Cancun
Friday December 5, 2025
I’m a few hours from leaving Cancun and returning to the refrigerator known as Toronto. We’ll be going from 30C to -3C over four hours. While I’m glad to get out of the capsule hotel and return to my comfortable, spacious bed, I will miss the weather, which has been absolutely gorgeous the entire time.
On the first day, we were up early at 4.30am to catch a tour to Chichen Itza, the world famous Mayan Pyramid. In fact, it’s a double pyramid, with a smaller one within the confines of the outer, visible structure. There’s so many mysteries and such a rich history to the area, and our tour guide Rodrigo who is part Mayan, had plenty to teach us about their way of life and the knowledge of his ancestors. Of particular interest to me was the numerical symbolism in the pyramids and how they used it to calculate astronomical phenomena. As a memento of the place, I bought a personalised Mayan Calendar with my birthdate converted to the Mayan format, as well as some zodiac-type symbols that I’ll have to read up on later.
In the afternoon, we went to a cenote called Chichikan, which is a watering hole formed from rainwater collecting in the limestone caverns. We had AYCE tacos, which were fine, and then went for a quick dip in the cavern. It was an incredible place, with the roots of the trees at ground level growing a hundred or so meters underground to reach the water. Then, after some tequila tastings, we were off to the town of Valladolid for a quick pit stop and then back to Cancun, a total of 14 hours on the road.
The next day, we caught the ferry to Isla Mujeres. Off in the distance, some dark storm clouds were brewing, but it wasn’t quite raining on the island yet so we walked around Playa Norte and some markets, and settled on some tacos for lunch. As we were walking to the south past the main ferry area, it started bucketing down so we sought refuge in one of the hotels for about 15 minutes. When the rain subsided, we continued down the eastern side of the island to reach Punta Sud, the southern end of the island. There wasn’t really much to see on the way, but the beaches were beautiful and the storm had passed so the sun was out. We took the bus back, having researched the route and the cost as well as how to hail the bus and ask for a stop. We caught the ferry back to the mainland around 5.30pm and walked back to the hotel from Playa Tortuga.
To be honest, that walk was pretty boring. Cancun’s Hotel Zone is mostly just resort after resort with really not much in between. It’s much larger than you think as well, so not particularly walkable. The food is very touristy and not cheap at all, catering very much to the American market. We’ve refused to tip while being here, and that almost got us into trouble at one place.
Yesterday, we were up early again for a day tour to Tulum, another Mayan city to the south. Though less impressive and less busy than Chichen Itza, the backdrop of the ocean made the area incredibly scenic. We left the ruins and began our snorkeling adventure. The water was a perfect temperature, and it felt great to be exploring the Mesoamerican Coral Reef, second in size to only to the Great Barrier Reef. We quickly saw some finger corals and fish, and very briefly a sting ray who swam harmlessly two meters below us. Then a giant turtle appeared, surfacing to breathe some air right in front of me! It was literally inches from my face, I couldn’t contain my excitement. We swam on, through a school of around 50 fish, and another turtle appeared, surfacing to breathe right in front of the group. It was incredible.
After snorkeling, we went to another cenote, this time it was more enclosed instead of being an open cavern. We swam through the interconnected tunnels, seeing an impressive array of limestone stalactites and stalagmites, as well as several small furry bats. The water was much colder than the ocean, but still pleasant to wade through. We exited and dried off for lunch, which was pretty decent, then we began our journey back to Cancun. On the way, we stopped by a convenience store for a coffee and saw the local spider monkeys swinging in the trees! We got the driver to drop us in downtown so we could explore a bit - we ended up going to Chinatown, which was quite small, and Costco, which was almost exactly the same as in Canada, but perhaps slightly more expensive, and then we went to the Las Americas mall before heading back to the Hotel Zone for dinner.
On our last day, we headed south to Playa Delfines - Dolphins Beach. We took some photos at the Cancun sign, then to El Rey archeological area to see some more ruins. We ended up getting chewed out by the mosquitos, so we took the bus back to downtown to wander around the central markets and more of the shopping malls. For lunch, we ended up in an industrial area and visited a small restaurant that I had found from Reddit, with no sign of English anywhere, which was probably the most authentic food we had the entire trip.
We had checked out earlier in the day, and we wanted to leave our luggage with the front desk while we were out, but the staff didn’t fully understand English so we weren’t completely sure they knew to take care of our bag. It was a little anxious coming back to the hotel to see if our luggage was there or not, but luckily the same receptionist recognized us and wheeled out our bag. We chilled for a few hours, grabbed some dinner para llevar and some snacks with our leftover pesos, and headed to the airport.
