It’s always in my family’s agenda to travel whenever we could. When we first came to Australia, my Dad used to play senior badminton tournaments interstate and in New Zealand and we’d road trip together with his teammates and their families.
Badminton isn’t the reason why we travel to this day, it was only the first few times experiencing traveling together as a family that we’ve grown to love it. Singapore, Jakarta and Bali became our main destinations of travel, right after my Dad stopped playing tournaments. These cities particularly were of great convenience given that most of our family live there. Overtime my Dad’s work got more and more demanding, so my Mom, sister and I flew to other cities in Asia and would usually find ourselves getting lost in the middle of these busy cities and end up somewhere on the outskirts – that’s the beauty of travelling. There’s not much of a difference between a life on the road and everyday life. The lessons I learned while travelling have always applied to everyday life, therefore I think it’s healthy to travel!
Welcome to my travel gallery (hit the refresh button if the photos don’t load properly).
These shots were taken from my Canon 500D. Prior to my Year 12 Photography classes, I was well equipped with a standard 8 megapixel digital camera. It was compact and whenever I go travelling I would never leave this baby behind – I made sure it was first thing I packed.
Obviously the quality of smartphone cameras almost exceed the quality of digital cameras today. As a result, I stopped carrying my digital camera since my iPhone is equally as good, the only exception is the storage which my phone doesn’t have much of compared to the camera’s SD card. But still, phone and digital cameras didn’t fully capture the right photos I wanted. I’m talking about fiddling with Depth of field, aperture speeds and exposure times. I was still on the hunt for something that allowed me to do this.
Catching up with my uncle in Taiwan a couple years back, I discovered his Canon 5D Mark II DSLR camera. I visited him with Mom and he allowed me to use his DSLR to take a few snaps while we were holidaying in Taipei. I played around with its settings and manually adjusted the focus, it felt like a device that knew exactly what I wanted. Going forward, I’m only a hobbyist and thought about an entry level DSLR. Keep in mind that it doesn’t always matter how good the actual camera is, but it’s the lenses that affect the result of a photo (big time!).
That’s pretty much the birth of my Canon 500D camera, which isn’t compact but certainly a lot more portable and affordable than my uncle’s camera. Some programs I use for editing and organizing my own photos is Adobe Lightroom and sometimes if I want to make quick edits on the phone, VSCO is a great app to edit photos on the go. There is also a link to see some videos I made using Adobe Premiere and iMovie.
Another one of my hobbies lie in videography, I’ve never had a specific device for this in the past as I only usually recorded on my phone or camera. My bestie’s good at this stuff and sometimes our friends would get annoyed at her for holding the camera too much. I get why, because nothing’s more satisfying than rewatching a hilarious video of your friends playing drinking games or even sober board games. Until the GoPro trend hit the market, I was invested in the world of videography and was amazed at how well it recorded footage on a small camera. To those reading this, get one, please, and never look back!
Catch my photos here and my videos here.
In Melbourne, street fashion is growing faster than ever. Bomber and puffer jackets have dominated clothing racks in retailers and oversized sweaters paired with tights and sneakers have been the go-to winter outfit for many youngsters. Celebrities collaborating with designers such as Jeremy Scott and Raf Simons and of course the likes of my favorite girl band 2NE1 are endorsers of this street style.
With this kind of influence, it’s no question why we’ve seen the birth of Giuseppe Zanotti in David Jones and Raf Simmons with Adidas in selected boutique sneaker shops. New retail stores like Sneakerboy and Republic Boutique are the few street fashion hubs across Melbourne and Sydney.
A store selling luxury street fashion does not yet exist in this city….until July 9th that is. Zenith is a new shop situated in the heart of the Melbourne CBD. It’s a condensed version of Collins St all under the one roof and I had the privilege of getting my first look at the opening.
It’s a small space and from what I’ve observed, most of the items they stock are sweaters, t-shirts, bags and bag charms. I also wouldn’t have been able to find this gem if it wasn’t for my dear friend, June Chen, who was working with the Zenith team to create a series of hand sculptures for a wall installation. June is a fellow artist who I connected with from a uni friend and although I love street clothing, I was mainly at the opening to see her work. The street clothing is of course a bonus!
