Keep it going

I've started to swim late night recently. In fact, I just came back from swimming.

Reasons on Why I Swim
1. As you all may know that I'm advised to swim more rather than do high impact sports.

2. I opt to swim at night because this would be the time I'm glued to my lappy wasting time.

3. When I get back from work, I'll be hungry and will try to have dinner immediately. It's not good to swim immediately after ingestion.

4. I was quite full today so with reference to the point above, I will eat less for dinner.

5. Swimming improves flexibility, not so much of agility though. Soothes the stiff muscles. Like Hua Tuo used to say, tighten those that are loose and loosen those that are tight.

6. It makes me tired so I don't have to use other ways to make me sleepy

I've just set alarm on 9:45pm on my watch. Will try to keep this going until I go back to Malaysia. Wish me luck!

This is insane!

I'm addicted to Facebook now. You'll see me updating it so much everyday. Look me up in Facebook - Damien Leong!

SGD>>>AUD>>>NZD

OMG OMG OMG!

Nice food

Cheese platter


Chocolate and espresso brownie with mango


Gyuniku beef with miso radish sauce


Sautéed seabass fillet with leek and mustard


Grilled chicken with Shiso Ginan sauce


Mushroom


Salmon slices chicken bacon roll and mushroom


Smoked fish platter with horse radish vineger



Ice Cream


Caviar and Fine Smoked Salmon


Grilled lobster with garlic herb butter


Rack of lamb with polenta and roasted vege


Do you know which resto serve such great food? To my surprise, this is what you get at First Class. Go to Airline Meals to check them out.

Technical - talking to experts

Previous post was about the commercial part of my job. This is about technical which is equally stressful.

As you may already aware, I don't sell planes directly to end users but I sell them to airlines (one of my markets). It's tricky because every single plane I sell needs to be customized. The level of customization is crazy I would say. I need to make sure even the type/size of cable from every switch in the cockpit is correct. Even the type of air that we pump into the tires can be customized. Imagine how much detail is that for a fleet of 5,000 planes. That's on the end user (plane) side.

As for internal equipments, airlines need a system to track their planes and to control their day-to-day processes such as issuing tickets and billing. We will provide the equipments and sometimes the hardware/software requires customization. To put it simple, whatever an airline need, they could shoot us an email and we would quote them accordingly.

Most of the buyers are expert in the field since forever. They would always ask questions which is so hard that sometimes HQ wouldn't know how to answer.

For example, what is the suitable temperature for the tires to obtain minimal friction while getting maximum grip in a condition where the tire pressure is 3 bar of 80% carbon dioxide and 20% oxygen while the ambient temperature is 22 degrees assuming there's no tail wind and ignore the air humidity. Please suggest/assume the landing speed, landing angle and type of tires and landing strip. Please provide the answer tomorrow morning.

What the hell?!?!?!?!??!?!

Back to ranting - Commercials

Ultimately my job is to sell stuff. In explaining my job, I'll just take a airplane as metaphor.

My jobs involves convincing them ours is the best and cheapest. Imagine the stress of losing a USD30,000,000 deal. This is the stress I deal with every single day. Owh ya, there was once where I misquote which is cheaper by USD500,000. The price is submitted and we have to honor the price if we won. So sometimes we wish we lose the deal also.

Just like what Airbus did, every single project I handled involves selling things that doesn't exist yet. I would walk to the customer and tell them to buy my A888 which is due next year that can handle 2 times the passenger load.

Would you pay for a car for RM1,00,000 which doesn't exist yet? I bet you wouldn't, that is why my job is not fun.

Don't let me get started with helping "potential" customers to start an airlines.

Name

Sempena Hari Jadi Blog I, I'll introduce my name to ebelibody.

For those who can read Chinese, my name will be a very unique one as the words are seldom used. Let me explain them one by one.

Last name/Surname/Family Name

梁 Liáng
Usually the word for surname doesn't bring any meaning to the name as they are meant to be surname only. Anyway, literally 梁 means beam or grain. Not too many people have this surname.

First name/Given name

丙曜 Bǐng Yào
These are the words that is seldom used. Most people knows that 丙 means C, as in A-B-C. 丙 also means the element of fire. Before I explain further, let me tell you a little story about my elder brother.

