For I am the messenger..
I didn't actually get shot literally, but I sort of felt that way.
Last Friday I noticed one of my colleagues doing something that broke company policy and through a sheer lack of judgement, I decided to tell them directly instead of doing it anonymously via the many channels that my company provides. Now, usually I do it anonymously (yes, I find these instances every now and then..) but with this colleague I had the impression that they would understand it was the wrong thing, appreciate the heads up and proceed to do the right thing.
Unfortunately for me the experience wasn't even close to that. The first few words back included, "You should know me better. I'm sad. Are you going to complain? I don't want to get into trouble." No thanks to an internal messaging system at work, the colleague had the cheek to post comments meant for other people to me, which included, "He wants to know what I'm going to do. Which leader I am gonig to speak to. He still wants to know." When I told them they've posted on the wrong chat, there wasn't a slightest hint of regret or sorry in the reply. "I'm not a technical person. Yeah, it's a mistake." Rude?
It's not the end of it. In my note to this colleague I explained my concerns, where the company policies were broken and that if they did not do anything to report/correct the error, I would. That, somehow turned into me wanting to 'complain'. Sigh. (see why it's never a good idea to tell colleagues directly their errors?) by the end of the day I got an sms to explain that they are taking steps to migitate the problem. It also came with something along the lines of " I wished you'd had told me there and then if you knew I did something wrong so I could correct it immediately. If you knew you were going to complain anyway..."
So there it is, the messenger shot dead. Granted, not exactly the most subtle of messengers but not supposed to be shot nonetheless. Even if I could have told them straight away (which I couldn't, as I wasn't completely sure and by the time I was, the 'situation' was beyond rectification. But does anybody care?) it wasn't my responsibility to help them avoid non-compliance. They needed to help themselves first.
Oh well. Nothing pays as well as doing the right thing. I'll remember to not trust the person whom I have observed to have breached company rules to act lawfully and just raise all my concerns anonymously. It's not so much the fear of retribution I try to avoid, its the fact that the person(s) involved would never (ok, highly unlikely) appreciate being told their wrong, late. oh, somehow it's my fault, and not theirs...
Monday, October 12, 2009
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Of Friends and....
Well, the whole lack of it..
For those unfamiliar of me, I have few friends. At the current moment I count 3. But then again, friends for me are people that I can really call upon in my hour of need and that I know, despite all our differences I will not have any problems spending time with them.
The funny thing is that, I realise (awhile back, actually), none of my friends belong to the same ethnicity as I am.
A quick aside, as I live in Malaysia, where there are several major races and countless minor ones, despite all our hoo har on being a mutiracial nation, people as they have all been have a tendency to stick to their own kind. So Malays hanging out with Malays, Chinese with Chinese, etc. Common; Expected.
I am Chinese. Of the 3 I call Friend, 1 is a Malay. Another a mixed Indian-Sarawakian Bumi( Bidayuh I think...uh oh.. not good). The last one is a Sri-Lankan Chinese mix. I have no Chinese friends. I had one during my school years but as I grew older and started working, I became more and more distant from my own ethnicity as ever. No wonder I have problems attracting chinese females. :D
I do not feel bad at the lack of Friends, as I always feel that friends should be far and few as these people require alot from me to keep. If I have too many Friends, I lose the ability to contribute to the friendship as I would want to/need to and then they all just turn into mere associates/acquaintances.
I just feel so weird sometimes that I am so far off the common grid I need to tell myself its true. Oh, its true...
For those unfamiliar of me, I have few friends. At the current moment I count 3. But then again, friends for me are people that I can really call upon in my hour of need and that I know, despite all our differences I will not have any problems spending time with them.
The funny thing is that, I realise (awhile back, actually), none of my friends belong to the same ethnicity as I am.
A quick aside, as I live in Malaysia, where there are several major races and countless minor ones, despite all our hoo har on being a mutiracial nation, people as they have all been have a tendency to stick to their own kind. So Malays hanging out with Malays, Chinese with Chinese, etc. Common; Expected.
I am Chinese. Of the 3 I call Friend, 1 is a Malay. Another a mixed Indian-Sarawakian Bumi( Bidayuh I think...uh oh.. not good). The last one is a Sri-Lankan Chinese mix. I have no Chinese friends. I had one during my school years but as I grew older and started working, I became more and more distant from my own ethnicity as ever. No wonder I have problems attracting chinese females. :D
I do not feel bad at the lack of Friends, as I always feel that friends should be far and few as these people require alot from me to keep. If I have too many Friends, I lose the ability to contribute to the friendship as I would want to/need to and then they all just turn into mere associates/acquaintances.
I just feel so weird sometimes that I am so far off the common grid I need to tell myself its true. Oh, its true...
Friday, September 25, 2009
Possibly My Greatest Flaw...
Quote:
“Until you make peace with who you are, you’ll never be content with what you have.” Doris Mortman
But I'm too content with what I have!
Sigh...
“Until you make peace with who you are, you’ll never be content with what you have.” Doris Mortman
But I'm too content with what I have!
Sigh...
Friday, September 18, 2009
Is it time...
to spill the guts out?
I'd say not quite, but it needs documenting anyway so here goes..
Prologue:
In June 2008 I just changed roles within my company and got introduced to a colleague who was rather health savvy. Through our interaction I was challenged, or encouraged, to consider reducing my weight. The key highlight of this encounter was how over a period of less than 4 weeks, I was influenced from 'Living to Eat' to 'Eating to Live'..
Note, for those unaware, I am somewhat of a glutton and find food rather irresistable. It didn't help that my childhood was one of poverty, so having food to eat more than that to stave off hunger was a luxury, one I never miss. To me, free food was always good food. Beggars can't be choosers......
I weight approximately 108KG before I caved in and asked my colleague to act as my dietician.
This first month:
The plan was to monitor what I eat. I've always overeaten, especially during lunch and dinners. Anyone who's ever seen my plate of mixed rice for lunches would comment on the mountain of food I had. So part of the gameplan was to change my food intake.
There were the usual restrictions. No oily food, deep fried dishes and fatty meats. Rice, my core intake daily, became rationed. Vegetables were changed to be my main food source. I was given a visual picture of splitting my plate to 6 portions; 4 for vegetables, 1 for meats and 1 for carbohydrates.
It was tough. But I was motivated and it was nice to have someone else care about my weight. I dug deep and got stuck in.
I recall losing about 2-3 KG the next time I weighed in. Cool stuff.. :D
The following months:
Progress was good but it was slow. At around 30+KGs overweight, I had a lot to do to even reach the border of an acceptable BMI.
As I manage the changes to my food, I was given stricter regime. Lunch remained the same, but dinner was to be made of significantly more vegetables than anything else. I for one loathe cooking, not so much because it taste awful ( I can't cook, but can eat most things I cook, however horrible the taste) but more for the time ratio between preparing the meal and actually consuming it. For me, the time required to prepare a meal should not exceed the expected time required to consume it. Else, it's really a waste of time. Luckily for me, my self prepared dinner menu included baked beans, (canned) tuna, bread and a variety of salad vegetables that required very little cooking, if at all. So I could get dinner ready in less than 10 minutes.
Even bread was rationed, especially on my weekends where I do not go out to eat. 2 slices for breakfast, 4 slices for lunch and 3 slices for dinner. No dumping loads of stuffs in between the slices ala Garfield; I'm allowed only light spread of olive oil butter or some tuna chunks in water. My food, overall was as bland as the word could be defined. Fortunately for me, I have very little issues eating bland food; As long as they aren't bad and giving me digestive issues, I'll eat it.
This went on for a few months. My weight loss were a little more apparent, dropping down to low 90 KGs by October 2008. Still far from safety, still a long way to go..
No more free consultation:
Unfortunately for me I have a thing about messing up with good things that happen to me and by October I lost my free 'dietician'. however, I was already getting used to the routine of avoiding oily food, rice and eating more vegetables. While my motivation dwindled with the lack of push from an external party, in addition of the pressure of delivering results so that my caretaker's efforts weren't in vain, I managed to keep myself in check most of my meals. I do end up with an occasional splurged of sinful food; A kuey teow goreng here, nasi lemak there and a Carl's Junior in between. But I have now gotten used to mixed rice with no rice, much of a surprise to many vendors seeing this big man not want rice, let alone add rice..
It's fun to surprise people sometimes, especially doing something completely unexpected.
By the end of 2009, I was hovering around mid 80s. Still having work to do, but at least I'm not way out there in terms of obesity..
Epilogue:
I'm now see sawing between 78-82 KGs these days. I'd like to drop down to low 70s or even high 60s, but that isn't going to happen until I will myself to exercise. Yes, I lost around 30 KGs by just watching what I eat. Not something that everyone can do, especially if they aren't way overweight in the first place. In my honest opinion, it only works for people who over eat all the time and are way obese. If you're just looking to get a better weight than your already good weight, work out.
My Joys:
1) Not having ankle and foot problems that, according to my orthopedist, was due to my weight.
2) Getting to wear pants 6 inches smaller.
3) Getting better mileage from my car.
4) Being able to jump, run and more or less stretch around without feeling utterly tired and overworked.
5) Discovering almonds as a snack. (Oh, yes, even my snack menu got changed!)
6) Learning to be more observant with food packaging and ingredient details. Not exactly an expert, but better than what I was before (as in oblivious).
7) Ok, it just feels good to not be overweight by a lot.
My sorrows:
1) Still having a bulging tummy (exercise you lazy bum!)
2) Getting all sorts of random people saying I've lost weight. I don't need you to tell me something I already know.
3) Losing motivation to keep up the work so that I can be fitter for my upcoming Go-Kart race.
4) Having a newly bought 'slim fit' shirt still in my closet because of the bulging tummy. Sigh..
5) Craving and missing oily food.
6) Seeing food for their 'sinful' content and not their taste value.
7) No longer able to maximise a buffet meal!!!!!!
May I keep this up for years to come and one day wear that shirt without looking like a fool!
Oh, and stop telling me I've lost weight! Because I haven't, at least not for the past 4-6 months!
I'd say not quite, but it needs documenting anyway so here goes..
Prologue:
In June 2008 I just changed roles within my company and got introduced to a colleague who was rather health savvy. Through our interaction I was challenged, or encouraged, to consider reducing my weight. The key highlight of this encounter was how over a period of less than 4 weeks, I was influenced from 'Living to Eat' to 'Eating to Live'..
Note, for those unaware, I am somewhat of a glutton and find food rather irresistable. It didn't help that my childhood was one of poverty, so having food to eat more than that to stave off hunger was a luxury, one I never miss. To me, free food was always good food. Beggars can't be choosers......
I weight approximately 108KG before I caved in and asked my colleague to act as my dietician.
This first month:
The plan was to monitor what I eat. I've always overeaten, especially during lunch and dinners. Anyone who's ever seen my plate of mixed rice for lunches would comment on the mountain of food I had. So part of the gameplan was to change my food intake.
There were the usual restrictions. No oily food, deep fried dishes and fatty meats. Rice, my core intake daily, became rationed. Vegetables were changed to be my main food source. I was given a visual picture of splitting my plate to 6 portions; 4 for vegetables, 1 for meats and 1 for carbohydrates.
It was tough. But I was motivated and it was nice to have someone else care about my weight. I dug deep and got stuck in.
I recall losing about 2-3 KG the next time I weighed in. Cool stuff.. :D
The following months:
Progress was good but it was slow. At around 30+KGs overweight, I had a lot to do to even reach the border of an acceptable BMI.
As I manage the changes to my food, I was given stricter regime. Lunch remained the same, but dinner was to be made of significantly more vegetables than anything else. I for one loathe cooking, not so much because it taste awful ( I can't cook, but can eat most things I cook, however horrible the taste) but more for the time ratio between preparing the meal and actually consuming it. For me, the time required to prepare a meal should not exceed the expected time required to consume it. Else, it's really a waste of time. Luckily for me, my self prepared dinner menu included baked beans, (canned) tuna, bread and a variety of salad vegetables that required very little cooking, if at all. So I could get dinner ready in less than 10 minutes.
Even bread was rationed, especially on my weekends where I do not go out to eat. 2 slices for breakfast, 4 slices for lunch and 3 slices for dinner. No dumping loads of stuffs in between the slices ala Garfield; I'm allowed only light spread of olive oil butter or some tuna chunks in water. My food, overall was as bland as the word could be defined. Fortunately for me, I have very little issues eating bland food; As long as they aren't bad and giving me digestive issues, I'll eat it.
This went on for a few months. My weight loss were a little more apparent, dropping down to low 90 KGs by October 2008. Still far from safety, still a long way to go..
No more free consultation:
Unfortunately for me I have a thing about messing up with good things that happen to me and by October I lost my free 'dietician'. however, I was already getting used to the routine of avoiding oily food, rice and eating more vegetables. While my motivation dwindled with the lack of push from an external party, in addition of the pressure of delivering results so that my caretaker's efforts weren't in vain, I managed to keep myself in check most of my meals. I do end up with an occasional splurged of sinful food; A kuey teow goreng here, nasi lemak there and a Carl's Junior in between. But I have now gotten used to mixed rice with no rice, much of a surprise to many vendors seeing this big man not want rice, let alone add rice..
It's fun to surprise people sometimes, especially doing something completely unexpected.
By the end of 2009, I was hovering around mid 80s. Still having work to do, but at least I'm not way out there in terms of obesity..
Epilogue:
I'm now see sawing between 78-82 KGs these days. I'd like to drop down to low 70s or even high 60s, but that isn't going to happen until I will myself to exercise. Yes, I lost around 30 KGs by just watching what I eat. Not something that everyone can do, especially if they aren't way overweight in the first place. In my honest opinion, it only works for people who over eat all the time and are way obese. If you're just looking to get a better weight than your already good weight, work out.
My Joys:
1) Not having ankle and foot problems that, according to my orthopedist, was due to my weight.
2) Getting to wear pants 6 inches smaller.
3) Getting better mileage from my car.
4) Being able to jump, run and more or less stretch around without feeling utterly tired and overworked.
5) Discovering almonds as a snack. (Oh, yes, even my snack menu got changed!)
6) Learning to be more observant with food packaging and ingredient details. Not exactly an expert, but better than what I was before (as in oblivious).
7) Ok, it just feels good to not be overweight by a lot.
My sorrows:
1) Still having a bulging tummy (exercise you lazy bum!)
2) Getting all sorts of random people saying I've lost weight. I don't need you to tell me something I already know.
3) Losing motivation to keep up the work so that I can be fitter for my upcoming Go-Kart race.
4) Having a newly bought 'slim fit' shirt still in my closet because of the bulging tummy. Sigh..
5) Craving and missing oily food.
6) Seeing food for their 'sinful' content and not their taste value.
7) No longer able to maximise a buffet meal!!!!!!
May I keep this up for years to come and one day wear that shirt without looking like a fool!
Oh, and stop telling me I've lost weight! Because I haven't, at least not for the past 4-6 months!
Monday, September 07, 2009
A Complaint of sorts...
Well, considering that I did call and there was a file created, I'd say it was more a formal complain than not...
2 weeks ago Shrek was due for his regular servicing and I took him to the regular workshop I go to. He was closing in on 20K KM but more importantly it's been 3 months since he got a makeover and since the last service he has taken me to Kuantan, Singapore and Cameron Highlands in between the usual commuting around the city.
Now for a Viva, I only need to service the car once every 10K KM after the 1st 10K KM, but me being me and generally letting people do their job with minimal fuss, I've failed to realised that the servicing @ 10K KM was only for 5K KM and not for a full 10K KM. On my 15K KM service, which was in May 2009, I let them serviced it for yet another 5K KM seeing that it would be weird to go from 15K to 25K when the distances should be every 10K (20, 30,...).
The main issue was the engine oil, which depending on the grade used, would last either 5K KM or 10K KM. Clearly my past 2 service sessions Shrek only got the 5K engine oil. This time around I made it a point to ask and to insist on getting the 10K KM engine oil so that my servicing schedule will be as per Perodua specs. it turns out the 10K engine oil cost only RM 15 more, but if I had to do the service again in 3 months (10K lasts 6 months), I'd have to fork out another RM 120! Realising what seems to me as an exploitation of the unlearned public, I made it very clear before they took my car that I am to be given the 10K engine oil.
About an hour later my car returned. To my horror they gave me the 5K engine oil! The woman manning the counter had the cheek to say they had no more 10K engine oil! They didn't even have the decency to let me know BEFORE they decided to go against my wishes. As the job was already done and I would like to think that they did DO the other things as required during each service, I paid up but not before telling them I'd never go there again.
