Recap 2024

Happy New Year Internet!

Every streaming platform (or rather every SASS platform) seems to do their “wrapped” at the end of the year. And although I am not a SASS (tho maybe that’s what a job is hmmm), I thought it would be nice to have a public recap of my achievements this year.

At least, those that I want to share publicly.

Yes, it’s a lil’ bit of an egocentric pat on the back. But hey, I don’t post much, cut me some slack lol.

Learning Achievements

This year, I took and passed 3 technical certs!

I passed the AWS Developer Associate Cert, the Kuberenetes CKAD Cert, and the Terraform Associate Cert!

Yes, I know celebrating certs can be cringe. Enter the meme of the cert gatherer, the guy who got all the certs but doesn’t know how to use it. But these three were majorly helpful in getting me up to speed with the products themselves, helping me shape my mental model of them – and I actually use them in my day to day.

Plus, I put a lot of effort into studying these man! Let me celebrate it :)

Out of the three, AWS Developer to me was the hardest, due to it’s closed book nature, broad scope, and the tricky questions. It required a lot of memorization, which isn’t my greatest strength. CKAD was less taxing, you gotta get fast at kubectl and know the shortcuts around it. Plus, since it’s an open book exam, as long as you got the concepts right, you can refer to the specific details in the docs. Terraform was the easiest by far, but that’s mostly due to the scope, and I got it for free after winning a quiz at a Hashicorp User Group Meetup. It was good practice on Terraform, as it forced me to actually go through a Terraform course instead of my usual learn by doing – doing so made me learn more about better implementations of TF.

Outside of AWS Dev, which was recommended by my work, I did the other two completely out of my own personal interest.

As for next year: I plan to do CKA and CKAS! I bought the exam vouchers over the cyber-monday weekend (60% off baby), meaning I’ll have to take both within the next year. I’m working a lot with Kuberenetes recently, and I’ve found myself lacking a bit of knowledge on the administrative side of things. Of course, I could google as I go, but I think following a circular will help me with my understanding. The security exam of it will also be interesting, I think it’ll give me a deeper understanding of Linux security in addition to the typical Kuberenetes security. All of these are also very applicable in my work and my interests, and I’m excited to take it on.

I’m not sure if I’ll do another AWS Exam next year, it really depends on my work load. Even if I clear these two early, AWS is not exactly at the top of my list for now due to my current circumstances… We’ll see! I’ve other plans in store :)

Traveling

Australia

My biggest travel highlight was Sydney/Gold Coast. I loved my previous trip to Australia when I visited Melbourne / Victoria. The chill vibes, the artistic city, resonated to me, someone who had always lived in bustling cities. However, this trip was my first time in New South Wales, Queensland. I love the beaches and scenary in Gold Coast…

And of course, I did a fair bit of shopping – be it at the malls or the Sunday markets. While I missed out on surfing, I still enjoyed the mountains, the blue skies in the day, the golden shades in the evening, pleasant winds, and nature sceneries around the area.

In Sydney: I loved the cozy cafes, little shops in corners, the cool weather, the diverse transport options in the CBD, the diversity and welcomeness of the area and THE DELICIOUS DIVERSE FOOD. (That was a long sentence.)

Traveling around by public transport boat was fun too, the transport nerd in me loved that this for some was a common daily thing. We stayed in the CBD area, which made moving around so easy – you could just walk anywhere. Of course, I understand that this isn’t the normal Syndeyer experience, as I would think rent in the CBD would be outrageous, but moving around the city was just so pleasant.

I will definitely be making another trip there. Probably not next year, but hopefully soon :)

Malaysia

I know, Malaysia, every Singaporean goes there. But this trip was special as it was my first solo overnight trip. I’ve always wanted to try exploring without my family or friends, in an effort to be more independent… Baby steps. With this, I decided to make it an easy one. I also had a mission to buy new clothes (My gym sessions have been making me bigger and no longer fitting my really old ones.). JB is great for this.

Being alone on the trip allowed me to do things on my own accord, a luxury I have never had before. I got to try things that typically I wouldn’t do if I was in a group or with family. That was liberating. Massages, going on weird detours based on what I saw was good on Google Maps, trying out food places I wanted, trying out public transport… It was so fun. Additionally, through this trip I learnt a few things about myself and made me way more confident to travel out on my own. Yes, I’m a bit old to be doing my first solo trip, but everyone starts somewhere.

