Through the eyes of engineers I have around me, I have learn to see some things I would not normally pay attention to.

Instead of taking in only the scent and sight of gorgeous shoes, bags, perfumes, cosmetics, books as I walk around any malls, I would also notice leaking pipes, impractical sink basins, unusual switch covers or poor traffic flow design.

Not that I welcome this tendency.

Although I must say, it can sometimes be a good distraction to have your attention snapped back down to earth when you are lost in a useless debate in your head on whether to get that handbag that you don’t need but oh-so-want, and you are unceremoniously asked to look down and see cracking floors.

Of course for the regular middle-income earner like most of us, buying more than one property is not that easy.

And of course that is why, “investing” in posh and luxurious vanity items seems like the only way to go.

What’s more, we are led to believe that buying certain particular handbags is a good investment as their prices will increase after a certain period – which is probably true for some exclusive and RARE models.

And IF you have the discipline to not use that beautiful handbag to death as well as the connection to re-sell it to the right market.

Because if you have none of these, then you might as well buy gold bullion or gold jewelry – at least, you still get to enjoy the jewelry, they are easier to clean and even without the right connections, you can easily dispose of them at your regular goldsmith shops and get your money back plus profit (if you time it correctly).

I grew up watching my father chatting with anyone, anywhere!

Seriously, who would think of chatting to a bunch of big-biceped and be-tattooed American bikers and expect to live to tell the tale? Yes, we lived through that and there’s even a photo of my then-scrawny and nerdy younger brother looking like he was photoshop-ped on a bike double his size.

So I have a little of this ability of being able to make small talks and it doesn’t really daunt me to be in a room full of strangers.

Of course it helps to be introduced around but once a handshake is made, I can start chatting or make the other person chat about anything – from weather to food to music to gossip to books to step stool to even diving spots – which is funny because I don’t dive and my last trip to anywhere dive-able was more than 10 years ago!

But my favorite (a little lame but never fails to work) small talk subject especially when I am talking to foreigners is – how do you like Brunei.