The next day I decided to just vent my frustration by calling up Perodua to lodge a complaint. After telling my piece and asked to fax over the receipt, I thought that was about as much as I'd hear about this issue. To my surprise, the same Customer Service Rep rang me back the next day to follow up and they called me again a day after to update me on the case! Maybe Perodua isn't as hopeless after all?
While I wanted to get a written apology and something done about the way I was exploited (which, yes, at some point I was at fault too for being ignorant), they manage to get the service centre to agree to change my engine oil to 10K for free. Unfortunately, the service centre didn't seem all too happy about having to do this and in the call with the supervisor at the service centre I felt there was much disdain from him.
I manage to get my engine oil changed last week. I'm still mulling whether to still write in officially since I still feel that the place is a con job (not so much in the work, but the scheme) and now I have to find myself another service centre to visit by February 2010.
In the meantime, I hope Shrek feels good as new, even if I haven't been all that nice to him...
2 weeks ago Shrek was due for his regular servicing and I took him to the regular workshop I go to. He was closing in on 20K KM but more importantly it's been 3 months since he got a makeover and since the last service he has taken me to Kuantan, Singapore and Cameron Highlands in between the usual commuting around the city.
Now for a Viva, I only need to service the car once every 10K KM after the 1st 10K KM, but me being me and generally letting people do their job with minimal fuss, I've failed to realised that the servicing @ 10K KM was only for 5K KM and not for a full 10K KM. On my 15K KM service, which was in May 2009, I let them serviced it for yet another 5K KM seeing that it would be weird to go from 15K to 25K when the distances should be every 10K (20, 30,...).
The main issue was the engine oil, which depending on the grade used, would last either 5K KM or 10K KM. Clearly my past 2 service sessions Shrek only got the 5K engine oil. This time around I made it a point to ask and to insist on getting the 10K KM engine oil so that my servicing schedule will be as per Perodua specs. it turns out the 10K engine oil cost only RM 15 more, but if I had to do the service again in 3 months (10K lasts 6 months), I'd have to fork out another RM 120! Realising what seems to me as an exploitation of the unlearned public, I made it very clear before they took my car that I am to be given the 10K engine oil.
About an hour later my car returned. To my horror they gave me the 5K engine oil! The woman manning the counter had the cheek to say they had no more 10K engine oil! They didn't even have the decency to let me know BEFORE they decided to go against my wishes. As the job was already done and I would like to think that they did DO the other things as required during each service, I paid up but not before telling them I'd never go there again.
The next day I decided to just vent my frustration by calling up Perodua to lodge a complaint. After telling my piece and asked to fax over the receipt, I thought that was about as much as I'd hear about this issue. To my surprise, the same Customer Service Rep rang me back the next day to follow up and they called me again a day after to update me on the case! Maybe Perodua isn't as hopeless after all?
While I wanted to get a written apology and something done about the way I was exploited (which, yes, at some point I was at fault too for being ignorant), they manage to get the service centre to agree to change my engine oil to 10K for free. Unfortunately, the service centre didn't seem all too happy about having to do this and in the call with the supervisor at the service centre I felt there was much disdain from him.
I manage to get my engine oil changed last week. I'm still mulling whether to still write in officially since I still feel that the place is a con job (not so much in the work, but the scheme) and now I have to find myself another service centre to visit by February 2010.
In the meantime, I hope Shrek feels good as new, even if I haven't been all that nice to him...
Tuesday, August 04, 2009
The Great Discovery... (Part 3 of my recent Singapore trip)
Now, where was I?
Oh, so dinner was done and over with and finally I got to my ex-boss mother's home. You see, my ex-boss has been living and working in Australia for quite awhile so she doesn't actually have her own place in Singapore. Her mom's apartment/condo is a 3 bedroom unit which has a rather huge dining area adjacent to the living area. Initially I expected myself to sleep in the hallway since my ex-boss did allude that her mom's place isn't all that big and only had 2 functioning bedrooms (the 3rd room, I noted, turned into a store room per se). Through sheer luck/kindness my ex-boss offered to sleep with her mom so that I didn't have to be 'tang cheong' (living room guard..:D).
Aside from the rather poor water pressure of the bathroom, the place was nice enough to give me a good night sleep for a day of adventure tomorrow. I believe the poor water pressure was down to the externally installed water heater, which IMHO has been known to reduce water pressures tremendously.
In any case, I woke up earlier than my host the next morning. After freshening up, I took their advise to stroll around the beach across the road (err, expressway..) The edge of the island was acutally about 1KM away from the apartment, so off I went for an extended early morning stroll. It was nice to see quite a number of people also having their walks, jogs and cycles early in the morning. before long I reached the beach.
To my surprise there were quite a number of camps all around the beach. The beach isn't all that good; Imagine a coastline next to a city and it being a public beach should give you an idea how 'nice' the beach is. Yet, there were easily 20 camps around that beach stretch and I could see even more along the coast. For a nation known for it's kiasu-ness (fear of losing), it's a wonder so many have atuned themselves to nature...What's left of it, at least, in a City like Singapore.
Unfortunately for me my stroll was shortlived as before I began turning back the sky decided it wasn't too happy I saw so many campers and decided to cry. So I ended up having my 2nd shower within an hour of each other. Soaked from tip to toe, I arrive back at the apartment having to bath again. luckily by then my ex-boss was awake and all that was left was for us to wait out the rain and then begin our road trip for....Singaporean Food!
While waiting for the rain to stop, I voiced my pleasure at seeing so many campers along the beach. My ex-boss then explained,"Those aren't campers. Those are squatters!"
:O :O :O
I mean, wha the f? So much for the people being close to nature and all that fluff. These blokes along the beach are the hardcore poor that you never see in the City. They camp around there, with their kids et all and use the public toilets to perform their natural hygene requirements. Explains why here were so many clothes hung out to dry..
Anyway, by the time my shock subsided, so did the rain and off we went for breakfast at Tiffan...Oops..Got carried away there...First stop was some hawker food court somewhere in the city (err, I'll confess I didn't take enough notes to recall where are the places that I went..). There were several suggested food to try, but in the end I decided to go with the crowd and ate wantan mee. There was a long queue for the food so I figured so many people couldn't be making such a big mistake. Unfortunately, the wantan mee was just so so. There was this porridge stall that was quite famous, unfortunately the hawker has gotten rather arrogant and weren't about to be bothered to hasten the orders. Refusing to wait, I skipped trying that as well. The good thing, however, was that I see Teh Tarik served in that food court. Looks like I'm really not that far away from home.. :D
After breakfast, we moved over to the middle of the city where a nice garden was keep sheltered from the bustling concrete jungle. It was actually quite a huge place and the walk around it was refreshingly green and polution free (to the levels that my limited senses could detect). Halfway through the garden it decided to rain again and we had to take shelter for almost half an hour. We weren't alone in that shelter. There was some other groups and one of them was a bunch of kids maybe 13-15 years old. It reminded me of the days when I joined such excursions in school. Ah, the good old days...
When the rain stopped we strolled around some more and hadsome close encounters with my close relatives.....Monkeys..As always, they knew not to mess with me since I'm clearly the BIGGER relative... :D
Before long it was lunch time and off we went to another food court. There I found what was my favourite meal throughout my weekend trip; Pig liver mee soup (something like that). The liver was cooked just about right leaving a little bit of rawness and tasting rather delicious. There was suppose to be some famous 'nasi lemak' thee as well but my ex-boss noted that it seems to have changed owners. Neverthless, she tried it anyway and found the food to be somewhat lacking.
By the time lunch was over we decided to walk around that area to see if we could find a nice place to sit around and have coffee/tea. While we didn't manage to find a suitable place, i did end up finding a bakery shop which sold almonds cheaper than Malaysia!! I get my almonds around RM 34 per KG and they were like selling them aroun SGD 11 per KG!! No surprise I took 2 KGs home with me.. I still haven't finished the first pack. Have to limit 1 KG a month or I will clearly overdose on almonds!
After which we decided to drive over to Dempsey Hill (ah, I remembered one!!) to have some tea. My ex-boss' stint in Australia has turned her into a coffee connoisseur of sorts where cafes served much better coffee at affordable prices. Starbucks? Junk coffee.. :D So at Dempsey Hill we decided to try one place where the name of the shop suggest it was Australian. I'm not so much of a coffee person, but I couldn't resist trying my childhood favourite drink...milkshake.. :D As always, the shake finished way ahead of the coffee. In any case the coffee was still not up to par, despite it being more expensive than Australian coffee. I'm just glad I haven't the need for coffee.
Now all this time I have my usual online commitments with webdota and I have been looking for an opportunity to get online. Unfortunately, my ex-boss mom's place isn't wired, so I don't get free access over there. Throughout the day we have been keeping an eye out for cybercafes, without much luck.
Dinner was nearby the apartment, opposite the local shopping complex. Yet another food court and this time I went for fried kuey teow. It was indeed yummy, though maybe too wet for many's taste. Unfortunately, either I've overkilled on 'bad' food or my tummy just didn't agree with the kuey teow, within an hour I had to purge. Luckily the shopping complex's washrooms were decent enough for the, erm, job.. :D
Oh, and no luck with cybercafe. Despite me knowing full well there are cybercafes in Singapore, unfortunately I was in the wrong parts of the island and asking a middle-aged female to help find a cybercafe especially when she's not been in the country for awhile was just looking for a needle in a haystack.
In response to that disappointment, I ended up buying myself 2 stacks of CDs; A collection of Betthoven's more popular piano sonatas and a collection of Mozart's better known compositions. The reason I bought the sonata CDs was because it had Waldstein, which I've been yearning to hear again ever since my cassette version was no longer playable. I still hear it's 3rd movement in my head everytime I brush my teeth. :D It also had some good sonatas, like Appasionata and Pastoral (unfortunately I'm not good enough to actual name the sonatas proper..) as well as the ever so famous Moonlight. Digressing a little bit. I can't imagine my piano teacher not knowing Moonlight's first movement even though I ccould only play the right hand!! It's so freakingly obvious! How could someone learn music upto diploma (I'm assuming she's properly qualified to teach, hehe..) and not have heard of it before???!!!!! Anyway, back to the CDs, the Mozart collection was bought mainly because it had Piano concerto no.20, a piece I've been hunting, too since my cassette versions broke apart. Funnily I stil find the cassette versions better than these new versions, for all the pieces I'm familiar with, despite the cassette versions being supposedly inferior recordings/technology. Could be the impression to a teenager that last much longer than it should..
So as much as I insisted on not buying anything during this trip, I failed to keep to my 'restriction'. After dinner and a should tour around the mall, back we went home to the apartment.
The next morning I didn't take another walk to the beach. Instead we walked to a nearby food court for breakfast and this time I had prawn mee. Unfortunately, I think prawn mee's in Malaysia are better. After breakfast and packing up, we headed to our last destination for an early lunch. Yet another food court, this time I had pork internals soup. I have to admit it's nice that pork is readily available, since it's sort of my second preferred meat (Beef steaks still takes the cake).
Then came time to return home. On the way to my last meal destination, I was somewhat instructed the way that should lead me home. However, poor memory and over reliance on my internal ability to find y way around led me to taking a long way around instead before getting to the correct highway that will lead to another expressway that leads to another expressway that eventually leads to the border..hehe..
I thought Iwould make good time since I arrived at customs around 12.30pm. Unfortunately, it seems like I wasn't the only person feeling like crossing the border at that time. An estimate of a couple thousands other drivers also thought the same. While exiting Singapore was quite a breeze, trying to get into Malaysia was another matter. It took me longer to get out of customs Malaysia than it took me to get from my food court in Singapore to the Malaysian border! With my anxiety that I've been offline from webdota too long and my eagerness to get home before dark, I nevertheless had even more trouble keeping to the speed limit.
Many a time I had to tell myself to slow down as on occasions Shrek was propelled upto 140 KM/H!! I'm sure Shrek had some joint pains after the drive. Having mentioned that, I arrive safely and intact (else how on earth do I write this??) by about 6.30pm. I drove almost 1000KM over that 3 days. Good fun. Should do more..
That concludes my somewhat elaborate retelling of my recent Singapore trip. Because my access card still has credit and I still have a couple of dollars worth of parking coupons, I'm probably going to drive down again the next time I visit Singapore, which would probably be next year. Hopefully next time I won't need to drive alone.
Oh, so dinner was done and over with and finally I got to my ex-boss mother's home. You see, my ex-boss has been living and working in Australia for quite awhile so she doesn't actually have her own place in Singapore. Her mom's apartment/condo is a 3 bedroom unit which has a rather huge dining area adjacent to the living area. Initially I expected myself to sleep in the hallway since my ex-boss did allude that her mom's place isn't all that big and only had 2 functioning bedrooms (the 3rd room, I noted, turned into a store room per se). Through sheer luck/kindness my ex-boss offered to sleep with her mom so that I didn't have to be 'tang cheong' (living room guard..:D).
Aside from the rather poor water pressure of the bathroom, the place was nice enough to give me a good night sleep for a day of adventure tomorrow. I believe the poor water pressure was down to the externally installed water heater, which IMHO has been known to reduce water pressures tremendously.
In any case, I woke up earlier than my host the next morning. After freshening up, I took their advise to stroll around the beach across the road (err, expressway..) The edge of the island was acutally about 1KM away from the apartment, so off I went for an extended early morning stroll. It was nice to see quite a number of people also having their walks, jogs and cycles early in the morning. before long I reached the beach.
To my surprise there were quite a number of camps all around the beach. The beach isn't all that good; Imagine a coastline next to a city and it being a public beach should give you an idea how 'nice' the beach is. Yet, there were easily 20 camps around that beach stretch and I could see even more along the coast. For a nation known for it's kiasu-ness (fear of losing), it's a wonder so many have atuned themselves to nature...What's left of it, at least, in a City like Singapore.
Unfortunately for me my stroll was shortlived as before I began turning back the sky decided it wasn't too happy I saw so many campers and decided to cry. So I ended up having my 2nd shower within an hour of each other. Soaked from tip to toe, I arrive back at the apartment having to bath again. luckily by then my ex-boss was awake and all that was left was for us to wait out the rain and then begin our road trip for....Singaporean Food!
While waiting for the rain to stop, I voiced my pleasure at seeing so many campers along the beach. My ex-boss then explained,"Those aren't campers. Those are squatters!"
:O :O :O
I mean, wha the f? So much for the people being close to nature and all that fluff. These blokes along the beach are the hardcore poor that you never see in the City. They camp around there, with their kids et all and use the public toilets to perform their natural hygene requirements. Explains why here were so many clothes hung out to dry..
Anyway, by the time my shock subsided, so did the rain and off we went for breakfast at Tiffan...Oops..Got carried away there...First stop was some hawker food court somewhere in the city (err, I'll confess I didn't take enough notes to recall where are the places that I went..). There were several suggested food to try, but in the end I decided to go with the crowd and ate wantan mee. There was a long queue for the food so I figured so many people couldn't be making such a big mistake. Unfortunately, the wantan mee was just so so. There was this porridge stall that was quite famous, unfortunately the hawker has gotten rather arrogant and weren't about to be bothered to hasten the orders. Refusing to wait, I skipped trying that as well. The good thing, however, was that I see Teh Tarik served in that food court. Looks like I'm really not that far away from home.. :D
After breakfast, we moved over to the middle of the city where a nice garden was keep sheltered from the bustling concrete jungle. It was actually quite a huge place and the walk around it was refreshingly green and polution free (to the levels that my limited senses could detect). Halfway through the garden it decided to rain again and we had to take shelter for almost half an hour. We weren't alone in that shelter. There was some other groups and one of them was a bunch of kids maybe 13-15 years old. It reminded me of the days when I joined such excursions in school. Ah, the good old days...
When the rain stopped we strolled around some more and hadsome close encounters with my close relatives.....Monkeys..As always, they knew not to mess with me since I'm clearly the BIGGER relative... :D
Before long it was lunch time and off we went to another food court. There I found what was my favourite meal throughout my weekend trip; Pig liver mee soup (something like that). The liver was cooked just about right leaving a little bit of rawness and tasting rather delicious. There was suppose to be some famous 'nasi lemak' thee as well but my ex-boss noted that it seems to have changed owners. Neverthless, she tried it anyway and found the food to be somewhat lacking.
By the time lunch was over we decided to walk around that area to see if we could find a nice place to sit around and have coffee/tea. While we didn't manage to find a suitable place, i did end up finding a bakery shop which sold almonds cheaper than Malaysia!! I get my almonds around RM 34 per KG and they were like selling them aroun SGD 11 per KG!! No surprise I took 2 KGs home with me.. I still haven't finished the first pack. Have to limit 1 KG a month or I will clearly overdose on almonds!
