Abyss of Fatigue v2

Dream

2012-01-09T12:14:00.003+08:00

It's been 82 days since the day my heart shattered into pieces. I was coping quite well, I could visit Chloe and smile while I was talking to her. I guess this is the mood swings that they are talking about.

Yesterday night I had a dream where my mom was holding a full moon baby. At first sight I knew it wasn't Chloe. I asked my mom, who's baby was it. She answered me it was a friend's baby. As she finished the sentence, I imagined that Chloe would be slightly bigger that the baby.

It made me feel how much I've lost out and many more things (or rather not) to come. I woke up and broke down. I'm glad that I can show all my feelings to my wife.

Went to work and can't stop thinking about Chloe. Finished the early morning meeting and took leave. I took out Chloe's photo and looked at her pretty cheek and chin. Will go and visit Chloe later.

Things not to say

2011-11-13T06:14:00.005+08:00

I never heard/knew/thought about such a terrible thing could happen and I think even the worst person on earth shouldn't experience what we've gone through.

However, here are somethings that I really dread to hear.

1) It's ok, you are still young. There are many more opportunities.
If it's a miscarriage in early pregnancy which is very common, then this would be appropriate. Let me put it this way, it's not my baby is not here yet, my baby has left. No other baby can replace my baby.

2) I hope that you can get over it soon/I hope that you can be normal again
I'm sorry, I'll never be the same again. Hang around with me more, may be you'll like the new me.

3) Someone was asking how am I doing now and I said I've only slept very shallow and thought about many things. To my amazement, he replied, "Yeah, that's how humans become more mature".
Does everyone have to go through this to be more mature? This is happening to me because I'm immature? As i've said, even the worst person should not experience this.

4) Tell me when you want to have a drink
This is not something that i want to forget and bury my sorrow by intoxicating myself.

5) If you don't know what to say, just say I'm so sorry. Don't have to pretend and try to convince me that you know how I feel. I think only parents can imagine what we are going through but will never really FEEL what we are going through.

Things that made me feel better:

1) Chloe is an angel now, the purest of angels. She has never felt any pain and faced this cruel world.

2) I will pray for her

3) People who really care. Thanks.

Funny incidents

2011-11-06T13:24:00.003+08:00

The excitement of expecting a baby can't be explained. I was buying so many things and Amelie had to stop me so that she gets to go shopping for Chloe. There were indeed some funny stories when we were shopping.

There was once we went to buy a baby car seat. We were at the traffic light waiting to cross the road and it was drizzling. I stepped in front to press the pedestrian button and when I looked back, Amelie's gone. I was looking left and right can't find her. She was giggling away hiding under the shade in the nearby shop.

Another funny incident happened when we were doing our weekly groceries at a wholesale market. Half way through, I suggested to bring some stuff back to the car. When I got back to the market, the mobile phone network was having problem. There's coverage but you couldn't call or message. The place must be bigger than 2 football field and was tired from searching and I went to the information center. Borrowed their phone to call but as Amelie was on the same network so the call can't get through. The only option was done with rows of blaring speakers "Amelie, your husband Damien is at the information counter waiting for you, please come to the information center." Amelie was telling Chloe, "let's pick up your daddy" as she was walking over.

Our Heroine

2011-11-04T11:01:00.002+08:00

Amelie is such an amazing mum. She did much more than what I expect a mom would do. She asked around for the best doctor and we've decided on Dr. Terry. She would go for a walk everyday in the park after dinner and I still feel bad that sometimes I was not able to accompany them.

During the 1st trimester, she would vomit quite frequently but I've NEVER hear a word of complain from her. Amelie is definitely a heroine in our family.

Amelie borrowed a stethoscope, we would play hide and seek with Chloe. Almost every night, we used the scope on Amelie's tummy moving inch by inch and we would be so happy when we found Chloe's heart. There would be days where we couldn't find it but we just shrug it off attributing it to the entry level scope that we are using. After a few weeks, the scope started to emit loud tapping sound that it was annoying to use and we stopped listening to Chloe's heartbeat and instead just waiting for her to kick mummy's tummy.

As we were planning to have a baby, Amelie took elevit everyday before we knew about Chloe. Dr Terry recommended fish oil tablets as well and since then, she took elevit and fish oil everyday. She wants the best for our baby and this journey made me love her even more.

By 6 months, Amelie's bump became big. Her hands and legs would swell but she wouldn't complain. She would tell me just to let me know it's uncomfortable but she's ok. This is when a walk in the park starts to get hard as it was hard for her to walk around and it was winter here, but she pushed on.

Amelie used her finger to press on her swollen feet to make a crater that will slowly subside which both of us giggled. I know she's very proud to have Chloe and Amelie's complexion and smooth skin says it all. I honestly thinks that she's very beautiful.

That's my Baby ❤

2011-11-03T07:28:00.004+08:00

It was late last year (2010) when we were both planning to have a baby. We knew the cooling period for the health insurance so the plan is to get pregnant by June this year.

One night in March/April, Amelie told me her period was late so the nest morning, I went to the supermarket to get a pregnancy test kit. We I came back, Amelie did the test. It was supposed to be 2 stripes but one of the stripe was faint. I called up the helpline to confirm and the lady on the line was kinda monotonic in explaining that there's a high chance it's positive, seems like she's very bored with her job.

On this side, I was so happy, so so so happy. Amelie was initially confused because I'm capped when we were doing it. Until now, we don't know when did she got pregnant.

Throughout the pregnancy, I took time off work to accompany Amelie for checkups. During the first checkup, the doctor showed us Chloe's heartbeat and then put the recorded sound through the speaker. I was so touched to see Amelie is carrying our baby and Chloe's heart is pumping strong. In my heart, I was shouting "That's my baby!".

New life

2010-04-29T23:04:00.002+08:00

25th April is an amazing day for me. I've been given a great responsibility in life. Starting out in Australia is really a turning point in my life in terms of career and personal life. Hopefully I can give my best and find a balance in between.

For the name of curiosity

2010-03-16T09:37:00.002+08:00

Hard wax, soft wax, whatever wax, its still pain as hell.

A place where I call home

2010-03-13T14:33:00.002+08:00

Came back to Malaysia few days before Chinese New Year. At first I was happy stuffing my face with lots of food, eventually the list of food cravings was satisfied and nasi lemak (and such) seems to have lost its magic. Thank goodness there's still mom cooked dinner to look forward to everyday.

Many friends assumed that I'll be on leave whenever I come back, the reality is I would go to KLCC/Etiqa office to work everyday. Even during Chinese New Year, I would have to go through my emails in the evenings because there's no holiday in Australia.

The drive to work is really taxing. Usually it'll take me 1 to 1.5 hours to get to office everyday. That's 2 to 3 hours wasted on the road. In Sydney, I would spend the time sleeping or preparing dinner.

After this when I come back again, I would have to apply for leave and pay my own flight tickets. The next trip would be in September for my brother's wedding.

Going to AU to work permanently will be a turning point in my life, what holds for me in the future is unknown. Wish me all the best.

Which one will be my love?

2010-01-08T22:33:00.001+08:00

Dell Vostro V13 or Dell Adamo Onyx?

Transfer

2010-01-02T13:52:00.002+08:00

As you all know, I was in New Zealand most of the time early last year. The project that I was working was stalled although the contract is signed because the operator does not have capital to rollout a network. It was pretty frustrating for me because it means that last year, I didn't contribute to any sales figure.

Australia office as a whole did pretty well because we've signed a deal here. The deal was lead by my staff (we were peers) and what I did was just monitoring and approvals. Initially, we were asked to be transferred together and surely we were elated.

Red tape is a major problem in our company; by the time we've sorted out half of the approval, the management decides that only 1 person should be transferred. The local boss told me that they would like to transfer me only. I felt that it is not fair so I've discussed with him on what are the options. He told me to see the MD and so I went.

MD asked me to discuss with my boss. Hmmm, don't like the idea of this ding dong game they are playing. Fortunately my boss is a straight forward person and doesn't like to beat around the bushes. I told him that I will not be able to convince my staff and no matter what the result, I have to state that I'm against my staff not transferring.

Like every discussion, he changed strategy. He said that the staff's hay level is too low. If he transfer, the office will not be able to give him a good offer. He's better off not transferring. After a few checks, the situation is genuine.

Discussed with my staff and he did his checking as well and decided that he will opt to stay with current arrangement where he will be getting overseas allowance and not transfer here.

Sometimes life is really not fair. I really try very hard to help him (risking my own career) but there's just not much I can do other than making lots of noise in the office.

Long term vs short term

2009-12-27T16:23:00.003+08:00

Sorry for being away for so long. Q4 is a crazy period for sales people as we are trying to close a few projects and prepare for next year's forecast.

There's also all the paperwork to deal with to get the working visa. Yeah, I'm gonna stuck here for quite some time. It was a tricky decision because after conversion, the take-home-pay is less even though there's an increment and the currency is 3 times higher.

This is because the rents and tax here is crazy while the EPF is less. Rents are going like AUD1800/mth for a 1 bed room apartment. Well, in a way my living standards is increased because I don't have to share an apartment anymore.

I pay quite a bit of tax to Malaysia gov but its nothing compared to the >20% tax that Australian gov is asking for.

So why did I do it when my take-home-pay is less? To build my profile before going to somewhere else.

Weather Forecast

2009-10-31T09:31:00.002+08:00

I used to think what's the point of knowing the temperature of the day. Malaysia is hot throughout the whole year. It's only when I'm in NZ and AU that I realize whether can change so fast. It can change from one sunny day to chilly windy gloomy weather the next day and we have to dress accordingly.

