Back home and clearing my leaves

Came back from Siem Reap last Wednesday. You know what? I finally fulfilled my long time dream of traveling to the Ang Kor Wat/Thom, visiting the ancient city and temples. The weather there was dry, humid and hot, but it was all worth it. Be it climbing up the temples on hands and feets, or walking tired, really, I like it, and I may plan to go there again in the future!

Yes, now back to home, but hey, I still have leaves to clear till end of the year! I reckon I can take a break again, and perhaps leave for another short trip this weekend or next. Hehehe...

Run...run...run...

I completed my 3rd marathon run last Sunday. It was one of the toughest of the 3 I ran for the last 3 years. Some of the running routes were new and long, but certain places that were so scenic that fellow runners stopped to take pictures.

The day was abit dry, the sun beaming down on us, hot in the late morning! Run, walk, stop, that was the strategy we were told to adopt in order to complete the run. Drinks and banana were given out at some points of the run, as usual. I had a banana given to me at the 14KM mark, I held on to it till the 30KM mark, and eat it! Ha...Ha...

The last 10KM was the toughest, my knees and leg were crying pain, but like the others, had to carry on. Finally, I made it! It was a fantastic feeling, but too bad no one was at the finishing point to receive me. I wished you were there...

What's for me in future?

I have been thinking about my future, my career.

Recently, I attending a seminar on cloud computing and virtualisation kind of stuffs, met this guy who was promoting his company's IT training. I thought about the Data Centre certification course, which in fact, is quite interesting. The course requires a person to have some experience working in DCs, which I think I fitted well, so I talked to my boss, and she supported it.

I don't think I can still stay in the sys admin field for long, too tiring, having to be on 24-hour stand-by, and woken up in the middle of the night to fix problems. I guess it's time for me to move on, just like her, ya...

This is not Good Bye...

Today is your last day with our project team. I hope that you have made the right choice to move on to do something else more suited for you.

The road ahead is tough, I know, I have spoken to your "future" colleagues, but I believe they will help you. You just have to ask if you do not know, and read more to gain knowledge. After all, it's pre-sales, you are expected to know more than an ordinary engineer.

Take care, you will have my support.

Ps. Just got news that the replacement for you has not be found, and may not be found in the near future...life goes on...

Transfer...ole...ole...ole...

It's confirmed, she is transferring to Pre-sales team starting 1-Nov, or rather she's joining the team after comes back on from her holiday (from 4 to 19-Nov).

I spoke to an old friend of mine where she will be joining his group, but not the same team. He said that it will be tough for her, because the pre-sales role requires one to be technical inclined, so the learning curve for her will be "very steep". She don't even like to do hands-on work when she was with our team!

Today, she emailed me to thank me for guiding her for the last 2++yrs, and asked me to give her my msn acct. Actually, I had given her my msn acct 2 years back, and she had added me, I guess either she had changed another ID, blocked me or had removed me from her msn list. Nope, not going to give it to her again!

I didn't even talk to her today, she was like enjoying herself, went lunch at 11:40am and came back only after 2:30pm, hey, our official lunch time is from 1 to 2pm, ok?!?!

Anyway, all the best to her, ole...ole...ole...

Doing Pre-sales?

She told me that most likely, she will move to pre-sales, and I have to start looking for a replacement for her soon. She will talk to the pre-sales boss, and likely if ok, will take up the post after she came back from holiday next month (wonders where is she going this time?).

Just recently, the PM decided to "out-source" the Peoplesoft server admin to another team, a group of middleware people, that triggers the rumours that She is to be replaced.

Just few days back, She had a email squabble with the DBA again, in the end, the PM intervented. Sometimes, I couldn't understand, why is it so difficult for people to work well with each other?

Well, if She takes up the post, then no more late coming to work (nowadays, She comes in after 10am), cannot take MC as she likes...haha. I hope She regrets her decision later on.

Sigh...I feel like leaving too...

Rumours worst rumours

Monday...I'm really not happy today. Why? I heard this morning that it seems the whole team knew about her intention to transfer to another department, which has not been confirmed yet, most probably she does not want to.

I have told the Project Manager about her intention to transfer. Damned it...I shouldn't have said it! Now, even other team's people knows about it. What should I do for damage control? What a bad move!