I had purchased 10kgs of luggage to check in, both ways, but what I failed to realize was that there is a size restriction and the bag must be cabin bag sized which makes no sense because it’s going into the hold anyway. There was no issue flying into Mexico, but they tried to enforce the limit as we were checking in for departure. Thankfully we managed to remove enough to squeeze most of the suitcase into their size checker, and the person at the counter decided that was good enough, so we went on our merry way, happy to not have to pay an extra $180.
Posted by Jeremy at 3:41pm on Friday December 5, 2025 :: 0 comments :: 
Hello Darkness My Old Friend
Friday November 28, 2025
Summers in Toronto are short - too short - and that all too familiar feeling of dread starts to set in as the leaves begin to change their hues from green to gold and red. Summer this year was very hot and dry, which meant that forest fire smoke was not great. Despite this, I still did my best to get out and see the city, whether it was for the multitude of cultural festivals, a trip to the Islands, blueberry picking at Wilmot Orchards, the free night at the AGO, or taking pictures of the many, many street cats that I’ve named after desserts. There’s Flan, a shy brown and white cat with a “haaa” kind of meow. His brother, Choco, a void with grey streaks, who tends to be a bit spicy. Oreo, a very rotund black and white cat that loves to flop on the floor and expose his belly. Smores, an aloof white and brown cat that always glares at me. Tangerine, a ginger who always has a place to go to. Sesame, a very talkative black and white cat who also has a tag saying “please do not feed”. Recently I also named Crème, a white and grey patched cat, and her brother, Brûlée, a friendly void, as well as Hazelnut, their brother, who’s a bit more shy.
We went to Point Pelee over Labour Day in the hopes we’d catch the monarch butterfly migration, but because of the hot weather, they hadn’t started their trip yet. Nevertheless, we visited the southernmost point of Canada, both on the island, as well as the bit on the mainland. We went canoeing around the marshes of Point Pelee Provincial Park, and got to meet some tiny baby turtles being released into the water.
Work was busy. We’d been leading up to our release on Nintendo Switch in September, and I had spearheaded the major feature, Buddy Up!, with GameShare. Because it was such a new technology, Unreal hadn’t fully supported it in the way we needed it to work, but after some help from the Nintendo forums, and some good old fashioned debugging (and some wild “I don’t know what I’m doing!” hacks), we managed to get something pretty damn solid, and I’m proud of what we shipped. Unfortunately, we didn’t do as well as we had hoped, and due to some other factors relating to the industry as a whole, the majority of the team was let go. I continued working until the start of October to finish the final QoL patch for Lynked, but it was a sad ending to a company and project I had poured so much into despite my short time there. We can all agree that the worst part of this is having to spend winter in Toronto.
The news broke the day before my parents were due to arrive in Toronto, which meant that after I finished up, I’d have plenty of time to take them around. We rejigged a few things and made some bookings, and soon I had a full ten day trip planned with them, from Algonquin to Ottawa, Quebec City and Montreal.
We covered so much in the month that they were here. For starters, I took them to Graffiti Alley, Chinatown and Kensington Market. That weekend, we went to Port Hope to see the salmon run, which was incredibly exciting for them. We had lobster mountain at Fishman’s afterwards, which was phenomenal. I also took them to Antler to try a bison steak and Tinuno for Filipino kamayan. The following weekend, we went for a maple farm tour on the way to Niagara Falls, where we got to try freshly made maple taffy. We saw the beautiful light show and fireworks over the falls at night, and in the day, the full splendour of the falls up close, with the boat ride right up to the Horseshoe Falls. We had a quick walk around the floral gardens and ended the day with a wine tasting for my parents, and an Italian meal in Niagara on the Lake before driving back to Toronto.
It was their anniversary on the Tuesday following our Niagara trip. We had dinner at New Orleans, a Cajun restaurant near Scarlett and Eglinton. Dad has always been a fan of Karen Carpenter, and being able to try the foods she sang about in her song On the Bayou was a real treat. The night had more to offer though - I’d been receiving aurora alerts and the readings online were all looking promising, so we went home, changed into warmer clothes, and drove out to Vaughan. Though the initial colours were faint, we were treated to a beautiful display of greens and reds at 11.30pm. Even without the cameras to show the colours, the lights were so bright on the horizon. An incredible spectacle for my parents, and such a memorable anniversary for them.