I also notice girls have amazing ability where they can sometimes wear so little or so much (ie. tall boots) regardless of the weather. Respect.

Boss

2009-10-10T20:00:00.002+08:00

After signing the contract, the MD here changed his attitude towards us. There was once when I wanted to update him about the project, he mentioned, "What do you want to say? Always the same thing. I don't want to listen".

The other day during mooncake festival party, he came to me and asked whether I've been transferred to local staff already or not. I guess bosses needs to keep the pressure on and reward according to the situation.

There was once also when I told the team that I've asked some budget from him to throw a party since we don't get Raya break, everyone wouldn't believe. We were given AUD500 to party!

The grass is greener on the other side. Period.

2009-09-18T06:15:00.003+08:00

A customer screws up and they blame us. Local office boss says no matter what, we have to play nice. So instead of pointing fingers, we politely find solutions for the problem.

Always its just so much that we can do and its the customer's fault, so we will insist that we can't really compromise anymore.

The Account Director and myself was very firm but professional in our discussion. During my conversation, the customer's GM said that AD told a bunch of lies and that's why we are in this situation. Slander. I told the GM, since the beginning of the conversation, I said I don't hope to have a your-words-against-my-words discussion. I'm here to explain and solve the problem. After all that, he said he don't want to see the AD in his office anymore. I wrap it up saying that I'm sorry we are in this situation.

So I called the AD to give him a heads up and he said that the GM told the CEO the samething yesterday but the subject is me. CEO said "GM said that he don't want to see Damien in his office anymore!". Errr...... Last I know, you are still talking to me and even late evening, you asked a favor from us.

I looked at my staff, "ok buddy, now there's no AD and PD in this project anymore, the project is all yours and good luck to you".

Rumput di sebelah adalah lebih hijau. Haid. (lol, I mean jangka)

Culprit found

2009-09-17T07:09:00.005+08:00

Was working late yesterday and called up boss to discuss something.

After discussing about work, boss said that increment will come in this month or next month. Increment was suppose to be around June and it's now September. Bonus was supposed to be April and delayed to June as well.

The funny thing about this company is no one actually complains. Even when part of the salary comes in late one month, everyone will just say "owh well". I guess its 2 things, everyone knows that company is not doing as well and our next meal doesn't depends on the timely arrival of our salary but I digress......

Before I continue, I'm reporting to a new boss now after I've been promoted. This new boss is a genuine, hardworking, kind, list goes on...... boss.

During the conversation, he mentioned, "actually HQ's big boss called me up to have you transfer to US again. So I said, as long we get "Pedang" (nickname for my previous boss) out of the way, you are all set to go."

I told him, its nice to know but I won't be considering it like before until it really is happening. He agrees and life goes on. Now I know what happened last time around, another classic case of boss don't want to let go.

This is our life in this company. You work hard day in day out be it whatever your reason is. If you do well, opportunities come and go fast. The thought of settling down in Sydney just set in and I was looking where to rent a place and what car to buy, etc. Back to square minus one again.

Enough of these boring bits, what car to buy? I was thinking Audi A4, I love those damn LED lights and tail lights. It still cost AUD50K here :(

Next up, Honda Civic. Hmm.... may be I'll just get one of those. What say you?

Post-sales is a different animal

2009-09-14T19:54:00.002+08:00

When a customer is hard with you, please remember they will be even more crazy after they've paid you money.

It's time to deliver all the over-commitments and half-truths.

Having said all that, although I've closed a bigger project compared to this one, I didn't handle post sales. When I saw the bank TT slip sent to us, there's a sense of joy knowing millions of money is actually coming in.

Owh ya, just for the record, the current promotion is without increment (yet).

Consolation?

2009-08-18T11:04:00.002+08:00

I'm back in Malaysia for a short trip as I'm flying off to Jakarta for a meeting. My KPI is still sub-5% and I'm getting used to it. Getting better in giving reasons and I feel less stressed when questioned.

As I write this, I realized that the situation is changing me. I'm no longer eager to push for results. May be I should be thinking how to solve it rather than giving more reasons.

Why the motivation now? It's because I saw my payslip yesterday. I flew out on April the last time around so I didn't get to see my Apr, May, June and July payslip.

My company pays 2 bonus each year:-
1) Fixed 13th month salary (bonus) in Dec and;
2) In early Q2, performance bonus will be given

This year's performance bonus came a bit late and it only arrived on June. Before I saw the payslip, I've only managed to have a look at how much came into my bank account. I was ok with it because rough calculation I managed to get around 4 mths of bonus.

After I saw the payslip, I thought may be all my hardwork is worthwhile. My performance bonus is 6.5mths (based on last years salary) or 5.5mths (based on this year's salary).

With the 1 month bonus at year end, then my bonus would be 7.5mths. I'm prepared to receive a meager bonus next year becuase of my sub-5% KPI achievement.

Why the stark difference in calculating based on take home pay and actual amount (4mths vs 6.5mths)? It's because Bolehland gov took MYR5,481.20 of tax money from me! EPF is big as well but at least I get to pocket it.

So stressed that desserts can't help

2009-08-04T06:52:00.001+08:00

Been very hectic lately. Added responsibility is really burdening and burning me out fast.

Hmmm

2009-07-03T22:58:00.001+08:00

Thanks for the honestly. May be its time to change. So any suggestion for a new hair style?

Blue?

2009-06-24T19:57:00.002+08:00

Went to a steakhouse yesterday. Learned 2 things during the dinner.

I don't like steak at all. I always thought that may be I have not came across a good piece beef.

Yesterday I ordered a Wagyu Top-Sirloin at medium rare, didn't like it at all.

Other than the usual Rare, Medium and well done, there's another degree of cooking which is Blue.

From wiki:-

Blue rare or very rare - (37.8°C/100°F core temp) Cooked very quickly; the outside is seared, but the inside is usually cool and barely cooked. The steak will be red on the inside and barely warmed. Sometimes asked for as 'blood rare'. In the United States this is also sometimes referred to as 'Black and Blue' or 'Pittsburgh Rare'.

Lesson
1. No like steak.
2. No know Blue.

Belgium Cafe

2009-06-20T21:03:00.002+08:00

Surprisingly I recognized it before stepping in. Been to this place around 4 years back......

Life is sometimes really funny. Somethings you think you won't lose it but you'll end up losing it. Somethings you don't think you can have it but you'll end up having it.

Things that I'm not prepared for

2009-06-18T21:21:00.004+08:00

After 1 week in Auckland, I rushed back to Sydney to assist the staff here. His mood is quite stable now.

The pressure that he's feeling is on me too, plus pressure from a few more projects that's very very hard.

When I'm down, I used to be able to talk to my colleagues or my boss. Now I can't share my frustration with my staff as it will de-motivate them more. I guess the easiest way to convince people to work hard is to work hard together, if not harder.

We've always have this feeling that bosses are hiding something from us, now I know why. Most of the time is to test water (trying to get hints by giving hints), avoid panic situation and to find the best time to spill the beans.

Eg. There's going to be a restructuring and you have to arrange the human resource accordingly. So you go and test water during a casual conversation. Do you like working on spreadsheet? Do you like Indonesia? The truth is I have to transfer you to Indon to prepare pricing strategy under a new team.

2009Q2/2009H1 is going to end soon and my target/KPI completion is just 4%. I've already prepared myself to write lengthy reports and to get screwed all ways.

Wish me luck.

Many things to learn

2009-05-30T23:23:00.002+08:00

Slowly my workload is changing; I no longer answer for KPIs for my own project, now 8 projects needs monitoring. Hence, hands on stuff is getting less and less.

There's also administration stuff such as company policies implementation, approvals, resources management, and more recently, I got the taste of staff retention.

As you all would know, stress management is important because we work in high stress level environment. A capable staff of mine was throwing tantrum in the office which was started by a joke. The next day, he went into another tantrum in a meeting with customer.

Managed to spoke to him over lunch before I flew to Auckland. Will continue to monitor him. May be I should start picking up some books.

Pressure is piling up

2009-05-24T19:01:00.002+08:00

I guess many would think that being a leader would be awesome but I can tell you it is not. Unless you want to be one which everyone hates, then it's should be piece of cake but if you want to perform well, it's a hell of a job.

The previous guy has left a big mess and I'm trying to mend it. Then there's also personnel issues. My staff was suppose to arrive on Tuesday 2 weeks ago. When is about time she should land, I tried to call her but couldn't get her. Called the airport to confirm the arrival of the plane and it arrived.

Went to MAS to check whether my colleague has landed and they told me she changed her flight. They told me because I'm a frequent customer, or else they wouldn't bother. When I called her up she said "Oh, I forgot that part (calling to inform).

I told her, if you want to spend a few days more in Malaysia, let me know so that I can arrange our task accordingly. I was flying off on Saturday (2 weeks ago) and she'll be arriving only on Friday. We had a very short handover only.

In my company, bosses get scolded, not the staff. So the sales KPI is all on my shoulder and it's not a good feeling when big bosses keeps questioning me about my numbers. Like I said a million times, will see how long I can last here.

This is so funny

2009-05-05T19:25:00.003+08:00

Conversation in the taxi with the driver along with my customer.

Me: Can you get me to the airport?
Driver: Which terminal?
Me/Customer: International.
Driver: Which airlines?
Me: Singapore Airlines.
Driver: It's either terminal 2 or 3.

While thinking how to make sure which terminal it is......

Customer: Isn't all flights in Singapore international? We wouldn't be flying from one side of the island to the other side right?

Learn to forgive and forget

2009-04-26T09:38:00.002+08:00

I really don't know what to do. He promised us that he will change but its only for awhile and he's back to the usual him.

