It’s coming to the end of another year, and I’ve been seeing a ton of “What’s in my bag” videos on YouTube. So in vein of a personal review, I think it would be fun to talk about what I use on a regular basis in 2025.
1. Hobonichi Weeks Mega and Five Year Diary
I used to be a heavy bullet journal kinda guy. Not the aesthetic type with a million markers and layouts for all sorts of occasions. Mine were the ultimate functional type, where I wrote every single note down into one notebook for the year, as much as I could. I had the Leuchtturm1917 as my go to, but one of the years, they changed the paper formula and my fountain pens could not carry on inside them.
Then I found the wonderful world of Hobonichi. The paper they use is Tomoe River, which is one of the smoothest and lightest paper that can handle heavy inks without feathering. This is key for me because I really enjoy using a range of inks. Or at least I used to… Subtle foreshadowing.
Hobonichi is actually a daily journal where you can reflect on the entire day. A lot of people use it for drawing, and note taking too of course, and it was super seasonal. It’s not the most expensive journal, but it’s not the cheapest either. There was a point where I was paying SGD90 for the Leuchtturm1917 in special colors, so SGD30-40 was okay for a Hobonichi.
Hobonichi Weeks Mega is a specific type of journal which uses a weekly layout instead of a daily. It also has a lot more pages at the back, for the MEGA portion. I stick receipts, logos, cutouts of all kinds there, and it gets fatter through the year.
I have one more Hobonichi, and it’s a five year diary. This is my second five year diary, I’ve done the Midori one before, the year I got married. This second one is something for me to reflect on as I grow annually towards 10 years of marriage. Also now with Baby Allison, there will come a time where she can also be a part of that diary portion too.
2. Moaan Inkpalm Plus
It’s meant to be pronounced moa-an, in Mandarin. And translates loosely as feel and press. It’s an eInk reader, running Android and Clarice got it for me for my birthday. In my reading challenges, it’s been so key for me to carry around, and I smash out books really easy with it on hand.
It’s super light, and slightly larger than my iPhone 13 mini. There is a backlight so I can read in the dark. Because it runs Android, I can also insert Libby, and borrow books from the library. Not that I really need to, I have a ton of books to read on my Kindle library already.
I was looking at getting the kindle for a really long time, but after some research, I figured I could try something a little alternative. There’s a bit of work to put in to set up the reader to be “The Best”, but I think I’m extremely happy with what I’ve done with mine.
If I was going to try read 100 books again next year, you can bet that I’ll most definitely still have this eInk reader around me at most times.
3. Uni Jetstream Pens
I’ve got a bunch of fountain pens from all sorts of brands. Some are great, most are ok. But the functionality of the Uni Jetstream pens have been something I’ve not thought about since secondary school.
After secondary school, I went into design school and decided all my pens would be Muji pens from then on. Slowly over time, I got into fountain pens. I also got some slim and tiny pens called the StyleFit pens. Then during COVID19, I read the Artist Way and started to go for artist dates, where I would treat myself to small purchases at art stores again. One of those times, I got myself a pack of Pentel Energel pens in a limited series colorway.
In all of these cases, my pens were single use. There was only one thing you could do: write in ink. The inks were changeable for the fountain pens. You could also have different ink types in the Muji Pens. StyleFit pens could accommodate up to 5 colors in one pen, that was pretty cool. Just that they ran out of ink really quickly.
Earlier this year, my sister went to Japan and picked up a pen for me that we both had seen on YouTube, called the Uni Jetstream Lite. This pen boasted ultra smooth writing, and ink that would go as fast as you could write. But what really sold me was the 5+1 pen. It has 5 inks, and 1 Mechanical pencil slot. I had not seen stationary functionality since secondary school in the early 2000’s. It was mad useful, and has been since I’ve gotten it.
It’s constantly attached to my Hobonichi Weeks Mega, and I use it in little ways every day, or every now and then. Not using as much as I should now, but I definitely use it a lot.
4. Moondrop Chu II and Dawn Pro
Music is important to me, in many ways. Most often, I use it to drown out the noise around me in public transport. Because of that, I have a pair of Sony WF-1000XM4, the earbuds with excellent noise cancelling, and honestly they’re really been great earbuds for travel.
But this year, I decided to go ham on Chi-Fi again (Chinese HIFI), and I found myself looking Moondrop and their range of in ear monitors – IEMs. I picked up a pair of really cheap ones called the Chu II (Chu 2) and they have made me think about music in terms of musical enjoyment once more.
They’re light, metal, well built, and they sound So Good. The Dawn Pro is a Digital-to-Analog Convertor, otherwise known as a DAC. It’s a bit more of a recent purchase, but I’ve really been so sold by how great music sounds once more. I can enjoy a range of music depth again, and it’s FUN.
There’s quite a few other things I think I use a lot more, but I might revisit it in another post. Maybe tomorrow’s? But for now, I think I wrote way too much. Thanks for reading if you have lol.
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