We covered St Lawrence Market and the waterfront that weekend. Saturday night was Nuit Blanche, and though there weren’t any standout art pieces, the vibe was great and a good showcase of the atmosphere in Toronto during these summer events. We had another lobster dinner at Yumi in Richmond Hill with the badminton crew, and then we were off to Algonquin the next day. We hit it at just the perfect time. I’ve never seen Huntsville so peaceful and quiet - I’ve only ever been there during public holiday weekends like Thanksgiving. The colours were stunning from Dorset Tower, and even though it was overcast the next day while we walked around the provincial park, we still got some beautiful pictures of the magnificent red maples on Highway 60, as well as a fox sighting!
We made our way over to Ottawa on Wednesday, where we did an immersive 3D experience of the Peace Tower, currently closed due to renovations. It was pleasant to be walking around Parliament Hill even though it was a bit chilly. For dinner, we found this incredible Burmese place near Chinatown that was super interesting and tasty. We had tried to go kayaking at Dow Lake, but they had closed for the day so we went the next morning, and dad throughly enjoyed being out on the water. We began the long drive to Quebec City, hitting some Thanksgiving traffic as we passed through Montreal.
I’ve only been to Quebec City once before this. It was fine, I guess? My parents loved it though. It’s got that French vibe and aesthetic, especially with the cobblestone paths in the old town, and the pots of flowers on the balconies. We had been super lucky with the weather so far and our lucky streak continued in Quebec. On our way to Montreal, we visited Chaudiere Falls Park, which I had missed my first time, and it was a short, peaceful walk (and free!) to see a beautiful waterfall.
I think my issue with Quebec is that I never know whether to fully lean into trying to speak French, or if I should just immediately admit defeat and go with English. I can’t really converse in French but I know enough to order off a menu and ask for basics, but it requires so much effort and my French is really bad, so I’d much rather just talk in English, especially if the other party knows how to speak English too.
We spent a few more days in Montreal. Originally we were worried that we wouldn’t be able to fill the time but everything worked out perfectly. Upon arrival, we went to St Joseph’s Oratory to catch the sunset. The next day, I took them up Mont Royal and then to the Botanic Gardens where we spent three hours walking around in the afternoon. At night, we caught the garden’s light show, Jardins de Lumiere, which we found to be well worth it. The Chinese lanterns that we had seen during the day had now been lit up at night, producing some incredible reflections in the lake where they were placed.
For our last full day, I took them around the old town and port area, and we finished the day at a French restaurant recommended by a friend, Leméac. What a meal - and what an incredibly massive dessert as well. The next day, we went to Schwartz right at opening for dad to try some authentic poutine, and then we did a Thousand Islands cruise before reaching Toronto late at night.
It was genuinely nice to have my parents around, especially because of the layoffs. The last time it happened, they basically just fed me all the delicious foods while we were in Malaysia. Being a tour guide gave me a sense of purpose and something to do. Following their departure, I bought myself a Nintendo Switch 2 and I’ve been playing Pokémon Legends ZA ever since.
There was the excitement of Halloween and a brief explosion of baseball frenzy as the Toronto Blue Jays made the finals (with a heartbreaking loss to the LA Dodgers), but it was only three weeks after my parents left that we got our first snowfall of the season. It was a significant dumping, with the snow lasting all throughout the weekend. It was an interesting sight to see the red and yellow leaves with a heavy dusting of white snow, which made for some beautiful pictures, but it was horribly cold and a sobering reminder that I’d be spending winter in Toronto, my first in four years.
In a last ditch effort to absorb some sun before the darkness of December and January, I’m off to Cancun - my first time in Mexico - where the forecast is 28 degrees. It’s begun to snow again in Toronto as we’re waiting to board the plane, and I’m looking forward to a weekend of warmth.
Posted by Jeremy at 10:43am on Friday November 28, 2025 :: 0 comments ::
There's Always So Much To Write About
Wednesday July 9, 2025
It's been an eventful four months since arriving back in Toronto. Upon returning to my apartment, I'd discovered a pigeon had disposed of the rosemary plant in the planter I'd left outside and replaced it with a small white egg, and multiple piles of pigeon shit all over the balcony. It was too cold to clean everything up, but the next day, a second egg had appeared so I knew I had to do something. Fortunately the temperatures skyrocketed to 16C one wet day in March, so I took the opportunity and binned everything.
