The Year 2020 We Remember

I know 2020 was a very tough year for everybody, and others might even fought more battles (not just the pandemic). Despite all these, I wanted to believe there are silver linings on situation like this and let’s try our best to continue with our life bringing any lessons and experience.

As a way to personally look back last year, I put together this year-end recap with me going over some of the highlights of my 2020.

• WordCamp Asia 2020 – even though the event got cancelled, there were still a couple of attendees that pushed through flying to Bangkok including fellow organizers. It was fun and memorable meeting them.
• Pandemic hits, town in lockdown – this is between March to may where our town had to impose an enhanced community quarantine or strict lockdown. This is the beginning of businesses dying particularly in our city and particularly in tourism and entertainment industry. People staying at home including us.
• I quit at my 5yrs full time job – this was a decision that I didn’t take lightly as I absolutely enjoyed the time in this company, and I believe I’ve grown so much since I joined there. The reasons mainly were — taking a few months break / sabbatical after 5years of work, and pursuing a business that I could run myself which is something that I have been planning to do.
• Getting Bits Circle up and running – at first I initially wanted to focus to be an agency specializing in WordPress based in the South East Asia (SEA) region, but I am starting to move something into offering products such as SAAS instead, while still helping businesses/individuals build a strong online platform with WordPress.
• Getting better at cooking – staying at home allowed me to have more time (hence practice) at cooking. However, my partner’s cooking is way better.
• Papa’s Chronic Kidney Disease – we thought being in a time with pandemic was the worst in 2020 but just when we enter the “-ber” months, my father got ill and diagnosed with CKD stage 5. It was exhausting (in many ways) for my family particularly going in and out of the hospital, and not to mention being admitted/transferred to more than one hospital. But thankfully we made it through, and my father is doing hemodialysis now.

Unboxed in 2020

While we’re at the topic of 2020, I wanted to also remember what I “unboxed” or acquired last year that are meaningful to me or in my work.

Work

• iPad Air 4th generation – this is totally worth buying especially after I learned how to use iPad as an extended display connecting to my Macbook, a feature Apple calls Sidecar. This is now my 3rd display alongside a Dell monitor.
• Logitech HD Pro webcam C920
• Magic Mouse
• Leather desk mat – I have a small desk right now and I love it that they have a perfect size.
• WD 1TB NVMe Internal SSD – this is extremely useful as I moved all my development sites here to save space in my Macbook Pro. I use this case.

Home

• 4-speed Tower fan with remote – I don’t know but it feels like a new world to use a remote for a electric fan despite its electric nature.
• Aukey car phone holder – I like this!
• Samsung Series 8 Crystal UHD 55inch Android TV – bought this for my parents for the holiday, and the cost is just a little over my 49inch 4K Sony Smart TV in my apartment. This is hot as there were a couple of people took home this TV before we did. I would say this is an all-around android TV including being used for events as it has great photo + background music feature. We used this TV to flash my niece’s birthday banner while playing kid’s birthday song on loop! If I have a dedicated living room, I would definitely consider buying this, too.

I think that’s it. Onwards and upwards to better things in 2021.