Initially, his name was not the one he was having. When he was a baby, he was constantly sick even with my parent's detail care even since pregnancy. To cut the (sick) story short, my parents went to the fortuneteller for advice. The fortuneteller advised my parents that his name doesn't suit him and needs to be changed. Now my bro is having a A4 size birth certificate as he changed his name.

Not taking any chances with me, my parents went to the fortuneteller to give me a name. As I was born on 26th November in Lunar calender, I was born in the winter season. To balance my cold birth, the fortuneteller gave me the element of fire. Coincidentally, the characteristic of fire element is similar to Capricorn's characteristic.

曜 means celestial planets or shine/brightness which is also a word that is seldom used. I guess fire is to give warmth to the winter chill and some light to the darkness.

Now you all know how did my name came about. How about Damien you say? It's very simple, one day after watching a movie and the cast was coming out, I saw the name Damien and I liked it. So I'm Damien since then.

3rd year and going strong~!

I've been blogging for 3 years now. Will continue to share bits of my life to all my dear bloggies :D

http://damienleong.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!AC21E4C4FF65EE42!108.entry

One more day

Wait.

Perks

So which one shall I choose?
1. Bungee jump off the harbor bridge? My initial plan.

2. Flying a small plane? I guess this is about holding the steering for 10 seconds though.

3. Skydiving? Need to chip in some money for it.

4. Noise canceling ear phone? It will give me lots of bliss during flight.

Plastic slave

Spoke too soon. I've reached my credit limit and actually there's a misunderstanding on my part where I kept saying HSBC sucks.

My credit limit is RM25K and I thought the limit is for every month. The previous bill (RM20K-ish) has not reach due date yet so I haven't pay for it. During the trip in Dubai, apparently HSBC allowed me to over swipe until RM35K. And I thought they suck for giving me trouble.

My dad told me HSBC Collections & Recoveries Dept. called home to look for me so dad gave them my email. They emailed me and I replied with my NZ number. I was cooking dinner and they called me twice.

I was thinking, it's just small amount right? With 2 months of credit limit (RM50K), why are you so nervous? The payment due date is next week. With a mood ready to screw them, I returned their call.

They explained everything and I was allowed to use RM10K over limit. My bad, may be I should ask for increase of credit limit. Thank goodness I have a habit of listening to their side of story before raging hell upon them.

On a side note, apparently there's no limit on the credit limit for Classic card. It was quite cool holding a Classic card which has RM25K credit limit. Due to some misunderstanding, they upgraded me and left me stranded here with my useless Classic card and the replacement is at home.

Another side note, I tried to apply for Citi CC and the look on the salesman's face is funny when I told him my credit limit for my Classic card. He kept asking questions, "You mean this card? This Classic card? How can that happen? Can I have your payslip?" Priceless.

Another side note, sorry for making this post messy. CC brings many experience to me. I was walking in Mid Valley one day and a girl approached me to ask whether I want a CC, I politely said "No, thank you". She turned around rudely and said, "By the looks of it, obviously you can't qualify for a CC". Darling, you have no idea.

I'm very picky with cards I own, they should serve me well since there are so many cards around. My preference is international banks as I don't want weird stares when I use the card overseas. My next target is Standard Charted CC as they offer free use of lounge in KLIA :D

3 simple words

It's torturing if you miss someone but you can't say it.

I miss you.

Tempted but enough

My boss sent an urgent email asking me to call him ASAP. I was wondering what does he want to discuss with me. Reallocation? Project Status?

When I called him, he wants to discuss with me about asking me to go to Macau next week for an exhibition. It's all about good food, great hotels and posh cars but I'll give it a pass.

I told him that I have plenty of things to do and I worry that I can't finish it in time. While rejecting his request, I helped another colleague by suggesting boss to send him instead.

Pros:
Showed boss that I prioritize work over fun
Get to rest more by traveling less

Cons:
Skipped the chance to enjoy
Missed chance to upgrade my Enrich to Silver (almost qualify)
Less credit card points (after I joined this company, my points can exchange for RM400 cash voucher, hehe)

May be it's due to the fact I've been to Macau before.

