Home is where your heart is

I've always thought that living abroad would be no big deal. Home would he wherever you decide is home. Your surroundings would have no impact whatsoever on how you live your life. Nothing changes. You go to work, you go home, have dinner, go to bed and wake up the next morning doing the same thing. From time to time, you socialize or you travel or do whatever else takes your fancy. The environment you live in doesn't change your lifestyle.

So then why is it that just when you're about to board the plane heading home, you develop anxiety. You start feeling jittery and start to wonder about all the things that you used to do back home and the things that you would do on this trip back. You start to remind yourself of all the friends that you would like to catch up with and all the great food that you've been missing since your last trip back.

Don't get me wrong. I enjoy living in The Hague. The pace is slower compared to Kuala Lumpur. Getting around is easy, you can easily take your bike out and go for a long ride without having to worry about lorry drivers who cant see you or even acknowledge that you have as much right as they do in using the tarmac. You dont have to worry about being late anywhere as you don't have to crawl through bumper to bumper traffic.

Over the last couple of years, I've found that I enjoy my life in the Netherlands. The lifestyle there gives me more time to pursue my other interests and develop some new ones. So why is it that when the plane lands and the cabin crew is making their final announcement before you disembark the plane, you get this feeling of pure contentment when they say "To the Malaysian citizens, welcome home". When you hear that, it sounds so right.

Not a good start, but not a bad ending….

It started off as one of those days. You know the kind of day where you wake up and feel like you've just been run over by a steam roller. That was how my Saturday started. I woke up quite early, around 7.00 and the moment I sat up I felt like I had been crushed by a huge rolling pin. All my muscles were aching and crying out to me to just lie down again.

I don’t know how to describe how I felt in English (I guess lethargy would be a close enough description) but in Malay I would call it as “lemau” (If I was referring to food, I think “lemau” would translate as “stale”). After a brief tinkle, I decided that my running shoes could wait another day and my rowing machine wasn't going to go anywhere, I went back to bed.

Waking up again at 10.00 was slightly better. I could no longer hear screaming coming from my muscles, just some faint whispering  For a brief second, I contemplated either putting on my running shoes and head out in 0 degrees temperature or spend 15 minutes breathing heavily on my rowing machine. Instead I did neither.

After another brief tinkle, my wife informed me that Siti had cooked nasi lemak that morning and had invited us over. All of a sudden, all my aches vanished. The thought of having nasi lemak for brunch sounded like a brilliant idea (I honestly didn't know that the invitation was actually for breakfast).

The nasi lemak was excellent. The hotness of the sambal was more prominent compared to mine but the sweetness and the sourness helped to temper it down a bit. The rice was nicely cooked and I noticed that there were chunks of rice from the bottom of the pot in the rice bowl (in Malay we call this the “kerak”). I love these chunks of rice from the bottom of the pot. I didn't notice them that much in my first serving. I only realized they were in the rice bowl about half way through my second serving, so naturally, I just had to have a third helping.

The sambal, eggs, cucumber and fried anchovies making up the whole nasi lemak combination.

I would normally stop there. Three servings of nasi lemak is a lot to have in one sitting (although I think my record was 5), but I spent yesterday afternoon experimenting with this recipe for chocolate mousse on a baked cornflakes crust. I couldn't find a recipe for chocolate mousse on a baked crust so I had to combine 2 different recipes. And I was very eager to taste it. It was wonderful. The crust was a bit crunchier than I expected making it very difficult to cut, but the mousse was perfect and the whole combination of mousse and crust worked very well. Next time I will have to find a way to reduce the crunchiness of the crust.

The Chocolate Mousse on Baked Cornflakes Crust
(You need to zoom in to see the crust)

After the start I had this morning, I didn't really think that I’d feel much better in the afternoon. When I start any day feeling “lemau”, it usually ends the same way. Not much that happens during the day that would improve my overall outlook for the day, but today, was different. Thanks to the nasi lemak from Siti  

Goodbye 2012!!! Welcome 2013!!!

Reflecting on the year gone by.

This is tough. It’s the eve of the New Year and I want to write something about it. I've been staring at this blank document for 30 minutes now and have typed and deleted at least 6 paragraphs. I have walked back and forth to the toilet 3 times (it’s about the only place I can smoke in the house and also there’s something about a toilet seat which makes it a great place for contemplation). And so far, I just can’t seem to put my thoughts in a coherent form to write them down. But I’m going to try anyway.

Around about this time of the year, I always find myself contemplating the events over the past 12 months, reflecting on the good times and bad times, trying to decide if the year that is about to leave, was a good year or a bad one. The conclusion that I have come up with is that it was a wonderful 2012.