After which we decided to drive over to Dempsey Hill (ah, I remembered one!!) to have some tea. My ex-boss' stint in Australia has turned her into a coffee connoisseur of sorts where cafes served much better coffee at affordable prices. Starbucks? Junk coffee.. :D So at Dempsey Hill we decided to try one place where the name of the shop suggest it was Australian. I'm not so much of a coffee person, but I couldn't resist trying my childhood favourite drink...milkshake.. :D As always, the shake finished way ahead of the coffee. In any case the coffee was still not up to par, despite it being more expensive than Australian coffee. I'm just glad I haven't the need for coffee.
Now all this time I have my usual online commitments with webdota and I have been looking for an opportunity to get online. Unfortunately, my ex-boss mom's place isn't wired, so I don't get free access over there. Throughout the day we have been keeping an eye out for cybercafes, without much luck.
Dinner was nearby the apartment, opposite the local shopping complex. Yet another food court and this time I went for fried kuey teow. It was indeed yummy, though maybe too wet for many's taste. Unfortunately, either I've overkilled on 'bad' food or my tummy just didn't agree with the kuey teow, within an hour I had to purge. Luckily the shopping complex's washrooms were decent enough for the, erm, job.. :D
Oh, and no luck with cybercafe. Despite me knowing full well there are cybercafes in Singapore, unfortunately I was in the wrong parts of the island and asking a middle-aged female to help find a cybercafe especially when she's not been in the country for awhile was just looking for a needle in a haystack.
In response to that disappointment, I ended up buying myself 2 stacks of CDs; A collection of Betthoven's more popular piano sonatas and a collection of Mozart's better known compositions. The reason I bought the sonata CDs was because it had Waldstein, which I've been yearning to hear again ever since my cassette version was no longer playable. I still hear it's 3rd movement in my head everytime I brush my teeth. :D It also had some good sonatas, like Appasionata and Pastoral (unfortunately I'm not good enough to actual name the sonatas proper..) as well as the ever so famous Moonlight. Digressing a little bit. I can't imagine my piano teacher not knowing Moonlight's first movement even though I ccould only play the right hand!! It's so freakingly obvious! How could someone learn music upto diploma (I'm assuming she's properly qualified to teach, hehe..) and not have heard of it before???!!!!! Anyway, back to the CDs, the Mozart collection was bought mainly because it had Piano concerto no.20, a piece I've been hunting, too since my cassette versions broke apart. Funnily I stil find the cassette versions better than these new versions, for all the pieces I'm familiar with, despite the cassette versions being supposedly inferior recordings/technology. Could be the impression to a teenager that last much longer than it should..
So as much as I insisted on not buying anything during this trip, I failed to keep to my 'restriction'. After dinner and a should tour around the mall, back we went home to the apartment.
The next morning I didn't take another walk to the beach. Instead we walked to a nearby food court for breakfast and this time I had prawn mee. Unfortunately, I think prawn mee's in Malaysia are better. After breakfast and packing up, we headed to our last destination for an early lunch. Yet another food court, this time I had pork internals soup. I have to admit it's nice that pork is readily available, since it's sort of my second preferred meat (Beef steaks still takes the cake).
Then came time to return home. On the way to my last meal destination, I was somewhat instructed the way that should lead me home. However, poor memory and over reliance on my internal ability to find y way around led me to taking a long way around instead before getting to the correct highway that will lead to another expressway that leads to another expressway that eventually leads to the border..hehe..
I thought Iwould make good time since I arrived at customs around 12.30pm. Unfortunately, it seems like I wasn't the only person feeling like crossing the border at that time. An estimate of a couple thousands other drivers also thought the same. While exiting Singapore was quite a breeze, trying to get into Malaysia was another matter. It took me longer to get out of customs Malaysia than it took me to get from my food court in Singapore to the Malaysian border! With my anxiety that I've been offline from webdota too long and my eagerness to get home before dark, I nevertheless had even more trouble keeping to the speed limit.
Many a time I had to tell myself to slow down as on occasions Shrek was propelled upto 140 KM/H!! I'm sure Shrek had some joint pains after the drive. Having mentioned that, I arrive safely and intact (else how on earth do I write this??) by about 6.30pm. I drove almost 1000KM over that 3 days. Good fun. Should do more..
That concludes my somewhat elaborate retelling of my recent Singapore trip. Because my access card still has credit and I still have a couple of dollars worth of parking coupons, I'm probably going to drive down again the next time I visit Singapore, which would probably be next year. Hopefully next time I won't need to drive alone.
Monday, August 03, 2009
Nope, This Ain't....
part 3....
Will need to digress a little bit.
Just survived a trip to Kuala Kubu Baru for some white water rafting. Organised by my company's sports club, I essentially went for free.
A quick setup. I actually did my first white water rafting 4 years ago in Kota Kinabalu and frankly speaking, I recall I had such a torrid time I vowed never to do it again. I fear large body of waters and do not like adrenaline rushes. But for some unexplainable reasons, the moment my company anounced this event, I signed up without even a blink.
That I lived to write this meant that I survived the event. It was much easier this time, for many reasons. The main one was not because I was wiser (that term really escapes me...) but because (IMHO) my raftmates and I were so hopeless and out of sync the guide decided to get more help each time we were about to pass through the rapids. That, as well as this time us being allowed to 'sit in', which basically means enjoy the ride while the guides do all the hard work keeping us alive..
My raft had 6 participants and 1 guide. From the beginning of the ride, my guide was giving us quite a hard time as he tries to whip us into discipline to no success. Some rafts had 2 guides and no prizes for guessing there were some complaints as to why they get 2 while we only get 1. After going through a couple of rapids, at one point our guide were heard to be so disappointed with our workrate he said it 'embarasses the government' (spoken in malay).
This did not go down well with most of my raftmates and they continued to find fault with his attitude and delivery. They complain his technique and wanted to train him on how to motivate us better. They were basically to used to the positive encouragement methods employed by American companies. I tried to explain to them that this is the Asian way; If you suck, you suck. Period. No sugar coating. No anxiety over how we may fail to handle the humiliation of being told off. The truth, nothing less. Get over it.
Unfortunately, the rest of the 'crew' couldn't see the light of day and they had little good things to say about the guide. I pity him and them. Him because his good work isn't valued. Them because they can't handle the truth. By the time the whole thing was over, he finally explained why he as so hard on us at the beginning. Rafting is an activity that each raftsman (and woman) needed to contribute to ensure the safety of the raft. Without concerted efforts, the whole experience would either be lacking; the guides will chose to take us through easy rapids; or extremely dangerous if the guide decides to let us capsize. Them being the experts, surviving a capsize would be all in a minutes' work. But for people like us, who do this sport once a lifetime maybe, the whole thrown overboard experience can cripple a person...It can also kill...
Nevertheless, everyone of our 50+ participants lived to tell the horror stories of being thrown overboard, raft capsizing and all the bumpy rides over the rapids. As for me, I managed to stay inside the raft all the way though half of the crew did get thrown overboard...Which is cool...
I should do this again...Someday. Hopefully the next time it will be a good crew of raftsmen (and women) who will not be to frail to get a good whipping or two. Only then will the experience be one that is worth remembering for good...
Will need to digress a little bit.
Just survived a trip to Kuala Kubu Baru for some white water rafting. Organised by my company's sports club, I essentially went for free.
A quick setup. I actually did my first white water rafting 4 years ago in Kota Kinabalu and frankly speaking, I recall I had such a torrid time I vowed never to do it again. I fear large body of waters and do not like adrenaline rushes. But for some unexplainable reasons, the moment my company anounced this event, I signed up without even a blink.
That I lived to write this meant that I survived the event. It was much easier this time, for many reasons. The main one was not because I was wiser (that term really escapes me...) but because (IMHO) my raftmates and I were so hopeless and out of sync the guide decided to get more help each time we were about to pass through the rapids. That, as well as this time us being allowed to 'sit in', which basically means enjoy the ride while the guides do all the hard work keeping us alive..
My raft had 6 participants and 1 guide. From the beginning of the ride, my guide was giving us quite a hard time as he tries to whip us into discipline to no success. Some rafts had 2 guides and no prizes for guessing there were some complaints as to why they get 2 while we only get 1. After going through a couple of rapids, at one point our guide were heard to be so disappointed with our workrate he said it 'embarasses the government' (spoken in malay).
This did not go down well with most of my raftmates and they continued to find fault with his attitude and delivery. They complain his technique and wanted to train him on how to motivate us better. They were basically to used to the positive encouragement methods employed by American companies. I tried to explain to them that this is the Asian way; If you suck, you suck. Period. No sugar coating. No anxiety over how we may fail to handle the humiliation of being told off. The truth, nothing less. Get over it.
Unfortunately, the rest of the 'crew' couldn't see the light of day and they had little good things to say about the guide. I pity him and them. Him because his good work isn't valued. Them because they can't handle the truth. By the time the whole thing was over, he finally explained why he as so hard on us at the beginning. Rafting is an activity that each raftsman (and woman) needed to contribute to ensure the safety of the raft. Without concerted efforts, the whole experience would either be lacking; the guides will chose to take us through easy rapids; or extremely dangerous if the guide decides to let us capsize. Them being the experts, surviving a capsize would be all in a minutes' work. But for people like us, who do this sport once a lifetime maybe, the whole thrown overboard experience can cripple a person...It can also kill...
Nevertheless, everyone of our 50+ participants lived to tell the horror stories of being thrown overboard, raft capsizing and all the bumpy rides over the rapids. As for me, I managed to stay inside the raft all the way though half of the crew did get thrown overboard...Which is cool...
I should do this again...Someday. Hopefully the next time it will be a good crew of raftsmen (and women) who will not be to frail to get a good whipping or two. Only then will the experience be one that is worth remembering for good...
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Shrek and I....(part 2 of recent Singapore trip)
getting lost down under..
Ok, not so down under and Shrek wasn't lost. Just myself. Driving in an unfamiliar territory (this mini island called Singapore...hehehe), I had with me some googled maps as well as some internet directions to get to my ex-boss' place. Dinner was scheduled around 7pm, so I had a good 90-100 minutes to get to the other end of the island. Which, is way more than enough..
Unless you get lost..During peak traffic period. It didn't help that the internet instructions were somewhat ambiguous, or required some basic knowledge of Singapore roads. While I have been to Singapore multiple times, this is the first time I am driving down on my own, unassisted/guided. Ok, minimal assistance.
Anyway, right out of the Customs area I had an immediate crossroads which thanks to lack of split second manoevering I didn't take an exit I shouldn't have. I ended up driving along the highway and eventually saw signboards that was familiar (as in noted in the internet directions) and began familiarising myself with the acronyms for Singapore hgihways. Off my head, they have PIE, CPE, errr......Only 3 weeks and I am already forgeting details.. Sigh. A sure sign of growing old.
Back to following internet directions, I manage to get onto the next highway without much glitch although I was travelling way under the permitted speed limit. Clear indication of a noob in the city. Nevertheless my next direction got me in trouble. From what I can recall, I was suppose to stay in PIE (and expressway) but it referenced Toa Payoh. Silly me thought that I needed to exit it and found myself off PIE and inside Toa Payoh surburbs. Took me a good couple of minutes to realise things were amiss as I couldn't find anything relevant to my next direction. An sms to my ex-boss to indicate I am lost and I proceeded to double back onto PIE. Had I any local street knowledge I would have been able to exit PIE much more ahead rather than where I left off, but alas, noob is as noob be...
Returning to the expressway I was again conned (by my silly self) to take the next exit, I think Paya Besar...(something like that) as it was indicated in the directions. Unfortunately for me, it was again just an indication that PIE would cut through that area, but I wasn't suppose to get off the expressway. This time I realised my mistake much sooner. Unfortunately, before I could make an appropriate (and somewhat late) change of lanes I had this Singaporean car honking me for my late manoever. I mean, the light was red and besides him, there were no other cars. Clearly Singaporeans have little patience. Especially this bloke. He even proceeded to move to the lane on the left to level wih my car and give me an eyeball. Funnily, he exited far left when the lane I was on proceeds to the right. Jerk.. :D
After a good turn or 3 I returned to PIE and told myself, no matter what happens I'll stick to this expressway until the very end where it's suppose to exit to CPE (another expressway). All the while I keep seeing signboards that say I'm headed towards Changi Airport and for all the wrong reasons I kept having the idea that Changi Airport is on the west side of the island while I'm suppose to be heading east. Internally I was torn, with my gut telling me to change directions but my brain saying enough gut moves, just stick to the plan.
Luckily for me at the end of the expressway was clear indications to the CPE and this time it gave me the option to go away from Changi Airport. So I figured my gut was right anyway (despite later realising how wrong I was). My next instruction was even more confusing. I was given the address as Marine Vista, which, by Malaysian standards, sounded like an condo name. Unfortunately, it turns out to be a road name for a smaller road.
The exit I was directed to go to didn't get me directly onto Marine Vista but the turning before it. The reason was that I was coming from the east, the exit directly to Marine Vista only existed if I came from the West (which would cause further confusion later). I could already see the scores of high rise condos around me and felt confident I was near, but I just couldn't find anything that would lead me closer to my destination. Time to use up my last helpline; Call the ex-boss.
Informing my position wasn't all that difficult, except that my ex-boss thought I came from the West, not East. So I supposedly overshot and had to exit back to the highway and move backwards (in terms of the directions, I was exit right, but from my perspective, I needed to exit left...) So I did exactly that and turned up even further from my destination.
I rarely feel lost. I felt DAMN LOST now. The only thing I had going for me was this internal sense of direction which I trusted (yeah, even boasted too) very much. From a complete lost position, I felt I was further off than initially suggested and took a risk to just drive on the main road that I was on. I thought to myself, "I'm going to need a little luck now." Time to score some critical rolls with my luck/direction score/skill. I believe I did, as somehow I saw the signboard Marine Parade, which was something mentioned in the additional instructions that came by after I got lost the second time.
Driving along that road I realised now that I have gone a full circle around my destination; As in instead of overshooting the first time, I undershot my exit, only to then reenter even further away from my destination because of the misconception of my position relative to my destination. I then drove aimlessly pass my destination only to find my way around.
So luck aside, I found myself on the other side of the road where my ex-boss was waiting for me. Initial plans were for me to drop off my luggage before we head to the dinner venue; my time spent groping around Singapore meant we'd have to go straight away and leave the 'lets check out the place much later'. Here comes the other funny part.
I'm been holding out that my ex-boss was a lady all through my writing I believe. If I let on about it earlier, then my bad. But for me to deliver the punchline now required me to indicate that it's a she. A brief description is that she's a somewhat typical chinese female in her forties, I believe. To make things easier for she decided she would wait for me at the main road nearby the bus stop outside the condo (or apartment? hmm...). I've seen my ex-boss before and my impression of her was as she is. Middle aged chinese female. For the fact that she was once a lawyer and worked in the same 'field' as I do now gave me the impression her attire would be somewhat...Old fashioned?
So there was this female which was in shorts and sleeveless with pony tails standing my the side of the road and in my erred mind I go,"Now where's my ex-boss? She said my the bus stop? Better drive towards the bus stop and look." I didn't give that youthful hip looking lady a second look!
Luckily there was a bus in front of me, so I stopped and waited for the bus to leave before seeing if this was the right bus stop. As I stopped my ex-boss rang me but disconnected immediately before I picked up the call. I was confused. Suddenly I realised there was that very same female I dismissed as some young chick running towards my car ( I think with arms flailing) and it finally dawn upon me..."That's her, you silly boy!" My ex-boss asked if I even saw her in the first place and I could bring about telling her I did but dismissed her as some teeny bopper....
I sure get my fair share of embarassing moments everytime I travel..Once she got on the car it was much easier to get to the dinner venue as she could direct my way. While she's not been in Singapore for awhile, she definitely knew Singapore much better than the noob me.
Dinner went as planned and food was so so. It was a beach side restaurant and 8 of us had a simple and talkative dinner. By 10pm ish the restaurant was asking for last orders, signalling it's time to go. Suprisingly no one decided to go drinking. I guess aside from the attires, everyone was rather homely type (or didn't want to show the crazy side of things to the people there...Alcohol does that, you know...)
A short drive back and we decided to have a quick teh tarik first before entering the condo area as parking before 11pm was by hour, after 11pm was until the next morning. Parking in Singapore is quite expensive. It seems like over the years teh tarik has become quite a norm there, so we found ourselves going to a nearby place for it. A short chat to update latest work stuff (mainly bitching about some colleagues and their incompetences...:D) and it was time to get back to the condo.
