Christmas 2012

Christmas is here again! This year we had 2 groups of guest, Meimei's colleagues and Nua group. Our usual mascot Chocopop has fallen sick today. But no worries, we have his buddy Bosco to back up as the host.

Lots of food, lots of booze, loads of fun. Don't you just love the festive periods. This year I don't have to deal with year end closing so it's so much more enjoyable.

For meimei's colleagues, we bought a whole suite of Starbucks mugs and flasks. These are great gifts and I bought some for the office folks as well. For Nua group we have the usual gift exchange.

I didn't use to celebrate Christmas but influenced by Meimei, it's one of the happier holidays I enjoy. This year's red Christmas tree is so beautiful. I think we'll try a gold theme one next year. Looking forward to another year of festivities.

i5 Upgrades Galore

Meimei bought 3 iPhone 5s at one go today, 2 whites for Sis and her, and a black for me. It sure is lighter than the 4, slimmer and longer with an additional row of icon space. How things have changed ... from someone who didn't fancy a smartphone to a person who stares at the phone everyday on the way to the car, the short way to the office, etc. I check my emails, play games, catch up on daily soccer and tabloid news, take random photos, etc. So much is done on the phone.

That said, sometimes I do get a certain short guilt trip that I am spending too much time on the phone and losing sense of other things around me as I walk. So off and on, I'll remind myself to put it away and just enjoy the walks. Turn around, take in the sights, experience the surroundings. Really, it seems everyone is losing these moments in time as we moved rapidly into the digital age. What a pity it would be when the only things we bother to see are the artificial landscapes on pint size screen of a device which was originally build for communication to bring the whole  world closer together.

Sawadee Kap ... Maybe Never Again

Flew into Bangkok on Sunday evening for work. This is the first time I've been to Bangkok. Don't really like the place ... well I didn't go anywhere. It's simply between hotel and office. Traffic is as horrible as Jakarta, but the food is worst than Indonesia. They fed me nasty lemongrass scented, dry and spicy spaghetti on Monday. I skipped lunch on Tuesday and thankfully I'm flying back in the night. The only nice thing to say for the trip is that the hotel room and room service was passable.

The migration is a crap project that was messed up by the previous team. Com'on, using Internal Orders to segregate the different books in the same company code. You have got to be kidding right? Some genius thought it will work and so here we are today. I've spent the last month or so trying to make sense of the nonsense data. It's the best I could have done given the short timeline and non structured base data. We will never get a balanced TB ...

So anyways, we migrate this few days and see how it goes. There wasn't a cutover plan to start with. Almost all the in-house consultants from the Germany shared service who are here with us look like they rather be somewhere else. And rightly so, there was no plan, no communication, nothing structured whatsoever. So bahh ... I'm never coming back to Thailand office again. 

A Vege Farm in Singapore? What?

Pardon my ignorance. Singapore is a concrete jungle of endless HDB flats, dotted by sparse areas of manicured gardens and the occasional little pieces of yet-to-be developed flat open land. How is it we still have space for vegetable farms begs the question of why all the new towns are so cramp. If we have space why not use it?! ... Ok, don't mind my rant, now onwards to the day.

I've just joined a new company 2 weeks ago and today we are out on an company excursion to a vegetable farm hidden in the depths of the Kranji area. I remember coming to this area once when Meimei and I were on our leisure drives. She is here with me today to explore the place. Nice place, lots of different sorts of plants. That's about it. Should be fun for the kids who never get the chance to be this close to nature. You just need to survive the hot sun, mosquitos, sand flies, and any other hazard related to forested areas. I don't recommend this to anyone other than the pure nature freaks.

On the bright side we get to see the new office folks and assess how they are like. As Meimei puts it, nah, most are pretty lame. Don't cut it in a competitive company. I have the same thought. Well let's see how it goes from here.

HK Trip 2012 - 20th to 22nd July - Part 2

21 July - Food, Shopping and more Food!

There is only one spot to have breakfast, Honolulu :-) I find it interesting that somethings so simple like macaroni and beef with a plate of egg and bun can be so satisfying. I wonder why it never takes off in Singapore ... Is it the culture or maybe the lack of specific ingredients? Hmmm might this be the next big thing in Singapore's food scene?

We had our fill and proceed to walk around the Wan Chai area. We like roaming the street market. Meimei used to live around the area and this was where the local get their grocery shopping done. As we near lunch time we hopped on a Ting-Ting to Sheung Wan. I'll never get bored of getting on one of these hehe. We are meeting 2nd Uncle and Aunty to have lunch at a famous claypot rice place.

 

Usually when 2nd Aunt recommends a place, you can't really go wrong. She is kind of a food connoisseur and pretty picky about food.

We spent the rest of the afternoon shopping at Mongkok, as usual. Dinner was at the hotel buffet restaurant. We were beat from all the walking and didn't feel like venturing it out. It's really hot and dry ... I'll feel deflated after just 20 steps ... this is a big cry from the lovely winter weather when we were here in 2010. It's been draining to walk about and am already surprised we covered so many places for shopping. 