I thought the hands looked very realistic and were executed perfectly. They are moulds taken from real hands! She told me her models had to sit in a chair for half an hour, in order for the hands to set before they could get taken off. It goes to show you how much patience and energy any sculpture requires. The worst thing is knowing that there’s a high possibility of breaking them as they are incredibly fragile especially after they’ve dried, they’re prone to cracking if not moistened enough. From my past experiences creating sculptures in my art classes and external projects, every sculpture I ever made had cracks and annoying fingerprints. Only with the right skills, tools and bucket loads of patience will you have the ability to deliver at a high standard.
Whether you’re into funky luxurious streetwear or an art or interior design enthusiast, Zenith is always open for you to see. Go have a look and don’t touch the hands!
Sometimes it’s easier to sum everything up in one big post…then create smaller ones based on the big post down the track. Warning: It’s a long post.
To sum things up I’ve put together a list:
1. Last September it was announced my artworks are going to be part of a publication of inspiring artists in Asia plus a potential exhibition was going to be held based on it. The exhibition officially happened last week with guest speaker and artist SAKIROO hosting the opening in Taiwan. There were many attendees (sad I couldn’t make it) but it was a delight to be updated with emails of photos and videos showcasing the event. I’ll make a post about this as soon as I can!
In the mean time please check out SAKIROO’s works. He lives in Seoul, has exhibited in 10 countries and has his own Wikipedia page (yep, you can’t get more legit than that). Finally, he is a true inspiration who’s made a successful living out of his love for art and design.
2. Lately Roth Management and I have been working on launching online campaigns for Malala Coffee. It’s still in its early stages but you can check out our kickstarter campaign here. To get a clearer vision of what the coffee’s about and how we got on board, I also made a post about the brand months ago. Malala Coffee was in concept development last year and only this year has the brand been refined. Again, I will make a post about this in the coming weeks.
3. I’ve temporarily moved into the city for work purposes! The city isn’t a foreign place to me. I enjoy the city buzz and the imperfections that come with it ie: distant sound of police sirens, loud people yapping their night away. Something about these background noises bring a vivid memory of Manhattan – my favorite place on earth outside of home.
I’ve found some awesome food places around the city, even a quick take out from the food mall downstairs is so tasty. One of them is Donburi & BBQ – they do the best spicy pork dish and they have great lunch specials with a mini buffet. I live upstairs so going downstairs for food proves to be the biggest convenience. There’s also a sushi burger joint next door which chris surprised me with dinner one day. Tastiest bento box I’ve had!
There are also some places I’d like to throw under the spotlight. Here we go… (excuse the mess)
Sliced beef, pad thai, calamari and thai iced tea at Fomo Thai
Cold noodles, takoyaki, Sapporo beer and Ox tongue at Shimbashi Soba and Sake bar
Mini tofu, barley water and the sweet pork buns at the the crowded Tim Ho Wan
Spicy raviolli at Vapiano
Combination laksa and fried rice at Laksa King
Salt and pepper tofu, egg net at Longrain
One thing I get excited about is the idea of a small gym and a rooftop tennis court in the apartment complex. The only person in the building who uses the tennis court is me and my roommate. Together, we have 9 years of combined tennis experience so thankfully we’re not that bad on the court – at least the ball doesn’t go over the fence and land on someone’s head downstairs!
It’s a nice experience being in exposed to a different environment in contrast to the suburbs and living with a bubbly roommate is an added bonus to this city lifestyle.
4. I got invited back to see the 2016 Top Arts Exhibition so I’ll be sure to catch that before it all ends. It was also a slight reminder for me to return to my artworks and work on more creative goodies for this second half of the year. I haven’t drawn since the end of February and it already feels weird to delay my drawings for this long!
A right-brainer by day and occasional blogger by night, you've landed on a place where I live and breathe all things art, design, culture and fashion. You'll find me documenting my life in the creative field, endless travels with friends and family and a bit of food.