There are just people whom you can't trust, next time, NO, there's no NEXT TIME, I'm going to keep my mouth shut!

Grand-pa Passing...

My maternal grand-dad passed away yesterday's morning. He lived to an old age of 80+. Days before his passing, the doctor had already told us to be prepared. The last few days we were there beside his hospital bed, he was having difficulty breathing, but he could still hear us talk to him and able to nod his head to response.

My grand-dad passing is almost 10 years after my grand-ma left us. He had been on a bad health for the pass few years, we felt sad to see him suffer, now that he has left in peace, with my grand-ma, we are glad for him.

Bye bye, grand-pa...

Oh yes, it's September!

Yes, almost 3/4 of the year passed. Just heard yesterday that one of our Windows Admin has tendered and will be leaving end of the month. He has been working for 5 years, it's time for him to move one, isn't it?

Just few days back, I heard from someone that this company is losing people (left the company) faster that it can recruit! I think it's true, since last month, I have already seen 3-4 people left from the same team. These people are very skilled, talented, and too bad, the company didn't counter offer them to make them stay.

Oh, rumour says that there will be a massive re-org this month, some departments in our group maybe "transferred" to the parent company, not sure whether it's true or not, well, I heard it from 2 persons, you guess...

I want her to stay

She emailed me to tell me that I need to get someone to cover the DR exercise, as she will not around to help. She said her last day would be 29-Sept.

When I looked at the leave chart, she had booked leaves from 30-Sept to Oct prior before telling me that she is leaving. I told the PM that I will talk to her, persuade her to stay, but I think it's tough.

I really want her to stay, after 2 years working together, there's already some kind of bond between us, really don't know what it's like without her around. I really like her, I did told her before in a casual way, that I like her, but she thought I was joking. I don't think the feelings is mutual, after all, she has a BF who is working in Oz, maybe he's coming back for her soon...what should I do???

What is she thinking?

She told me that she wants to leave the team by end Sept, either out of the company or transfer to another group, maybe sales. I asked her why? No reason, she didn't find a new job, but has plan to travel overseas with her parents to...HK after the job change.

I don't know what's in her mind, I think she is really fed up with the others, esp. the DBA, who has been treating her quite badly. Just the other day, the DBA wrote an email complaining about some people in the team coming to work late in the morning, obviously, she was one of the "pin-pointed" one. Yes, she was unhappy.

I really don't understand why can't people work well with each other, so much office politics and unhappiness, I think I getting tired of all these, I want to leave this job, but what should I do next?

Late at night

It's late at night, 3:16am in the morning.

Why am I still up? Don't I want to sleep? Go fighting with the Zzz... monster? I want to sleep, but I can't, I'm troubleshooting a problem, work issue.

Just couldn't figure out what's the problem, no matter what, just can't re-start up that PS App server, it's complaining about some handlers issue. I suspect it's due to the network ports being used by other processes, but this shouldn't be happening, it has been running fine for the last 5 years.

Well, carry on, keep figuring out how to solve...

Half marathon

The next half marathon race is in two months' time, and I had signed up for it, while I'm supposed to start training for it now, I haven't really started yet. I had only clocked the furthest 4km? That's not even 1/5 of the race's distance!

The longest trainig run I did was 15km before a previous race, I don't know whether I can clock this much distance for each training session this time. Maybe there's still time, hopefully, I can do better.

Year 2010, 2nd half

We are in the 2nd half of year 2010. The economy is good now, the job market is great too! It's a good time for people to switch jobs, or aka job hop.

Just the other day, it was announced that the price index for HDB and private house sales had gone up, looks like people are getting back their confidence to invest in real estates again.

The banks are back recruiting people, so is in IT. This country needs talents, and more foreign people will come, esp. ever since after the two integrated resorts are in business, I guess the house rental price will soon go up too. We will start hearing complains of high price rentals again.

The people who makes tons of money out of RE and rentals are laughing all the way to the bank, so we need bankers...It's vicious cycle, really, it's all about supply and demand, agree?

Be appreciative

Thank you...thank you...thank you...

Does saying 'thank you' means that you appreciate someone? Especially s/he had helped you?

