Wrapping up the 100 day challenge 😊 almost been a month since coming back from Japan. Came back with a new job and very happy to make more savings to cover all the expenses and make future plans. Two things I wish I did more in Oct would be 1) keep YouTube momentum and 2) push myself on hard skills

95/100 Oops skipped a few days of this 100 day challenge as a lot going on in the past few days. Leaving Japan soon. I’ve had so much convenience store food and Japanese style fast food 😹

83/100 After sabbatical for about five months, soon to start a new role, exciting! Still keen to build out business to achieve personal development and financial goals, but I’m not ready yet. Been interviewing in the last month and grateful to join a team that nourishes entrepreneurship spirits 🤝

82/100 Lots of standing restaurants here, you just stand and eat, it’s been an interesting experience. Guess the main reason is the optimal use of space, and the efficient turnaround as I think I eat faster while standing. Had cold soba noodle and fried corn bread for 450 yen, that’s 3 dollars.

81/100 Back to Tokyo with a pair of sore legs. Travelling teaches project and risk management, budgeting, adaptability, communication… But, most importantly, empathy. At 1130, I felt the floor shivering, a small quake I felt for the first time in life, the locals don’t even bother talking about it.

80/100 tried Mount Fuji once yesterday but it was thunderstorm with typhoon warning so couldn’t push through, today tried it again and blessed with sunshine so made it to the top 💪 actually it was so much unexpected sun that I got serious sunburn 🥵

79/100 Preparing to summit Mount Fuji tomorrow, some fries to start loading the energy, all the very best of luck and hope the weather will be fine.

78/100 Really like the idea of the art aquarium with beautiful decor, lighting and design to present goldfish. Wonderful viewing experience. It’s probably the same fish we see elsewhere, but, humans do pay more attention in this environment, probably the idea of fashion is the same.

77/100 autumn themed bento for 540 yen which is about 3.5 dollar, freshly made in the kitchen at this Life supermarket, yum yum 😋

76/100 Visiting the Final Fantasy cafe in Tokyo. My husband played it more than 20 years ago. When I was young, video game was seen as bad influence so I didn’t get to try much, always curious when I walked by the ‘internet cafe’, I didn’t have laptop until age 15 or so, I played minesweeper a lot.

75/100 the sound feature in Japanese toilets is a classic example for b2b vs b2c. This feature is designed to solve people’s problem of not wanting others to hear them “in action”. I don’t think I’d pay for this, but it’s been common probably from b2b sales, I will sit back and enjoy the bird sound😂

74/100 Arrived Tokyo. Second time here since 2015. Both of my parents worked at automobile manufacturing when they were young, my dad went for a business trip to Japan around 1997 and he really enjoyed it, I remember him showing me a photo when I was young. Last time I spoke with my dad was in 2008.

73/100 Finished the artist’s way book over a 12 week period because that’s how the book is structured. I will continue to explore and nurture my inner artist. Thanks Julia.

72/100 A small win yesterday, really proud of myself applying what I learned in prompt engineering into practice. Thoroughly enjoyed iterating and training ChatGPT and got a working prompt to quite accurately assess writing skills and provide feedback based on a set of rubrics from an academy.

71/100 At end of July I decided to try creating one video every two weeks but it didn’t work because I experimented a separate microphone and had sound issues in editing which caused so many weeks. It’s been really painful editing this and had to cut 90% of the content: https://youtu.be/kHi01rqOabg

70/100 Finished 10k run today within 70 minutes, kept saying to myself: keep the form, keep the pace and keep moving. Sometimes same principles feel applicable in life: keep healthy habits (the form), keep the consistency (the pace) and keep working and exploring (moving and pushing).

69/100 This week went by so quickly 😯finished the book the mom test and hello world, bought more books on AI, went to the Greenwich Observatory today and inspired by the story of John Harrison, who worked on the problem of calculating longitude at sea for 40+ years, inventing the marine chronometer.