The weather didn't really warm up properly until May. But when the city's cherry blossoms, magnolias and tulips burst into bloom, it heralds the start of True Spring and it's such a wonderful time to be out and around the city to visit all the beautiful trees downtown. The University of Toronto, Queen's Park, Christie Pits and High Park have some magnificent flowers, and it's all a matter of finding the less crowded ones so you can avoid the Instagrammers. We had the Victoria Day fireworks and very soon after, the official 1.0 launch of Lynked: Banner of the Spark.
Though it's only been a year and a bit since I joined FuzzyBot, it's felt like I've slid in and made myself useful pretty quickly. Shipping a game is intensely stressful for everyone. Console development is hard. Programming for TRC requirements is hard and often those features will never been seen by the majority of players. But we did it. The team did it. We pulled through for a largely successful launch and quickly patched some major issues. Reception has been very positive, but I think the game has struggled with discoverability, which is a very common problem these days. It's satisfying though, and we're all incredibly proud of what we've accomplished, and we should be! We celebrated in style - the three of us in Toronto, with partners, at Barberian's Steak House.
There was also Doors Open (Got to see the Mayor's Office and a bunch of cool things in the City Hall, as well as a guided tour of the murals out in Islington), a week in Montreal, Eurovision, and the usual street festivals like Taste of Little Italy and Do West Fest. There was the inaugural Toronto Video Games Month; one of the events they had was to project some video games onto the wall of a factory building by Billy Bishop Airport while people played - that was really cool to watch for a bit, but the highlight was getting to meet the Mayor of Toronto, Olivia Chow, who has an incredibly strong Asian Auntie vibe about her. She tried really hard to sound like she knew about video games but ended up talking about Angry Birds. There was also the Rat Race, a scavenger hunt of sorts through Toronto's underground PATH system, which we achieved second place for! There was Pride, a few days in Bruce Peninsula, and a week in Sudbury visiting Manitoulin Island and Killarney Provincial Park, some of my favourite places in Ontario.
Summer is truly a great time to be in Toronto, it's really a shame that it goes by so quickly. This autumn though, my parents will be visiting me, here in Canada, for the first time since I arrived eight years ago, so there's plenty to look forward to in the months ahead.
Posted by Jeremy at 12:35am on Wednesday July 9, 2025 :: 0 comments ::
And Now Back to the Cold
Sunday March 2, 2025
It’s been a wonderful but busy eleven weeks - eleven weeks! Gone by already! - and as I leave Aotearoa, my home of 30 years, I’m full of gratitude for all the people I got to see and the food I got to eat.
When I went down to Wellington last month, I was reminded of the great lifestyle I had while I lived here; the great eateries, the walkable city, the beautiful night sky, the lush greenery and the sounds of native birds chirping in the trees. But as my friends have slowly left the city for the suburbs or even completely new cities, the vibe has changed and even I know deep down that my heart is in Toronto. Wellington will always be special to me, and I will be back in the future.
In amongst my usual weekly activities like Thirsty Thursday and Spicy Food Thursday, I also attended Owen and Bea’s wedding in Waikanae, literally on the other side of the world from where I had seen them last. It was nice to chat with people and explore Nga Manu Nature Reserve, but I was home early enough to catch the Dragon Dance and Chinese New Year fireworks at Frank Kitts Park. Today, I played piano at Central Baptist, a lovely reminder of my roots and a tribute to the community that has helped me so much.
Back up in Auckland, I was at Sam and Chara’s wedding with a bunch of my old friends from my church in Kelston, catching up with people who I hadn’t seen in over five years. My stepmum, who had been badly injured from a fall and surgery for a fracture, but is now in much less pain and discomfort than before, also arrived back from Malaysia. I caught up with Deanna, elusive Chief Cookie Officer of Moustache and got a private behind-the-scenes tour of the new premises. There were lunches and dinners with ex colleagues and old school mates and Uni friends, a Chinese New Year dinner with the all-important yee sang salad that we decorated with a snake made of cucumber, we celebrated Dad’s 70th at Lilian with a fantastic meal and exquisite cake, and William’s 39th at his place with a hilarious slapstick comedy about beavers, and three Jeremys. There was Auckland Pride, weekly badminton (my physio had told me I could play if I took it easy but still managed to evade injury after going a bit competitive), and a trip out to Muriwai with Alfie who was visiting from Toronto/Hong Kong.