Oh, I haven't seen it yet. I should describe it. But I'm way past the number of words per post...So it'll have to be another time then!
Next up: The Condo, The Food and the Great Revelation!!!! :D :D
Ok, not so down under and Shrek wasn't lost. Just myself. Driving in an unfamiliar territory (this mini island called Singapore...hehehe), I had with me some googled maps as well as some internet directions to get to my ex-boss' place. Dinner was scheduled around 7pm, so I had a good 90-100 minutes to get to the other end of the island. Which, is way more than enough..
Unless you get lost..During peak traffic period. It didn't help that the internet instructions were somewhat ambiguous, or required some basic knowledge of Singapore roads. While I have been to Singapore multiple times, this is the first time I am driving down on my own, unassisted/guided. Ok, minimal assistance.
Anyway, right out of the Customs area I had an immediate crossroads which thanks to lack of split second manoevering I didn't take an exit I shouldn't have. I ended up driving along the highway and eventually saw signboards that was familiar (as in noted in the internet directions) and began familiarising myself with the acronyms for Singapore hgihways. Off my head, they have PIE, CPE, errr......Only 3 weeks and I am already forgeting details.. Sigh. A sure sign of growing old.
Back to following internet directions, I manage to get onto the next highway without much glitch although I was travelling way under the permitted speed limit. Clear indication of a noob in the city. Nevertheless my next direction got me in trouble. From what I can recall, I was suppose to stay in PIE (and expressway) but it referenced Toa Payoh. Silly me thought that I needed to exit it and found myself off PIE and inside Toa Payoh surburbs. Took me a good couple of minutes to realise things were amiss as I couldn't find anything relevant to my next direction. An sms to my ex-boss to indicate I am lost and I proceeded to double back onto PIE. Had I any local street knowledge I would have been able to exit PIE much more ahead rather than where I left off, but alas, noob is as noob be...
Returning to the expressway I was again conned (by my silly self) to take the next exit, I think Paya Besar...(something like that) as it was indicated in the directions. Unfortunately for me, it was again just an indication that PIE would cut through that area, but I wasn't suppose to get off the expressway. This time I realised my mistake much sooner. Unfortunately, before I could make an appropriate (and somewhat late) change of lanes I had this Singaporean car honking me for my late manoever. I mean, the light was red and besides him, there were no other cars. Clearly Singaporeans have little patience. Especially this bloke. He even proceeded to move to the lane on the left to level wih my car and give me an eyeball. Funnily, he exited far left when the lane I was on proceeds to the right. Jerk.. :D
After a good turn or 3 I returned to PIE and told myself, no matter what happens I'll stick to this expressway until the very end where it's suppose to exit to CPE (another expressway). All the while I keep seeing signboards that say I'm headed towards Changi Airport and for all the wrong reasons I kept having the idea that Changi Airport is on the west side of the island while I'm suppose to be heading east. Internally I was torn, with my gut telling me to change directions but my brain saying enough gut moves, just stick to the plan.
Luckily for me at the end of the expressway was clear indications to the CPE and this time it gave me the option to go away from Changi Airport. So I figured my gut was right anyway (despite later realising how wrong I was). My next instruction was even more confusing. I was given the address as Marine Vista, which, by Malaysian standards, sounded like an condo name. Unfortunately, it turns out to be a road name for a smaller road.
The exit I was directed to go to didn't get me directly onto Marine Vista but the turning before it. The reason was that I was coming from the east, the exit directly to Marine Vista only existed if I came from the West (which would cause further confusion later). I could already see the scores of high rise condos around me and felt confident I was near, but I just couldn't find anything that would lead me closer to my destination. Time to use up my last helpline; Call the ex-boss.
Informing my position wasn't all that difficult, except that my ex-boss thought I came from the West, not East. So I supposedly overshot and had to exit back to the highway and move backwards (in terms of the directions, I was exit right, but from my perspective, I needed to exit left...) So I did exactly that and turned up even further from my destination.
I rarely feel lost. I felt DAMN LOST now. The only thing I had going for me was this internal sense of direction which I trusted (yeah, even boasted too) very much. From a complete lost position, I felt I was further off than initially suggested and took a risk to just drive on the main road that I was on. I thought to myself, "I'm going to need a little luck now." Time to score some critical rolls with my luck/direction score/skill. I believe I did, as somehow I saw the signboard Marine Parade, which was something mentioned in the additional instructions that came by after I got lost the second time.
Driving along that road I realised now that I have gone a full circle around my destination; As in instead of overshooting the first time, I undershot my exit, only to then reenter even further away from my destination because of the misconception of my position relative to my destination. I then drove aimlessly pass my destination only to find my way around.
So luck aside, I found myself on the other side of the road where my ex-boss was waiting for me. Initial plans were for me to drop off my luggage before we head to the dinner venue; my time spent groping around Singapore meant we'd have to go straight away and leave the 'lets check out the place much later'. Here comes the other funny part.
I'm been holding out that my ex-boss was a lady all through my writing I believe. If I let on about it earlier, then my bad. But for me to deliver the punchline now required me to indicate that it's a she. A brief description is that she's a somewhat typical chinese female in her forties, I believe. To make things easier for she decided she would wait for me at the main road nearby the bus stop outside the condo (or apartment? hmm...). I've seen my ex-boss before and my impression of her was as she is. Middle aged chinese female. For the fact that she was once a lawyer and worked in the same 'field' as I do now gave me the impression her attire would be somewhat...Old fashioned?
So there was this female which was in shorts and sleeveless with pony tails standing my the side of the road and in my erred mind I go,"Now where's my ex-boss? She said my the bus stop? Better drive towards the bus stop and look." I didn't give that youthful hip looking lady a second look!
Luckily there was a bus in front of me, so I stopped and waited for the bus to leave before seeing if this was the right bus stop. As I stopped my ex-boss rang me but disconnected immediately before I picked up the call. I was confused. Suddenly I realised there was that very same female I dismissed as some young chick running towards my car ( I think with arms flailing) and it finally dawn upon me..."That's her, you silly boy!" My ex-boss asked if I even saw her in the first place and I could bring about telling her I did but dismissed her as some teeny bopper....
I sure get my fair share of embarassing moments everytime I travel..Once she got on the car it was much easier to get to the dinner venue as she could direct my way. While she's not been in Singapore for awhile, she definitely knew Singapore much better than the noob me.
Dinner went as planned and food was so so. It was a beach side restaurant and 8 of us had a simple and talkative dinner. By 10pm ish the restaurant was asking for last orders, signalling it's time to go. Suprisingly no one decided to go drinking. I guess aside from the attires, everyone was rather homely type (or didn't want to show the crazy side of things to the people there...Alcohol does that, you know...)
A short drive back and we decided to have a quick teh tarik first before entering the condo area as parking before 11pm was by hour, after 11pm was until the next morning. Parking in Singapore is quite expensive. It seems like over the years teh tarik has become quite a norm there, so we found ourselves going to a nearby place for it. A short chat to update latest work stuff (mainly bitching about some colleagues and their incompetences...:D) and it was time to get back to the condo.
Oh, I haven't seen it yet. I should describe it. But I'm way past the number of words per post...So it'll have to be another time then!
Next up: The Condo, The Food and the Great Revelation!!!! :D :D
Thursday, July 16, 2009
About a ....(Part 1)
trip down to Singapore last weekend....
Well, looks like I've been able to keep up with traveling to that country that I supposedly so loathe. The people, in general, at least. The country is actually quite ordered and nice.
In any case, enough talking about same old same old...The trip down last weekend was quite different from the previous trips...Here's a few reasons:
1) I was driving down...ON MY OWN...(Ok, I went with Shrek..But I'm sure he doesn't mind me not actually counting him... :p)
2) I wasn't there on business or for some event that I was in some way a part of. I was going there with no other reason but to eat...Eat..and EAT!!!
I actually had some photos taken, but somehow I failed to get around uploading the pictures. So when I do, maybe revisit this and have some silly fun on the silly pictures I take (hint hint, I don't think there was anyone in the pictures..).
Now the main excuse for me to go down was to join in a farewell dinner of my ex-boss, who, while was quite unfortunate to be retrenched by my company and inadvertably realised how despite all the talk about employees being important et all, realised that in times like these (yes, my company is affected by the whole economic crash in the USA) everyone's so busy covering their own ass they forget to do the decent thing; retrench people with dignity. They shy around the subject, make it all hush hush yet when the shit hits the fan, they act as though they didn't know it was coming despite being informed like aeons ago. Earlier in my working life I still believed that sometimes leaders/bosses don't get the news that we expect them to get as much as we expect them to, but over the years I've come to know that a leader that's ill informed is a poor leader. A good leader tends to get information from various sources and when dealing with retrencment/downsizing, if they're not part of the plan then they would have contributed in it. Hence, they would have KNOWN..
Back to my ex-boss, who unfortunately only rejoined the company around 2 years back so would only get a small package, initially took the news quite hard. As with anyone who is forced to undergo a change in their lives, especially when in comes to losing a source of income, she was quite unhappy with the news. But over time she saw the better side of the news. Coupled with the fact that despite being told to go within 1 month of the announcement, she was asked to stay for another 6 months, giving her more time to clear up the stuff and look for another job. While she has yet to reemploy herself, I hear she's lined up good prospects and wishing her best of luck. In any case, she's enjoying the extended holiday where the only reason it will end is because she chooses too; Not because the annual leaves approved only so much or something needs to be done back at work...
Oops. Supposed to talk about the trip..hehe..
Now dinner was on a Friday and for some reason the Singapore Government decided that they'll let cars from Malaysia drive over for free if it's from 5pm to 2am daily. Why? I don't know. Maybe they want travellers to not come into the city during working hours. Since getting past Customs at 5pm would be just nice for me to reach dinner time around 7pm, I had to time my drive nicely so that I do not arrive in Johor Baru too early or too late.
For those unfamiliar, the drive is from KL - JB - SG and the distance is around 400KM thereabouts. I racked up a good 900KM for my whole trip. Which was good exercise for Shrek. I expected the drive to take about 4 hours bar any jams along the highway. I left my office (yes, I ws working on Friday) around 11.45am and decided to eat lunch along the highway. At first I wanted to have McDonalds at one of those drive through outlets, but I missed the outlet along the highway and ended up with 2 buns instead. I bought a Snickers bar, but didn't eat it until I reached the causeway.
The drive down was largely uneventful. Trying hard to abide by the speed limit and keeping to the fact that I needed to arrive at the causeway after 5pm, it was quite a carefree drive. Shrek doesn't go very fast, so at 110KM/H he was quite worked up but stable. I had 2 short stops along the way, mostly to relieve myself and to change from shoes to slippers. Do not drive long distance with shoes unless they're superbly comfortable..Have mercy on your right foot...
Despite all my attempts to be on time, my inner anxiety of being late made me arrive Johor Baru by 4.15pm. With time to kill, I went petrol kiosk hunting so that I have a full tank when I cross over to Singapore. Luckily for me, I'm not restricted by Singaporean laws that require the petrol tanks to be of a certain amount when crossing over, either way...Unfortunate, for the very fact that I didn't reasearch JB at all, I ended up driving round and round the city eventually ending up at the same petrol kiosk I spotted on the opposite side of the road. Then I decided to make another big round before going towards the malaysian Immigration complex as I prepare my travel towards Singapore.
It wasn't after 5pm, however. But as much as I wanted to save SGD 20 by crossing over after 5pm, I was getting jittery waiting for time to pass by. I clearly have issues staying put. So I crossed the Malaysian Customs 20 minutes ahead of time. Nothing much happened except I notice that there were a large number of cars stopping at the side. I guess I'm not the only one intending to not pay. Eventually a traffic police came over to 'encourage' us to move along and stop waiting.
Passing through Customs in Singapore was quite a breeze. Luckily from there onwards I DID research...Somewhat...Now, if only even having some directions and a print out of the way to meet my ex-boss I'd not get lost....
But then again, I expected to get lost since I'm driving in a foreign country for the first time...... :D
.....To Be Continued...
Well, looks like I've been able to keep up with traveling to that country that I supposedly so loathe. The people, in general, at least. The country is actually quite ordered and nice.
In any case, enough talking about same old same old...The trip down last weekend was quite different from the previous trips...Here's a few reasons:
1) I was driving down...ON MY OWN...(Ok, I went with Shrek..But I'm sure he doesn't mind me not actually counting him... :p)
2) I wasn't there on business or for some event that I was in some way a part of. I was going there with no other reason but to eat...Eat..and EAT!!!
I actually had some photos taken, but somehow I failed to get around uploading the pictures. So when I do, maybe revisit this and have some silly fun on the silly pictures I take (hint hint, I don't think there was anyone in the pictures..).
Now the main excuse for me to go down was to join in a farewell dinner of my ex-boss, who, while was quite unfortunate to be retrenched by my company and inadvertably realised how despite all the talk about employees being important et all, realised that in times like these (yes, my company is affected by the whole economic crash in the USA) everyone's so busy covering their own ass they forget to do the decent thing; retrench people with dignity. They shy around the subject, make it all hush hush yet when the shit hits the fan, they act as though they didn't know it was coming despite being informed like aeons ago. Earlier in my working life I still believed that sometimes leaders/bosses don't get the news that we expect them to get as much as we expect them to, but over the years I've come to know that a leader that's ill informed is a poor leader. A good leader tends to get information from various sources and when dealing with retrencment/downsizing, if they're not part of the plan then they would have contributed in it. Hence, they would have KNOWN..
Back to my ex-boss, who unfortunately only rejoined the company around 2 years back so would only get a small package, initially took the news quite hard. As with anyone who is forced to undergo a change in their lives, especially when in comes to losing a source of income, she was quite unhappy with the news. But over time she saw the better side of the news. Coupled with the fact that despite being told to go within 1 month of the announcement, she was asked to stay for another 6 months, giving her more time to clear up the stuff and look for another job. While she has yet to reemploy herself, I hear she's lined up good prospects and wishing her best of luck. In any case, she's enjoying the extended holiday where the only reason it will end is because she chooses too; Not because the annual leaves approved only so much or something needs to be done back at work...
Oops. Supposed to talk about the trip..hehe..
Now dinner was on a Friday and for some reason the Singapore Government decided that they'll let cars from Malaysia drive over for free if it's from 5pm to 2am daily. Why? I don't know. Maybe they want travellers to not come into the city during working hours. Since getting past Customs at 5pm would be just nice for me to reach dinner time around 7pm, I had to time my drive nicely so that I do not arrive in Johor Baru too early or too late.
For those unfamiliar, the drive is from KL - JB - SG and the distance is around 400KM thereabouts. I racked up a good 900KM for my whole trip. Which was good exercise for Shrek. I expected the drive to take about 4 hours bar any jams along the highway. I left my office (yes, I ws working on Friday) around 11.45am and decided to eat lunch along the highway. At first I wanted to have McDonalds at one of those drive through outlets, but I missed the outlet along the highway and ended up with 2 buns instead. I bought a Snickers bar, but didn't eat it until I reached the causeway.
The drive down was largely uneventful. Trying hard to abide by the speed limit and keeping to the fact that I needed to arrive at the causeway after 5pm, it was quite a carefree drive. Shrek doesn't go very fast, so at 110KM/H he was quite worked up but stable. I had 2 short stops along the way, mostly to relieve myself and to change from shoes to slippers. Do not drive long distance with shoes unless they're superbly comfortable..Have mercy on your right foot...
Despite all my attempts to be on time, my inner anxiety of being late made me arrive Johor Baru by 4.15pm. With time to kill, I went petrol kiosk hunting so that I have a full tank when I cross over to Singapore. Luckily for me, I'm not restricted by Singaporean laws that require the petrol tanks to be of a certain amount when crossing over, either way...Unfortunate, for the very fact that I didn't reasearch JB at all, I ended up driving round and round the city eventually ending up at the same petrol kiosk I spotted on the opposite side of the road. Then I decided to make another big round before going towards the malaysian Immigration complex as I prepare my travel towards Singapore.
It wasn't after 5pm, however. But as much as I wanted to save SGD 20 by crossing over after 5pm, I was getting jittery waiting for time to pass by. I clearly have issues staying put. So I crossed the Malaysian Customs 20 minutes ahead of time. Nothing much happened except I notice that there were a large number of cars stopping at the side. I guess I'm not the only one intending to not pay. Eventually a traffic police came over to 'encourage' us to move along and stop waiting.
