I feel like recently I am blossoming more into a flower. Especially with my new Pleats Mama cherry blossom bag. Sakura is carrying her new sakura bag and dressed in sakura colours today. 😀 Well, I wore my cream pleats blouse from Uniqlo with my pink linen shorts from Muji today. Oh I picked my black merino wool cardigan from Sezane as well. So it definitely matches the bag colours that I got. You can see a photo of the bag in here. I matched it with my VCA Sweet Alhambra necklace in rose gold and it is a perfect addition to the entire outfit. 🙂 I’m definitely blossoming well and beautifully! I took a selfie of my outfit of the day and all of my friends (probably biased haha) praised my outfit choice. Whee!

Okay, except for Alex who commented that I look like an auntie who is going to wet market to buy vegetables (all in Chinese). Rude! -.-

I used to be a dehydrated flower but now that I am refocusing everything on myself, I’m definitely blossoming well. A flower needs water to grow well. The same for grass too. I should always focus on myself and direct the water to myself to grow well.

That reminded me of something that a friend told me. My real Chinese name can be translated to Japanese name “Reika”. I just checked and whoa, Google translate did translate it accurately.

YJ*: Sakura actually fits you well because hua means flower
Me: yessssssss
Me: not bad, you are smart
Me: your PhD has come in handy hahahahaha
YJ: also btw your Chinese name can pass as a Japanese name
Me: eh is it???
YJ: yes
YJ: rei ka

* Not going to put the name of my friend because he is listed as a public figure on Google and I don’t want my blog to appear when his students googled for his name…

It was an old conversation but as I am blogging about blossoming more into a flower, I decided to google about “rei ka”. Apparently it means “beautiful, lovely, flower, petal”.

Perfecto lah. All these glowing up is actually inline with my name. *acts out a pretty pose* I’m vain and I’m not even going to deny it. Hahaha. 😀 If I knew my Chinese name can be translated to such a beautiful Japanese name, I would have called myself Reika instead of Sakura. Lol…

No idea why no one ever told me about “Reika” name… Not even my friends, who knew both Chinese and Japanese. I am not exactly sure how to write it in Japanese characters though and my friend didn’t type it for me. Luckily I got a Japanese mentor and I have my 1-1 meeting with him tomorrow so I will definitely ask him about it. Otherwise, I have to ask my Japanese violin teacher this Sunday during my violin class. If I like how the characters looks like, then I might add it into my online name. Haha.

On a side note, will I recommend anyone to buy Pleats Mama bag? Probably no. I already see some design and quality issues on my first day of use. To be honest, I haven’t had a bag brand which I do not complain, except Hermes. LOL. I also have complaints about my Hermes bags but Hermes after sales is always able to address every single concern I have. So no complaints about it. No wonder I have the most number of bags from this brand so far. I don’t think I ever bought so many bags from a single brand/shop before in my life…

Sakura got a new sakura bag from Pleats Mama. Haha, I actually blogged about it in here. It finally arrived tonight. So now I got new set of clothes from Goelia, new earrings from Mimi33 and a new bag from Pleats Mama. 😀 Whee! Okay, I should stop shopping completely now. It feels like it is Chinese New Year all over again haha.

I am also preparing for my GCP Security exam followed by CISSP exam. I’m also heading to Hong Kong this year. I welcome all suggestions on what to eat, shop and sightsee for Hong Kong. 🙂 This is going to be my first trip to Hong Kong and same for my friends too. Feeling excited but also apprehensive because I broke my goal of not traveling this year. Oh well. Hopefully my finances are still okay after the trip. :/

I ordered another bag recently. This time it is from Pleats Mama! Actually I wanted to visit it when I was in Seoul last May and October/November. I didn’t manage to visit and didn’t get to see the pleated tote bag. I was able to try it out when Pleats Mama have a popup shop at TANGS Orchard. The quality seems pretty good and I decided to get it online – because the design I wanted is limited edition and is only available in Seoul and online.

Can’t wait to get it soon haha. I have been thinking about it for some time and was even discussing with some of my friends about it. The new Sakura is so much smarter with spending money now. Well, because I spent a lot last year in getting assets so yeah, need to save money now. 🙂 Haha.

In fact, the entire discussion I had with one of my friends is like lowkey funny.

Me: Serious topic. Even more serious than other stuff. Is to decided whether should I add more clutter and spend money hahahaha. (I’m supposed to declutter)
Gulabi: (rofl emoticon x4) It’s cute but do you think this is giving value for money?
Me: Like tote bag for work. I actually got backpack for work. Then another tote bag (green) too.
Gulabi: (sends a photo of her new sunscreen and also her new manicure)
Me: Wah got flower de!!!!! [I’m referring to her new manicure]
….
Gulabi: So do you need this? It’s cute but not very cute tbh
Me: It’s never a need.
Gulabi: Yes, to celebrate spring [referring to her new manicure design]
Me: I like this reason. Going to use this reason for the bag too. Hahahaha.
Gulabi: Your mind was always set, Sakura.

Hahaha. So that’s how I convinced Gulabi that I need the new cherry blossom bag from Pleats Mama. Going to take photo of it when it arrives! I got the bag insert for the bag too. I’m excited now!

I bought my first ever instant camera in my life. Well, I wanted to get a new instant photo printer and was thinking of getting Instax Mini Link 2 or Mini Evo. Then I discovered Leica Sofort 2 which is a hybrid (camera and printer). It looks really pretty and the photo quality is better than Mini Evo so I went for it. 🙂

Okay lah, I admit the beauty of Leica Sofort 2 and USB C support is what push me for Leica instead. Hahaha.

Quite happy to get a new toy to play with and can’t wait for more Instax films to arrive as I am finishing my first pack of films from Leica. Leica films are really expensive so I am going for cheaper alternatives from Fujifilm Instax series haha.

This is also my first Leica camera. I have a Panasonic compact camera that is using Leica lenses but it is not Leica camera. Well, now I technically have a Leica camera haha.

Whee! It’s my birthday again. I know I should be a bit sad that I am older by a year now but nevertheless I am still quite excited. I finally can unbox my birthday gift that I got for myself in January this year.

I got myself a Van Cleef and Arpels 5 motif bracelet in hammered yellow gold this year. Yes, it is quite a splurge and I paid full deposit in January thinking that I will have to wait for a year to receive it. It ended up coming in a week. The power of paying full deposit instead of just waitlisting it. Also helps to have a helpful SA who is willing to take in full deposit when the time window opens. Well, I must thank my SA for letting me know that the window has opened so I can pay full deposit for it. Otherwise, I highly doubt I can get the bracelet till now. Hammered gold pieces are not made in huge quantities as compared to the crystal/gemstones versions…

I managed to fly back to Singapore a few days earlier before my birthday. Unfortunately I ended up falling very sick. That’s after my bloody accident in US. I managed to avoid wound infection while in US but didn’t manage to escape flu bug when I am in Singapore. Gahhh. Luckily I managed to get better by my birthday and was able to drag myself out of the house to buy my own birthday cake – an important tradition for myself haha. I treated myself a cup of Koi black tea latte too. After 2.5 weeks of having horrible and super expensive bubble tea in US, I certainly welcome having one of my favourite bubble tea in Singapore.

This year has been transformative for me as I hit several major milestones in life. I will leave the details in another blog post in future as I reflect in 2023.