22 Jul - Lazing Away the Day

Lots of shopping errands to be done. Meimei and office colleagues are into Longchamp bags and so we were at their Central outlet. I lost count of the number of bags we bought, I think there were like 5 to 6 of them? We were then at HMV to look out for DVDs. The prices are not terrifically better than in Singapore but you could find a few special imports from the US.

Lunch was at Yung Kee ... we don't miss the chance to have this. You can't get a proper roast goose in Singapore, period. And if this wasn't enough, we shopped a bit more in the afternoon and was back at the hotel close to 3pm. I had a flight to catch at 8pm so we decided to have high tea (yeah! one of my favourite meals) before I set off for the airport. 

I was supposed to get on a bus at 4pm but for some reason there was a delay. I found out why later at the airport, my flight was delayed too. There were typhoons all over China and the Cathay planes couldn't get to Hong Kong for the transit to Singapore. The airport was packed to the max when I arrived. I couldn't get food at the cafeteria as people were jostling for seats. Eventually I decided to use the food coupon they had gave out earlier at the counter and had a crap dinner at a noodle restaurant. I was supposed to fly off at 8pm but didn't get onto a plane till close to midnight.

I wished I could spend more time in Hong Kong. But Meimei is here to work and it didn't make sense of me to stay on to roam around alone. Plus I have to get back to work as well. A new job awaits me in the coming week. 

HK Trip 2012 - 20th to 22nd July - Part 1

Woot! We are in Hong Kong again! Meimei has to be here for a week or two so we are here earlier over the weekend. It's been a year and a half since I came here for Christmas ... how time flies. We would have come more often if it wasn't my work schedules. It's summer time though and the weather can be hotter and dryer than Singapore.

20 July - Arrival

We took half day leave and flew into Hong Kong in the evening. We are now staying at the Excelsior Hotel. Meimei was here the last time and it was a very convenient and comfortable hotel to stay, with MTR and shopping district right at the doorstep of the hotel. As always, the first itinerary is to make a trip to Grandma at the east Kowloon area. We brought a special gift this time, Durians! Apparently Grandma loves durians and so we had make a trip to get a box of our favourite Mao Shan Wang the night before. And the stall had unique vacuum pack versions for us to pack into our check-in luggage. It seems they have quite a few Chinese customers who would tabao the durians when they go home to China and they had 'perfected' the packaging to cater to that.

It's always warming to see the Grandma, uncles and aunties. Grandma loved the durians. You can't get these in Hong Kong, or so I've been told.

Durians! 2012

It's durian season and we've been on a binge recently. Meimei's colleague has a contact at the popular durian stall up at Upper Serangoon Road which specialises in the Mao Shan Wang variety. I love this breed, sweet with tingle of bitterness and all so creamy! We would literally drive down every time there was a deal. Even then it wasn't cheap but it was worth it. Typically we would spend $60-70 each trip. We must have made 2 trips a week recently haha. Well it's not going to last too long since the season can be short at about 2 months. So we are enjoying as much as we can on this wonderful King of Fruits.

Aircon Mayhem

The air-con in the master bedroom leaks. Could be due to the constant daily use or just plain bad luck that the installation was not done properly. Over the past year we had the maintenance folks come look at it several times and invested in steam cleaning with hopes that it will solve the problem.

Recently it started dripping badly and especially so in the wee hours of the morning between 4-6am. We would hear sounds of *droop droop droop every few seconds. It's driving us mad! We had to put a pail at the spot and even then the maddening noise is preventing sleep. I could cover my ears with pillow but I know the sound is keeping Meimei awake. She is a light sleeper and this must be excruciating for her.

So eventually we decided that we want this solved once and for all. This is not the first problem we had with our air-con. About a year back we had to re-lay the whole wiring as the initial installer used inferior wires which burnt off. That cost us $300. This time, we decided to spend $1.2K to redo the entire insulation and piping. Have a look at the picture, the left is the insulation we are changing to and the right one is the lousy cheap-skate version used. Basically the initial installer used all the crappy materials they could get their hands on. And the price isn't even cheaper than other place! 

The new installers had to tear off some of the false ceiling and casings in the rooms and even drilled bigger holes through some of the walls to fit the new insulation. The place is now in a mess. We'll going to have to engage a contractor to put up the false ceiling and concealments again. We are crossing our fingers the air-con doesn't give us any more problems ... We had put up with enough anguish, frustration and sleepless nights.

I Quit!! . . . 4th Time Lucky?

Yes I quit. For the 4th time. Since I'm gonna zombie for the next month while I serve out my notice, why don't I put this time to good use? 

Meimei has been away to Spain for holiday with Sis and Mama since last week. So I might as well start now, maybe this would be the Anniversary gift for Meimei. She has longed for me to stop smoking. Though I must say she is being very very patient with me. And I truly thank her for that. Most wives would nag and nag at their husbands, but not Meimei. She would tell me to smoke less in her good natured way and frown when I grin and sneak off to smoke. She would never have that menace or resentment, just a quick show of disappointment and then with a simple smile move on. *kiss thank you ... You don't know how much that means to me.