Last weekend, I took my parents out to New Plymouth for a couple of days. My sister had recently been with her family over New Years, and after seeing the photos that they took, my parents decided they wanted to go too. The scenery and weather was fantastic. There were beautiful gardens to walk around, as well as the coastal walkway where the Wind Wand was. There were some magnificent views of the mountain, Maunga Taranaki, especially from Paritutu Rock, which was a steep climb on stairs for the first half, and then rock with a chain to hoist yourself up. I was impressed that Dad made it up there, and he was surprised by his own ability too. We caught the sunset up there on Sunday evening and the colours around the sky were majestic as they contrasted against the silhouette of the mountain.
The food was pretty decent too. On the first night, we went to the Orangery, famous for its tableside flambé menu. We had a great breakfast at the Arborio in the museum, and some nice Japanese-style bites for dinner at the Snug Lounge. All in all, it was nice to get away from the big city and enjoy the scenery in the countryside, and it really goes to show just how lucky Kiwis are to have this in their backyard.
In my final week here, my parents cooked abalone from Japan that had been dried and stored for 40 years. Dad had brought it to New Zealand from his father’s shop in Malaysia and I suppose it was finally a good time to eat it. The next night, I took them for an exquisite Middle Eastern meal at Advieh and had an amazing experience. And finally last night, we celebrated my birthday with a family barbeque. It’s been amazing. But unfortunately it’s time to return to the cold lingering winter of the northern hemisphere; but I’ll be back another day.
Posted by Jeremy at 12:19am on Sunday March 2, 2025 :: 0 comments ::
2025 So Far
Sunday January 26, 2025
The end of 2024 was pretty quiet without my parents around the house in Auckland. I wrapped up work for the year, I spent a lot of time at the gym, I caught up with people who hadn’t gone away on holidays. I’m at the age where my friends are all talking about injuries and ailments like gout. I spent Christmas with my sister and her in-laws out in Waiuku. The weather has been mostly warm and sunny, and I’ve been loving it.
For New Year’s Eve, I bought myself some prawns and green-lipped mussels, and cooked those up for a delicious seafood feast, then I headed to Mt Eden to watch the Sky Tower fireworks and the Harbour Bridge light show. As usual, they were a bit disappointing, but the vibe was great. I was staring out over the city close to midnight and admiring the night sky; even with all the lights of downtown Auckland, I was able to see Orion, Jupiter and Mars. It was a reflective but enjoyable evening.
I went to play badminton on New Year’s Day. After my foot injury in November, I was a bit rusty from a month off sports, and after playing almost nonstop for 90 minutes, my body began to shut down. With all the aching and tense muscles, my slipped disc triggered again, and I was in agony for two nights. Luckily I knew the stretches to do to alleviate the pain, but it would be another week before I’d be able to get a physio appointment. By that time, my pain had improved significantly and I was back to doing many of my daily activities without too much of an issue. No gym or badminton for a few weeks though. However, I did manage to do a "military grade" 3km obstacle course in Matakana as part of Sam's stag do, though I had to skip the 3m wall under orders from the physio. We were super filthy at the end of it, but it was really fun and the weather was fantastic that weekend. I rushed home to pick up dad to go to his wine club's annual general meeting which was being held on someone's property in Red Hills, and they had a bunch of alpacas and two fluffy cats that I played with.
I took dad out to Muriwai one night to try and spot the comet. Though the weather was too cloudy to spot it, it was still a beautiful place to hang out and watch the sunset. The gannets of course were all there, squawking loudly and returning from their evening fishing expedition. We tried again the next day, just by going down the road to the waterfront, but saw nothing.
Now I'm in Wellington, at an Airbnb a few doors down from one of the properties I used to live at - the one with Smudge, who has probably sadly passed away in the eight years I've been gone. The last time I was here, the city seemed pretty dead because many people hadn't returned to work yet; this time, it feels a bit more alive down Cuba Street and Willis Street, but it's awful to see the Central Library and council buildings still in a state of construction. Many of my old favourite restaurants have shut in the past few years, a result of a significant reduction in the government workforce and the state of the economy in general. Still, there's a sense of nostalgia and a triumphant homecoming; like I've spread my wings to see the world and I'm back to see where I started and honour the city that I called home for nine years. And it's odd, because I've been away for eight years now, but it doesn't seem as long as my time in Wellington.
It's been a busy weekend catching up with people and eating delicious food. Of course I went to Little Penang, and Auntie Tee recognised me after all these years. I went to the Sunday service at Central Baptist too and somehow volunteered myself for piano next weekend. There's a lot of new restaurants that my friends are taking me to over the next few days, and I'm really looking forward to connecting with all my old mates too.
Posted by Jeremy at 8:14am on Sunday January 26, 2025 :: 0 comments ::