New beginnings

People always talk about New Beginnings when someone got married or started a family. I always thought because it's a new chapter in their life. Partly this is the case, but after my wedding and the arrival of my first baby, I know the in-depth meaning of New Beginnings. After every such milestone, you kinda start over. Not only financially since those milestones can cost you an arm and a leg, but mentally too. Maybe not so much with being married, since we've been with each other for ages. Practically we were marrried just wihout that piece of paper and the ring. Not that the wedding wasn't special, but a new edition to the family was a whole different level of special. It's like it's not about me or us as a couple anymore. Our main focus is the baby and all decisions made are considered what's best for the baby. I don't know if every mom experience the same thing, but in the coming blogs I will be writing about my pregnancy and motherhood. I hesitated if I needed to start a different blog, but this one is about loving life. We created one...so to my definition, it sure fits in here. So here goes my inner voice of the first moments of finding out....

"On september 22nd 2016 I found out I was pregnant. A fact that I had been hesitant to find out. A gift that I was not sure whether I would be good enough to accept. For years my life was always about me and then there was the husband and now,...it's all about a human being  that I've never known before, but who I'll according to everybody will love with all my heart. I was hesitant, but I was also realistic to know that it was not something I hate and it's something I'm also curious about. Women have been childbearers since forever, so what happens really that makes a woman even though knowing all the pain and tearing still choose this path for thing 2 and more."

Elevate your brain

For nearly a month now, I have been using an app to improve myself. And since I like this app so much, I'd love for you to also try it. It's called Elevate app.

I like it because I do see improvements in my English. Even now I'm blogging, I seem to have a better word usage and understanding of how to substitute words to make it more interesting. And since it's in a game form, it makes it challenging to reach achievements.

It has 5 areas that the app focuses on: Reading, Writing, Speaking, Listening, Speaking, Math.
For every area, you see the skill levels and the percentage compared to other Elevate users.


For some time now, I have been looking for ways to improve myself. According to Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba, what you do between 6pm and midnight are crucial to your future.



I don't agree with everything he stands for, but with this I do agree. During work hours, you're working for someone, but after business hours, you're working for yourself. Every improvement is for yourself, so that's why I've been looking for ways to improve me as a person. There's so much knowledge nowadays. Google is making learning easier, Coursera even offers free courses. It's up to you if you want to give up some of your free time to learn something, gain extra knowledge and improve yourself as a person.

Are you a traditional Manager?

From life experience and many managing courses I've been, everyone seems to believe in a certain managing method: Authority- based hierarchy, position-created respect and power. But more and more companies are applying unorthodox methods for keeping their employees 'in place'. The standard hierarchy that every company used to apply, where the CEO is the one stating the rules and everybody else needs to abide by seems to be changing.

 

However in Suriname, it appears that most companies are still keeping this mind-set. Mostly because the companies are a family-owned business or a one-man show, where what the owner says goes. Or even the managing director or CEO, who believes he/she is all mighty and powerful to make you or break you. Slowly, but successfully many have proven that there are more people-friendly ways to keep your employees in-line.

One of the most popular and employee-friendly companies is Google. Of course I don't know what happens internally, but what outsiders like me see and read about is that their employee benefits are really great, the environment is super relax and even a bit like being on campus again. That is one of the reasons why people are dying to work for Google. Their compensation should be also satisfying I believe otherwise most might have considered otherwise. They even have their '8 rules how to be a good boss' here

The reason I'm blogging about this is that I just read an article about Yata's CEO, Daniel Chong, who is also using a different approach than the traditional way towards his employees. It goes as far as that he doesn't see and mention them as their employees, but as colleagues.

The article I read was in Chinese, but it made me so curious that I googled him a bit. Here is an article in English, so that you can read a bit about my curiosity. Although he's CEO of a big supermarket chain, he's still plain simple and down-to-earth, because he believes that everything he's achieved is teamwork, in which he only plays a single role. And I'm starting to wonder if their humbleness, which you see it in the way they dress (see Bill Gates and Daniel Chong), is what makes them so successful as CEO's.

Where most CEO's insist on making the final decision on every single part of anything, he gives the employees the ultimate freedom to create and explore and only intervene if he foresee problems or issues needs to be solved.

 

However the freedom seems so nice to have, but I have to say that I kinda believe in a mix of the traditional way and the unorthodox way. I do believe that the CEO is just a position and his job is to assist his employees, so that they can work efficiently and accurately, but a certain authority needs to exist to keep everyone in line. A organizational chart with lots of empowerment.

