Summertime

When you have quite a number of free days in the week it's easy to get sucked in to a sluggish type of lifestyle. You sleep all day, vegetate in front of the TV and get depressed and bored after realising how your day was spent, and the cycle repeats day in-day out because your mind is just too sluggish to work properly. (un)luckily for me, the many days I spent without leaving the house during my resubmission made me realise how pathetic (and claustrophobic) life can get without fresh air or human contact. So I've been trying to keep myself occupied, doing at least one productive thing a day that would make me enjoy and appreciate my holidays more:

1. Meeting up and reconnecting with friends. 

Whether it's just a chat over coffee, dinner, or a full on day out in London, 

being in the company of friends is one of the most uplifting things to do in your day. There's nothing like catching up over lost time, reminiscing over the past or even just rambling about current worries, future ambitions, or the weather.

2. Simple me-times. 

It's not often that I get off work with the sun still shining, but when I do I make the most of it by heading straight to the beach for a stroll or even just to sit, people watch and enjoy the sunset with two scoops of rum and raisin ice cream until the sun goes down. 

3. Star-gazing at the beach.

We saw not one, but three shooting stars that night. 

4. An inspiring read: Nadia Comaneci's autobiography.

Easily one of the most inspiring books. It doesn't focus too much on Nadia's perfect ten gymnastics career, but rather the other side of things that not many knew: living under a harsh communist regime,

her experience of defecting to the United States (Nobody would ever guess that an Olympic medallist would be running in the snow, climbing over barbed wires and crossing Romanian-Hungary border fearing for her life that she would be shot by the secret police). Despite all her hardships,
Nadia never gave up.

5.My favourite quote from the book, out of many:

"Hard work will always get you somewhere.If you have a little talent and work very hard, then you have a shot at being a big winner. 

And if you have a lucky star in your hands,you may just accomplish your goals. 

Above all else, you have to be hungry to do something unbelievable."

6. Being inspired by other people's art.

I've been meaning to change the canvas painting I have hanging above my work space. 

Pinterest is amazing for all sorts of inspiration-- The pattern is something that I would probably try to recreate for my little canvas art.

7-8. An artsy day at London: A visit to Sou Foujimoto's Serpentine Pavilion.

Like most, if not all, Japanese works of art, it really is beautiful in a very simplistic way.

For someone with terrible height phobia, I didn't even notice that I was climbing up this pavilion, stepping on see through constructive glass. I too busy being in awe of the pavilion. The only worry was for kids who found it the perfect jungle gym and started climbing onto higher bars that were not meant to be climbed on :P

9.Home-time.

I have been spending a lot of time deep cleaning the flat- something I do once a year when my housemate moves out. It took me 8 hours this time, to thoroughly clean every nook and cranny of the flat and to get rid of clutter. There's still a tiny bit left to be done, but my flat is 95% fresher, cleaner, and homier! Also made my first lasagne. It was more of Popeye's food with farm-fulls of spinach rather than mince because I still cannot be bothered to deal with raw, bloody things. Nevertheless it turned out pretty good!