City Chase Toronto # 2 (August 14, 2010)

This time around - I did the City Chase with my good friend Charlene and here are the challenges/route we did/took:

#1 Beach Bum - Paddling Relay - One of us have to kayak around a floating buoy and come back before the other person go on a surf board and paddle around another floating buoy. We were one of the first 25th teams to finish this challenge and got a VIP Passing Lane Card which allow us to access a ChasePoint ahead of teams in the regular line.

#2 Local Hero - We had to put on a real fireman outfit (which is extremely thick and heavy), then to unroll & roll up the hose (individually). Also as a team we have to use a hose to shoot 2 targets before moving on. Special note that the firemen at this station are HOT HOT HOT!

#3 Busta Move - Learn a breakdancing routine

#4 Hiyah! - Learn a Japanese self defense trick

#5 Doctor, Doctor - We had to partner up with another team and carry a stretcher with 2 glasses filled with water for about 20 meters - we can spill the water but cannot tip the cup. After we carefully put down the stretcher, we had to bandage an elbow properly before we get our stamp

#6 Namaste - Do hot yoga while answering some trivia questions about yoga

#7 Monkey Around - It's an indoor obstacle course. We get to choose Short & Scary or Long & Easy. I did Long & Easy which was to jump/crawl over some box hurdles. Charlene did Short & Scary which was to rock climbed to second floor and jump off from second floor onto a padded area

#8 Once Upon A Time - A professional story teller read us a story at the Runnymede Library and we had to answer 5 questions about the story correctly

#9 Sweeeet Ride! - We had to grab 2 strangers to go in a Mitsubishi vehicle at a designated area with us and find a song on the radio to sing for a minute

#10 S.W.A.T. - One of us had to put on a full paintball gear to go in the battle area (to be shot at) and to find a golf ball in order to complete the challenge

We were able to finish the first 6 challenges within 2 hours so we thought we can finish the race in record time. Unfortunately it took us 3 hours to complete the last 4 challenges because of the location and transit delays. We also didn't get to use our VIP Passing Lane Card as none of the challenges had any line up. Our finished time was 5hr 13 mins and finished at 208th place.

I think we will aim to finish within top 100th next year!

City Chase Toronto #1 (June 19, 2010)

City Chase an urban adventure/scavenger hunt that teams of 2 will run, walk and use public transit to navigate their way throughout the city while completing 10 "ChasePoints" challenges before the 6 hour cut off time. Previous challenges includes pole dancing, white water rafting, sledge hockey, bug eating, letting tarantula crawl on your stomach and more, all designed to test you mentally and/or physically and to push your comfort zones. Simply said, City Chase is like a mini-Amazing Race.

Being a huge Amazing Race fan, I have always wanted to give City Chase a try and finally, this is THE year. The Toronto #1 event this year is the 100th event and the start/finish line was stationed at Nathan Phillip Square. To celebrate the 100th race, there are many special ChasePoints including rappelling down the Toronto City Hall. I would've loved to rappel down the City Hall just like Milla Jovovich in Resident Evil (how often do you get a chance to do that?) but my partner said absolutely not so we did some of the more "ordinary" challenges instead.

Here are our clue sheets:




We talked about strategies pre-race and were going to spend a good 20 mins after we get our clue sheet to determine the best route but as soon as the clue sheet is in our hands, I got anxious and threw all the strategies out the door! With everyone running towards a subway/streetcar, all I wanted to do was to start moving! Needless to say, I was dragging Laura to the subway station before she had a chance to complain!