Probably that originates from my hospitality background.
As a supervisor intern in the food and beverage department of a well-known hotel chain, it was clear to me that however I'm the one with authority, I was the one to create a healthy environment, where the waiting staff can make sure to keep the guests happy and the kitchen staff to create their magic without any sabotage. And one thing I always communicated with the staff: " Help me help you, so that we can create a great experience for the guests!!"

New Year's Eve

First and foremost, a belated Merry Christmas.

This December had been both quiet and busy. Since I started my cake business in mid November, there was some orders and I kinda was happy that it was not too much. Yeah, maybe that sounds a bit weird. Everybody loves big orders every day and especially with December. Probably because I just started and my oven is still a very small one, I believe the amount of orders I got in December was just the perfect amount. Otherwise I might be overstressed with everything else that's also happening at work.

It's New Year's Eve. One year has passed in something that felt like a wink. So many lessons and laughter, so many ups and downs. And for the first time in December I have not really been partying nor food fests like all those years, but today is New Year's Eve, it's a time I make an exception to everything like: going into big crowds, go wild and go crazy.

There is just something about Suriname's New Year's Eve. Maybe it's the smell of fireworks, the seeing of old friends, who you haven't seen in ages, the drinking with complete strangers, who are willing to share their bottle of alcohol. And the rain?? Nobody cares about the rain, but it's preferably after you're already at the spot you wanted to be. I believe most people see the rain as a kind of blessing, a shower from heaven.

It's still 9:30 in the morning and streets are still quiet and the sun is shining, but once it hits 11am, then the crowd has risen from their needed rest to go through the many hours of partying.

I still need to decide what to do today. Will it be Pagara Estafette Downtown or Pagara Estafette North? Shall I go to Galaxy after that or Instyle? Choices, choices......even the last day of 2014, choices need to be made.

So for 2015, I wish you all get the right guidance to make the right choice!! It might be that one decision that might change the course of your life!!

Sweets: reasons to eat cake!

On November 13, 2014 I officially launched my cake page on Facebook: Sweets!!
Had been thinking about it for a while and been working on my logo and finally last Thursday, it felt like the perfect moment to launch it.

Associated with the launch, I will be giving away a cake on November 19!! The requirement to participate is to like & share the page and give a reason why you should win it. Check my page Sweets for further details.

Whenever people read 'reasons', the first thing that comes to mind :' is it my birthday or someone else's birthday?'. But the whole idea of this requirement is to let people think about why they should have cake.

There are a lot of reasons to eat cake and whenever it's free, all the better.

Like mini temptations  has its top 10 here, I will also create my own top 10 reasons why you should have cake:

1. Everybody can use something sweet in their life.(that's why my page is called Sweets!!)
2. It makes a perfect combination with your cup of hot beverage.
3. It's like the cherry on top of a balanced diet

4. You're alive!! It's something worth celebrating and celebration means cake!!
5. It's someone's birthday (didn't your neighbor's dog became 2?), graduation, achievement, retirement....just fill in the blanks.
6. The most standard flavors are vanilla, strawberry and chocolate. But actually, there are hundreds of cake flavors and textures to choose from. Check here for the countries with their cakes. ( the most interesting one: Better than s3x cake. I definitely should check the recipe of that one!)
7. They come in various sizes and forms: cake pops, cupcakes, bundt, round, square, sculpted. Even life-size cakes exist.
8. It's good to give in to temptations sometimes, especially the sweet ones. Repressed emotions (towards sweet) might result in a disastrous outcome ( pig out party!!)
9. It gives your meal a happy ending. :)
10. It always brings a smile to whoever receives it.

https://zanegrava.wordpress.com/2011/03/

That's my top 10. Do you know any more reasons why you should have cake, please share!

Food for thought: Inferno

Spoiler Alert!! Unless you have already read this book or you don't mind spoilers, otherwise please be warned that the end of Dan Brown's book 'Inferno' will be discussed in this post.

I've finished this book for a while, but the recent events have made me think about it again.

I like Dan Brown's book, because the author likes to use certain facts in his books. Mostly I read his books in front of a computer, so that I can Google anything that I'd might want to make sure it is actually true. After reading his books, it always keeps my thoughts busy for several days; wondering if what's written actually might be true or that what we've been told all these years is the supposed truth. His best work for me is still his previous one: The Lost Symbol! I finished it within 3 days (if not earlier) and it kept me thinking for days and discussing the ideas with people around me.