Passing through Customs in Singapore was quite a breeze. Luckily from there onwards I DID research...Somewhat...Now, if only even having some directions and a print out of the way to meet my ex-boss I'd not get lost....
But then again, I expected to get lost since I'm driving in a foreign country for the first time...... :D
.....To Be Continued...
Monday, June 22, 2009
Not so much an Epiphany
I was driving back early last Friday from work. Early as in around 4.30pm or so. The intention was solely to avoid the jam.
Taking my usual route, where at a point I will be on a 4 lane main road, I was flabergasted that there was a jam. I was on the second lane (from the right) which was one of 2 lanes that leads to the next road on my way back home. The other lane that also leads straight to the next road for me was the fast lane, which at this point wasn't moving all that fast either. The 3rd and 4th lane were options, but near the end of the road I would have to cut back in and in a jam, that's generally not a nice thing to do.
But who says I'm nice? :p
But my ability to decide on what lane to swerve into was limited by the fact that 2 vehicles in front of me was this big lorry obscuring my view. Without the ability to see further up front, I could not really tell if the lanes on my left were actually freer and would be feasible to take those lanes, at least all the way until the end. I could only see the cars zooming by, but without photographic memory i couldn't tell for sure if I've seen those cars before and that my slow crawl towards the end of the road, at some point I may have actually took over them. I manage to check that the fast lane was moving slower than me at the moment.
Throwing the idea of taking the left lanes so that I can get out of the jam sooner and staying on the same lane and just waiting it out, I failed to capitalise on all the opportunities that came and went to take the left lanes. Eventually even the car in front of me left. Now I am directly behind the lorry, further impairing my view up ahead. I have been on the lane for over 15 minutes and was still awhile before I reached the end of the road. Usually this stretch takes less than 3 minutes to get through, now it seems like it's taking forever. My impatience got the better of me eventually and I ended up not taking the left lanes, but taking the fast lane when I noticed that the car I was tracking was no longer around or behind me.
After a 30 minute crawl it seems like the whole thing was a result of an accident way in front..
So what's with the epiphany?
Here's life, or a situation. There are typically a few ways I can get through life/situation; The unpreferred way(slow lane), the tried and tested way(s) (middle lanes), or high risk way(fast lane). Depending on what type of person I am and also depending how I wanted to get through life/situation, I would be in the lane you're most comfortable.
But what happens when I'm caught in a jam? When the lane I'm on isn't progressing the way I expected it? I'd look around and see if the other lanes would give me a better option. Now, the standard expectation is that the slow lanes will always be slow and the fast lane will be faster. But in a jam, I'd never know really. Depending on what's causing the jam, what is the fastest lane could very well be the slowest, and vice versa. That's what looking further ahead helps. As well as looking at other options.
There comes the next stumbling block. What if that BIG FAT LORRY is right in front of me? I can't look forward and can only assess the lanes (options) based on what I can see beside me (present) and behind me (past). Will I take a risk? If I do, which risk will I take? More importantly, will I be indecisive and spend too much time wondering if I should switch lanes (options) and end up spending too much time getting stuck behind that BIG LORRY?
Now, there's no telling that the other lanes will be faster, aside from what I can judge now and what I know of the lanes before. So I could very well switch and end up in a bigger jam that I did before. But the moral of the story is that if I don't try them out, I'll never know. All I'll ever see is this big fat Lorry blocking my way and for all I know, the whole jam could have been because of the lorry. I couldn't see in front, how could I tell?
In conclusion, life can be like a drive down a road. When in a jam and there's no telling if the lane you're on will get you to your destination (in time), assess your options and make a decision quickly. More importantly, once the decision is made, stick to the results and quit blaming/regretting the decision. If the choice garnered a poorer result, reassess; Switch lanes again if you have too. The only thing that would have happened was your continued attempt to find the best lane. Unless you're happy being stuck behind the big fat lorry...There is nothing wrong with being happy...:D
I'm happy behind the big fat lorry in life, but not when I'm driving.. :D
Taking my usual route, where at a point I will be on a 4 lane main road, I was flabergasted that there was a jam. I was on the second lane (from the right) which was one of 2 lanes that leads to the next road on my way back home. The other lane that also leads straight to the next road for me was the fast lane, which at this point wasn't moving all that fast either. The 3rd and 4th lane were options, but near the end of the road I would have to cut back in and in a jam, that's generally not a nice thing to do.
But who says I'm nice? :p
But my ability to decide on what lane to swerve into was limited by the fact that 2 vehicles in front of me was this big lorry obscuring my view. Without the ability to see further up front, I could not really tell if the lanes on my left were actually freer and would be feasible to take those lanes, at least all the way until the end. I could only see the cars zooming by, but without photographic memory i couldn't tell for sure if I've seen those cars before and that my slow crawl towards the end of the road, at some point I may have actually took over them. I manage to check that the fast lane was moving slower than me at the moment.
Throwing the idea of taking the left lanes so that I can get out of the jam sooner and staying on the same lane and just waiting it out, I failed to capitalise on all the opportunities that came and went to take the left lanes. Eventually even the car in front of me left. Now I am directly behind the lorry, further impairing my view up ahead. I have been on the lane for over 15 minutes and was still awhile before I reached the end of the road. Usually this stretch takes less than 3 minutes to get through, now it seems like it's taking forever. My impatience got the better of me eventually and I ended up not taking the left lanes, but taking the fast lane when I noticed that the car I was tracking was no longer around or behind me.
After a 30 minute crawl it seems like the whole thing was a result of an accident way in front..
So what's with the epiphany?
Here's life, or a situation. There are typically a few ways I can get through life/situation; The unpreferred way(slow lane), the tried and tested way(s) (middle lanes), or high risk way(fast lane). Depending on what type of person I am and also depending how I wanted to get through life/situation, I would be in the lane you're most comfortable.
But what happens when I'm caught in a jam? When the lane I'm on isn't progressing the way I expected it? I'd look around and see if the other lanes would give me a better option. Now, the standard expectation is that the slow lanes will always be slow and the fast lane will be faster. But in a jam, I'd never know really. Depending on what's causing the jam, what is the fastest lane could very well be the slowest, and vice versa. That's what looking further ahead helps. As well as looking at other options.
There comes the next stumbling block. What if that BIG FAT LORRY is right in front of me? I can't look forward and can only assess the lanes (options) based on what I can see beside me (present) and behind me (past). Will I take a risk? If I do, which risk will I take? More importantly, will I be indecisive and spend too much time wondering if I should switch lanes (options) and end up spending too much time getting stuck behind that BIG LORRY?
Now, there's no telling that the other lanes will be faster, aside from what I can judge now and what I know of the lanes before. So I could very well switch and end up in a bigger jam that I did before. But the moral of the story is that if I don't try them out, I'll never know. All I'll ever see is this big fat Lorry blocking my way and for all I know, the whole jam could have been because of the lorry. I couldn't see in front, how could I tell?
In conclusion, life can be like a drive down a road. When in a jam and there's no telling if the lane you're on will get you to your destination (in time), assess your options and make a decision quickly. More importantly, once the decision is made, stick to the results and quit blaming/regretting the decision. If the choice garnered a poorer result, reassess; Switch lanes again if you have too. The only thing that would have happened was your continued attempt to find the best lane. Unless you're happy being stuck behind the big fat lorry...There is nothing wrong with being happy...:D
I'm happy behind the big fat lorry in life, but not when I'm driving.. :D
Monday, June 15, 2009
45 days ago...
Was my last blog entry...
I just haven't been feeling like blogging. While that's shoould mean that things aren't stressful or depressing for me, it unfortunately isn't. Just that the depression is cope-able......
In any case, a chance meeting with good old Barry after like maybe months....was truly enjoyable. Though I'm not so sure about his significant other..hehe...We actually went to a Japanese restaurant that, in my recollection, was probably the first Japanese restaurant I went to. I also recall that he was the one who brought me there, back a good 12/13 years ago..
The good old days. When money was scarce but all the experience was enjoyable. Where travelling hours on busses were acceptable and having to wait 15 minutes isn't such a waste of time...
Now I may have more money but I have lost my patience, lost my appreciation for many things I used to...
Need to keep those feet firmly planted on the ground....
Oh, another person quoted that a person should be focusing on the revenue, not the expenses in a way to obtain what they want in life. Well, that only works for things that you can buy with money and it will be a never ending cycle of always wanting more because you keep on wanting to get more. That school of thought, while seemingly positive and progressive, leads people to a never ending cycle where needs are never met. I still prefer the 'pessimist' school of thought, where it's not about getting all that you want or the endless pursuit of them, but a decision to curtail those wants so that life can stop somewhere. Because while our thoughts seems endless, our lives aren't. There's no point having and endless search and hunt for things when I can't stop and smell my flowers.
I'd rather have just one pot of flowers, but I spend the rest of my time nuturing and admiring that one pot of flowers. I don't want to be going after a plot of land, acres of flowers yet never have the time to enjoy the beauty of the flowers since it's a never ending task to maintain those acres of flowers. Oh, having other people maintaining it for you may seem to be the answer, but if you aren't the person doing it, then those flowers really don't belong to you. You own them, but they don't belong to you. For the ones spending their sweat and blood are the ones actually doing the work, not some hotshot manager pointing the fingers to have things done....
hmm...I should have another go at positive thinking sometime...But not today..Today I should continue working on my pot of flowers...
I just haven't been feeling like blogging. While that's shoould mean that things aren't stressful or depressing for me, it unfortunately isn't. Just that the depression is cope-able......
In any case, a chance meeting with good old Barry after like maybe months....was truly enjoyable. Though I'm not so sure about his significant other..hehe...We actually went to a Japanese restaurant that, in my recollection, was probably the first Japanese restaurant I went to. I also recall that he was the one who brought me there, back a good 12/13 years ago..
The good old days. When money was scarce but all the experience was enjoyable. Where travelling hours on busses were acceptable and having to wait 15 minutes isn't such a waste of time...
Now I may have more money but I have lost my patience, lost my appreciation for many things I used to...
Need to keep those feet firmly planted on the ground....
Oh, another person quoted that a person should be focusing on the revenue, not the expenses in a way to obtain what they want in life. Well, that only works for things that you can buy with money and it will be a never ending cycle of always wanting more because you keep on wanting to get more. That school of thought, while seemingly positive and progressive, leads people to a never ending cycle where needs are never met. I still prefer the 'pessimist' school of thought, where it's not about getting all that you want or the endless pursuit of them, but a decision to curtail those wants so that life can stop somewhere. Because while our thoughts seems endless, our lives aren't. There's no point having and endless search and hunt for things when I can't stop and smell my flowers.
I'd rather have just one pot of flowers, but I spend the rest of my time nuturing and admiring that one pot of flowers. I don't want to be going after a plot of land, acres of flowers yet never have the time to enjoy the beauty of the flowers since it's a never ending task to maintain those acres of flowers. Oh, having other people maintaining it for you may seem to be the answer, but if you aren't the person doing it, then those flowers really don't belong to you. You own them, but they don't belong to you. For the ones spending their sweat and blood are the ones actually doing the work, not some hotshot manager pointing the fingers to have things done....
hmm...I should have another go at positive thinking sometime...But not today..Today I should continue working on my pot of flowers...
Thursday, April 30, 2009
A Losing Battle...
Today must be one of the worst days of my emotional life.
I feel like caving in..I feel like giving up.
I feel like there's no more reason to keep going on. Not the way I wish to.
I feel I am lost and will never be found.
I fear I am losing resolve, that I'm cornered without a way out.
I don't want to fall, I don't want to lose. But I don't think I can take it anymore..
Time to let go?
Oh, in case anyone reading this gets really funny ideas, I'm trying to not have to date...:P
I feel like caving in..I feel like giving up.
I feel like there's no more reason to keep going on. Not the way I wish to.
I feel I am lost and will never be found.
I fear I am losing resolve, that I'm cornered without a way out.
I don't want to fall, I don't want to lose. But I don't think I can take it anymore..
Time to let go?
Oh, in case anyone reading this gets really funny ideas, I'm trying to not have to date...:P
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Sarcasm..
To some, I've too much of it. To others, I've not got enough..
I've always been a quick thinking person, especially as a child. While it was easy to dismiss the child's nasty remarks as naive and innocent, somehow my remarks seem to always cut straight to the point and hurt people. Around the age of nine, one time my family decided to visit my grandfather's orchard. Now this isn't your nice orchard where you've got gardeners and cleaners plus nice infrastructure for people to rest and relax. Nope. This is your 'in the woods' and poorly run type of orchards. Typically, our visit there wasn't much for fun but to work. There were plantations to care for, weeds to pull, shed to clean and develop.
It was pain. I couldn't fathom what on earth I was there for if all I get to do is sweat in the sun and work for no apparent reason other than my parents or grandparents telling me so. Typically, me being myself, I abhored these visits and I doubt I made any attempts to hide my displeasure. So on one fine day at the orchard, I quipped back at something and my mom told me,"why do you always say things without going through your head?"
Now I've heard that a thousand times before and in the past, I couldn't understand what it meant. But this time, it somehow dawned upon me that I always voice my opinion without really caring how it would make other people feel. That, and my lack of tact meant that everytime I spoke truthfully, someone gets hurt. Yes, the truth hurts especially when it's not laced with kindness and compassion. Since then I started to become slowly, but surely, a thinking communicator instead. What I didn't realise, was that by me slowly forcing my words through my head before they came out, I now lack the ability to be straight to the point. Instead of spear like accuracy, I began developing twist and turns in my words, sort of in my own way to hide the bare truth.
But the sarcastic part of me never really left. It just got shafted to my inner self, my subconcious. Every now and then, at times when I have least control of my thoughts, those pointed sentences come out thick and fast by the time it's over I am labeled rude, disrespectful and what not. I wasn't even a teenager yet...
Over time I ceased becoming a person easy to anger yet easy to make friends, but I started to become more recluse and introvert. Yes, I used less sarcasm, but that was because I talked less. When I do talk, I take such a long departure from the point that I either confuse or bore people. Oh yes, I agree I was boring. That's the price I had to pay to not hurt people.
Then in my days in the university, where most people begin to find themselves and what they want to do in the future (yes, some kids have their future all planned out. But for lesser beings like me, it takes much longer (and sometimes never) to find one's true calling) I had a weird conversation with an associate while hanging out at a hobby store. In that conversation, I think there was alot of dissing of certain players both for their behaviour and their poor results. The associate stated,"No matter how bad the person is, they too have self-pride. We shouldn't be bashing them up so thoughtlessly".
Again I was reminded of what my mother used to say about me. The funnier thing was that this statement came from an associate who isn't exactly the kindest person in the world. Yet he, truthfully or not, found it relevant to cut people slack. Again, I do not recall any of our personality strikes being lies, so they were just plain truths that hurt. Being upfront about it, hurts.
There lies the issue with sarcasm. Or at least when people complain about my sarcasm. Wait, the stories incomplete.
So reeling of 2 insightful statements to remind me that not everyone can handle the truth (yeah, I knew it before A Few Good Men did..:p), at one time I was helping out with a M:tG event. It was back in 2000 and KL was hosting its first ever Grand Prix and they needed people. I happily volunteered as I was no good with the game, but ruleswise I was ok. I also passed my level 1 judge test there, despite not really scoring the required passing mark, so it was all good then.
What I want to mention was one of the nights we had dinner at a nearby restaurant. The main organisers from the US were also holding an Invitational event running concurrently with the GP. That dinner, they also invited the Invitational players. One Gary Wise (only those aware of M:tG would know the name, if you've been playing long enough..:p) was seated opposite me at dinner. In one of the conversation, something came up and most of the people had a good laugh but I was clueless. I got a nice remark from Gary," You're not very good with Sarcasm, are you?"
Here I go "what?" in my head. All my life I've been blasted for being too sarcastic and here someone's telling me I'm not good enough? How rude! But that's besides the point. More importantly, I realise that sarcasm is only good for people when they don't get hurt but when they do, it's bad. The problem is, most of the time my sarcastic remarks happen IS when the person's around. Not behind their backs. It's not like I'm lying about them. I'm just making obvious, without the shadow of concealment, the plain truth that hurts. For that, I am crucified to no end.
Well, too bad people. You've got to learn to handle the truth because everyday you have to face it. Laced with kindness or not, the truth will hurt you. It's just whether you have to face the pain in front of people or in hiding. If you have a problem with me telling in your face what the truth is, then don't let me find out the truth. I aim to pull no punches. Same goes if you know of my truths. Spare me no leniency and just fire away. Fair game, this sarcasm.
I'm done trying to say nice things to people so that they don't get hurt.