68/100 self transformation can also be facilitated by physical transformation, this week, did F45 for three days in a row, and did a 3-hour bouldering today, planning a morning run tomorrow, yes we can 💪🏃🏻‍♀️☀️

67/100 Enjoyed one day hiking trip to the countryside with a sunny meal at the pub

66/100 Today started with a run 🏃🏻‍♀️, then I did cooking, SAVERS routine, video editing, Coursera learning on AI and climate change, ping pong 🏓 and another late night bed time. Today I also recited a poem. I used to recite over 50 Chinese ancient lengthy poems for exams, now I recite for peace and joy

65/100 I thought of an analogy, ChatGPT (and applications built on top of it) now is like Excel in 1985 (year launched). In job market 2023, Excel is like a basic skill (38 years since launch). Adoption curve would be much faster now, use AI tools like ChatGPT, Midjourney would be basic before 2030.

64/100 Most Chinese B2C tech products like mobile apps require authentication with Chinese ID and local phone number. I wonder what that ‘border’ means and what this could mean in the future. Imagine you would need to download a map app and a payment app for each country you visit.

63/100 so much talk about LK99, think it will take a few years to understand the ability for mass adoption and applications. However what a time to be a dreamer! Flying cars, supercomputers, more equality with digital resources, more innovation, it’s nice to dream, thinking what life will be like.

62/100 When I started working in 2011, the Bank of England base rate was 0.5%. It stayed around that range for over a decade. From 1% in May last year to 5% in June this year, and still the high inflation, my head is spinning. I need to revisit economics and know what it all means for the future…

61/100 Running alone is free and creative, running together is motivating and progressive, week 2 of the morning running club, not only it helped me to stay on track of training plan, but it also motivated me to wanting to push. A heavy rain today, I probably wouldn’t have ran if not for this group.

60/100 On money, 2 small wins this year 1) put some money into a global diversified fund with ISA, 5% gain in the first six months this year, not too bad 2) now in age of high interest rate, did a round of yield farming to get the flex savings account with the highest interest rate at 6.1% (annual)

59/100 Growing up, money was associated with pain and stress, so I didn’t make the time I wanted to manage money, I just put aside regular savings monthly. I have an accountant qualification and a master in finance and I worked in banking, but I’ve only started to actively manage money since 2020.

58/100 today started with a run, a visit to the garden, a meet up with Ali Abdaal and chatting about YouTube, a networking with content creators, ended with practicing speaking with the Ultraspeaking speaking games which were fun, a hot tea and a wish for tomorrow’s productive video making.

57/100 excited about seeing Ali Abdaal tomorrow in person, first time meeting a YouTuber influencer up close. Now I hope to release a video every two weeks, so need to think about what I could share that is useful for this week’s video.

56/100 I never cook with recipes, maybe spontaneous cooking can be a talent, they always turn out alright. Today’s homemade dish is spicy soup noodle (just used Shin ramen lol) with vegetarian dumpling, tofu and Tung Ho (a popular vegetable in China).

55/100 Coming to West London to visit a friend and we assembled a sofa together, what a fun experience. Actually furniture assembling could be a great team building activity.

54/100 One positive change during this sabbatical is how every single day is equally important (no more bias). Today is a Friday and I’m really looking forward to doing things I want to do tomorrow. We are fortunate to be alive every single day and each day should be treated with full respect.

53/100 I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. - Walden

52/10 I think among many things, music is the one that is harder to catch up, when I moved places to places I could always integrate and pick up conversations but I’m so nervous when it’s music topic. How many Asian musicians are known? Music has such big influences to people, US and UK did so well.

