But everyone gets tired of waiting, assuming, hearing promises, saying sorry, and all the hurting. We've got to do what’s right for us even if it hurts.

Truth is we have to accept that there will always be people that stay in our hearts, even if they don’t stay in our lives.

Dram drama drama blah blah blah... I hate love.

UAE West Coast Road and Camping Trip

Gloomy day last Thursday but who cares? That doesn't stopped us from our camping adventure in UAE West Coast Region!

Fancy looking but not so helpful book :P

It was planned to go camp somewhere west where we can swim so we chose Al Gharbia. According to reviews, this is the place where you can find a vast amount of dessert plus a never-ending coastline with stunning beaches and islands. Btw, going to this place by road is approximately 250kms-ish.

Huge trucks on the road starting from Musaffah to West Coast!

First stop, Mirfa. We went to Mirfa Hotel as we read that there's a public beach right beside it. Surprisingly, there's a huge warning banner that welcomed us saying "photography is prohibited" and "swimming prohibited - deep water". What the heck?! I can't help but think how funny it is to drive all the way there and stay in that hotel right infront of the beach where you can't even swim. Lol. So we decided to look for some other place to stay.

Nice view eh? But oh no you can't swim!

Since we had this book as a guide, we looked for a decent place nearby where we can camp. Next stop - Jebel Dhanna in Ruwais. Allegedly, this place is one of the "best" places and something tourists need to check out for when going to this part of Abu Dhabi. Apparently, this place is an industrial town with two fancy hotels and private residential areas. Again, a no-no for campers! There may be parts where you can put up your tent but we found those areas filthy and abandoned.

It's past noon with all our stomach crying for food and we still haven't found our perfect spot. As we keep driving further, I'm seeing that we are going far from the coastline. I started to think this part of the country sucks. Turning every page of this unreliable off-road book that we bought and checking on some answers from the gps and map, we decided on going to Sir Baniyas Island. I was like, "OK" since this is nearly 30minutes drive from where we are right now.

As we approached Sir Baniyas, I was pleased with the quietness and calmness of the place. Seeing brownish to white sand and different shades of blue sky/sea around it made me happy. We saw a few cars parked right beside the road while the owners are sitting laid-back with their fish gears. We went off-road to find this suitable spot. T'was a bit of a Maldivian style beach except for those huge rocks scattered in every place. But it's alright. That's the thing with camping - you won't be able to get everything perfect. We made a joke like "What's the point of having hundreds of kilometers of coastline? People here don't understand why we need beaches but on the other hand we don't understand why they don't need beaches."

Look at that! Yes, it's in UAE! :)

 

Vlad enjoying this low tide Maldivian rocky scenery and thought
of doing the bbq in the middle of the sea!



There's a port in this area where they transfer people (even cars)
to Delma Island and Sir Baniyas Island.

Free as a bird! :)

I made a friend, a really gorgeous one! His name is Errol. :)


Overall, I would say it's a good experience going to Al Gharbia but I wouldn't really recommend it. For me, in this country, if you wanna go for camping, best place is still over the dessert and if you wanna go swimming, just go to Corniche Beach. But who knows? Maybe there are places out there that's worth visiting that I'm not aware of. So far, the book guide and some links over the net are not so reliable so we'll see. Till my next adventure! Ta-ta!

Dim Christmas

It's almost Christmas eve and here I am sitting on my bed writing this blog post. I was about to experience one of the best holiday with a very special person yet for some insignificant reason, all the bliss just completely vanished.

Why?

Maybe I was really trying so hard competing with time. Maybe I always make myself available every time I am needed. Maybe I am wrong expressing my affection through words. Maybe I should stop being silent whenever I am disappointed and pretend everything is okay and that I am all okay. I think I should change MUST CHANGE because being like this hurts so bad that you will be accused as a demanding and negatively cold as a stone, easy-going fake culprit.

I couldn't explain what or how I feel at this very moment. I wanna cry but tears doesn't want to come out. I feel like any moment am gonna burst and the whole world will explode. This is so fucking soul-hurt, like a knife stabbed straight to your heart kind of hurt.

Camping at Fujairah

It's holiday and it's winter season, meaning - it's camping time! We planned and decided to go to Fujairah to see some rocky mountains and at the same time, to swim in the beach.

I'm telling you, camping preparation was not that easy. There are people who you would think would come and will end up backing out, there will be fights with regard of who does or buys what and all kinds of inevitable shitty things.. but I think it's all part of the adventure. So yeah, before we even enjoyed our winter camping trip, of course, there were few dramas we surpassed. I think life will be so boring without these. Hehe..

Anyway, so we left Abu Dhabi early morning as travel time is roughly 3 hours. The exciting part? It was raining cats and dogs on our way there! During the trip, I was skeptical to go any further. We even stopped not so nearly halfway as Stewart couldn't see anything on the road with this heavy rain. We warmed ourselves with some coffee and waited for a few minutes and then we went on and stopped, and went on and stopped, so it goes. I was like, what the heck?! I just kept on thinking or should I say praying for the rain to stop.

First stop for coffeeeeeee.

Once upon a wet day...

Our second stop.

Strike a pose. Third stop.

Eventually, after quite some time, we arrived at this camping spot. The place is okay. Good side is that there's a beach, downside is where the f*ck to pee??? This is not the same as in the dessert where aside from the moon and the stars to watch over you doing your thing, you will only expect camels to catch you off-guard! Of course we managed but in a very uneasy and uncomfy way.

We arrived about lunch time and we started putting up our tents and do some grilling. Since the weather is acting up that day, we just ate, entertained ourselves by playing cards while boozing and then slept cuddling eachother inside the tent around 6PM. And oh, one more thing I hate about this place is that it's so crowded. We couldn't feel/hear the nature because of our neighbors' heart-thumping lame music.


Wot?



Our bad moods were changed the next day - the sun is up, shining and smiling at us! We spend the morning barbequing, swimming and sunbathing. So this trip wasn't so bad after all. At least we enjoyed half a day of our almost two-day adventure. We packed and returned back to AUH in the afternoon.

Goofing under the sun.

with Cora

Going home. 

Honestly, I didn't enjoy this trip that much. Don't get me wrong. I wouldn't mind going back there but I prefer to go some other place. For me, camping over the dessert is still the best.

Stay tuned for my next sandpit adventure! Toodles!