I've always been a quick thinking person, especially as a child. While it was easy to dismiss the child's nasty remarks as naive and innocent, somehow my remarks seem to always cut straight to the point and hurt people. Around the age of nine, one time my family decided to visit my grandfather's orchard. Now this isn't your nice orchard where you've got gardeners and cleaners plus nice infrastructure for people to rest and relax. Nope. This is your 'in the woods' and poorly run type of orchards. Typically, our visit there wasn't much for fun but to work. There were plantations to care for, weeds to pull, shed to clean and develop.
It was pain. I couldn't fathom what on earth I was there for if all I get to do is sweat in the sun and work for no apparent reason other than my parents or grandparents telling me so. Typically, me being myself, I abhored these visits and I doubt I made any attempts to hide my displeasure. So on one fine day at the orchard, I quipped back at something and my mom told me,"why do you always say things without going through your head?"
Now I've heard that a thousand times before and in the past, I couldn't understand what it meant. But this time, it somehow dawned upon me that I always voice my opinion without really caring how it would make other people feel. That, and my lack of tact meant that everytime I spoke truthfully, someone gets hurt. Yes, the truth hurts especially when it's not laced with kindness and compassion. Since then I started to become slowly, but surely, a thinking communicator instead. What I didn't realise, was that by me slowly forcing my words through my head before they came out, I now lack the ability to be straight to the point. Instead of spear like accuracy, I began developing twist and turns in my words, sort of in my own way to hide the bare truth.
But the sarcastic part of me never really left. It just got shafted to my inner self, my subconcious. Every now and then, at times when I have least control of my thoughts, those pointed sentences come out thick and fast by the time it's over I am labeled rude, disrespectful and what not. I wasn't even a teenager yet...
Over time I ceased becoming a person easy to anger yet easy to make friends, but I started to become more recluse and introvert. Yes, I used less sarcasm, but that was because I talked less. When I do talk, I take such a long departure from the point that I either confuse or bore people. Oh yes, I agree I was boring. That's the price I had to pay to not hurt people.
Then in my days in the university, where most people begin to find themselves and what they want to do in the future (yes, some kids have their future all planned out. But for lesser beings like me, it takes much longer (and sometimes never) to find one's true calling) I had a weird conversation with an associate while hanging out at a hobby store. In that conversation, I think there was alot of dissing of certain players both for their behaviour and their poor results. The associate stated,"No matter how bad the person is, they too have self-pride. We shouldn't be bashing them up so thoughtlessly".
Again I was reminded of what my mother used to say about me. The funnier thing was that this statement came from an associate who isn't exactly the kindest person in the world. Yet he, truthfully or not, found it relevant to cut people slack. Again, I do not recall any of our personality strikes being lies, so they were just plain truths that hurt. Being upfront about it, hurts.
There lies the issue with sarcasm. Or at least when people complain about my sarcasm. Wait, the stories incomplete.
So reeling of 2 insightful statements to remind me that not everyone can handle the truth (yeah, I knew it before A Few Good Men did..:p), at one time I was helping out with a M:tG event. It was back in 2000 and KL was hosting its first ever Grand Prix and they needed people. I happily volunteered as I was no good with the game, but ruleswise I was ok. I also passed my level 1 judge test there, despite not really scoring the required passing mark, so it was all good then.
What I want to mention was one of the nights we had dinner at a nearby restaurant. The main organisers from the US were also holding an Invitational event running concurrently with the GP. That dinner, they also invited the Invitational players. One Gary Wise (only those aware of M:tG would know the name, if you've been playing long enough..:p) was seated opposite me at dinner. In one of the conversation, something came up and most of the people had a good laugh but I was clueless. I got a nice remark from Gary," You're not very good with Sarcasm, are you?"
Here I go "what?" in my head. All my life I've been blasted for being too sarcastic and here someone's telling me I'm not good enough? How rude! But that's besides the point. More importantly, I realise that sarcasm is only good for people when they don't get hurt but when they do, it's bad. The problem is, most of the time my sarcastic remarks happen IS when the person's around. Not behind their backs. It's not like I'm lying about them. I'm just making obvious, without the shadow of concealment, the plain truth that hurts. For that, I am crucified to no end.
Well, too bad people. You've got to learn to handle the truth because everyday you have to face it. Laced with kindness or not, the truth will hurt you. It's just whether you have to face the pain in front of people or in hiding. If you have a problem with me telling in your face what the truth is, then don't let me find out the truth. I aim to pull no punches. Same goes if you know of my truths. Spare me no leniency and just fire away. Fair game, this sarcasm.
I'm done trying to say nice things to people so that they don't get hurt.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Fireworks...
Bored and tired of playing Dota, I stepped into the living room hoping to entertain myself by gazing into the idiot box. It was around 8.30pm and the idiot box was showing rather idiotic things. I wonder why I pay the monthly fee these days since the shows are rather crappy over weekends. I don't watch on weekdays you see. But if I were to cancel the subscription my mother would probably give me an earful since she's at home all day (except for weekends...)..
Even while playing Dota in my room I've been hearing someone talking as though there is a party nearby. Dismissing it as probably one of my neighbour in my 24 stories apartment (or condominuim, but I don't want peple to think that I live in some really expensive place because the place is not that expensive, or classy, at all) hosting a party, I just kept ignoring the noise I hear in a futile attempt to find some entertainment via the idiot box.
Then I hear explosions and looking out my balcony I see bright colours. The explosions persist and then I realised someone was letting off fireworks nearby, around the construction sites of the semi-detach houses at the bottom of the hill my apartments occupy. Without much thought I instinctively opened up the grill to my balcony (yes, eventhough I live on the 22nd floor, it pays to be careful with home security as there are people who would climb into balconies that high up just for an easy break in) and stepped out to have a closer look.
I've watched fireworks before, but in most instances they are at least a few kilometres away and I'm usually on the ground. This time, I am at a height where the lights go bright and the loud booms are resonating throughout my apartment. The fireworks went on for a good 3-5 minutes, all the time I just stood there and witnessed the spectacle. Realising the show was finishing, as well as my proximity to the fireworks, I was somewhat worried that the finishing act might just reach me. Indeed the final blast was huge and far reaching, but luckily it didn't shoot across as far as I was worried about.
That, made my Saturday Evening. Sunday was still crap, however.
Though I want to note that while I still don't see why people like fireworks all that much, after all, it's just lights and loud noises, seeing one so close and so unexpectedly have reminded me how beautiful fireworks can be. As well as how life can spring surprises in the most unexpected of ways. The next time I hear noise like parties, I hope they have fireworks too. This time I'll try to record it on camera.
Even while playing Dota in my room I've been hearing someone talking as though there is a party nearby. Dismissing it as probably one of my neighbour in my 24 stories apartment (or condominuim, but I don't want peple to think that I live in some really expensive place because the place is not that expensive, or classy, at all) hosting a party, I just kept ignoring the noise I hear in a futile attempt to find some entertainment via the idiot box.
Then I hear explosions and looking out my balcony I see bright colours. The explosions persist and then I realised someone was letting off fireworks nearby, around the construction sites of the semi-detach houses at the bottom of the hill my apartments occupy. Without much thought I instinctively opened up the grill to my balcony (yes, eventhough I live on the 22nd floor, it pays to be careful with home security as there are people who would climb into balconies that high up just for an easy break in) and stepped out to have a closer look.
I've watched fireworks before, but in most instances they are at least a few kilometres away and I'm usually on the ground. This time, I am at a height where the lights go bright and the loud booms are resonating throughout my apartment. The fireworks went on for a good 3-5 minutes, all the time I just stood there and witnessed the spectacle. Realising the show was finishing, as well as my proximity to the fireworks, I was somewhat worried that the finishing act might just reach me. Indeed the final blast was huge and far reaching, but luckily it didn't shoot across as far as I was worried about.
That, made my Saturday Evening. Sunday was still crap, however.
Though I want to note that while I still don't see why people like fireworks all that much, after all, it's just lights and loud noises, seeing one so close and so unexpectedly have reminded me how beautiful fireworks can be. As well as how life can spring surprises in the most unexpected of ways. The next time I hear noise like parties, I hope they have fireworks too. This time I'll try to record it on camera.
Friday, April 17, 2009
Dream, Dream, Dream......
Absolutely no idea what brought me to come up with that header, aside from the fact that every other header I wanted to use seemed like something i've used before. So here's to disjointed headings. Wait, that doesn't really work since the heading's quite complete, just that it has nothing to do with the nothing that I'm about to nothing about. Is the 'Nothing' closing in on me? Where's my own luckdragon? Heck, i could do with a little bit of luck these days..
Aside from having cheat pains at irregular intervals, in which the GP claims to be me just anxious or depressed (which is true on the later count), I'm every bit the same person as I was the last time I posted. I don't have much to talk about, my life's an utter bore (having said that, it's boring to me. it might not be boring to you, but to me it is so here's to writers right...) and I've littel reasons to post much here.
Work environs hasn't changed though I'm getting better interaction with the colleagues seated near me. But otherwise, same old same old. I'm tired of whining about work, so let's move on the my personal life.
I've been thinking about blogging on certain topics. Marriage and Divorce, Straying Men, the State of Economy in my Country (this is extremely risky as I could get myself hauled of for no reason..:p), My Sorry Life....etc.. But some how the topics just seemed either too sensitive (really, sensitive? For me?? :p) or I just don't think I have sufficient know-how to write about those topics. So I'm kind of having a writer's block recently.
I could rant about my failing heart and my constant state of depression, but that's a little too revealing. Enough to mention that my constant battle with age and the interesting things that comes with it are failing; To a point I'm almost at a loss to what I'm to do.
So enough babbling incoherently even on a blog. Let's try to get some semblance with the header/title/subject.
I recently dreamnt of a death of a person dear to me, yet even in the dream I felt so little over the death I wonder will I ever mourn the way other people do. Wait,...boring..let's try again.
I still dream to one day write down my 3 piano concertos, 2 symphonies, 3 overtures, 1 violin concerto, several piano scores and other ocherstral works. If only I'd spend less time with mindless automated activities like computer gaming and start writing. Wait, I've mention this severa times too. Broken recorder am I not?
Ok, dream. C'mon. I can do better than this.
Oh, I have a new dream car. It's known as a Mini Cooper. (not sure if I've mentioned this before...) Not any Mini Cooper (though in essence, actually, any Mini Cooper will do...:p) but one that's pimped to look like a Kelisa. I recall being asked why would I want a car that cost near half a million ringgit be pimped to look like a car that cost a tenth of it. Well, imagine being looked down upon by other drivers on a slope/highway/traffic lights thinking that they'd overpower me anytime. Then before they'd see it, vroom! I'm off and they can kiss my a$$!!! Haha. I'd still lose out to those big big luxury cars or even the sports ones, but hey, where I am, I'd probably beat around 85% of the other cars...:D
Now that's 1 dream that is new. My other 2 dreams, well.......
Maybe one day if I'm drunk I'd end up posting them here...But I can always delete them...muahahahahahahah
Now back to my boring existence...
Aside from having cheat pains at irregular intervals, in which the GP claims to be me just anxious or depressed (which is true on the later count), I'm every bit the same person as I was the last time I posted. I don't have much to talk about, my life's an utter bore (having said that, it's boring to me. it might not be boring to you, but to me it is so here's to writers right...) and I've littel reasons to post much here.
Work environs hasn't changed though I'm getting better interaction with the colleagues seated near me. But otherwise, same old same old. I'm tired of whining about work, so let's move on the my personal life.
I've been thinking about blogging on certain topics. Marriage and Divorce, Straying Men, the State of Economy in my Country (this is extremely risky as I could get myself hauled of for no reason..:p), My Sorry Life....etc.. But some how the topics just seemed either too sensitive (really, sensitive? For me?? :p) or I just don't think I have sufficient know-how to write about those topics. So I'm kind of having a writer's block recently.
I could rant about my failing heart and my constant state of depression, but that's a little too revealing. Enough to mention that my constant battle with age and the interesting things that comes with it are failing; To a point I'm almost at a loss to what I'm to do.
So enough babbling incoherently even on a blog. Let's try to get some semblance with the header/title/subject.
I recently dreamnt of a death of a person dear to me, yet even in the dream I felt so little over the death I wonder will I ever mourn the way other people do. Wait,...boring..let's try again.
I still dream to one day write down my 3 piano concertos, 2 symphonies, 3 overtures, 1 violin concerto, several piano scores and other ocherstral works. If only I'd spend less time with mindless automated activities like computer gaming and start writing. Wait, I've mention this severa times too. Broken recorder am I not?
Ok, dream. C'mon. I can do better than this.
Oh, I have a new dream car. It's known as a Mini Cooper. (not sure if I've mentioned this before...) Not any Mini Cooper (though in essence, actually, any Mini Cooper will do...:p) but one that's pimped to look like a Kelisa. I recall being asked why would I want a car that cost near half a million ringgit be pimped to look like a car that cost a tenth of it. Well, imagine being looked down upon by other drivers on a slope/highway/traffic lights thinking that they'd overpower me anytime. Then before they'd see it, vroom! I'm off and they can kiss my a$$!!! Haha. I'd still lose out to those big big luxury cars or even the sports ones, but hey, where I am, I'd probably beat around 85% of the other cars...:D
Now that's 1 dream that is new. My other 2 dreams, well.......
Maybe one day if I'm drunk I'd end up posting them here...But I can always delete them...muahahahahahahah
Now back to my boring existence...
Wednesday, April 01, 2009
New Toy for the Big Boy!!!!
My Digital Piano has arrived!!!!!
Yippie!!!!
It's not much, but sure cost me quite a bomb....
It even has recordings in it and some interesting selections indeed!!
Can't wait to go home tonight and continue pounding on the keys!!!
Oops...
A little useless post this is....:p
Yippie!!!!
It's not much, but sure cost me quite a bomb....
It even has recordings in it and some interesting selections indeed!!
Can't wait to go home tonight and continue pounding on the keys!!!
Oops...
A little useless post this is....:p
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
When I Laugh, (or Smile)....
When others won't, for clearly the situation doesn't warrant the humour/laughter....Most of the time it's not because I have a sadist view of most things (thought at times, I do), but simply because there is very little I can do about it.
Going back abit. I'm getting quite a lot of slack from people who know me but don't know me all that well for my ill-timed laughter or smiles. Most people write me off as being some sicko finding fun out of other's misfortune (yes, I smile/laugh at other people's misfortunes. But I laugh at my own significantly much more..) Oops. Wait, Saint Saen's Organ symphony just ended. Going to put something else on..Brahm's Tragic overture is next..
Now, where was I? Ok, so I laugh when things go wrong. Or something bad happens. It's not that I am insensitive towards the situation, but throughout my years I have turned into a person almost impervious to grief by bad luck/misfortune. Or, at least, I don't show it.
Wait, let's jump around a bit and confuse myself and anyone insane enough to read this. Take this example that happened over lunch. This new waiter serving at a food court came over to take me and my friend's orders. I wanted my good old teh tarik (pulled tea with milk) and my friend ordered Milo Ais (ice) kurang manis (less sugar). The waiter promptly went off and returned a few minutes later. In his hands were Teh O panas and Teh O panas Ais (that's tea wihout milk, and another with ice). Two completely different drinks from what we ordered. Ok, if you're not from my region/locale, the orders don't seem that different, but where I am from, they shouldn't make these mistakes. But they do.
After clearly stating the drinks we ordered and have the waiter return the drinks for correct ones, my friend commented that I seem to be enjoying myself with the waiter's incompetence. His clue was the smirk on my face. While he agreed that I wasn't in anyway making hell out of things and giving the waiter a hard time, I seemed to like the whole muck up. To him, I was having fun. But I wasn't. Fortunately for me, his comment was both blasé and direct, allowing me the opportunity to explain (Not many people allow others to explain things that seem weird to them but in reality it isn't. OR, they just find it weird. PERIOD). So I explained that my smirk wasn't because I enjoyed it, but it was just me not showing my frustration to the whole mess of things at the waiter whom I know, or believe, was new, foreign, and untrained. The reasons why he gets the job is because (most) restaurant/food court operators in my country are so selfish and profit-minded that they prefer to hire foreign labours to do jobs locals can do simply because it's probably at a fraction (possibly even a tenth) of the cost of locals. It is also not helped that locals here find jobs like that( waiting tables at coffeeshops/food courts) either demeaning (yes, (many) uneducated people in my country believes they are due a desk job that pays them well without them requiring to use much brains) or too low paying, making the bosses sometimes having no option but to look for job hungry foreigners who would take any job that will pay them ANYTIME.