Will talk to someone to ask for advice later today. Yeah, I'm in Singapore now.

Holiday? You wish! Work like mad? You bet!

2009-04-18T12:58:00.002+08:00

Was working until 2am (Auckland time) yesterday, work up at 6am (KL time) due to jet lag. Its really very tiring.

I'm actually having a teleconference meeting since 2hrs 45mins ago. It was suppose to be 1.5hours but I guess it will take much longer.

Sidenote: I was talking to a 40yr old colleague and he told me that he have to work 15years more before retirement. If I were to work like this for 40 more years until retirement, I guess my health would be down the drain. May be I should review my priority in life when I reach 30.

Top of the game

2009-04-17T22:31:00.002+08:00

I'm in front of my laptop now with a busted butt and back from the 11 hours of flight. The pressure and workload of my job can't be easily explained.

Also with a dizzy head, 50+ mails has to be squeeze into my head and hopefully some of them can stay there while I'm preparing for tomorrow's meeting.

Do I have a life? Well, not so much of a life. BTW, yeah, back in KL for the week (I hope).

Cold Winter

2009-04-13T19:24:00.002+08:00

During my trip down south, I realize that jeans is not a all terrain apparel. When hiking up Fox Glacier, wearing jeans didn't help so I decided to buy a trekking pants after I come back to Auckland.

Went to Kathmandu. No, not Nepal, it's a outdoor equipment brand. Got myself a Mazagan pants. Since Easter is over and winter is coming, got myself a Naxos top.

Original price = NZD159 + NZD159
Discounted price = NZD99

Not bad.

Something new

2009-04-10T14:22:00.003+08:00

Read about absinthe on the net few days ago, it's also called the Green Fairy. Being a curious kid always, while hanging out at the bar yesterday (today's Good Friday and we are not working), I ordered it.

Was serve with Mansinthe, apparently it's Marilyn Manson's absinthe. Took it in a shot glass which cost me NZD25. Believe me, it'll be crazy to take the whole shot in one gulp as the alcohol content is 66.6%.

Also found out that marijuana is not harmful in anyway. May be I should try it one day. Where is this Pro-ngong when you need him the most.

Decision has been (automatically) made

2009-04-09T17:37:00.002+08:00

Some were rooting for AU/NZ and some were rooting for US. I was still waiting for US to finalize the offer and I was told that recently there's a new policy in place where they are focusing on localization in US. Being a foreigner, clearly it's a challenge to have me hired there so I was told, "Hopefully we can work together next time".

Was I disappointed? Actually no. I'm very happy with my current department. Excerpt from the mail I sent to my future boss,

"...... team has given me a venue and responsibility to perform. I'm very grateful for the trust and opportunity. Bosses and peers are superb in this team and it's a joy to work with, sans the stress that comes with the job of course ;)

X project and Y project do not happen just because of one person. It's a team effort and I will say this again, within the department we have a good team/platform to support us throughout the project. Guidance from A, B and yourself (in alphabetical order, haha) has shown me many new perspectives on tackling problems in a project."

This is my sincere feeling I have for my department, I owe it to them. By staying, my boss have other arrangement for me so we have to sit down to sort things out. Too bad that it's so hard for us to meet as I'm suppose to fly back this month to file in my income tax but he'll be on a round trip to Indonesia and Australia.

Hope that my discussion with him will be fruitful when we meet at Singapore end of this month. Yeah, you heard me right, I'm going to Kiasuland.

Absence

2009-04-06T17:34:00.002+08:00

Sorry for leaving here without updates for such a long time. 3 weeks ago, I was so damn busy and without internet.

I was busy for 2 weeks on my project which finally we reached another milestone. The milestone is the main purpose that I'm here. The USD80mil deal is so sweet and I'm glad that it's finally over.

Last week I went on a holiday to south island, my mom and I planned it few months back. Will blog about that later.

I've complaint about Qantas few months back and karma did it's magic today. Since they upgraded me to Silver, I have a one time complimentary use of Qantas Club. On the return flight, I've booked the wrong time for my flight. Booked my departure time near to my mom's arrival time rather than her departure time. I chose to fly Qantas because I wanted to spend my airmiles that I accumulated before I leave NZ.

I had about 3 hours to kill so I decided to use my complimentary pass. Surfed the net for quite a bit and waited for final call. That's what I learned what the businessman/businesswoman does, wait till the very end so that you don't have to queue and you can enjoy the lounge.

I didn't bother to check the seating as it's such a short flight and I didn't mind where ever I sit. When I board the plane and looked at my boarding pass, I found out that I was upgraded to business class. A company I've complaint about gave me a chance to fly business class for the first time.

How was it? Nothing special as its a domestic flight. Just that you have a bigger seat and get off the plane earlier. Human is insatiable so I'm hoping that I can be upgraded for a long haul flight next time ;)

Conflict

2009-03-22T11:26:00.002+08:00

Have you ever hated your boss for asking you to cancel something so that you can join a meeting after working hours or on the weekend?

Have you ever been pushed by your boss so much that you want to straggle them?

Have you ever been told by your boss that you've not done enough even though you've given your best?

I guess most people will think that bosses are assholes. They keep pushing and pushing us, it drives us up the wall.

What many bosses fail to do is to explain to the staffs why is he doing it. They like to feel the authority of demanding things. What I prefer to do is to give the team a target and they'll come up with a strategy and plan themselves and I'll give my comments.

That way, they can feel that the own the task and wants to complete it, when something goes wrong, they are accountable to it. Obviously, I'll have to accept the blame too because its me who choose to leave it up to them.

Back to the 3 questions above, this is the monster that I'm turning into. I accept that many people are just not like me, where the most important thing is to achieve the goal regardless of everything else. I'm still learning how to deal with this. Hopefully I'll learn how to manage people.

Life is special

2009-03-08T17:27:00.003+08:00

Remember my long lost friend? After being here for 6 month and about to leave soon, I make it a point to pay her a visit.

She's staying in Katikati. Left Auckland at 8am and reached there about 11am including a few break and photo taking. Catch up about ol' times and talked about how's life now. Not sure whether did my colleagues felt bored then. I've asked 4 of them to come along.

No, not that I'm intimidated or shy. I'm an "old timer" here. Plenty of colleague come and go. I'll bring them around because I'm allowed to use the company car and I want to travel to places and snap pictures.

After Katikati, we went to Tauranga. Did Mt. Maunganui, the beach and a beautiful waterfalls (forgot the name lah).

Damn freaking tired now, signing off. Nights.

ps. I love GPS.

Now what?

2009-03-06T03:13:00.001+08:00

Ok, to tip the scale a bit. What if I say US offer will have renumeration package which is 50% higher than AU/NZ?

Free = Good?

2009-03-04T16:50:00.002+08:00

SC shared this site with us. To put it simple, East Ocean e-Imaging (EOE) offers digital photo printing service (among other stuff). The site has a clean looking interface with few important tabs and a handy search bar on top with all sorts of highlights below. I find it odd that it’s formatted to be 800 pixels wide rather than 1024 and it doesn’t support Firefox :(

The service is quite interesting as no matter where am I, I can send my photos to my family and friends back at home. This is possible by the fact that you can have different billing and posting address. International shipping is also available.

I’ve been taking loads of pictures but I’ve never printed any photos since few years back. Even then, it was my ex who printed them. 3R was the standard then and usually it goes for 30cents. Nowadays, 4R is the “correct” size to print and from EOE, its 30cents. With all the prices in Malaysia escalating, this is a good deal. Even 5R goes for 50cents only. Free delivery for purchases over RM35 is the bomb, totally makes sense for this service.

One of the worry when printing photo is whether the shop can reproduce accurate colors and details of the picture. I have friends who went through a lot of trouble to have the shop print to the color profiles that he want.

I’ll be eager to get my hands the photos when I get back to Malaysia next month. If it’s good, I’m sure I’ll be ordering more as it’s so convenient.

ps. I'll keep a lookout at the photo competition as well ;)
ps2. The slow internet makes the upload painful.

Owh......

2009-02-27T13:21:00.003+08:00

Today was a "interesting" day. It's been quite sometime I didn't have a connection to go online.

I took this chance to read all the blog and FB-ing. First bombshell I learn is my 2nd ex will get married soon. So happy for her although we have many many many misunderstandings. Last I know, she's still not in talking terms with me. Hopefully she'll accept my sincere wishes.

Next I found out that my recent ex (comm'on, not that many la. 3 in total) is in another relationship. When I was back in KL for CNY, I did met her to pass her some stuff. It turns out that she wasn't single anymore then but she didn't tell me.

It's never good to learn about something from 3rd party. Like I said previously, we are the most distant close friend. We know each other well but we are so distant with each other. It's actually very sad that a person that I've spent 5 long years of my life treats me this way.

Hopefully both of them can be happy. I still feel sorry for the things I've done.

Which one?

2009-02-26T18:09:00.001+08:00

	US	New Zealand
Position	WiMAX Product Manager	Head of WiMAX Team for Australasia
Job	Same as current role. North America region includes US and Canada. Will be serving biggest WiMAX operator in the whole world.	Overseeing 3 staffs. Australasia region includes AU/NZ/Pacific Island. Will be serving top tier WiMAX operator in Asia Pacific.
Career growth	I have the opportunity get exposure dealing with biggest operator and a whole new market.	I have the opportunity to learn to be a proper "Manager".
Moolah	Will be paid in USD and I'm guessing the pay in US will be ok due to high cost of living and currency.	Will be paid in AUD and there will be a increment for the promotion.
Challenges	Market penetration into a tough operator. Sales volume will be a big challenge as we are the new/late comer.	Handling staff for the first time but sales volume will be guaranteed and I will be actively discussing with potential operators and keep current account in check.
Things to think about	I'll be far away from home. If I get lucky, I may get to go back to Malaysia once a year.	I'm not quite ready to be a Manager. Previously I'm managing projects and receiving directions from bosses.
Reporting	My immediate boss will be fantastic but the HOD will be a bit tricky.	All bosses in SP and Australasia are fantastic.