You know...sometimes we said too much of something, it becomes a routine, just out from our mouth, but it does not mean that we meant what we said. After sometime, hearing too much of such words, like 'thank you' from people, makes you feel that they don't mean it, it's not really from the heart, but just saying it for the sake of saying it.

The other word people commonly like to say in this part of the world is 'sorry', sounds like 'sorry' or an apology, but really, do people mean what they say?

She is back...

Oh yes, she is back today. Her leaves ended last Thursday, but she took a day of medical leave for Friday, she had sms-ed me saying that she had diarrhoea on the day (Thursday) she reached here.

I had tried to contact her via her hp no. on Friday and Saturday, but couldn't get through. She finally sms-ed me on Sunday's afternoon, saying she just got her new SIM card, humm...I thought she had just changed a new one recently???

I have not seen her this morning at office, but, I heard she came in around 9+am, early, huh?

She is coming back soon...

Well...for almost a month away from office, she finally coming back in 6 days time!

I wonder how she would have changed after coming back from her hometown. I noticed that after coming back from her past overseas trips she kind of behaving differently.

We have recently moved our office to another floor of the same building, our desk spaces are now smaller, and quite squeeze. She has been allocated a desk space next to the other Sys admin, hope that she will like it.

How is she?

Heard about the bombing at Yangon near Kandawgyi Lake in the military-ruled country's commercial hub where crowds had gathered to celebrate the Buddhist new year (Thingyan/Water Festival, 13 to 16-Apr)  on 15-Apr.

I wonder how is she, I tried to call her but couldn't get through her Hp. She told me that she will be bring her mum to a hospital in Yangon for medical treatment, so not sure whether she was affected. Hopefully, she is alright and not harmed.

Time is so slow moving this week, she is only away for less than a week, and I'm missing her so much. Where is she now??

She goes away

Starting today, she has gone on leaves, back to her home country in Myanmar. She said she will need to take care of her mum who is undergoing a surgery in Yangon. So, she took all of the 6 days of Family Child care leave days, plus 11 days annual leaves. She will only be back on 7-May, that's for almost 4 weeks!

Heard from the PM, some of the team members were making snide comments with her taking such a long leaves, and apparently she (PM) was not happy with it (i.e. the comments)...why some people acted in that way? What's wrong for a her to take leaves to visit her parents overseas? Then, I realised that it's all "office politics", whoevers survive it,  lives! I just can't be bother at the moment, busy with other things.

Oh yah...I missed her, wonder what is she doing now?? 4 weeks more to wait...my gosh...*sigh*.

Universal Studio Singapore

Two days back, my company invited us to an USS night out event (7pm to 11pm). Each of us paid only $20, was $25, but reduced due to the closure of the BSG rides.

Well, I would say it was a 'pro-family' event, because you see lots of parents with their kids and families. Not all the attractions and rides were available, but the food court, some restaurants and food stalls were open. For the rides, only the Mummy Revenge (indoor) and Shrek (outdoors) were available. The other fun attraction is the Shrek 4-D show, where you have to wear 3-D glasses to watch it, the chairs rocked and water splashed at you, fun eh...

Try the Shrek ride for warm up before going for Mummy and the rest. The Shrek roller coaster ride is fast, but no stops like the Mummy ride. For the Mummy ride (~2 minutes), it accelerates, stops, reverses, bang walls (be warned of internal body injuries!),  fast speed turn left and right (no upside down or twists)...SCREAM!!! HAHA...

Half a candle

Next time you want to celebrate birthday for your girlfriend, try this...

Buy a small cake, with just 1 small candle. This 1 small candle symbolises 1 year old, right?

Break the candle into half, put it on the cake, and lit it up.

If your gal ask you why only 1 small candle and it's broken into half? Say this...

"1 small candle on a cake symbolises celebrating 1 year old birthday, so, half a candle for you means...my dear, your are my BABY! I will always care for you..."

Cheers for CNY! Cheers for my holiday trip!

Oh good, tomorrow is CNY day 1, then day 2 and day 3, after that, I just need to show face in office on the Wednesday, and wow...I will be off to Perth...hehehe...

Tonight's CNY's eve reunion dinner was good, got lots of things to eat, but also lots of food can't finish up eating. I just had chilli crab for supper, left over from the dinner, I'm really stomach full now.