Here are the challenges/route we decided to do/go:
#1 Say Cheese @ Rogers store near Yonge & Davisville (challenge is on the red clue sheet) - the first 25 teams finish this challenge will get a fast forward pass (Skip line up at a chosen challenge) - we ended up finishing at 28th, watched the last pass being given away

#2 Burn It Off @ Goodlife near Yonge & St. Clair - we had to choose a chocolate bar before we go into Goodlife… then once we chosen the chocolate bar, we had to burn the calories of that chocolate bar on treadmills as a team

#3 Boot Camp @ Balfour Park near Yonge & St. Clair - like it said, it's a boot camp

#4 Using Your Head @ the same park for boot camp - One of us had to wear a helmet with a bucket on top, and the person had to throw a beanbag in the bucket from 4 different distance

#5 Serve 'em Up @ Yonge & Bloor - essentially bartending - one of us had to shake the drink and throw a slice of lemon in the shaker behind her back, and one of us had to serve the drink with the glass on top of our forehead (easy but long line, although we used the waiting time to have our only washroom break of the race)

#6 Walk Hard @ Trinity Bellwoods Park - one of us had to balance and walk on ropes that's tied between trees (can use the partner to balance) - there are I think 5 of them and if at any point you fell of the rope, you have to line up in the back and do it all over again - we were able to finish it in one go

#7 Target Practice @ Trinity Bellwoods Park - we had to throw a very heavy ball (not sure what it is) into a bucket from a distance

#8 Climb On! @ Stanley Park South - we had to do piggyback polo

#9 Dip Dip Dip @ Waterfront (Address is wrong on clue sheet) - kayaking - one of us have to kayak to a floating ball and grab a coloured tag, then the other one had to do the same except to find the other colour - whichever colour your partner didn't grab (red/yellow)

#10 I'm Dancin' @ HTO Park - we had to learn a breakdancing routine

At the end, my partner and I are still friends when we cross the finish line and we finished at 268th place in 5 hour 5 mins 25 seconds. Our time is pretty decent for our first race considering alot of teams don't even get a rating because they cross the finish line after the 6 hour cut off time. We had so much fun and we would definitely recommend City Chase to anyone who's adventurous!

I think I'm addicted to urban adventures!

Don't call me baby

It must be a Caucasian thing - calling anyone and everyone "babe", "baby", "honey", "sweetie", "sweetheart", "sweetie-pie" or whatever sugary thing it might be.

We will never call another human being a sugar-related name in our culture. It actually sounds pretty disgusting calling someone "sweetheart" in Chinese.

If someone calls me "honey", it makes me wonder if that person actually just forgot my name or worst, didn't know my name. I think the only people allowed to use these names in public are married couples - you are with the person for the rest of your life (knock on wood), might as well simplify things.

When I first dated my boyfriend, I thought it was so sweet that he calls me babe. Then I realized that he calls every female species "babe" on MSN/email. With my strong will power not to strangle him during the confrontation, I told him that if he wants to call me babe he better never call another human being the same (if you want to live). It's no longer special if you call everyone that, you might as well call me "Hey you".

A friend of mine calls her boyfriend babe, the problem is that she called her ex-boyfriend babes too. It's just confusing.

People, save the sweet talks behind close doors. In public, just call me my name.

Men & Commitment

I often tell my girlfriends that I can always spot a "Wife-beater". What's a Wife-beater? Men who are narcissistic, arrogant, insensitive, uncaring and are unlikely to commit in a relationship. How do you spot one? If a guy looks like he spends more time on his hair than you do - he's probably one. If a guy dirty talk with you before he gets to know your name, he just want to get into your pants. If a guy always say no, stay far far away.

So what should a girl do? If you are looking for a long term relationship, find someone who's genuine (trust me, you'll know if someone is genuine), who's a bit adventurous and wants to try new things and most important of all, someone who's truly care about you. If someone truly care about you, he won't ditch your dinner plan just an hour before the scheduled time. He also won't make you check your phone a hundred times an hour to see if you missed his call/text or that your phone had miraculously stopped working.

One day something hit me and I wonder if I should do a market research on it: Bald or balding men are more willing to commit. I suddenly noticed that a lot of guys with a full head of hair at work/in my personal life are either still single or unmarried (my boyfriend included). Vice versa, most of the bald men I know are ready to propose or already married. May be they want to lock a woman down while they still have some hair on their head? If you notice the same thing, you definitely should let me know. May be the new 2010 strategy to find "The One" is to find a balding man.

