Twenty Twenty.

Oh 2019! It felt like the whole year just upped and left the building so quickly I had no time to actually make sense of how quickly 2020 came upon us. I’m not sure if it was being sick over the holidays or the fact that I took a 3-week vacation in so close to December that made it seem like the holiday just disappeared in a blink of an eye!

There have been a lot of highs, lows and milestones; it’s unreal how things, when timing is right, would just fall into place!

So here’s a quick recap of 2019 and share some of my goals for 2020!

A New Condo

Man oh man! I wasn’t sure I was going to be buying a condo and there definitely wasn’t any urgency aside from wanting to have my own space. Everything about Toronto’s housing market leaves very little to be desired considering how ridiculously expensive everything is. So when I casually started looking in the Spring of 2019, and immediately felt like that there wasn’t going to be the perfect place for me. I sort of compromised on location to get everything else – while it was not immediately in the area I wanted, it’s a 15 minutes ride away. And I know, location is the first thing you want to prioritize but having lived in my condo for 4 months now, I don’t really have any complaints!

A 3-Week Trip in South Africa

By October, I realized that I had my full 3 weeks+ worth of vacation days still around. Unfortunately since I could only move 5 days in 2020 so I ended up using up the whole thing on a last-minute South Africa, which was a spectacular decision. Even though it was a last minute trip, I got an amazing price on those last minute tickets to Cape Town! I ended up doing a bit of everything – a week of surfing, another week road-tripping and another week just exploring coffee shops, going to markets and really enjoying life in Cape Town!

Life and Compass

You might have noticed that the blog has a new name/domain link! I’ve had the old blog name for 6 years by 2019 and unfortunately, while I was away, someone domain-jacked my old domain name and stole my content. I’m still in the process of filing a copyright infringement of against the person who is stealing my content and appreciate your support!

Work Updates

Talking about how work has evolved is always exciting; I’m grateful for the opportunities and paths forward! These days are busier than others so the blog hasn’t been a priority. Hopefully going into 2020, I’ll have a better time balancing my projects and more time to come back and blog again.

In the meantime, Life and Compass feels like a great new start – the blog name feels more in line to the content and a more travel/life-oriented content. Let me know what you think!

My goals for 2020 is to slow down and focus more on myself. A couple of goals that I want to highlight for the year.

Getting back to the gym!

I did quite well with F45 last year and buying a condo/moving/renovation made it difficult to keep up because I couldn’t even make it for more than 2-3x a week (Compared to how I did when I first started, going for 4-5x/week). I’m also trying to make more use of my condo amenities, particularly the pool and gym; there’s also a very lovely park right across from my condo, so no excuses!

Finish Organizing/Setting Up my Home

I was so excited to pull my condo together but then fell into this stasis when it come to home decorating because I got 75% of stuff done. I felt that it was sufficiently done but I still have masking tape on the wall from when I was trying to put together my gallery wall. It’s just so silly to not try to finish setting up especially since they just need 30-60 minutes on the weekend.

Learn 1 New Skill Every Weekend

Sometimes I get to the point on the weekend where all I want to do is just chill and online shop but I know there are better things than just spending money mindlessly ahaha!

Happy 2020! Hope your new year is off to a fantastic start!