Did I miss anything?

Where'd you go?

2009-02-22T15:12:00.003+08:00

I was all set for US but 2 bosses from my current team gave me a good proposition. They asked me to stay in Australia to be the Head of my Department for Australasia covering AU/NZ/Fiji/Vanuatu/PNG/Samoa/etc.

Both will be paid in local currencies (eg. USD and AUD). Average for last year, USD is higher than AUD by 20%.

The job in US is the same as my current one, just that the region is different. On the other hand, I will be overseeing 3 staffs in Australasia. One of them is a pain where the sun doesn't shine. I'm sure he won't be accepting me as his boss due to his character.

There are so many things to think about. Any suggestions?

St. Damien

2009-02-19T17:22:00.004+08:00

While I was walking at a beach filled with girls in bikini holding my camera, a pair of teenage girls asked me.

Girls: "Why are you talking the pictures of girls for?"
Me: ** Puzzled ** Errr........
Me: Wait, let me show you.

** A pat on the shoulder **

Me: You see, I'm a nice guy. I shot a few hundred of bird in flight photos today. If I get it right, the result will be amazing :D

Relax

2009-02-14T18:41:00.002+08:00

As most of you already know, my internet is dead.

The secretary is still not able to pin point which operator fuels my apartment with internet.

What do I do without an internet? The answer is plain simple, I find internet.

Problem is solved by going to my colleague's place to go online. It's not the same though. I can't lie on the sofa because the sofa is too small. I can't lie on my bed. I feel bad if its midnight already and I better start packing.

I'm actually writing this post at home and will only publish it when I go to her place. Prior to writing this, I cooked instant noodles for lunch, did half of the laundry, and cleaned my camera.

I've actually find cleaning the camera very therapeutic. Using a cleaning “pen” and a high quality lens cloth, I clean the serviceable parts of the camera bit by bit while slowly taking them off. I always feel calm and nice when doing this.

DSLR also can so self-portrait :P

Don’t get me wrong, I abhor cleaning the dishes, house or whatever sort of cleaning that will make my hands wet. It doesn’t stop there, as the skin on my palm is very sensitive, it will slowly die off and peel.

So whoever girls out there who is considering me, please do consider again.

As always

2009-02-10T17:17:00.002+08:00

Got an email today saying that the venue for annual meeting has been changed to Jakarta rather then Bali. Boo hoo........ Anyway, I still have to go.

Tagged by Simchi and Mictsen in FB

2009-02-10T16:36:00.001+08:00

Rules: once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. at the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. you have to tag the person who tagged you. if i tagged you, it's because i want to know more about you.

to do this, go to “notes” under tabs on your profile page, paste these instructions in the body of the note, type your 25, tag 25 people (in the right hand corner of the app) then click publish.

1. Hope to do a MBA in the future.

2. I have 2 exactly opposite character in me. I'm actually very shy and I have low self-esteem. To hide this side of myself, I always force myself to be bold and show confidence.

3. My toe pinky has weird sharp because I wore very tight shoes when I was young because mom wants to save money.

4. Doesn't like disco, prefers pub or bar.

5. Can't sing or dance or play any musical instrument.

6. Doesn't wear underwear since university.

7. Hopes to see Aurora, whether it's borealis or australis.

8. Loves to show off. Still learning and trying to control.

9. Has torn ligament and meniscus in both knees due to sports injury.

10. Is a black belt in taekwondo.

11. Longest hour without sleep is 50 hours with continuous work and stress.

12. Have loads of stretch mark all over my body because I was diagnosed with a rare case where my bones grow faster than my flesh and (oh well) I was very very very fat when I was young (this explains point number 2).

13. I've only been drunk once in my life. It was kinda scary to think back how did I manage to drive home that day.

14. Loves Samurai X, Futurama, Simpsons and Family Guy.

15. Likes to support the underdogs when watching sports. If the stronger team wins, its expected; when the underdog wins, bring on the celebration!!!

16. I'm a light sleeper, will wake up to any sound and light. Unless I'm really tired, then I'll snore :P

17. I cry quite easily. Ok, not as in cry lah but I shed tears quite easily. When watching movie or reading sad stuff.

18. Not so much of a fiction book fan, likes to read about real life experience and technical stuff.

19. Andy Lau is my distant relative. Seriously.

20. I'm always lazy to take med. Not because of the taste, just lazy. Will always gives excuse that I'll be fine without med.

21. I forget -ve stuff easily. I'm not good with dates as well.

22. I know what is a lexicographer. It's a person who writes dictionary.

23. Will always be on time for any appointment and end up being the first to arrive. Always! So don't be late for my wedding.

24. I'm an atheist. I can't seem to believe anything that can't be explained with logic. I've tried to understand and accept but I just can't. But this doesn't mean I give up. Sometimes I still try praying/hoping but I just get disappointed always.

25. I love cooking but I hate doing the dishes. My request for cooking is, "I can cook but you must do the dishes. Deal?".

Bonus 26. I plan to name my daughter (if I have one) Hazel Leong.

Happy Chinese Valentines

2009-02-09T17:21:00.002+08:00

I had some food left from yesterday's dinner

Salted Vege Soup

Bitter Gourd with Snapper Fillet in Spicy Tao Si Sauce

Stir Fried Lettuce with Egg

Wanted to finish them today but realized today is the last day of CNY. Thought it would be good to have something I like so I went to Ding Hao BBQ Restaurant.

As usual, was served with a complimentary hot soup when they bring over the menu

Told the nice Malaysian girl I don't need the menu, ordered my fav Roast Duck with Roast Pork Rice.

And this amazing tasty + big portion plate appeared in front of me soon after.

To gauge how big the plate is, I've put my handphone in the background for comparison. Meals usually comes at NZD8-12 for 1 portion and this plate cost NZD11. Good value for money I would say :D

Do I get to go this time?

2009-02-08T19:27:00.002+08:00

Remember Silly Nangka? This year's meeting will be at Bali! It will be from 19th to 22nd this month.

The Account Manager was transferred, so now I'm also the Account Manager for my current project :x

As I have more responsibility in my current project, not sure whether the office here will allow me to leave for Bali. Anyway, it's on the weekend so I'll try my best to go as I've never been there before ;)

Wish me luck!

Illegal Kuli

2009-02-06T17:50:00.002+08:00

Few days back while I was in Malaysia, I went to Asia Cafe to have my dinner. Half way through my dinner, the workers there ran like crazy. I thought there was a big fight going on until I saw officers with Imigresen written on their back. Those who had legitimate documents made a beeline and walked calmly to the officers.

After I finished my dinner, I had to walk past them. I was shocked to see that they were asked to squat while waiting for the officers to check their document. Come'on, didn't they queued properly and handed in their documents? You don't have to treat them that way right?

Actually I can relate to the foreigners because in a way I'm actually one of them. You see, when I went to Philippines and now New Zealand, I've always used a visitor visa instead of a business visa.

Why didn't I apply for a visa? Well, company usually wants us to fly to a country immediately so there's no time for that. Further more to apply for a business visa to NZ, we need to send in the application to the NZ embassy either in Singapore or Sydney.

While I was coming into Auckland this time, my colleague went through a lot of trouble. It took us almost 2 hours to clear immigration and customs.

I certainly hope that I won't be blacklisted from entering a country, subsequently being barred from other country.

Sidenote:
I spoke to US boss about dates. As I would go there much later than he expected, Canada was out of the picture as they need me there within this month. He said most probably I'll be in Chicago. This feeling is the same like when I joined the company, they can't make up their mind on where to send me to.

Tagged by Vboy

2009-01-31T08:27:00.003+08:00

Where is your cell phone?
Beside me

Your significant other?
Imma married to my career

Your mother?
Learning

Your father?
Old

Your favorite thing?
Any new gadgets. New one will outshine the old one in a blink

Your dream last night?
I seldom dream

Your favorite drink?
Teh O Ais Limau/Iced Lemon Tea

Your dream/goal?
I'm a short term goal kidda person because I don't like to limit myself.

What room are you in?
Bedroom in Sri Muda

Your hobby?
Photography

Your fear?
Heights

Where do you want to be in 6 years?
Back home in Malaysia/Europe

Where were you last night?
Home

Muffins?
With hot choco please.

Wish list item?
Holiday

Last thing you did?
Reading

What are you wearing?
Nadah, just woke up.

TV?
Nat Geo

Your pets?
I don't like pets because most animals' lifespan is shorter and turtles doesn't interest me at all

Friends?
Loads, heaps, plenty

Your life?
Busy

Your mood?
Needs rest

Missing someone?
Too many to list :P

Drinking?
Yeap

Smoking?
Nope

Your car?
Proton "Ah Beng" Saga, hope to buy a Audi A4

Something you're not wearing?
Everything lor, duh

Your favorite store?
Whichever is the cheapest?

Your favorite color?
Blue

When is the last time you cried?
At least half year ago

Who will resend this?
Not sure

Where do you go to over and over?
Office? Airport?