On top of the head

Girls, the only place that hair should exist is on top of your head and above your eyes.

I guess most girls will think about lifting up your arms to check but I'm not talking about armpits here (although its a no-no as well). I'm talking about mustache. Please girls, find ways to remove it.

It's a big turn off for guys no matter how pretty you are and yes we notice it.

As for pubic hair, that's for you and your partner to explore :D

Q4 - Summer in South Hemisphere

It's the coldest summer ever!

Pou pou sou (proposal)

Before joining this position, I could never imagine so much of workload could ever exist. Remember those TVB series where staffs in corporate giants are tasked to prepare a proposal for a project?

The initial plan has to be drawn up and you will invite people from various department. Securing human resources is not an easy task, a typical team will consist about 20 person with 4-5 core roles.

This is where everyone will fly in to support the project. If they are not able to fly in, they will be supporting remotely.

The proposal will cover every single details of a multi-million project. Equipment details, network plan, function list, implementation plan, radio frequency planning, maintenance, training, warranties, managed services, etc etc. The list could go on forever. Owh ya, how could I forget pricing.

All of these will then be compiled. Imagine 8 rings of hard cover 2" folder, that's the amount of document that we usually prepare. A typical time frame of 1 month will be given to us but I've experienced 2 weeks of getting it done before.

After submission, clarification will ensue. Mountains of question will be bombarded and some are so detailed that you need help from R&D. Concurrently, price negotiation will be conducted. Sometimes we have to ship in millions of equipment to prepare for a demo to them which adds to the workload.

When they are done with evaluating and decides to go with us, we have to prepare the contract documents. Contract will be about double the amount of hard cover folders as whatever is submitted previously has to be inside and new ones as well.

Lawyers will be a pain in the ass as our wordings has to be "proper".

ps. to relief the stress, I found a new <3
Muji is going big around the world due to its quality with affordable price. Their bath salt is amazing.

Honestly..... Trust me

When I was in my previous project, you can see that I keep on bitching about my work. Actually the work is still sucky but some how I tend to post more positive post. To recap how much I travel recently; I flew to Chicago on 26th and I got back here today from Dubai, its 41 days.

Auckland>Chicago>Auckland>KL>Sydney>Auckland>Dubai>Auckland

Including transit, I was in LA, Brisbane, Singapore and Hong Kong.

I was suppose to go to Shen Zhen in this trip but I didn't manage to get a China visa in time, my colleague handled that trip.

What's so bad about flying to places you say? The rough estimate of total flight hours from the above itinerary not including delays is 87 hours. I can assure you that if you go through this, you will join me in singing the same tune. On average, I'm in one place for about 6 days only.

If the fatigue from flying is not enough to kill you, the jetlag will.
Auckland is ahead of Chicago by 18 hours
Auckland is ahead of KL by 5 hours (day light saving)
Auckland is ahead of Sydney by 2 hours
Auckland is ahead of Dubai by 17 hours (day light saving)
** Auckland is the earlist office to start work in my company **

Well, that's not all. For the first 2 days in Dubai, the schedule was:-
During the day, meeting with the customer.
During the night, internal meeting.
Throughout midnight to wee hours, preparation of documents and proposal.
** Sleep is in taxi and fishing in the meetings **

With all the flight hours, jetlag, sleepless night, workload and stress. I've arrived at 10am to my office straight from the airport. Yes, no going back to rest first. My colleague's comments were, "Wah, your eyes so puffy one? Not enough sleep ar?". When I touched my face, I could feel that pimples will be coming out all over and studs appearing on my unshaven face as well.

As for the pay, many people thinks that I'm paid in USD. Not anywhere near that. Even the stewardess are better off than me. How about commission you say? After closing the USD30mil. deal in Pinoyland, the "appreciation" shown was in the ballpark of MYR1000-2000.

To be fair, I did a bit of sight seeing on the 3rd day and compared to my peers back at home, the pay is slightly better (but it's a total different playing field).

St. Damien without wings

I was snapping pictures and my colleague left me behind. They slowly became small figures in my view as they go further away.