I was so excited when I heard of this new book and still, it took me several times to start and at the end actually kept reading. To be honest, I had hoped it'd topped The Lost Symbol, but unfortunately it was good, but not that good.

But back to why it suddenly kept my mind busy again. Lately, the world has been in a whirlwind of illnesses. In Suriname, mostly troubled by Chikungunya and globally, everyone's shocked with the recent developments of Ebola.


This book's about how the main character, Robert Langdon, is part of the crew to prevent a global threat from an intellectual organization. This organization's biggest fear is overpopulation in the world and which they are trying to prevent. This book made it appear that virusses and illnesses are brought into the world to prevent overpopulation from happening. In the end, the airborne virus spread in the book was one to make random people infertile, but what if in the real world, some maniac had actually created the Ebola-virus to eliminate part of the world population? In their minds, they are doing the world a favor.

The movie: The end of the world

I gotta admit, seeing the amount of people growing in the world, there is a possibility that at a certain point the world might be overpopulated. In history, time and time again, there had been reasons to believe that the world might end (according to many, Y2K would've been the end and we're 14 year further), but every time a solution came up for whatever it threatened it. Or who knows, maybe the world was reset without us knowing that a button was pushed at a certain point in our lives.

Who knows me is aware that I'm not religious, but I do believe that everything happens for a reason. However hope is often delayed disappointment, but sometimes it's all there is to cling on. And when it comes to illnesses, a cure will be found it's just whether you'll live long enough to know about it.

Rotary agenda: keeping your appointments booked deliciously

Starting at elementary school, I was told about the importance of an agenda, but the excitement didn't last till the first week of school. For me, the fun part of having an agenda was making it nice with all kinds of clippings from my idols and cute stuff. The next thing that made it interesting was that I could pass it to all my fellow classmates to check it out and put in their contact information and eventually some comments. And that I could put appointments, test dates and my test marks in it, was a nice add-on, but surely not the main focus of an elementary student.

Now, being in the work field for more than a decade (and a tad older and forgettable), I see the importance of having an agenda. My mind just doesn't seem to hold on to that much information anymore. But I have to admit, I don't usually use an agenda, because I don't like how it's so plain and boring. It's just a hard cover with pages of paper to write on. And I don't see myself doing the clipping thing anymore.
 

 

 

 
So, when my friend Marieke Visser send me a Rotary agenda, I was kinda skeptic. I mean, I'm flattered that she's so nice to have thought of me and I'm really thankful for that, but I was not sure I'm gonna use it (thoughts about boring and plain). So when I finally got it in my hands, I was really impressed. She knows I love food, so with a theme as 'What's Cooking?', you kinda already caught my attention. And I'm not saying this because I got it as a gift. I really liked it because of these reasons:
 

 
1. It has different features:

  - an agenda to book all your appointments (duh....)
  - a calendar
  - and since the calendar is made in a stand-up way, you can lay it on your office to scroll the pages or use it as a table calendar or really bring it with you as a normal agenda.
 
2. Promote Suriname

This agenda contains a lot of information about Suriname: the food, the raw ingredients, the food events. This would be a perfect gift for tourists or foreign business partners. It's professional, the quality of the product is good, you're supporting a good cause and you're promoting the pride of being a Surinamese. And if you might be in a conversation with someone, who doesn't know Suriname, you can always show the pictures in the agenda itself, so make sure you get yourself one.
 
3. Good cause

Every year the Rotary initiates this agenda project and all generated income will be used for a good cause. To keep it interesting, a different theme will be chosen every year.
 

If you're interested (which you must be), you can buy it at:
- Readytex, Maagdenstraat 44-48
- Icana, lobby Hotel Torarica, Mr. L.J. Rietbergplein 1
- Randoe Woninginrichting, Dr. Sophie Redmondstraat 250.

 

If you need additional information about this agenda or anything else related to it, you can contact: 

Cees Dilweg, cadilweg@randoe.com / Tel.: 442958 / Mobiel: 0880 6419

Each agenda will be sold for SRD 62,50 (about $18,-) and the income will be used for several Rotary projects as indicated in their press release.
 
And this agenda came really at the right time, since I'm going to take my cake hobby to the next step soon and now I have somewhere to book all the cake orders!!

 **My apologies since my pictures really doesn't give the agenda justice, but I hope you understand that it's made with a simple Blackberry and by a non-photographer**