So the whole muck up, while to some part, was the waiter's fault, in many ways, it wasn't. Nor will it help if I turn hostile and give the guy a good shouting or two. I still wanted him to bring me the drinks I want, and preferably not contaminated. So my response? Withold all the negative energy in me, try to it work out with the waiter and hope that he gets it right the second time. Oops. Tragic overture ended too. This is longer than I thought. Schumann's Piano Concerto it is then.
There you have it. A common occurance where you have me smiling (at times laughing with myself) when most others would either show their annoyance or anger and react negatively. I'm not saying that I am so capable of controlling my anger and all that saintly stuff. I don't. Nor do I try to. If showing anger, annoyance and frustration, in my honest opinion, gets the message across, I will, without hesitation, give it to you/them/it. Just ask the many poor sods that tried to telemarket me. But in many instances, these emotions/reaction just doesn't do the right job. So, instead of making everyone feel bad, I'll just make myself feel bad. By doing so, most people think I'm some psycho. (Which, on a different vantage point, isn't so far off bulleye :p)
The next time you see me laughing or smiling when you don't see how it can be funny, don't immediately think I'm having a good time too. I'm just not showing it. On other note, I do find it hilariously interesting how in a span of 3 months, I know of 3 persons whom I am not related to to have died. By my theories, while death is inevitable, they tend to happen over much longer periods of time; not so frequently. Must be me..
Going back abit. I'm getting quite a lot of slack from people who know me but don't know me all that well for my ill-timed laughter or smiles. Most people write me off as being some sicko finding fun out of other's misfortune (yes, I smile/laugh at other people's misfortunes. But I laugh at my own significantly much more..) Oops. Wait, Saint Saen's Organ symphony just ended. Going to put something else on..Brahm's Tragic overture is next..
Now, where was I? Ok, so I laugh when things go wrong. Or something bad happens. It's not that I am insensitive towards the situation, but throughout my years I have turned into a person almost impervious to grief by bad luck/misfortune. Or, at least, I don't show it.
Wait, let's jump around a bit and confuse myself and anyone insane enough to read this. Take this example that happened over lunch. This new waiter serving at a food court came over to take me and my friend's orders. I wanted my good old teh tarik (pulled tea with milk) and my friend ordered Milo Ais (ice) kurang manis (less sugar). The waiter promptly went off and returned a few minutes later. In his hands were Teh O panas and Teh O panas Ais (that's tea wihout milk, and another with ice). Two completely different drinks from what we ordered. Ok, if you're not from my region/locale, the orders don't seem that different, but where I am from, they shouldn't make these mistakes. But they do.
After clearly stating the drinks we ordered and have the waiter return the drinks for correct ones, my friend commented that I seem to be enjoying myself with the waiter's incompetence. His clue was the smirk on my face. While he agreed that I wasn't in anyway making hell out of things and giving the waiter a hard time, I seemed to like the whole muck up. To him, I was having fun. But I wasn't. Fortunately for me, his comment was both blasé and direct, allowing me the opportunity to explain (Not many people allow others to explain things that seem weird to them but in reality it isn't. OR, they just find it weird. PERIOD). So I explained that my smirk wasn't because I enjoyed it, but it was just me not showing my frustration to the whole mess of things at the waiter whom I know, or believe, was new, foreign, and untrained. The reasons why he gets the job is because (most) restaurant/food court operators in my country are so selfish and profit-minded that they prefer to hire foreign labours to do jobs locals can do simply because it's probably at a fraction (possibly even a tenth) of the cost of locals. It is also not helped that locals here find jobs like that( waiting tables at coffeeshops/food courts) either demeaning (yes, (many) uneducated people in my country believes they are due a desk job that pays them well without them requiring to use much brains) or too low paying, making the bosses sometimes having no option but to look for job hungry foreigners who would take any job that will pay them ANYTIME.
So the whole muck up, while to some part, was the waiter's fault, in many ways, it wasn't. Nor will it help if I turn hostile and give the guy a good shouting or two. I still wanted him to bring me the drinks I want, and preferably not contaminated. So my response? Withold all the negative energy in me, try to it work out with the waiter and hope that he gets it right the second time. Oops. Tragic overture ended too. This is longer than I thought. Schumann's Piano Concerto it is then.
There you have it. A common occurance where you have me smiling (at times laughing with myself) when most others would either show their annoyance or anger and react negatively. I'm not saying that I am so capable of controlling my anger and all that saintly stuff. I don't. Nor do I try to. If showing anger, annoyance and frustration, in my honest opinion, gets the message across, I will, without hesitation, give it to you/them/it. Just ask the many poor sods that tried to telemarket me. But in many instances, these emotions/reaction just doesn't do the right job. So, instead of making everyone feel bad, I'll just make myself feel bad. By doing so, most people think I'm some psycho. (Which, on a different vantage point, isn't so far off bulleye :p)
The next time you see me laughing or smiling when you don't see how it can be funny, don't immediately think I'm having a good time too. I'm just not showing it. On other note, I do find it hilariously interesting how in a span of 3 months, I know of 3 persons whom I am not related to to have died. By my theories, while death is inevitable, they tend to happen over much longer periods of time; not so frequently. Must be me..
Monday, March 30, 2009
I'm Broke, By the Way...
The weekend's been quite interesting. For those familiar with me, interesting is the word I use too often as proxy to more accurate but potentially deangerous terms like; Boring, Ridiculuous, Silly, Incompetent, Unacceptable, Mess, Useless, Annoying, etc......You should get the drift.
But this weekend was interesting in essence. It was expensive, however..
I'll start off with my 2 hour trip to Sunway Lagoon. Now, I've never been much of a fun-park guy, mostly because I haven't the heart to take all the crazy G-Force they are all aimed and putting the human body through. But as with many things that hurts my heart, it has such a shoddy memory of pain that for some unknown reason I felt like doing all those crazy rides. It didn't help that my company decided to arrange the trip free for people like me (who are members of a club in the company). That, or the fact that I'm now 30+ makes me realise that if I don't try them now, I probably never will.
So after some kiddie rides I took the ship like ride that moves like a pendulum, but eventually goes all 360 when the momentum is just enough to reach the apex and fall over. Half way on the ride my heart was already giving out and I could hardly think reasonably. I couldn't scream, not sure why and all I could think off was how to survive the ride. Eventually I just focused on the floor of the 'ship' and didn't even dare to look out when I could tell I was upside down. When the whole thing was over, I couldn't wait to get off the ride. I had this weird sensation in my heart which said pretty much, "DON'T TRY THAT AGAIN"..Gladly...
After that I took some other rides and shot some paintballs. By noon I was ready for lunch and left the park soon after. Note to self: Do not ride crazy rides. Do not do them alone.
Funness...
Now what has that got to do with me being broke? Broken, maybe, but broke?
Well, yesterday I did some scouting for digital pianos/keyboards. The problem I have now is that my keyboard at home is not touch sensitive, i.e. light touch or hammer the keys I get the same sound and loudness. For casual playing that's actually good, for my piano lessons it's not good enough. I have been putting off securing a new keyboard for awhile, but with the sound of the old keyboard getting worse, I'm losing drive to practice.
So at the end of the scouting session I signed my life away for a new digital keyboard. It arrives tomorrow. Luckily for me the makers have realised a market for small digital keyboards for beginners like me that cost half as much as the bombs of normal digital keyboards and nowhere near acoustic pianos. Still, in this economic environment, I'm broke...
Oh, a quote from myself I told my (ex) boss, " Interesting Developments, Without Much Developments"....
But this weekend was interesting in essence. It was expensive, however..
I'll start off with my 2 hour trip to Sunway Lagoon. Now, I've never been much of a fun-park guy, mostly because I haven't the heart to take all the crazy G-Force they are all aimed and putting the human body through. But as with many things that hurts my heart, it has such a shoddy memory of pain that for some unknown reason I felt like doing all those crazy rides. It didn't help that my company decided to arrange the trip free for people like me (who are members of a club in the company). That, or the fact that I'm now 30+ makes me realise that if I don't try them now, I probably never will.
So after some kiddie rides I took the ship like ride that moves like a pendulum, but eventually goes all 360 when the momentum is just enough to reach the apex and fall over. Half way on the ride my heart was already giving out and I could hardly think reasonably. I couldn't scream, not sure why and all I could think off was how to survive the ride. Eventually I just focused on the floor of the 'ship' and didn't even dare to look out when I could tell I was upside down. When the whole thing was over, I couldn't wait to get off the ride. I had this weird sensation in my heart which said pretty much, "DON'T TRY THAT AGAIN"..Gladly...
After that I took some other rides and shot some paintballs. By noon I was ready for lunch and left the park soon after. Note to self: Do not ride crazy rides. Do not do them alone.
Funness...
Now what has that got to do with me being broke? Broken, maybe, but broke?
Well, yesterday I did some scouting for digital pianos/keyboards. The problem I have now is that my keyboard at home is not touch sensitive, i.e. light touch or hammer the keys I get the same sound and loudness. For casual playing that's actually good, for my piano lessons it's not good enough. I have been putting off securing a new keyboard for awhile, but with the sound of the old keyboard getting worse, I'm losing drive to practice.
So at the end of the scouting session I signed my life away for a new digital keyboard. It arrives tomorrow. Luckily for me the makers have realised a market for small digital keyboards for beginners like me that cost half as much as the bombs of normal digital keyboards and nowhere near acoustic pianos. Still, in this economic environment, I'm broke...
Oh, a quote from myself I told my (ex) boss, " Interesting Developments, Without Much Developments"....
Monday, March 23, 2009
Yet Another Bites the Dust....
Interestingly, 2 persons I've known of at work has since passed away.
One via suicide, the latest one suspected to be murdered.
My whole workplace is a gloomy place to be for the moment.
Yet all I can think about is how my Danny Murphy and Micha Richards picks for Fantasy Football turning out to be great picks!!
I don't quite know these 2 individuals that have passed away, but I have worked with them and even shared meal times with them before. Both are female, by the way. While everyone's thinking about the ordeal the latest demised would have went through hours before her time (consideirng current speculation involving foul play), I can't feel the slightest for her.
It's not the first time I felt this hollow in me. Last year a known associate lost her mother and when informed, my thought was solely on "yet another where I wouldhave to fork out money if I turned up at the funeral. I shall pass". In my memory, the closest persons who have passed away while I was mature enough to understand the passing were my grandmothers. Yet, I don't recall ever shedding a tear for either one of them. Granted, I wasn't close, but..?? Really??
I don't know, maybe if in the time my immediate family members or my parents, that time I might actually feel it. But for now, I think I'm unable to feel sad when a person dies..When a person dies, here are my immediate thoughts:
1) They do not need to suffer in life anymore
2) If they died young, that means they've done a whole lot of good for their god to take them away.
3) I don't want to go to the funeral as I don't want to pay
4) Wonder how did they go?
5) Will they realise (their soul/spirit) they are dead? For the dead that don't know/accept that they are can really give the living problems.
While I now believe going to a person's funeral is some sign of respect, I can't see myself going to one anytime soon. Unless I've some work to do...
:p
One via suicide, the latest one suspected to be murdered.
My whole workplace is a gloomy place to be for the moment.
Yet all I can think about is how my Danny Murphy and Micha Richards picks for Fantasy Football turning out to be great picks!!
I don't quite know these 2 individuals that have passed away, but I have worked with them and even shared meal times with them before. Both are female, by the way. While everyone's thinking about the ordeal the latest demised would have went through hours before her time (consideirng current speculation involving foul play), I can't feel the slightest for her.
It's not the first time I felt this hollow in me. Last year a known associate lost her mother and when informed, my thought was solely on "yet another where I wouldhave to fork out money if I turned up at the funeral. I shall pass". In my memory, the closest persons who have passed away while I was mature enough to understand the passing were my grandmothers. Yet, I don't recall ever shedding a tear for either one of them. Granted, I wasn't close, but..?? Really??
I don't know, maybe if in the time my immediate family members or my parents, that time I might actually feel it. But for now, I think I'm unable to feel sad when a person dies..When a person dies, here are my immediate thoughts:
1) They do not need to suffer in life anymore
2) If they died young, that means they've done a whole lot of good for their god to take them away.
3) I don't want to go to the funeral as I don't want to pay
4) Wonder how did they go?
5) Will they realise (their soul/spirit) they are dead? For the dead that don't know/accept that they are can really give the living problems.
While I now believe going to a person's funeral is some sign of respect, I can't see myself going to one anytime soon. Unless I've some work to do...
:p
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
It's Been a Month!!!
Since I last blogged!!
Oh my, words escape me.. No, really, I really have little to blog. I wanted to write about educational choices and work happiness but realised the post was going from nowehere to, well, nowhere..
I'd like to blog about bread making but unless I just want to write about how crap my attempts have been, there really isn't much to write about.
I'd like to write about my love life............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................(still don't get the hint??)
I'd like to write about work but there isn't anything new to blog about..
I'd like to write about my progress with piano lessons but progress has been slow. Aside from a serious consideration (despite the poorer economic conditions) to purchase a touch sensitive electronic keyboard that should set me back around RM 3000.
I'd like to blog about any other thing, but really.......
I guess the only thing worth looking forward for the moment is this concert I'm going to go in 10 days time..Should be fun...
Hope it's fun....
Oh my, words escape me.. No, really, I really have little to blog. I wanted to write about educational choices and work happiness but realised the post was going from nowehere to, well, nowhere..
I'd like to blog about bread making but unless I just want to write about how crap my attempts have been, there really isn't much to write about.
I'd like to write about my love life............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................(still don't get the hint??)
I'd like to write about work but there isn't anything new to blog about..
I'd like to write about my progress with piano lessons but progress has been slow. Aside from a serious consideration (despite the poorer economic conditions) to purchase a touch sensitive electronic keyboard that should set me back around RM 3000.
I'd like to blog about any other thing, but really.......
I guess the only thing worth looking forward for the moment is this concert I'm going to go in 10 days time..Should be fun...
Hope it's fun....
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Shaking Hands...
Literally, shaking hands. As in 2 right hands phyisically in embrace in a show of gratitude or just greeting.
So what gives with the topic? Well, I am generally a non-physical person, to an extent even handshakes are avoided. As greetings I'd say the occasional hi, or even just a raise of a brow signifies the standard 'yes I see you and acknowledge your presence' indication when dealing with people. Of course, in more official situations, i.e. at work, I'd follow the customary expectations. However, I still flinch whenever I have to deal with visitors from abroad whom tend to have rather elaborate hi's and bye's.
Having said that, Last Sunday I probably shook more hands (and all different set of hands!) then I have for the past, erm, 20 years?? Oh, I guess I'm ahead of myself here.
Before going on, I should do the customary shout out to my friend who, after 2 wedding receptions, should now be officially married enough for the previous generation to accept him to their fold and stop treating him (and his wife) like single people. :P In any case, long be your marriage, fruitful (pun intended) and fulfilling (that just came out of a blue). Enjoy being on the giving end of all the nasty marriage jokes. :D :D!!
Ok, back to shaking hands. Ok, maybe not.
I have recently developed a fear of weddings and, well, most social gatherings that I have basically put up a huge sign saying, "Ignore me for wedding invites!" (it's invisible, but they know its there...). I have skipped a number of weddings since acquiring this phobia so much that even my mom is annoyed as she too has had to turn down some of the invites from my relatives as she doesn't want to go there alone (I offered to drive her but not attend, you see...:p). With this friend's wedding, the crux was that it was in a format of a buffet, rather than a sitdown, therefore I actually could turn up, feast and leave without saying a word. (Almost makes me feel like a wedding crasher/free-loader with an invite...:D). But as I have told everyone who wanted to invite me to their wedding, I would prefer to be involved/helping, but if I'm just to go (and in Chinese weddings, to go and pay; which after last weekend isn't clearly true anymore, but you'll see..) then I'd rather not. The phobia is the real reason, but I don't think anyone would believe or accept I really have one. They'd rather accept that I'm a stingy (little doesn't fit me very well) big %^$*%& who just wouldn't pay up when someone I know gets married.
So luckily for me my, friend decides that he probably needs some manual labour who'd be free (and even pay for his own transport, hahaha!) so he decided to ask for my help. Initially I had a very simple assignment for his wedding; Ensure a certain area in the parking lot was reserved for the in-laws. When the kompangs (traditional malay timpani/tramborine of sorts) sounded, my duty is done and I'm free to wine and dine...Ok, no wine, but dine or more correctly, lunch...as I wish. Unfortunately, due to some technical reasons the parking area wasn't cordone off and by the time I arrived on Sunday morning, I was jobless..