Five people who email me regularly?
Spam bots

My favorite place to eat?
Nando's

Favorite place I'd like to be at right now?
Europe

Inviting all that would like to do this to give it a shot :D

Worklife

2009-01-25T09:55:00.002+08:00

Yesterday something funny happened, colleague A called me to ask me to attend a meeting today. Yes, on a Sunday but that's not the story. I'm used to working on weekends as usual.

Colleague A also went on about colleague X bad mouthing me in front of the boss. I don't mind because it's not real and the boss is the Deputy MD in Australia office. In other words, I don't report to him as I'm a regional staff.

Colleague J is my close buddy in the company, he over heard colleague A trying to jeopardize me from coming back to Malaysia for CNY and he told me. Colleague A even had the nerve to tell me that he actually persuade the boss to allow me to go back.

It's really funny that colleague A and X is doing all these. Or may be this is their nature - Politics of a Chinese company.

I'm more amused with them rather than pissed but surely work would be more effective without all these. Hope that these insecure colleagues in their late 20s can grow up and strive hard to success rather than trying to be on top by pushing everyone down.

ps. Happy Chinese New Year to all readers :)

Misunderstanding ei?

2009-01-23T19:55:00.002+08:00

Called up US boss. Spoke a bit and he reaffirmed me that the plan is still very ON. The funny thing is, he said most probably I would be in Canada rather than US.

I'll be joining North America regional office, similar to my current job where I'm in South Pacific region office.

Will keep you guys updated. Sorry for not blogging recently, the internet in Auckland is dead.

ps. I'm back in Bolehland, will fly back to Auckland on the 3rd.

What?!?!?!?!

2009-01-16T16:30:00.004+08:00

Today I received a mail from my boss asking me to call him so I did.

When I called him, he had many issues to talk to me. Yada... yada... yada...

Then he said this, "Damien, the plan to US might not push through. Be prepared for that.". He continued with, "Just stay in South Pacific, we will assure that you have plenty of room to grow".

I just said ok. I don't understand why. Called up his boss which is my boss who requested me to transfer.

Me: Is the US reallocation plan not pushing through?
KW: AFAIK, the plan is still on.
Me: But AJ told me that it's not going to happen.
KW: It's still on. I will talk to AJ. Did ZD spoke to you?
Me: Nope.
KW: That smelly pussy! (Erm yeah, he said that literally). Discuss with him later and call me back.
Me: He's sleeping already as its late in US, I'll give him a call tomorrow.
KW: Ok, call me these few days.

It seems something like last time's empty promises. When the thing is suppose to happen, suddenly there are so many twist and turns.

May be it's AJ's plan to ruin my chance to go there. Yes, he a person with many tricks up his sleeves.

Jia You!

2009-01-14T19:27:00.003+08:00

I'm a self-motivator. With this job, I'm always alone with most of the team member either in Malaysia or Indonesia. When colleagues share their woes with me, I'll always show them a different angle of the story.

Scene 1
A: There's a lot of problem! Blah blah blah........... yada yada yada.......... Blah blah blah........... yada yada yada..........
Me: If there isn't any problems, we would be out of job won't we? Company hires us to solve problems ;)

Scene 2
A: The customer is crazy! They are asking for this, that, everything! There's so much work to do! Blah blah blah........... yada yada yada..........Blah blah blah........... yada yada yada..........
Me: If the customer don't give you anything to do, it means that we are out of the bid. So it's better to be busy then free ;)

My favorite line, the night is darkest before dawn. The toughest time is when you are near your goal, you are almost there! Don't give up!

Talk Crap Sing Song

2009-01-13T22:25:00.004+08:00

In my line of work, I need to always have a good insight on things and answer them spontaneously. Rather than a "Yeah, surely it's affected", below was the conversation I had with the Chairman.

RI: Did the financial crisis affect your company's projects?
Me: Those projects that have been budgeted and underway will not be halted.

It's very unlucky that the financial crisis happened in Q4 which most companies are doing their budgeting for 2009.

With the thought of financial crisis at the back of every manager's head, surely they'll be very cautious on how they spend their money but they will allocate some for CAPEX.

The cake will be smaller but surely there will be a cake. Chinese vendors have always been very aggressive on pricing. During evaluation of a bid, pricing is a big factor and the financial crisis will magnify the weight that pricing carries. Hence, Chinese vendors will have a better upper hand.

In a nutshell, total sales volume may go down but market share will go up.

** Combining some hard facts with sales talk is tough, I'm glad that we had a good discussion after that **

Masaking Alone

2009-01-10T14:01:00.003+08:00

NZ is a heaven for cooking. You can easily find fresh milk products, vege, meat and poultry. I do enjoy walking in Foodtown (think Giant/Tesco/Carrefour/Mydin) to look for food that I like and cheap bargains.

While I was shopping to fill up my kitchen, I saw Couscous. I picked it up to read the cooking instructions on the back. It's so easy! Picked it up immediately as I love Couscous.

The problem with cooking alone is that you always end up buying and cooking too much food. I can't just buy one onion right? Hmm, or can I? Remember the beef curry that I had? It was only 1/3 of the beef that I bought. I always try not to have the same food back to back so I prepared couscous and some fried egg with cabbage and tomato. Added some carbonara sauce as I would imagine it will go well with couscous and it did.

The mountain of couscous was too much for lunch so I kept some for dinner. As for dinner, I took another 1/3 of the beef and cooked beef stew. This time, I've simmered the beef stew from 2:30pm to 6:30pm. It taste so much better compared to the already very good curry that I had.

Sigh, now I have too much beef stew...... I guess I'll cook some noodles and have beef stew noodles for lunch tomorrow.

Photography

2009-01-09T20:22:00.004+08:00

I had my Alpha since Apr 12, 2008. It's been an expensive hobby since and there's no sign of stopping.

I always find the easy way out when I meet a problem with my photography which is to buy better gears rather than using other techniques first. This leads to another problem, I can't really maximize the equipments that I have since I only used some of the functions.

I love my sexy petal hood lens

One of the secrets of photographer is that we shoot many pictures and we will only show the worthy ones. Most of them will post-process it but I suck in this department so most of my pictures will only go through crop and adjusting color curves.

I seldom post up my pictures because it's not up to mark yet. When I don't know how to improve the pictures, then I will post them up and ask for comments and criticism. Most people are kind and they would give nice comments. I do appreciate when people gives me constructive comments to improve my shots.

Although there are many unpleasant incidents regarding photography, I'll share one funny one. KY Speaks once introduced a nice chinese roast specialty shop in Sri Muda which I don't know even though I stayed there for more than 20 years. Ok la, when I was studying, I always eat at home.

Dropped by the place with my cam (it's always with me) and started snapping the food. When I was snapping, the boss came over and chit chat with me. It went something like this:-

Boss: Are you from the press?
Me: Nope, just shooting so that I can blog about it. I've read another blogger recommending your shop so I came to try it out. Blah blah blah.....
Boss: Owh..... wait, let me garnish the dish properly for you.
** After garnishing the dish with loads of leafy greens **
Boss: Now it's nice to shoot.

So I carry on shooting then makan the delicious "glass" char siew (although its a bit too fatty) and chinese sausage.

After awhile of makan, the boss came back with a plate of roasted goose and he said "this is for you to try, give me the URL next time you are here"

The roasted goose was very nice. Tapao-ed another quarter for my family (of course paid la) and my mom said we'll order half bird for CNY :D

Oh Fark!

2009-01-09T13:48:00.004+08:00

I spent more than RM6500 when I was back in Malaysia. It was 19 days so on average I spent around RM350/day.

Rough figures
Camera stuff = RM2800
Clothes = RM700
Food and liquor = RM1700
Others* = RM2300

*ang pow money la, petrol la, toll la, presents la, whatever-I-spend-with-cash

I knew I spent a lot but I wasn't prepared for this colossal figure. I'm ok with camera stuff and clothes but I guess I need to cut down on food and liquor. Time to save, save and save.

Beef Curry

2009-01-09T13:16:00.003+08:00

It's so tasty that I had to blog about it immediately!

A few months ago when Gopi was here, he taught me how to cook curry the correct way. After that, I've always wanted to cook curry but I just didn't managed to.

When I came back from Malaysia this time, I told myself I have to cook it once. Yesterday after work, I went to buy some beef and other stuff that I wanted to cook.

I started cooking about 7pm and by 8:45pm, the beef wasn't soft yet. So I scooped out the vegies and had vegetable curry for dinner.

Yeap, lots of vege in the curry. Since I decides what to buy, why not eat healthy right?

Not giving up the beef curry, I allowed it to simmer up till 11pm by constantly adding water and looking after the heat. Waited for it to cool down and chuck it into the fridge.

Today when I came home, I decided to have dry curry instead of normal curry so I heated up the curry and allow it to dry itself off.

As you can see the vegies is already all soft like a proper curry, the beef is so tender that it falls apart just by poking it with a fork. Although not visually appealing, it smells amazing and taste yummilicious! I guess putting less vegies will make it taste/look/smell better :D

Recap of 2008

2009-01-07T18:57:00.000+08:00

1. Went on a first company trip to Sri Lanka.
It was a cool party by the pool!

2. Missed the chance to vote.
Anyway, PR won! Rawr~~~!

3. Won some awards in work.
Awards that you shouldn't share about in work due to many people will be envious :(

4. Started to enjoy drinking rather than drinking blindly.
Most people would drink whatever their friend is drinking. Again I would like to emphasize, I've only been drunk once in my whole life.

5. It was a taxing year for me in the office.
Many days without sleep and countless attempt to phyco myself to keep this job.

6. Ended a 1880 days relationship.
It was a hard time for me but I found that many people do care for me. Thanks all, you know who you are.

