2021 Round Up

I’ve never done this before, let’s just put this out there first. So, this may turn out exceptionally well or pretty darn average. Will this be a disaster? I highly doubt so, it’s just words of a mid-20 year old after all.

When I sat down thinking about the past year (2021) and the one before that (2020), it’s honestly coming to me as one big face mask-wearing blur. So, it obviously took me sometime to gather my thoughts and kinda look back at what the f*ck happened in these past two years.

Anyway, here’s a quick round up of 2021.

January:

I felt pretty optimistic about things. I was eager to achieve some things and had pre-planned out a few personal goals I had in mind.

February:

I officially made the jump into journalism; believe it or not, it took me less than a month to realise the state of journalism in this country is absolutely bonkers.

March:

A series of unfortunate events later (and this was only in March), I find myself on the look again. I spend the month doing more interviews, fixing my website, updating my portfolio, taking digital marketing/analytics courses etc, and also decided to spend more time having spontaneous morning breakfast plans with my folks.

On a side note, Instagram music was finally made available in Malaysia, and the first song I used on Malaysian Instagram was “You Can Call Me Al” by Paul Simon.

April:

I got a couple of good leads but had that split moment realising a sense self worth (so important to have). Re-discovered the atrocious pay imbalance that is present in this reality, decided to reject a few offers and KIV a few, because y’know, never settle for less than what you think you’re worth – something I picked up from my Dad that I am more than grateful to have. Aside from that,I spend once every weeknight on the badminton court and every Sunday morning on the futsal court.

May:

Accepted a role at corporate group, started learning about the ins and outs of the market industry and also wrote a whole ton of copies in Chinese. Did copy development for all three mighty Malaysian languages for the first time – English, Chinese, Malay – an experience that I refer to as the holy war.

June:

I turn 24.

July:

Remember what I mentioned about the blur? This is one of the few times where I have no recollection of what happened. It just went by like snap*.

August:

I switch roles once more, to an advertising agency that I have had my eyes on since 2019-ish. With names such as Netflix, McDonald’s (the big M) and Maybank, I was hooked. Of course, the culture was also immaculate.

Poured oatmeal on my 2014 MacBook Air one fine morning, made the jump to a 2020 MacBook Pro.

September:

Read up on more slides and decks that I’ve ever did in a long time.

October:

Work took over and I barely had time for badminton nights anymore. Work was fun though, it was a good challenge that I was up for and I love a good challenge. I went ice skating for the first time in a long time.

I re-met someone significant.

November:

Blur, I don’t even know man. I’m pretty sure I’ve complaint about lockdowns like 10,000 times at this point though.

December:

I end the year achieving a goal that I didn’t even remember about and had to take in a gruesome realisation of how things don’t always go according to plan. Moved forward some of those goals into 2022, which I was once again feeling optimistic about.

For whatever that’s about to come, I’ll see that I’ll ride out the wave. For the sake of things.