another week to salary

3 weeks into worklife and things are beginning to pick up. being in an organization where career development and progression really depends on taking own initiatives and exploring things on your own(not to mention pace or not), i made myself sit as an observer to a workshop organized by my department for technical professionals who were responsible for assessing more junior executives who want to be promoted. had a good laugh watching them act out how their candidates would react. some of them should get part time jobs acting. haha.

well im beginning to see where my role is in my department, which is mainly to manage data of level 1 and level 2 executives from various technical skill groups. when needed, i would be coming up with reports for analysis on where our organization stands where human capability management is concerned. i.e. how many people should we hire in the near future to replace those who are retiring, etc. since i am familiar with graphs and charting for analysis(did that for internship and for my final year project), this gives me a chance to dedicate my brains to creatively coming up with new ways of representing data. seems like so far so good.

meanwhile, i am looking for opportunities or paths that i can take to go forward within the organization. Ai Pheeng suggested that i do CFA (when googled, Certified Financial Analysts and not Cat Fancier Association which was the second most popular hit). but from the site i require a US bachelor's degree and sufficient working experience. its still too early to tell but the idea of managing money is quite interesting at the moment. maybe its because i just started out and everything has to be planned and spent through a budget. however, i really do need to make myself more marketable within the organization since my IT skills will probably be insignificant as compared to working with a software house. all in God's will as i always say.

on other non-work related matters, i started jogging at the KLCC park, much to my colleagues' amusement, leave the office around 5.30 and do 1.2km rounds which takes me 10 minutes per round. its not much but at least i get to sweat quite a bit and head back to my rented room, tired, shower, head to bed and count down to the weekend again. so far since the last two weeks i have managed to run 4 rounds in the first week and 6 rounds on the second. hopefully the 10 round target is achievable but Grace, my roomate would need to find something to do while waiting for me to slowly finish my rounds.

for those who are wondering, there are rarely any hot girls running around at the park. they're probably working out profusely at the gym. for 2 weeks in a row i met Asun jogging at the park. i only passed him twice when i ran 4 rounds so im not THAT slow i guess. its either that or he left earlier and i didnt meet him anymore. haha.im not planning to join a gym until im really settled in the company and work and all first. in the meantime, i go back to office after running and change into work clothes again before taking the LRT home, sweat dried off by then.

still think there are more readers when i post on Friendster. but i include this in here as well. feel free to checkout my picasa page at http://picasaweb.google.com/jamietan84. Enjoy!

Visited Sarawak Year 2007

This year’s trip to Kuching, Sarawak was planned since January after the advertisement for free flights offered by Air Asia, recently awarded world’s best low cost carrier by SkyTrax. Since I always had the luxury of a place to stay when I’m at Kuching, I planned my travel risking the fact that I might have been working somewhere by July. All I had to lose was the airport tax amounting to RM180 if I couldn’t make it for any reasons whatsoever. Little did I know I ended up living in India for 4 months since February.

Wonderful memories aside, Tomi booked another one way ticket returning from Kuching to Kuala Lumpur wanting me to spend more time there with his family. Since I was supposed to notify Petronas that I back and available for work again, I thought I would not get a job till at least September since Petronas will take time to process my application and such. However, as explained in my previous blog entry, I was expected to report for work on August 1st after much persuasion for a 2 week postponement, enough for me to savor all that Kuching has to offer.

I was on the same flight as Juliza, not before we managed to be one of the first few in Malaysia (all other people would either be working or at school) to watch Harry’s 5th movie. It was fun getting excited and trying to remember the plot twists since it was more than 2 years ago since I read that book. In addition was the fact that what was written in the book did not tally with what was shown in the movie. Jules and I dozed off in the plane despite its narrow seats and constant noises coming from flight attendants trying to sell souvenirs and that one person who bought nasi lemak and ate it that everyone that didnt had their mouth watering and hoping that the aircraft will land as soon as possible.

I was welcomed by Chin, Siang Yeek, Douglas, Tuck Fai and Tomi in his new Avanza, just in time to bring our batchmates around sightseeing and such. I tried my best to stay at arms length from each of them (except Tomi) after the initial hugs because i did not want them to get a whiff of myself not having a shower since early morning. We met the rest (Roy, Freddy, Ravon (Ravin and Evon from this point forward), Thana, Fish ) at a nearby 24 hour hawker center for Teh Si Peng (iced tea with Ideal milk) and dinner since i took a late flight. Didnt sleep much since i was decidedly hyper from the caffeine in the drink.

After saying Hi to Tomi's parents who are currently busy renovating around their house to build a nice patio, we head off for lunch and then Jong's crocodile farm and Annah Rais Longhouse and Homestay. It wasnt new for me but i was sure it was a nice experience to have when visiting Borneo for my friends. Had to play travel guide since it is the 4th time i have been to Kuching.
The first weekend i was there was spent at Sarawak Cultural Village at Santubong, host to the 10th Rainforest World Music Festival. Can't describe how refreshing it is to totally be immersed in music from various parts of the world, this year namely Celtic, Latin American, South American, Russian throat singing, hip shaking that would give Shakira a run for her money from Madagascar, A Capella singing from Zimbabwe, American skiffle, Sape music and lots more.