I have to say that I wasn't really expecting much from 2012. I had no job and spent most of my time at home. My biggest worry was that I would get bored and depressed since I didn't have much to occupy my time with. I was diagnosed with diabetes in 2011 and my cholesterol level was border line. So on top of not having much to do, I had health issues to contend with.

But during the year, things started to pick up. My professional life remained in the gutter, but I was expecting that. I figured as long as I stayed in the Netherlands, it would be very difficult for me to find a job, so I wasn't expecting much improvement there. But everything else started to fall in place.

I started to become active again towards the end of 2011. I started going to the gym, played badminton, and I went running and cycling on a regular basis. All this continued throughout 2012 (except for the last month or so as I was advised to stop playing sports for a while because of a hip problem). These activities not only improved my fitness levels, but they also helped increase my overall health. My blood sugar level is still high but it has been constantly reducing throughout the year. My cholesterol level is still border line, but I see light at the end of the tunnel.

Besides that, I've also managed to travel a bit this year. I went back to Malaysia 3 times, and spent some time in Norway, Italy, Portugal and the UK.

Western Norway was breathtaking. We spent a couple of days hiking around Maloy and the hills surrounding it. And then we spent another day driving into the mountains, looking at the wondrous nature of glaziers and also taking in the beautiful scenery of the fjords.

In Italy, we enjoyed the scenery around San Gimignano and the Tuscan countryside. We also learned a bit about the history of Lucca and Sienna but one of the highlights of the trip and the whole year was driving a Ferrari California around the countryside surrounding Maranello in Italy.

Unlike the other places, Portugal was a relaxing holiday. We stayed in the beautiful town of Cascais, 30 minutes away from the hustle and bustle of Lisbon and just soaked up the sun at the hotel swimming pool.

In the UK we went to catch a live game at Anfield, the home of Liverpool FC (my favorite football club). We also spent a couple of days just driving around the countryside in Oxfordshire and Wiltshire, taking in the beautiful scenery and enjoying the offerings of the small quaint towns such as Stow-on-the-Wold, Chipping Campden and Bradford-upon-Avon, along the way.

But if I have to say, the happiest moment of 2012 to me, would be looking at the joy in my wife’s eyes when I gave her the birthday present I got her.

(That first part was written on New Year’s Eve. The next part was written a few days after the New Year)

I have never made a New Year’s Resolution. Every year, on the eve of the New Year, I reflect on the events of the previous year, without making any resolutions for the New Year. I’ve always believed that whatever resolution that I make at the eve of a New Year will be forgotten within a couple of weeks, a month at the most. So I've never made any.

But this year, I've decided to make a New Year’s Resolution. I guess this change in heart has been brought about because I feel like there is so much more that I can achieve when I put my mind to it. So here are my New Year’s Eve Resolutions:

1. I’d like to learn some new things.
1. I bought an acoustic guitar a couple of years ago and took some lessons. That was before I moved to the Netherlands. When I moved here, I stopped completely. Last year, I started to take guitar lessons online and I think I am making some progress. So my first resolution is to learn how to play the guitar properly.
2. Apart from that, I’d like to learn how to ski. It won’t really be a useful thing to know back in Malaysia but I would like to go on a skiing holiday and I would like to know how to ski before I go on that holiday.
3. I would also like to learn how to make coffee. I've been looking at learning this for a year or so. I have been looking at a course in London and hopefully this year I’ll be able to take that course.
4. I would also like to learn other things but I haven’t really decided on anything else yet. More on this later.
2. I’d like to experiment more with my cooking. I have my normal repertoire which I think I've more or less perfected according to my tastes. But nowadays I feel like I should expand my horizons and try different things as well. I've already started with a birthday dinner for my lovely wife and it turned out quite well. The starter was Mussels cooked in tomatoes, while the main meal was a Lemon Baked Turkey, Roast Pumpkin and Parsnip, a simple salad and for dessert, I served a Banoffee Pie.
3. I also want to increase my fitness levels. I want to keep on playing squash, badminton and tennis. I also want to start cycling and running again. I've got a rowing machine now and that will help with my fitness levels.

The full spread

Top (right to left): Roasted Grated Pumpkin and Parsnip, Salad with Pomegrenate
Bottom (right to left): Mussels in Tomatoes and Banoffe Pie

That’s all my New Year’s Resolutions. I might decide to add to that list later on in the year but then they won’t be New Year’s Resolutions any more. I’ll keep you posted on my progress.