7. My first increment in my life.
17.5% is fantastic for a first timer :P

8. Found a new hobby - Photography
I guess this expensive hobby will stick with me some a long tmime.

9. I didn't manage to get a diving license.
I was hardly in Malaysia to begin with :(

10. Got my big breakthrough is my company.
It was lots of hardwork and luck.

11. Additional increment after winning project is not kept.
I found out that it was rejected by HR. Well, said my boss.

12. Failed to achieve my savings target.
I really have to work on this.

12. Been to US and UAE.
I would like to visit Taiwan, Japan and Europe. Regardless for work or holiday.

13. Overspend a few times.
Knowing how to earn without enjoying spending is dumb right? This contradict with number 12 :/

14. Knew how to maximize my credit limit for my credit card.
No la, not so serious of over spending la. All for company.

15. Facebook!!!
Need I say more?

16. Rather than giving me an increment, my boss offers me to reallocate.
We still need to discuss about the package.

17. Qantas Silver and Enrich Silver
No more queue!

18. Had an awesome time back home
Attended annual dinner, spent X'mas, my birthday, friend's wedding, New Year with my friends and family is amazing.

End of 2008

2009-01-07T18:04:00.003+08:00

2008 didn't end pretty well for me. Mom of a friend and a close colleague passed away. It also made me think about my close friend's dad who died almost 2 years ago.

I'll talk more about my colleague because it's the life that I'm living. Lily joined our team about 6 months ago. Never got the chance to meet her until recently because we are always on the go. She's been supporting my project in New Zealand for some time now but she hasn't got the chance to drop by.

I've always promised her that whenever she's free, I'll arrange her to come here. We've tried to arrange her to come here 3 times but she's tied up with other projects. In the end I told her, lets fly to NZ after New Year.

She met with a freak accident outside her apartment in KL on New Year's Eve. She's a hardworking and bubbly girl, the only daugther in the family and we've only met 2 times. It's so so so so sad.

Everytime during a toast over meals, I'll always insist that my family wishes me Bon Voyage and safe whenever I'm traveling. They would always say things like good fortune and good luck with my career but to me, health and safety is above all.

No matter how much my company or the insurance compensate Lily's family, she will not be with us anymore. May she rest in peace and hope that her parents will be ok.

May be

2008-12-30T23:33:00.002+08:00

I'm having a blast this trip back home! Yes, I want to say this over and over again. I realized how much I've missed out last time. When I was in a relationship, she was the center of my universe. I would plan out everything with her in mind.

Now that I'm free to arrange what ever I want, I get to meet so many friends and do so many spontaneous things which I don't have to explain.

It's kinda sad that I have to leave this new found feeling that I like. Since I'm still young, career out weights personal short term gratification.

I love Malaysia for all the F that it's got

2008-12-29T12:50:00.001+08:00

Family + Friends + Food = Fun!

I'm really having a great time in Malaysia. Thanks all for the wonderful time!

I'm gonna be a L soon

2008-12-26T08:43:00.003+08:00

Since I'm back here, I've arranged to have my meals (lunch, dinner and supper) with my family and friends. Being a Malaysian, having acquaintances during meals is more of a norm as compared to foreigners where meeting up for them is usually over coffee or drinking session.

This time around other than attending the various events that I've mentioned on the post below, I took the chance to savor as much Malaysian food as I can. With lunch, dinner and supper, I've never had the feeling of hungry since I've landed in Malaysia (Ok, once. There was one where someone was late for a gathering).

It was a good chance to tell everyone that I'm due to leave to the States in late 09Q1. Most of the reaction was pleasant with well wishes but surely there are some sour grape as well. When someone says something like "no amount of money can make me leave Malaysia", there are two ways you can interpret it. It's either the circumstances doesn't allow the person to leave Malaysia or they just want to make a statement where opportunity like this is not beneficial to them because they wouldn't want it anyway. I guess it boils down to the person's attitude and the way he said it.

Spending Counter: MYR3-4K ish, die die die.

Home Sweet Home

2008-12-21T09:01:00.003+08:00

It feels so nice to be home this time. I guess this will be the longest home coming ever for me since I've joined this company.

Other being in Malaysia for a long time, I'm happy because so happens that there are so many events. Hakka gathering, Winter Solstice (Dong Tzi), Simon's birthday (my buddy from sec school), Christmas, Annual Dinner, ma big day, New Year, etc etc.

When I get home, the usual drill would be going through all the mails that is meant for me. Like I said before, my parents will definitely open all my mails for me. So make sure if you are sending anything personal, do state it clearly :P

Surprisingly, my tier level for Qantas Frequent Flyer has been upgraded to Silver whereas my MAS Enrich is still blue. There's a couple more flights to go.

Next would be letters from banks. Account statement, credit card statement, etc etc. I got a few regret letter for denying credit card service as well. Owh well, I'm still stuck with one card now. I called the agents up and they told me it's due to them not being able to get me on the phone :/

And finally, I'm happy to come back because I can spend like crazy! It's been only 3 days and I've spent at least few thousand. There's no sign of stopping yet. Die, spend bonus money before its in my account.

Bottoms Up

2008-12-13T05:33:00.001+08:00

Merry Christmas to bloggies of Abyss of Fatigue

It's been awhile since I scribbled something here. It's either I'm busy at work or too tired from X'mas parties.

We had island party theme

Imagine drinking back to back every night, sometimes even since lunch. Yesterday was X'mas party for NZ office. It started since 1pm till 7pm. 6 hours of unlimited supply of liquor.

Yes Pumkinz, including Heineken

6-7 bottle of beer and 1 whole bottle of Sauvignon Blanc. Like that numbness after all that.

Ariba~~~ Muchos Graciaas!

Nom Nom Nom

2008-12-10T06:52:00.000+08:00

As you all know, I've started a swimming regime to get myself in shape. Yes, I know round is also a shape.

It all went well until recently where I've been working late everyday. It pisses me off a lot. So as a revenge to my company, I will have meals with my colleagues here in the pretext of dining with the customer.

High stress + minimal sleep + binge = FAT

Be prepared to welcome this piggy home.

Lonely

2008-12-08T19:26:00.000+08:00

It's 12:40am.

I've been working all by myself in the office, the silence is so loud. At the peak of my current project, the previous project in Philippines has asked me to explain something that will require 1 page of M$ Word document to explain. The problem is I've explained to them more them 5 times to separate people in Philippines office.

They insist in asking me separately and not communicate internally. Every time I would explain and put a footnote saying please refer to person A/B/C/D but they just don't care.

I still have other work to be completed by tonight. At times like this, I wish to talk to someone. To beg for pity, to release some stress, to rant, whatever is it, anyone can offer me your ears?

Excitement + Anxiety

2008-12-07T04:18:00.000+08:00

Usually these 2 feelings doesn't come together, it's either you are happy or worried. Having handled projects with so many highs and lows, I'm quite numb towards incidents in the office. Even something good happens in the project, it'll just be ticking something off the list.

I remembered last time around when I won the project, I wasn't ecstatic. It was more like finally it's done and lets proceed to another phase. It's only after sometime, I start to savor the achievement. When I got back to Malaysia and the whole office is congratulating me and asking me for a treat.

There's something new on the platter that will change my life. My boss in HQ confirmed the reallocation when I called him at 10:30pm at night, it's 5:30pm for him anyway. He told me to start drafting out the handover plan. Called my boss to draw out some plans and candidates. This job really exposed me to all sorts of processes.

Working professionally aside, I have to take care of my own interest. I've been punching numbers in M$ Excel and it seems like a hard case to push through. After considering the 30% tax, the lack of EPF, my own apartment, standard of living, my current pay, *cough* the humungous bonus that I was expecting *cough*, and etc., the number is quite bloated. I've even considered being hired in HQ and then transferred there which makes it more complicated but the tax would be 20% only. Hopefully, I can sort this out without having too much problem.

It'll be a whole new life. New friends, new colleagues, new clients, new challenges, new apartment, new life (ok, I said that already)...... So many uncertainties makes me on my toes. I like a predictable life with unpredictable incidents. It's ok to go for ski diving or eating crazy food out of a sudden but I know how am I going to live my life.

For those of you who is wondering, most probably I'll be in Plano, Texas which is near to Dallas. We have 9 offices there and TX is our North America regional HQ. Yeap, my life will be pretty much in the air as I can only get to the clients by air. Targetted trasnfer would be 09Q1. Wish me luck in my nego for moolah.

Stress

2008-12-04T02:24:00.000+08:00

I'm a funny person, my performance is almost proportionate to my stress level. When there's no stress, I would dilly dally on the task at hand.

Yesterday, a new timeline has been drawn up for my project and it's quite tight. I can feel the stress building up and people around me can feel it too.

Back to the funny part, I actually like this feeling quite a bit. It pushes me to work harder. Diamond only forms under great heat and pressure. This rock has proved its trustworthiness and will be transferred to a new place for many new challenges. It's confirmed, wish me luck.

PS. some mainland colleagues can't pronounce my name properly. They either call be by Day-Min or Diamond. ROFLOL!

Alamak

2008-12-01T07:15:00.000+08:00

I'm staying with a Malaysian colleague now. Everything is cool except he's very calculative when it comes to food.

Let's say we plan to cook something for dinner so we went to the supermarket. While we are there, we started buying stuff for dinner. Here comes the problem, he would complain most of the things is expensive. The thing that he kept repeating is eggs. Yes, I know 1 friggin' egg is about 60 cents ringgit.

The thing is by cooking ourselves, the meal is usually less than NZD5 and it's healthier. A typical meal would cost NZD10 regardless what you eat unless you want to go with fastfood which is NZD8 to NZD10.