Hey, I haven't pack up for my vacation yet, maybe do it on day 2. Work? hmm...something to tell the team, esp. gal gal, so that she can help to cover some of my duties. Gal gal is acting kind of strange lately, sometimes she looks so different, e.g. with the dark eye shadow make-up, she just had her hair cut a little bit shorter and straightened too. She hasn't been talking to me much these days, except about work, I'm worried, really, whether she can cover my area of work while I'm away.

I will be away, likely till end of Feb. Time flies, in two more weeks and it's March 2010 coming.

Chinese New year coming...

                                   
You know what? In just 10 more days, it's Chinese New Year!

How times flies, we have just done with 1 out of 12 months of year 2010, I really can't remember what I did last month, or even the last month of the last year. But, I do know, most likely, I will be getting busier, because one of our projects is going for a tech refresh, and I'm working on the technology and costing stuffs.

Well, wether or not, I'm Chinese, Indian, etc., let's hope the coming of CNY will bring us better luck, and more incoming cash too, tons of it! Cheers...

Fun with special effects pictures

Have you wondered how some people can post their photos on their blog or Facebook where they look like that their faces are embeded on billboards, magazine covers or a dollar bill.

I have been trying to figure out this for quite some time, then, just last night, while doing some searching on the Internet, I finally found out how they did it, hehehe....without the use of any complicated software like Adobe Photoshop, check these out -> http://funphotobox.com/ and http://photofunia.com/.

There are other free photo editors in the Net, just need to search for them. Right now, I'm trying to figure out how to create my own templates with my own pictures.

Count down to holiday!

I have booked a flight to Perth during the CNY period, never did I know that when I checked the weather forecast, Feb happens to be the hottest month of the year there! I think I will be roasted and severely burnt there, it's already so hot (~32 degrees celsius) here, hopefully, it's not as humid as this place.

Things have not been the same since handing over my work to another senior. I did what I can to pass on the knowledge I have, it's really up to her to pick them up. I will going into stealth mode, maintain a low profile, talk less, so as not to attract attention. Good thing that the users and my team don't come asking me often now, yah, they know I no longer in charge, so, I do see a difference in people's attitude towards me! That's how it works here, they are showing their true colours, ho...ho...ho...

Fancl TenseUp drink vs Meiji Amino Collagen Powder

Last year, I tried the Fancl TenseUp drink, it supposed to improve my skin texture, make it more firm and looks more radiant, but it's really kind of expensive. A month supply (~30 bottles) costs around S$180! After taking it for a few months, I can't really tell whether it does what it's supposed to do.

Recently, I saw this product, Meiji Amino Collagen Powder from Japan, a cheaper alternative, but with more collagen content (5000mg) extracted from fishes, hopefully it works fast and better to improve my skin looks!

If you want to look young, with better looking skin, try the powder too and let me know whether it's effective; and don't worry, it doesn't taste fishy, furthermore, your can drink it with fruit juices or any beverages.

Early in the morning 6 o'clock

Yes, it's now 6 o'clock on a Thurday's morning. Yesterday's night I had attended a ex-NS army friend's wedding dinner at SUNTEC. I had a good time meeting with other friends whom we have not met for many, many years since MR.

I don't know why I woke up at 4 in the morning today, maybe because I had a dream, a bad one? I have been thinking about us, I'm really sorry if I had made you feel bad lately. I'm just not in the good state of mind to think properly, I had planned to take unpaid leaves and leave this place for awhile, but it didn't materialised. I guess you are disappointed now, I'm sorry.

Happy 2010!

Yesterday, I was out with some of my Japs classmates for dinner. We went to a Japanese restaurant at Liang Court, it's called 'Tam Po Po'. Just the four of us, the rest couldn't make it, anyway, they missed out on the good food.

The fishes were nice, soft and not oily (fried?), I even ate 2 bowls of rice (free re-fill) because it was good, the sticky type that you get to eat in a real Japanese restaurant. We also had something like the kamameshi, like a hotpot with vegetables, fish meat (collagen!) and soup. We also had black pig meat, it was good too!

The dinner was good, one of the best I have ate so far here. Lucky that we had reserved a table before going there, because by the time we were seated, many people were already queuing up outside the restaurant!

Washoku wa totemo Oiishi desu! Daisuki desu ne!