So yeah I'm trying for the 4th time now. Hopefully I won't have stuffy dripping nose, headaches, cold sweats, etc like the previous times.

Getting Used To MacMac

Maybe it's just me but I'm having a hard time getting used to the Lion's keyboard shortcut. It's as though it's non-existant. Going through various web forums you'll see many gripes on Mac's over reliance on the mouse. Yes Lion OS is build intuitively where almost every action is just a mouse click away. But can using a mouse be faster than a simple keyboard shortcut key? Never in a million years. Naturally Apple fanatics will retort that this is the Mac OS we are using, and not the Windows PC. And Windows copied much of Mac's interface. But that's another topic all together. Back to the shortcuts, it seems Mac OS never had a cut and paste shortcut function key until Lion. Goodness .... you are literally forced to use the mouse to drag a file from one folder location to another if you are using an earlier OS version.

The other inconvenience I'm facing is the different shortcut keys for MSOffice applications. Mac MSOffice have different shortcut keys so a simple edit F2 function in PC's MSExcel is now replaced by Ctrl-U in Mac. So I had to fumble each time I try to edit a cell in Excel. Let's face it, if you are working you are more likely to be using a Windows version MSOffice application than you would a Mac.

So now every time I have to consciously remind myself which OS I'm working on so that I get the right shortcuts. Hopefully I'll get to the immediate level of using Lion. For now, I have resorted to adding a Safari link on Office keyboard shortcuts for reference http://mac2.microsoft.com/help/office/12/en-us/excel/item/64766a97-9258-4f78-9feb-2742ce769041. I'm still looking out for a good list for OS shortcuts ...

Oldie Rock?

I was going through Meimei's iTunes songs today and found a number of rock songs from All Stars United, Ataris, Green Day etc. She's always been the oldies and cutie songs fan and I never pegged her for rock. I found out later that it is one of her phases, ala dreamed of being an assassin phase. Hehe silly girl. I placed 1 star rating for all of rock ones ... I just don't get it haha.

New Flipflops

Was at Tan Tock Seng Hospital today and dropped by Novena mall as it was along the way. I've been wanting to get this flipflop from a store there for sometime now. It didn't have a mango color in my size anymore and so I went with another design. Turns out, it looks pretty good and it kinda matches the bermudas I like to wear.

Starving At Work

Well it has to come to this again. I've just tendered my resignation. And this is the first time I've had to serve a 2 months notice *yawn. The best part is that my boss refuses to allow me to clear my leave. Seriously ... if you need me to handover things nicely to the replacement, you could at least make me happy by letting me take leave yah? If I have to attend interviews, how am I going to go without being able to take leave? So yeah, stupid decision ... well you see why I had to leave. 

The other thing was that I was only having one meal a day. There isn't any eateries nearby and driving out takes roughly 15 minutes to get to a hawker center. So I've been on a one meal diet for the past few months and basically surviving on cigarettes when I get hungry. The lack of food is making me very depressed. Cramped in a bomb shelter room without windows, no breakfast or lunch, crappy colleagues, idiotic boss. Nah, enough is enough. 

I've delivered what I was hired for, which is to managed the outsourcing of 3 Accountant roles. They hate my guts for it, but hey, I wasn't the one who made the decision to have you made redundant. Why don't you grow up and take it out on the people responsible, I'm only a facilitator. Being nasty to me isn't going to save your job. You don't deserve the pay you are getting with the elementary skill sets and technical knowledge. Live with it, that's how the world is, our neighbours are becoming more educated and they are cheaper. Think the 80s when we took over jobs from the West, it's our turn now.

So yeah, I've done everything above board. Did my part and lived up to my personal integrity. So off I go now for the next challenge ... Though these 2 months are going to be boring haha. This is the first time I've signed a contract that had a 2 month notice and I'll never do it again. :-)

Yum Cha Dim Sum Delivery

First there was the pizza delivery, then came the fast food burger deliveries and fried chickens. Now there is Dim Sum delivery. It may have been around for some time but I've only found out about it in recent months. Smart move by the Yum Cha chain seeing that there may not be any other rivals in the Dim Sum category, though it would have to compete with others in the overall home delivery arena.

And judging by the standard of the home delivery Dim Sum, I must say the delivery is notching up pluses for its brand. The quality and taste of the Dim Sum are good, and I especially like the Fried Mee Sua. Oh and the Crispy Red Bean Paste with Banana is to die for.

This has just gone into my list of favorite restaurants, even if it was just the home delivery option.

Another iToy!!

Meimei just bought me a new iToy!! A Macbook Pro 13" hehehe I love it I love it I love it!! Thank you dear *kiss

Finally I can replace my old desktop PC. Though i'm not going to be able to play PC games but I haven't been really gaming anyways since I left FFXI. So yeah, this works perfectly. A portable machine I can bring to bed to blog ... oops errrr to use for studying *looks around. Yup, Meimei bought it for me to work on my MBA. And yes I'll do that, but I can also use it for other stuff yah?