Wanted to run but many worries flashed in my mind. The feeling of something precious to you being taken away is not nice at all. Let me give you some metaphor, what's the best hobby that you have? Singing? Dancing? Cooking? Or perhaps going to the gym?

If one day due to excessive passion without care, your happiest moments turned awry and you can't sing anymore, ever. How would you feel? That's what I'm feeling now.

I loved sports my whole life. I play tennis, football, basketball, ping pong, and etc. Tried out almost every sports including hockey, squash and softball. I always strive for the best and I enjoy a competitive game even if I've lost the game. Pushing each other to the limit is fun and throwing in some taunting and jeering just adds spices to it.

One fine day of playing Captain Ball (owh well, here goes the confused look again). It's a leisure game where not many people play. I was playing hard as the competition is coming. As I was moving forward with a teammate with 1-2-1, when my teammate is trying to pass the ball to me, my eyes was on the ball. After I got the ball and looked in front, the dumb-ass guy was in front of me and I couldn't stop.

To avoid him, I quickly pushed very hard on 1 leg and tried to jump away rather than going straight into his path. Wrong choice. I ended knocking him slightly in the air and it tipped my off balance. I couldn't control my landing and I twisted my knee. Some sort like what happened to Owen.

Our injury is the same, the knee bent sideways. Gross isn't it? I swear the sound of my anterior/posterior cruciate ligament snapping and tearing my meniscus is still haunting me. It was funny when I was lying there are they carried on with the game. They all thought I was acting until they pay attention to my knee. My tibia was trying to stick out and my skin was holding it back.

What does all these means? My knee is very loose as it can bend sideways now. What the doctor did was to remove the ligament as it won't heal and it will cause too much fiction in the knee.

To add to the matter, I gave it a rest for awhile but went to training again.

As I was taking care of my left knee, I put too much pressure on my right knee and same thing happened again to my right knee, albeit not as serious as my left knee. So now both of my knees are wobbly.

Now I can't even jog. Doc says that I'll get arthritis at an early age and no impact sports. So I've since moved to swimming, archery, pool and golf. Not so much though as I like competitive sports. As always the whining about too much work and no time to play doesn't help at all.

Chances of healing? I would have to queue for a donor and go for a ligament replacement surgery. As doc put it, god only gave you 1 chance with your ligament.

- St. Damien without wings -

ps. Didn't mentioned about the room rates for my room here. It's AED2000/night which is almost MYR2000/night. Dubai's real estate is crazy.

Radisson SAS Hotel, Dubai

First, the flight was delayed due to engine failure. As we are suppose to fly AKL>HKG>DXB, we will miss the Hong Kong to Dubai flight if this flight were to be canceled. Thinking ahead, if this flight is confirmed canceled, then everyone will rush to other airlines to book their flight.

Quickly booked a seperate flights with Air New Zealand and Emirates to get to Dubai. Air NZ will only fly at midnight and Emirate will fly on the evening but Emirates have 2 connections.

True enough it was a serious engine problem and the flight was canceled. We proceed to Emirates. We are tagged all the way from Auckland to Brisbane to Singapore and finally Dubai with 1 hour transit in Brisbane and Singapore. Total flight time is 18 hours plus 2 hours transit.

Thank goodness the plane is a good one, will blog about that later.

There seems to be a few expo/conference/forum going on in Dubai now and the rooms are full every where so I end up with this all to myself.

Seems like a normal hotel room


Owh, there's a living room. Cool!


Wah, kitchen as well.


From another angle


I doubt I would be cooking


It's a pity that I don't get to cook here. Its an amazing kitchen


1st room


My room. Yes, ZOMG! 2 rooms with 3 beds for me? Now where are the air hostess? I'm all set for fun tonight!


Another angle


and another


Not enough ar?


I seduced one of the Polish air hostess and I got this for free.


Walked back to the living room to get more pictures, this time from the kitchen.


Behind the dining table


Tiring to be artistic


Complicated phone


I think I slimed down

Opps, there are pictures of the bathroom but seems like I missed them and I have to rush to a meeting now. Hang on your seats, will update here whenever I can.