51/100 really missed the Chinese food today so I made some congee, sesame sauce noodle with chilli oil and fried an egg. Listened to the Andrew Huberman and Tim Ferris podcast today which is interesting: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/huberman-lab/id1545953110?i=1000617525832

50/100 Getting back on track, here is the vlog from travelling 5 cities in China: https://youtu.be/XbWmyFU52Qo. Why do I want to do YouTube? 1. Practice video storytelling skills which I think are key digital skills. 2. Discover my creations and creativity. 3. Find my identity and overcome my fear.

49/100 In April I started learning how to make videos and then I set a goal to make one video a week as practice. This stopped during my travel as editing turned out to be impossible on the laptop I had with me. Now I’m back and excited to get back on track, aim to release a travel video tmr! 🤓

48/100 currently thinking about how to simplify life and optimise time. I’m curious and tend to explore many things, like I am active on more than 8 social platforms in Chinese and in English. I think there was the time to diverge, now it’s time to converge, think harder on what I want to focus on.

47/100 Coming back from the travel, the most warm welcomes are the bills 🤣 Finally paid all the bills: service charge, council tax, heat, water, and electricity. In London, on average everyday, I wake up with about 13 pounds of bills regardless of what, thats more than average daily income in China.

46/100 Thank you @cecile.bsky.social for sharing with me her course called On Sabbatical! Todays marks the completion of this learning as I’ve gone through all the content including intentions setting, resting, reconnecting, to abundant mindset, money, nomading and becoming the author of your life.

44/100 Friend’s kid birthday party today, felt much back to normal now as was shifting the context from all the travels. Today started running again; also did the planning for the next few weeks which is a good start. The rain smells nice.

44/100 Hello home. First time having two cup noodles on the long haul flight, not sure why but they just tasted better than the flight meals. Forgot to call about my dietary requirements so didn’t have many options. Much cooler in London, saw the weather forecast, Beijing still at 39 degree Celsius.

43/100 spent about 3000 quid for this travel, with the opportunity cost of earning money, probably more cost to this trip, but, it’s really all worth it. Fun to speak Mandarin and Cantonese again and observe my Chinese speaking persona. Got familiar with the digital infrastructure and latest culture

42/100 I like visiting different bookshops in each city to observe trendy topics (at least what each shop owner wants to recommend or thinks what local people are interested in) and do people watching ☺️ It’s also fun for me to spot English authors who are frequently mentioned in Asia & vice versa

41/100 won’t be back to the mainland for a while, it’s been a great trip, felt surreal at first after not visiting for years, now I almost feel so local that it’s sad to leave. A bit unlucky with the heat wave or rain season in each city I visited. Maybe next year, and a better season, 好久不见 很快再见

40/100 hello July 👋 This June, I still find it hard to believe that we managed to travel to Hong Kong, Shanghai, Suzhou, Beijing and now Wuhan. Soon back to Shanghai, Hong Kong and wrap up the travels. Time to start budget checking, mind setting and heading home safely. Thank you June ☀️

39/100 Can’t remember the last time I was in Wuhan, maybe 2006? It’s famous for the huge variety of breakfast foods and I had a street eat brekkie today, the classic sesame noodle 热干面, 6 yuan which is about 1 dollar. One of my fav breakfast choices. Quite a nice hotel here for 300 yuan, a good deal.

38/100 Hello Wuhan, a city that got well known for the wrong reason. Things are back to normal. I almost forgot, it’s a beautiful city with the Yangtze River and Han River, 3500 years of Chinese history and the uprising movement in 1911 that started here has led to the collapse of the dynastic rule.

37/100 I haven’t celebrated my mom’s birthday for maybe like 5 or more years, actually I can’t remember the last time we celebrated it together. This was the main purpose of this trip and I think she had a good day. Yesterday I tried best to be child mode that’s her fav. Time to return to adult mode

36/100 one of my fav Chinese breakfast combo, millet congee 小米粥 and 5 vegetarian baozi, I bought them at the local eatout nearby for 7 yuan which is about 1 dollar. Freshly made and yummy, a bit packaging waste for takeaways but this is only once in a long while.