Ok, since I wasn't getting paid, jobless would be a little off. Assignment-less. But I was already there and even given some pin-up thing (I don't know what it's called, but its meant to be pinned on my shirt) to identify me as one of the 'workers' (While I'm writing this I'm getting some really distracting influences I just can't make up better words...sigh...). The next thing I know I was asked to help ushering.
All of a sudden, from me assigned to doing something I relish (yes, telling people "NO, YOU CAN'T PARK HERE" is something I relish doing), I ended up being the (few) guy greeting every guest coming to my friend's wedding. I was not, of course, prepared in any way for the task at hand. Suffice to say I spent the first 30 or so minutes avoiding the guests in someway so that I don't have to shake their hands. Eventually, I just got used to the gesture. It was also easier when some of the guest were mutual associates of ours whom the parents ( the other people ushering the guests) weren't familiar with.
By the time the kompangs sounded, (which also included the expected delay of the arrival of the bride and groom..) I have somewhat gotten into the groove of shaking hands. Not to say I'm now a 'shake hands' person, but on that day maybe I was. I'm back to being me, ofcourse...:P
That, explains why shaking hands is the title of this post..
Oh, before I forget, it is no longer just the Chinese who practice giving money when attending a wedding reception. Even this wedding (he is Malay) the practice was quite apparent. While some still turn up with presents, a vast majority of the guest gave moeny (or small envelope of something, which could very well contain some love letters, secret messages and even recipes of the unspoken kind...:p But I'll just assume they are cash). So eventually weddings will be business transactions. I.e. I'm getting married, I'll come up with the capital to host a reception and everyone I invite will help pay it off. I'm guessing this was definitely NOT the reason why people host wedding receptions in the first place, but by pracicing the giving of cash, it will sooner or later turn into one.
Why do I care? I'm neither getting married nor attending a wedding reception (which I am expected to pay for) anyway???
So what gives with the topic? Well, I am generally a non-physical person, to an extent even handshakes are avoided. As greetings I'd say the occasional hi, or even just a raise of a brow signifies the standard 'yes I see you and acknowledge your presence' indication when dealing with people. Of course, in more official situations, i.e. at work, I'd follow the customary expectations. However, I still flinch whenever I have to deal with visitors from abroad whom tend to have rather elaborate hi's and bye's.
Having said that, Last Sunday I probably shook more hands (and all different set of hands!) then I have for the past, erm, 20 years?? Oh, I guess I'm ahead of myself here.
Before going on, I should do the customary shout out to my friend who, after 2 wedding receptions, should now be officially married enough for the previous generation to accept him to their fold and stop treating him (and his wife) like single people. :P In any case, long be your marriage, fruitful (pun intended) and fulfilling (that just came out of a blue). Enjoy being on the giving end of all the nasty marriage jokes. :D :D!!
Ok, back to shaking hands. Ok, maybe not.
I have recently developed a fear of weddings and, well, most social gatherings that I have basically put up a huge sign saying, "Ignore me for wedding invites!" (it's invisible, but they know its there...). I have skipped a number of weddings since acquiring this phobia so much that even my mom is annoyed as she too has had to turn down some of the invites from my relatives as she doesn't want to go there alone (I offered to drive her but not attend, you see...:p). With this friend's wedding, the crux was that it was in a format of a buffet, rather than a sitdown, therefore I actually could turn up, feast and leave without saying a word. (Almost makes me feel like a wedding crasher/free-loader with an invite...:D). But as I have told everyone who wanted to invite me to their wedding, I would prefer to be involved/helping, but if I'm just to go (and in Chinese weddings, to go and pay; which after last weekend isn't clearly true anymore, but you'll see..) then I'd rather not. The phobia is the real reason, but I don't think anyone would believe or accept I really have one. They'd rather accept that I'm a stingy (little doesn't fit me very well) big %^$*%& who just wouldn't pay up when someone I know gets married.
So luckily for me my, friend decides that he probably needs some manual labour who'd be free (and even pay for his own transport, hahaha!) so he decided to ask for my help. Initially I had a very simple assignment for his wedding; Ensure a certain area in the parking lot was reserved for the in-laws. When the kompangs (traditional malay timpani/tramborine of sorts) sounded, my duty is done and I'm free to wine and dine...Ok, no wine, but dine or more correctly, lunch...as I wish. Unfortunately, due to some technical reasons the parking area wasn't cordone off and by the time I arrived on Sunday morning, I was jobless..
Ok, since I wasn't getting paid, jobless would be a little off. Assignment-less. But I was already there and even given some pin-up thing (I don't know what it's called, but its meant to be pinned on my shirt) to identify me as one of the 'workers' (While I'm writing this I'm getting some really distracting influences I just can't make up better words...sigh...). The next thing I know I was asked to help ushering.
All of a sudden, from me assigned to doing something I relish (yes, telling people "NO, YOU CAN'T PARK HERE" is something I relish doing), I ended up being the (few) guy greeting every guest coming to my friend's wedding. I was not, of course, prepared in any way for the task at hand. Suffice to say I spent the first 30 or so minutes avoiding the guests in someway so that I don't have to shake their hands. Eventually, I just got used to the gesture. It was also easier when some of the guest were mutual associates of ours whom the parents ( the other people ushering the guests) weren't familiar with.
By the time the kompangs sounded, (which also included the expected delay of the arrival of the bride and groom..) I have somewhat gotten into the groove of shaking hands. Not to say I'm now a 'shake hands' person, but on that day maybe I was. I'm back to being me, ofcourse...:P
That, explains why shaking hands is the title of this post..
Oh, before I forget, it is no longer just the Chinese who practice giving money when attending a wedding reception. Even this wedding (he is Malay) the practice was quite apparent. While some still turn up with presents, a vast majority of the guest gave moeny (or small envelope of something, which could very well contain some love letters, secret messages and even recipes of the unspoken kind...:p But I'll just assume they are cash). So eventually weddings will be business transactions. I.e. I'm getting married, I'll come up with the capital to host a reception and everyone I invite will help pay it off. I'm guessing this was definitely NOT the reason why people host wedding receptions in the first place, but by pracicing the giving of cash, it will sooner or later turn into one.
Why do I care? I'm neither getting married nor attending a wedding reception (which I am expected to pay for) anyway???
Monday, January 19, 2009
The thing about domestic helpers (aka maids)...
But in my opinion, from the stories I hear from colleagues, more like legal slaves....
To be frank, I don't employ one probably because I don't earn enough to afford one and luckily my mom (who lives with me, haha!) is willing to help out with the household management. Most of the time I (and my other siblings) contribute financially as and when funds is required. So I haven't experienced the 'luxury' of having someone non-related do all the work 24/7...Or more or less that way. I do, however, have cleaners coming weekly to do the standard household chores over several hours. That, is somewhat affordable.
So I shouldn't complain when other people CAN afford hiring/employing another person to do the whole household administration for them. It's an improvement in quality of life for them, and provides employment for the hired help.
For sheer economic sense, in most instances these hired help are non-local. While Malaysians are still cheaper than many countries (which explains why so much work gets moved here, as well as why I have a job..), labour cost of a Malaysian is unfortunately more expensive than most Malaysian can afford. Hence we go plundering our poorer neighbours. Unfortunately, them being our poorer neighbours, are not as educated as Malaysians. But the rise in Quality of life (and to some extent, better currency), attracts them by the loads.
So many Malaysian families get to play employer, even when they don't own a business but jobs which may have more than 10 bosses who could dictate their work/play hours everyday. The cool part is that since their all foreign labours, aside from the need to either survive through the red tape of employing one or paying off to expedite the process (note: this is merely speculation. I have no proof you can PAY OFF to expedite the process), they have very little 'employer' issues which they have to deal with.
No Annual Leave, Medical Insurance, Accident Insurance, Off Days, Allowances, Sick Days, Promotion, Pay Rise, etc.. They hire them with 1 fixed salary, and that goes on for as long as the 'maid' sticks around. (Ok, some more reasonable employer may give salary increases, but, really, who am I trying to bull?). The 'maid', considering that they 'live in', basically begins work when they wake up and do not stop until they sleep. You can argue they get to rest as and when the chores are done. But if anyone of us working for a proper company is on call 24/7, we're WORKING. Hence so are they. Even if they aren't actually doing work (Not that all of us actually work throughout our 8-9 hours daily either...)
Not only do they not have to deal with all things an employer should be mindful of, because of the amount of financial commitment involved, they also go to an extent to control the lives of these maids. Who they speak with, what they do when they're not at 'work', what they do with their money, how they dress, etc. I can understand that they are merely looking after their own interest; to ensure that the one person they rely on so much to support their 'improved' Quality of life, they need these maids to do nothing but care for their family and households and have no intention on furthering their own interests.
So if you're a foreign maid of a poorer nation than Malaysia employed in Malaysia, you can forget about going out to meet people and new friends, meeting old and known ones, falling in love, getting married, getting laid, having hobbies, personal time, etc... Unless your 'employer' is ok (or in some cases, involved...:p) OR, you have to do it hush hush. As with all secret rendevouz, they rarely become anything good for any party, except maybe...Maybe the parties involved.
So looking from a 3rd party's perspective, I see the hirers as slavers and the hired, slaves. Why so? Because the hirers do not offer the same, or somewhat equal amount of freedom that they have to their hired ones. While the hirer can go about doing all things that we, as human beings, believe is our right, the hired seemed to have signed that right away. When the hired do, at some point decide to do these things (falling in love, getting married, wanting to do something else other than being at 'this employers' beck and call), the hirers cry blue murder and act as though they never had it coming and deserved so much more for all that they've done for the hired.
If all proper companies did that, we'd all be slaves, no? (Ok, for the select few that actually have jobs. Does not apply to does whose job is to employ people. :p)
As I mentioned at the start, all this dawned on me after hearing the many sob stories of my colleagues who do employ maids (I seem to be calling them all sorts of stuff, but they all should mean the same thing). When their maids runaway, or leave, they have all these sob stories to tell. But when you listen to how they actually treat their maids, you'd wonder who in the right mind would have stayed? I mean, yes, the opportunity to work for them is an upgrade of quality of life..But human nature dictates that we will always want better, and other things. These maids are no different. Back where they were maybe they couldn't find enough for 3 meals, so working abroad is godsent. But once they're here, 3 meals isn't quite enough. They will see there is more out there. As much as they may (or may not) appreciate what these employers have done for them (like saving them from the hell hole they were before), it's counts for almost nothing when it's no longer enough. We, appreciate our current bosses/employers for giving us this job. BUT when someone/something better comes, are we going to say no and stick around anyway? (yeah yeah, those who know me would say that I'm one of those who might stay...But I'm not being discussed here...)
NO. AND no one in our right mind would say we are evil and ungrateful (ok, maybe sometimes, but generally speaking....) Yet these maids are thought off as such.
I pity these maids. At the same time I pity the employers as well. Some of them are really nice people. But once they experience the power of being able to dictate a person's life (and they are not kin...), they lose sight that their maids are as much human as they are with the same needs et all, only less fortunate. Treating them any less makes them devils in disguise. If only they'd realise that.
But then again, that's just me seeing from the outside. I'm sure if I were in their shoes I'd probably end up doing the same thing too. Which is why if I can I'd rather not employ a maid (IMHO, having cleaners come periodically doesn't count as they're a service, not employed by me..:p) I now see how appropriate it is when I was a child to help out at home, even when most of my peers were happily playing outside or with their console games.
That's all the rant for the moment.
To be frank, I don't employ one probably because I don't earn enough to afford one and luckily my mom (who lives with me, haha!) is willing to help out with the household management. Most of the time I (and my other siblings) contribute financially as and when funds is required. So I haven't experienced the 'luxury' of having someone non-related do all the work 24/7...Or more or less that way. I do, however, have cleaners coming weekly to do the standard household chores over several hours. That, is somewhat affordable.
So I shouldn't complain when other people CAN afford hiring/employing another person to do the whole household administration for them. It's an improvement in quality of life for them, and provides employment for the hired help.
For sheer economic sense, in most instances these hired help are non-local. While Malaysians are still cheaper than many countries (which explains why so much work gets moved here, as well as why I have a job..), labour cost of a Malaysian is unfortunately more expensive than most Malaysian can afford. Hence we go plundering our poorer neighbours. Unfortunately, them being our poorer neighbours, are not as educated as Malaysians. But the rise in Quality of life (and to some extent, better currency), attracts them by the loads.
So many Malaysian families get to play employer, even when they don't own a business but jobs which may have more than 10 bosses who could dictate their work/play hours everyday. The cool part is that since their all foreign labours, aside from the need to either survive through the red tape of employing one or paying off to expedite the process (note: this is merely speculation. I have no proof you can PAY OFF to expedite the process), they have very little 'employer' issues which they have to deal with.
No Annual Leave, Medical Insurance, Accident Insurance, Off Days, Allowances, Sick Days, Promotion, Pay Rise, etc.. They hire them with 1 fixed salary, and that goes on for as long as the 'maid' sticks around. (Ok, some more reasonable employer may give salary increases, but, really, who am I trying to bull?). The 'maid', considering that they 'live in', basically begins work when they wake up and do not stop until they sleep. You can argue they get to rest as and when the chores are done. But if anyone of us working for a proper company is on call 24/7, we're WORKING. Hence so are they. Even if they aren't actually doing work (Not that all of us actually work throughout our 8-9 hours daily either...)
Not only do they not have to deal with all things an employer should be mindful of, because of the amount of financial commitment involved, they also go to an extent to control the lives of these maids. Who they speak with, what they do when they're not at 'work', what they do with their money, how they dress, etc. I can understand that they are merely looking after their own interest; to ensure that the one person they rely on so much to support their 'improved' Quality of life, they need these maids to do nothing but care for their family and households and have no intention on furthering their own interests.
So if you're a foreign maid of a poorer nation than Malaysia employed in Malaysia, you can forget about going out to meet people and new friends, meeting old and known ones, falling in love, getting married, getting laid, having hobbies, personal time, etc... Unless your 'employer' is ok (or in some cases, involved...:p) OR, you have to do it hush hush. As with all secret rendevouz, they rarely become anything good for any party, except maybe...Maybe the parties involved.
So looking from a 3rd party's perspective, I see the hirers as slavers and the hired, slaves. Why so? Because the hirers do not offer the same, or somewhat equal amount of freedom that they have to their hired ones. While the hirer can go about doing all things that we, as human beings, believe is our right, the hired seemed to have signed that right away. When the hired do, at some point decide to do these things (falling in love, getting married, wanting to do something else other than being at 'this employers' beck and call), the hirers cry blue murder and act as though they never had it coming and deserved so much more for all that they've done for the hired.
If all proper companies did that, we'd all be slaves, no? (Ok, for the select few that actually have jobs. Does not apply to does whose job is to employ people. :p)
As I mentioned at the start, all this dawned on me after hearing the many sob stories of my colleagues who do employ maids (I seem to be calling them all sorts of stuff, but they all should mean the same thing). When their maids runaway, or leave, they have all these sob stories to tell. But when you listen to how they actually treat their maids, you'd wonder who in the right mind would have stayed? I mean, yes, the opportunity to work for them is an upgrade of quality of life..But human nature dictates that we will always want better, and other things. These maids are no different. Back where they were maybe they couldn't find enough for 3 meals, so working abroad is godsent. But once they're here, 3 meals isn't quite enough. They will see there is more out there. As much as they may (or may not) appreciate what these employers have done for them (like saving them from the hell hole they were before), it's counts for almost nothing when it's no longer enough. We, appreciate our current bosses/employers for giving us this job. BUT when someone/something better comes, are we going to say no and stick around anyway? (yeah yeah, those who know me would say that I'm one of those who might stay...But I'm not being discussed here...)
NO. AND no one in our right mind would say we are evil and ungrateful (ok, maybe sometimes, but generally speaking....) Yet these maids are thought off as such.
I pity these maids. At the same time I pity the employers as well. Some of them are really nice people. But once they experience the power of being able to dictate a person's life (and they are not kin...), they lose sight that their maids are as much human as they are with the same needs et all, only less fortunate. Treating them any less makes them devils in disguise. If only they'd realise that.
But then again, that's just me seeing from the outside. I'm sure if I were in their shoes I'd probably end up doing the same thing too. Which is why if I can I'd rather not employ a maid (IMHO, having cleaners come periodically doesn't count as they're a service, not employed by me..:p) I now see how appropriate it is when I was a child to help out at home, even when most of my peers were happily playing outside or with their console games.
That's all the rant for the moment.
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