Don't let me get started with bananas now. Aduh!

I've even cooked a few meals free for him.

Next please.

ps. his basic salary is at least 50% higher than me. To be fair, he spent RM200k dumping his ex.

Keep it going

2008-11-30T18:11:00.000+08:00

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!

2008-11-28T02:08:00.000+08:00

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

2008-11-27T07:04:00.000+08:00

OMG OMG OMG!

Nice food

2008-11-23T18:21:00.001+08:00

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

2008-11-23T06:25:00.000+08:00

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

2008-11-22T12:42:00.000+08:00

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

2008-11-20T17:52:00.000+08:00

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~!

2008-11-20T08:02:00.000+08:00

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

2008-11-19T18:35:00.000+08:00

Wait.

Perks

2008-11-16T09:07:00.000+08:00

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

2008-11-15T05:26:00.001+08:00

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

2008-11-14T23:01:00.000+08:00

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

I miss you.

Tempted but enough

2008-11-11T22:32:00.000+08:00

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

2008-11-10T20:12:00.001+08:00

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

2008-11-09T11:26:00.000+08:00

It's the coldest summer ever!

Pou pou sou (proposal)

2008-11-08T09:39:00.001+08:00

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

2008-11-06T17:50:00.001+08:00

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

2008-11-02T00:27:00.000+08:00

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

2008-11-01T13:58:00.001+08:00

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.

1.00 MYR = 1.04677 AED

2008-10-31T03:01:00.000+08:00

Yeap, its my first time to Middle East region. Slightly excited but I'll be there for 3 days only. Since this is an emergency trip, I was not able to contact my 2 friends who's working there. I'm sure one of them wants me to bring liquor to him, haha.

I still owe you guys a blog on Chicago and now it'll be another one on Dubai.

A touch of class

2008-10-27T07:18:00.001+08:00

A sweet close friend of mine knew that I've always wanted a name card holder. The last time around when I went back, she gave me a surprise by handing this to me.

The usual card holder you see will either be metal or PVC This is different, I liked it the moment I saw it. It'll be the house for all my foreign currency and the plastic which is being sent to my house. The previous plastic didn't really served me that well although I've used it extensively

Back to the card holder, it's better than what I've expected and it gave me a touch of class. You can buy everything in the world but you can't buy good taste

Thanks dear

PS. It's Labor Day here so I'm not working today. Happy Dewali to all Hindu friends.

Opps, I did it again and again

2008-10-25T15:42:00.001+08:00

After just arriving from Sydney yesterday, today the gang wants to go to factory outlet. Oh well, I went there once so I brought them there today. Bought a nice Nike shoe, 1 shirt and a cap.

For the shirt, the Esprit storekeeper is a Malaysian I knew the first time I went there. On top of the factory outlet price, we got another 30% discount. There are many ways to use charm, hehe.

May be we'll go to an island tomorrow. It's hard to find 5 Malaysian colleagues in NZ, soon they'll all leave me alone here again.

Opps, I did it again

2008-10-23T17:26:00.001+08:00

Like a true Australian, I went to shopping today. Aussies are paid weekly on Thursday. So effectively, they have 13 months salary (52/4=13).

Today's bill came up to RM300ish. Before mom starts jumping on me, most of it went to supplements for my knee and pills to boost my energy level as I always suffer from jetlag.

I reached on Monday morning from an 8 hour flight from KL and straight to the office for a presentation to the CTO and gang. Fell like a log on to the bed when I reached home late at night about 11pm.

Next day, I woke up at 6am due to the FREAKIN' sun. I can't sleep when there's light. After a few days here, the jetlag has gone but the cycle begins as I'm flying to Auckland tomorrow. The story doesn't end there.

I'll fly to China next friday, the cycle begins again!

Ok ok, to be fair I bought a Kathmandu sling bag which I don't need but it's damn cheap. Even the cashier said that it's lower than staff price.

Who wants a souvenir?

P&C

2008-10-21T16:52:00.000+08:00

Sorry for not updating for a long time, been busy the moment I step foot in Bolehland. Tried to arrange every session of lunch, dinner and supper with different gang of friends.

For the first time, half way through yum cha (Asia Cafe) with high school buddies, the sugar cane and fruit juice became beer. A bit like old uncles drinking at food court. The hot and humid environment didn't help at all.

Mom said she don't plan to bake cookies for sale this coming Chinese New Year and asked me to give her ang pow of RM2000. Lesson learn, do not disclose to your parent how much you make every month.

For me its quite unavoidable as they will open all letters meant for me including my bank statement and credit card bills. For the CC bills, she saw that I spent quite an amount on clothes when I'm overseas and she kept nagging me for wasting money.

I usually buy when I see a bargain and me being the typical me, I'll only buy it when it's on sale or from warehouse sale.

There you go mom.

May be I should open another bank account where the bills will be sent to my office rather than my house.

My α Journey Cinco – Infinity and Beyond

2008-10-09T00:09:00.003+08:00

This post is reserved for the convention. I’m sure I’ll learn and hopefully improve from this convention.

It’s amazing how a picture can tell a story and I’m glad that I have an Alpha to tell my story, including some interesting ones (s) (s) (s).

Wish me luck in the contest!

My α Journey Uno – Baby steps
My α Journey Dos – And there shall be light
My α Journey Cero – How I became an Cinnabar
My α Journey Tres – Fall in love
My α Journey Cuatro – Alpha Convention
My α Journey Cinco – Infinity and Beyond

My α Journey Cuatro – Alpha Convention

2008-10-09T00:01:00.002+08:00

Learning is a continuous process, other than the basic photography and photo editing workshop conducted every month. Sony also has arranged a series of FREE activities for Alpha owners to hone our skills. Having always on business trip away from Malaysia, I’ve already missed out 3 events below:-
Explore Malaysia With Sony Alpha – Malacca
Sony Alpha 9th August Seminar @ Le Meridien Hotel
Explore Malaysia With Sony Alpha - Sungai Congkak

Not only these events are free, they give out goodie bags, free meals and not to forget it’s very rewarding in the sense where you get to improve your photography skills. To top it off, there are always heaps of gifts to be given away.

When Sony staff hinted about a convention, I’m all for it. The registration opened and I registered regardless whether I can make it or not. If I really can’t make it, I’ll just pass the chance to other fellow Alpha owners.

Being the first 400, my registration is confirmed. So can I make it? I’m drafting this mail 39999 feet in the air slightly south of Jawa island. Yes baby, I’m flying in from Auckland!

On catching up with buddies, sorry guys, ma’ boss is asking to fly to Sydney on Monday to handle another problem. Most of you would be thinking I have a cool job but it ain’t cool when you have to fly so frequently to solve problems other left behind.

It’s funny that I registered for 2 events and I manage to make it to both of them. Yeah, so my plan on coming back worked slightly too perfect where I’ll fly in for the convention and then fly to Sydney after that. May be next time I’ll be more precise with what I wished for, something like “I really hope I can make it to the convention and a bit more time left for family and friends”.

My α Journey Uno – Baby steps
My α Journey Dos – And there shall be light
My α Journey Cero – How I became an Cinnabar
My α Journey Tres – Fall in love
My α Journey Cuatro – Alpha Convention
My α Journey Cinco – Infinity and Beyond

My α Journey Tres – Fall in love

2008-10-08T23:55:00.003+08:00

After learning how to use manual mode, it opened a wide door for many creative photography. My Alpha will always be in front of my belly or at my waist no matter where I go. Since Sony is new in DSLR scene, you hardly can see any Alpha around. When I do see another Alpha, I will walk up and say hi! Not to forget Konica Minolta users as well because Sony bought them over.

After getting the hang of Manual mode, the fun doesn’t stop there. Kelvin WB gave me another space to play with. Have you seen a beautiful sunset photo which the sky is orangy and all? It’s WB working its magic.

Although I started of with the determination to have a minimalist gear with my kitlens only. I failed, period. Being able to scale is dangerous, did some research and I got myself Sigma 70-300 DG APO to add some range to my arsenal. Out of all the types of photography that I shoot, I like candid the most. The Sigma gave me the advantage of being obscure when preying for a candid shot. The innocence of children is priceless.

The wireless TLL function that comes with the body is killing me now. I’m try to refrain from investing more into gears but the new HVL-F58 flash is so yummy. This new found love-hate hobby is driving me crazy and depleting the numbers in my bank account. Now I can understand how a person can spend tens of thousands of hard earned money for a handmade top range lens.

My α Journey Uno – Baby steps
My α Journey Dos – And there shall be light
My α Journey Cero – How I became an Cinnabar
My α Journey Tres – Fall in love
My α Journey Cuatro – Alpha Convention
My α Journey Cinco – Infinity and Beyond

My α Journey Cero – How I became an Cinnabar

2008-10-08T23:49:00.002+08:00

Decided to post ala Ring 0 style, now for the prologue.

Initially, camera serves as a snapshot device of my life. 2 years ago, I bought a P&S camera. The camera served me well and I started to love photography more. Came the day that I left it in the company car. Well, that’s another post.

Extensive research on the net (dpreview, CNET, etc) is always part of the process when I want to buy something. If you were to ask me which model of P&S to buy, I can tell you the pros and cons about a few candidates. The thought of getting a DSLR came to mind and I started to look at them as well.

Since I love photography, why not buy a camera that allows me to yield better results? I was clear with what I want – a beginner DSLR which gives the best deal right out of the box.