This year's ticket sales hit an ultimate high of RM1million in value. The place was packed with people mostly enjoying music while sipping(or chugging alcohol) with the beautiful rainforest as the background. Organization of this event always seem like a trial and error process. But i dont really understand why it is still so after 10 years of attempting to get it right. Hope the situation improves next year. But i usually forget about its setbacks immediately when i listen to the music that these people churn out. My favourite this year would be Hun huur tu and Malerija from Tuva, Russia, Shannon from Poland and Shooglenifty from Scotland (hope i got the spellings right). Managed to see Denise Keller but didnt have any camera so it was a mental picture i made for that moment.

Can't upload any pics from the RWMF website so feel free to browse http://www.rainforestmusic-borneo.com/

The next few days were spent recovering from the weekend at the music festival and driving friends around sightseeing Kuching town and not to mention a whole lot of eating and discovering new "famous somethings" places. after dropping off these people one by one, Tuckfai, Tomi and i decided to attempt to climb Mount Santubong the next Saturday. there were 15 checkpoints in which i decided to give up after the 5th. Had lots of persuasion to move forward and i managed to scale the peak after a 3.5 hour climb primarily by adrenaline (the usual climb was 3 hours) and coming down took longer because there were many parts where i actually just sat there and tried controlling my tears from not wanting to go down anymore. And not to mention us diverging into a denser path away from the summit trail. Thank God for His protection else we could have ended up in another episode of Discovery Channel's I shouldn't be alive:SI am really amazed by the fact that i reached the peak, and the pain after coming down was real enough to prove that i made it. Since i was always making excuses especially when i climbed Mount Kinabalu last year. I was already making up a story to explain why i didnt reach the peak this time if anyone were to ask me, but i didnt have to this time! Tomi got to realise his dream of becoming a mountain guide by being so patient with me even though i was either tearing, screaming, cursing or being really quiet all the way down.

Click to view my Santubong climb from Tomi's camera

A day after that saw Tomi and I heading to Bako National Park, 45 minutes drive from Kuching town and another 20 minutes boat ride. It was where Nike filmed a football ad with people like Ronaldo kicking by the beach. This park is known for the home of all the species of wild animals available in Borneo, although sightings really depends on your luck. Trekking in the jungle was a piece of cake if you climbed a mountain a day before. We managed to spot Proboscis, macaque, and gibbon monkeys, squirrels and bearded pigs that had wisker-like beards similar to walruses just right outside the hostel where we stayed. too bad it rained the next morning before we left so we could not spend more time exploring other trails.

Click to view my Bako pics from Tomi's camera

The last few days i was there were spent at Tomi's house watching TV and i had a chance to cook for his family. my family would have laughed if they tasted my cooking since my dad cooks so well it would be impossible to even match, let alone be better. And i took a flight home alone to attend David and Cheryl's wedding, which was beautiful from beginning to the end. Congratulations for those two. So that marked the end of my holiday in Kuching. Do try to make it a point to visit. Don't jus take my words for how beautiful Borneo is.

First Day for the next 9 years

Today marks my very first day at work, after going through some bouts of feeling down having to end my holiday and move out into a crappy house and no amount of consolation from myself and others seem to help. The day started out good so far with Grace and I managing to get some sleep at the new (old) house that we spent almost the whole weekend cleaning up with parents and others who were willing to lend a hand. Both of us slept with the anticipation of moving out only after having spent a night there. But convenience is definitely a plus point since it only took us 5 minutes to reach the LRT station. Since it’s the first day for both of us, we planned to head home at 5pm(official end of working hours at Petronas) to go look for other places to live in preferably around Asia Jaya area where it is also conveniently located near another LRT station.

So far I’m unable to say much about work except that I am situated at Level 44, Tower 1 of the majestic Petronas Twin Towers a famous landmark for those outside Malaysia. My boss’ office has a very nice view. Am writing this while waiting for a briefing since morning when I reported for work and I’m lucky to get a nice Dell workstation with flat screen monitor so as to prevent anymore eye problems. Can’t wait to go to the clinic to get my long postponed Hepatitis B booster jab and a visit to the dentist since I receive full medical benefits from this day onwards. So far am trying my best to remember the names of my colleagues. They seem like a nice bunch of people. Brains dont seem to work well this morning. Really trying hard to keep my head up and not fall asleep.

sitting in front of the Pc really made me reminisce the times at Infy where i had Jaya to disturb and to help Amalina or Aisyah to break their own high scores at Text twist. Then there was the beautiful hotel room that Grace and I shared. Sigh. Those experiences really proved to be valuable that i doubt will be able to go through anymore. Now i am left with 2 more hours to kill before lunchtime where i can resume my count on the number of UTPians stationed at KLCC whether for internship or for work.