I love fall — it’s one of my favorite seasons, just behind summer. I’m captivated by the changing colors of the trees. Growing up in a tropical country, I never experienced the dramatic transformation in nature we get here in Canada, and I really appreciate it.

Travel

No major trips lately; the last big one was to Dubai in May. We spent eight nights there, and it was amazing. Dubai is such a unique place.

Our most recent getaway was to North Cascades National Park in the U.S. for a fall hike along the Maple Pass Trail. Over the summer, we stayed closer to home, visiting parks and beaches around BC.

Self-Improvement

I’ve been pretty lazy about my guitar practice. I only picked it up last week after weeks of not touching it. My fingers don’t have the best flexibility or coordination, so I need to put in more effort than most—and I haven’t been doing that.

This year, I’ve also been listening to fewer podcasts, especially since I started going on walks without my phone and headphones, just soaking in nature.

Health

I’ve made significant improvements to my health this year, losing about 10 kg and even starting strength training, which I used to avoid. Over the past few months, I’ve stayed dedicated to strength training, and it’s rewarding to see muscles I didn’t even know I had.

Reading

I’m currently reading Storyworthy. The last book I finished was Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things, which I enjoyed.

Professionally, the last book I read was Designing Data-Intensive Applications: The Big Ideas Behind Reliable, Scalable, and Maintainable Systems by Martin Kleppmann. Now I’m reading Software Architecture: The Hard Parts, but I’m progressing slowly.

Hobbies

My building has some garden plots, and I rented one. The project has gone well—we’ve harvested almost everything now, though the cold weather is taking a toll on the plants.

Aside from that, my hobbies are the usual: gym, reading, and podcasts.

Professional

At work, as part of the Platform Team, I recently completed a Migration of Spring Boot from 2.7 to 3.2, along with the Migration of Spring Sleuth to Micrometer Observability in Spring Boot 3. I also upgraded parts of our system, including the Migration from Netflix Zuul to Spring Cloud Gateway Server MVC. It was challenging but rewarding to dig into how things really work. Right now, I’m focusing on some business tasks.

Cheers!

(This is a now page, and if you have your own website, you should make one, too.)