I lined up a few models from different brands and the choice is obvious on paper. The anti dust sensors, the eye-start auto focus (everyone says that this is uber cool), and the Super Steady Shot (SSS) makes perfect sense. Any lens (including 3rd party) that is attached to the Alpha will have image stabilizer whereas for other brands, you need to buy lens which has some sort of IS technology in every single lens that you buy.

A200’s price sealed the deal; it was also the cheapest in the market. As I said, the choice is clear but there’s something that stops me from buying it. I’m NOT in Malaysia. Sigh, it’ll be 1 month before I’m scheduled to go home. I went to Hidalgo to look for A200 but it seems that the launch date of A200 in Pinoyland is no where to be seen. The guys back in Malaysia were showing off their joy with the A200 in LYN. This gave me to read more to find out the pros and cons of the Alpha.

When I reached home, I went to Sungei Wang to get the Alpha. They salesman tried to coax me to get a Canon instead. He let me played with 2 models and the macho Alpha strengthens my choice. The grip of Alpha is perfect and the mirror flap/shutter sound is just plain manly. To be honest, one of the reasons I decided to buy DSLR is because it looks cool and Sony wins hands down in this department.

My α Journey Uno – Baby steps
My α Journey Dos – And there shall be light
My α Journey Cero – How I became an Cinnabar
My α Journey Tres – Fall in love
My α Journey Cuatro – Alpha Convention
My α Journey Cinco – Infinity and Beyond

My α Journey Dos – And there shall be light

2008-10-08T23:39:00.002+08:00

After getting back to Pinoyland, I was a lonely ranger with my Alpha. It’s only the buddies in LYN and AMC (now Alphanatics) which can help me out virtually. The temptation of going Manual is getting stronger but whenever I try, I would be disappointed as I wouldn’t know what combination of ISO, Aperture, and Shutter speed I should be using for different situation.

It really did refrain me from enjoying photography, its like a spooky closet which you’d avoid and ignore. I want to be a proper DSLR user rather than using a DSLR as a P&S. Sony provides Basic Photography with Alpha DSLR every month. I dived into the 12-6-2008 registration not being sure whether I can make it back to Malaysia or not.

I’ve planned the timing (visa) right, sped some of the task so that it would seem that the workload will not be high and they won’t be asking me to extend my visa. Everything worked perfectly, although there was still anxiety when I was heading to Ninoy Aquino Airport. It’s only when I boarded the plane that I feel relieved. I’ve heard of a case where a colleague was asked to go back into office from Soekarno-Hatta Intl Airport for some urgent matters.

Long story short, I was in the workshop learning about the basics all over again the right way. There’s nothing like straightening out all the basics, after all it was very much of a self-taught/exploration journey all these while. When John the instructor started explaining the exposure meter in Manual mode, I saw the light that I was looking for. It was empowering indeed, I now can shoot in Manual!

My α Journey Uno – Baby steps
My α Journey Dos – And there shall be light
My α Journey Cero – How I became an Cinnabar
My α Journey Tres – Fall in love
My α Journey Cuatro – Alpha Convention
My α Journey Cinco – Infinity and Beyond

My α Journey Uno – Baby steps

2008-10-08T23:33:00.002+08:00

When I took the Alpha home, I’m so excited! There’s always a kid in every guy when it comes to gadgets. Straight away I charged the battery and started to flip the manual. Imagine the agony of learning steps to adjust some settings but not being able to try them out!

It was dinner time and mom asked me to have dinner together. After being away from home for so long, there are a lot of catching up to do but I was distracted by the manual. After writing this down, I feel a bit guilty that I wasn’t paying 100% of my attention conversation over dinner.

Having owned a Point&Shoot camera before the Alpha, I used the Auto mode on the Alpha extensively. From the encouragement (sometimes jeering, haha) of other Alpha males (pun intended, we are cool!), I’ve started using Program AE, Aperture-priority AE, Shutter-priority AE modes. Then there’s Multi Segment, Center-Weighted, Spot metering and White Balance to learn.

It was a trial and error kind of thing in the beginning. The flexibility of a DSLR means there are so many things that could go wrong. Slowly I understand the cam and photography more, hence less of shoot-review-delete.

As time goes by, I’m tempted to use manual mode but I had no idea what to do with it. I need some light!

My α Journey Uno – Baby steps
My α Journey Dos – And there shall be light
My α Journey Cero – How I became an Cinnabar
My α Journey Tres – Fall in love
My α Journey Cuatro – Alpha Convention
My α Journey Cinco – Infinity and Beyond

Erm..... I have a Bachelor Degree in E&E.......

2008-10-07T04:13:00.000+08:00

This industry is very competitive, casual chatting will always end up with

A: I did my Masters on Radio Frequency

B: I wrote a paper about Air Interface Protocol for my Masters

C: Everyone has a Masters Degree in China, so I did one as well

D: She's Dr. Kiki to you. She did a PhD. before joining the company

E: We address him as Teacher Daniel because he was a university lecturer

F: I did a Bachelor's Degree in E&E from a small uni in Malaysia.....

Shall I go back to school?

Leaving on a jet plane

2008-10-05T18:32:00.005+08:00

My mom always tell me that I'm a kampung boy because she remembered the first time I was in a car, I kept crying and crying and crying non stop. It's funny that some incident will stay in the mind for a long time.

This kampung boy was excited the first time he was on the plane. The airport, the seat, the sudden acceleration, the meals...... Due to my job nature, I no longer have anxiety when going to the Airport. The food and wine could be better.

After the long flight to and fro Chicago and Auckland, finally I found the determination to calculate the total journey that I've traveled on a plane. Below is a list of the flights that I've been on.

Flight distance obtained from http://www.world-airport-codes.com/

Subang > Pangkor
Distance between Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah (SZB) and Pangkor (PKG)
9184 kilometers (5740 miles) < Siao liao lor
166 kilometers (103 miles) X 2 = 332 KM (using wikimapia)

Kuala Lumpur > Kuala Terengganu
Distance between KLIA (KUL) and Sultan Mahmood (TGG)
332 kilometers (208 miles) X 2 = 664 KM

Kuala Lumpur > Kuching then Miri > Kuala Lumpur
Distance between KLIA (KUL) and Kuching (KCH)
969 kilometers (606 miles) X 1 = 969 KM

Distance between Miri (MYY) and KLIA (KUL)
1376 kilometers (860 miles) X 1 = 1376 KM

Marudi > Mulu
Distance between Marudi (MUR) and Mulu (MZV)
56 kilometers (35 miles) X 2 = 112 KM

Kuala Lumpur > Sydney
Distance between KLIA (KUL) and Kingsford Smith (SYD)
6580 kilometers (4113 miles) X 2 = 13160 KM

Sydney > Gold Coast
Distance between Kingsford Smith (SYD) and Gold Coast/Coolangatta (OOL)
678 kilometers (424 miles) X 2 = 1356 KM

Kuala Lumpur > Penang
Distance between KLIA (KUL) and Penang Intl (PEN)
326 kilometers (204 miles) X 2 = 652 KM

Kuala Lumpur > Jakarta
Distance between KLIA (KUL) and Soekarno-Hatta Intl (CGK)
1128 kilometers (705 miles) X 2 = 2256 KM

Kuala Lumpur > Manila
Distance between KLIA (KUL) and Ninoy Aquino Intl (MNL)
2488 kilometers (1555 miles) X 16 = 39808 KM

Kuala Lumpur > Macau
Distance between KLIA (KUL) and Macau Intl (MFM)
2509 kilometers (1568 miles) X 2 = 5018 KM

Manila > Singapore > Colombo > Singapore > Manila
Distance between Manila (MNL) and Changi (SIN)
2373 kilometers (1483 miles) X 2 = 4746 KM

Distance between Changi (SIN) and Colombo (CMB)
2748 kilometers (1718 miles) X 2 = 5496 KM

Manila > Cagayan De Oro
Distance between Ninoy Aquino Intl (MNL) and Cagayan De Oro Domestic (CGY)
783 kilometers (489 miles) X 2 = 1566 KM

Kuala Lumpur > Auckland
Distance between KLIA (KUL) and Auckland Intl (AKL)
8697 kilometers (5436 miles) X 2 = 17394 KM

Auckland > Sydney
Distance between Auckland (AKL) and Kingsford Smith (SYD)
2158 kilometers (1349 miles) X 4 = 8632

Auckland > Los Angeles > Chicago > Los Angeles > Auckland
Distance between Auckland (AKL) and Los Angeles Intl (LAX)
10480 kilometers (6550 miles) X 2 = 20960 KM

Distance between Los Angeles Intl (LAX) and Chicago O'hare Intl (ORD)
2800 kilometers (1750 miles) X 2 = 5600 KM

Total Distance = 130,097 KM

The airlines that I've flown with and my comments

Pros: Very polite staff, newspaper, delicious peanuts, plenty of entertainment, nice pillow, announcement of baggage carousel
Cons: Apple juice is meant for business class only

Pros: Nice cocktail (Singapore Sling), many specific diet meals, printed menu
Cons: Lousy mixed nuts

Pros: Ice cream, thick magazine, announcement of baggage carousel
Cons: Relatively slow service

Pros: Nothing special
Cons: Unorganized ground staff, lousy meals

Pros: Crew that can speak 9 languages
Cons: Crappy entertainment

Pros: Nothing special
Cons: Food need to buy separately

Pros: Nothing special
Cons: Bread like rock

Pros: Nothing special
Cons: Trying to squeeze profit in every way

Pros: Play games with kids in the air
Cons: Nothing special

Pros: Nothing special
Cons: Nothing special

As for plane type, I prefer Boeing for its smooth flight and headrest. When Airbus deploy its tires, it will give a loud and hard "tuck" sound but the interior looks better.