Make up overload

I was walking down the hallway and as I was turning the corner, I saw an orange thing walking towards me - I almost jumped but then I instantly realize that it was just my colleague, who always have too much bronzer on.

How do you tell a friend or a colleague who you see everyday that perhaps they went a little heavy handed on the make up? I mean, she must know about it right? The collar on her white puffer coat is orange. Her neck and ear colour are different than her face.

Even my boyfriend said one day: hey I thought bronzer is only for cheekbones, why did your colleague put it all over her face? I don't know? May be she wants to glow? Literally.

Sometimes truth hurts. That's why I blogged it instead.

Vancouver Winter Olympic

I’m sick of the world criticizing our Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics.

I was there; I was in my home town Vancouver for a week to witness our staggering passion for our beloved country. The Olympic spirits and energy was so contagious that all you see on Vancouver streets are a sea of reds and whites.

We never said we are perfect.

Not enough snow? We are not Gods. Mind you the 2014 Olympic host city - Sochi doesn't usually have snow in the winter.

One of the arms of the torch at the Opening Ceremony had a glitch and didn't rise. Big deal, that's why we had 3 more.

Fenced off Cauldron? If I’m a part of the organizing committee I might even put a team of SWAT Team in front of it since there are so many crazies like the complainers around. Oh and by the way we fixed it immediately after all the ignorant complaints.

What about the long line ups to see the Cauldron after we opened up an observation deck on a roof of a nearby building? Guess what, get over it. The world is here so get used to the line ups.

And let’s not forget any of the following:

We were such good hosts. We were courtesy to the world and there were not a second of film clip showing us with any kind of violence. We are fun, we have funny commercials and we even poke fun at ourselves at the Closing Ceremony. We won the most gold medals in any Winter Olympics and more importantly, we displayed sportsmanship while winning these medals.

We can always strive for excellence but we will not get hung up on perfection.

I am a proud Canadian.

iPhone

My boyfriend and I went to Vancouver last week to celebrate the 2010 Winter Olympics while visiting my family and friends. One night we went out for dinner with my childhood friend and during dinner, boyfriend checked his iPhone non-stop to check on the male figure skating score & status. The event is somewhat important because Torontonian Patrick Chan is our medal podium hopeful for the night.

Childhood friend and I talked all night and was glad that boyfriend had the iPhone to keep him entertained. After dinner, childhood friend was driving us back to my parent's condo. Parent's condo is in tight security where you need a fob to open every door and you cannot activate the elevator to go to your resident floor without the fob. So I asked for the iPhone I share with my boyfriend to call my mom to come downstairs to "pick us up". I can't seem to turn the iPhone on and boyfriend confesses that the battery had died while he was keeping track of the Olympic.

Now, problems.

1. Since I'm out of town, I don't have anyone's phone number because they are all programmed on the iPhone
2. Childhood friend doesn't have my parents or my brother's phone numbers
3. My parents and brother cannot contact me because our phone is dead and they don't have my childhood friend's phone number
4. We cannot get to my parents' condo even if we tailgate someone through the main door because we still need a fob to activate the elevator to go to my parents' floor
5. My childhood friend is the only person in the world who does not own an iPhone or an iPod (even my illiterate Vietnamese mom has an iPod) therefore she does not have a charger we can borrow
6. When iPhone dies from battery exhaustion, it doesn't have any backup battery to allow you to turn it on just for one second to grab a phone number

I simply cannot believe that I can't go home because my boyfriend killed the iPhone by checking progress on Male Figure Skating. We ended up going to Best Buy and steal their electricity from the iPhone display. We suspiciously stood around the iPhone display for 15 minutes because the iPhone won't turn on unless if it has at least 10% battery.

Note to self: Do not share an iPhone with a boy ever again.

Patrick Chan did not make it to the podium at the end. But at least there is a happy ending to this story - no one slept on the street that night.