That being said, my next JB trip will likely be with more people… It’s hard to try food when it’s just one person haha.

Work

Work wise, this is my second year working in my current company and I have gotten more into a groove in my work. Outside of my previous projects that mostly revolve around the big data ecosystem, I got assigned another new project that exposed me to more architecture design, Kubernetes and GoLang. I’ve had genuine interest in these off work for a while, I’ve been attending the local K8S user group for more than a year, and I’ve love GoLang since I used it 3 years ago. These new projects allowed me to use these tech in bigger projects as well. Being in a cybersecurity company, these are (obviously) cybersecurity projects as well, an ever evolving fascinating field for me to follow.

I’m still doing big data related projects at work too. Yes, it’s a fair bit, but I have/am enjoying the learning, exploration roller-coaster ride.

I also love the team I’m in and the mentors I have at work.

Tech repairs

Tech repairs wise, it’s been an… okay year. I’ve procrastinated too much, with “I was busy with work” excuses, so there are a few projects that I failed to get to again this year.

There were also a few failed repairs. The biggest thing was a display swap where the part I got was bad (LCD instead of OLED), and another iPhone SE battery replacement where I tore a cable (oops) and haven’t gotten the time to get the new part. There was another macbook repair that turned out to have more of an issue than I thought as well.

However, there were a few successes:

• An iPhone 11 battery replacement swap
• Redmi Note 8 Pro Battery Swap
• Nothing back glass and battery swap
• Pixel 6 camera and battery swap
• Poco M4 Pro display swap (bad part, but it technically works still lol.
• Logitech MX Master 2S button fixing

I don’t think I really learned much this year when it comes to repair… I did get better with using tape to glue back a phone instead of relying on pre-applied ones… but that’s not really anything to celebrate about.

Maybe in a few years time I’ll get into micro soldering :)

Bakes

My baking slowed down a fair bit this year. Like I said, I was busy at work lol. That doesn’t mean there are a few things that I am proud of this year.

My biggest recipe that I loved doing was a Baklava Cheesecake. It was so rich, tasty, and a great blend of different flavors, and something I had never done before. I’m pretty impressed with it myself. And it looks amazing.

I also was requested to do a Capybara cake by my Sister. I messed up a lot, not having the right and enough ingredients, fridge/freezer space, and doing it on a short timeline. It was bad, to the point where I gave up halfway in following the original design. But it turned out damn cute still. I learned a lot, I’ll do a better job next time.

There are also other bakes I did this year, pumpkin cheesecakes, brownies, cookies, a few birthday cakes here and there… But overall was a slower year. I’m excited for the new year, I am thinking of following the baking challenges that /r/baking has at least once a month… I wanna challenge myself more :)

Health

NO PICS HERE. I feel cringe doing that

This year was the year I hit the gym consistently. And my gains have shown. People have complimented me (of which I don’t know how to accept), and looking back to when I started tracking, I’m happy with my “growth”

I’ve gotten my Dumbell curl from 12.5KG to 17.5KG. Bench press from 55KG to 90KG. Leg Press from 69KG to 110KG. Squat from 35KG to 90-100KG. Pull ups from 6 to 10. Lat pulldowns from 23 KG to 47.5KG. Dumbell row from 12.5kg to 25kg… among other things.

Sorry, it’s really hard to track, because I was just using messages to myself to track them haha. Now I’m actually using an app and trying to be more sincere about my workouts.

It’s not just the aesthetics though. I love the ability to focus on other things during a workout and I felt like my health was WAY better after hitting the gym consistently. The dopamine hit after a workout is chef’s kiss .

I only yearn to get stronger next year… with more focus on lats, better back, stronger core… I’m hella weak on those. More research into cutting, bulking, and whatever that is might come too, but for now I’m still enjoying whatever consistency this is right now.

Next year

Outside of what I’ve written above, what is my goals for next year? Honestly, spending more time on personal relationships and IRL things, I really let that go this year and felt very disconnected with friends. It takes effort, and everyone has limited time, I just have to put more effort in it.

Here’s to a great new year, hopefully I get a great wrapped next year :)