Land of Lions... and lambs

Few weeks back, my company provided an oppurtunity for me to get expose in the islands south of Malaysia and I must say, it was a good eye opener experience... both in work and in cultural!


Singapore is great, with their clean and systematic traffic and orderly fashion really make my heart at ease... as much as I hate to admit it, that bloody country really beats the hell out of my pathetic country, they just reported an inflation rate of 7.7% this year as of this month, and I'm really curious what Malaysia's number will come out to... note: Their economy rice in Chai Chee was just SGD2.50, try beat that number dollar to dollar.... and the current political situation in my country is a joke which deserve a standalone entry itself, sigh. Anyway as usual in Singapore there is bound to be shopping, shopping and more shopping.... so Orchard, Bugis and vivo city is the targets of choice.


The bulk of my time were spent in the huge island of Bintan which is a 1.5 hour ferry journey away from Tanah Merah ferry terminal, deployed at Lobam ferry terminal which near to the Bintan Industrial Estate (BIE). The ride wasn't so bad as I didn't feel dizzy or vomity, and clearing the Indonesia customs is a breeze, this is also the 1st time I have step into Indonesia soil ^^


The place resembles the period of time where human had yet to discover musket and uses sling as primary weapon, although the road had been incredibly paved with tar and portholes are still a rare thing, the amount of vehicle is low over here, and 95% of the vehicles here are SUVs like Avanza, Innova and in some rare cases, CRV, Feroza and Frontiers

The night life are pretty scary for foreigners here as there are no emergency payphone around, people retire to home early and you just don't trust people anymore after all the news you listen from all sorts of crime that could happen nowadays.


As seen in the picture, this is one of the most lively town around my area called "Prampanon", might not exactly spelled correctly but this is all there is, 1 street, with shops at both sides until the end of the road.

I forgot to mention that this part of the world is +0700 GMT, that means night comes early, and coupled with no entertainment, it is a really dreadful place to spend your life here, especially people at my age IMHO. But then again, one can actually save alot of money if he stays here just to pass time.


Food here on the other hand is wonderful, nearly every night we ate seafood here, and nearly every lunch we ate nasi goreng ayam. Many of my colleagues have constipation issue, while I have bowel problem every morning.... strange how my ever strong stomach have problem digesting the delicious food here, must take a mental note before flying to the country of stars and stripes..

Nevertheless, its consider ok for an island 3 times the size of Singapore and with just nearly 3 million population (as in contrast with Singapore's 4 million population), one would know why the government doesn't find the need to invest so much in this place, unlike Batam island which is just couple of clicks away, classifed as free trade zone and complete with lots of shopping mall and 'entertainments'

Bintan is generally an ok place, but one need to constantly get in touch back with civilization in order to remind yourself how the world is pacing, maybe thats the reason the people supporting this facility will constantly travel to and fro from Singapore... In a way its a healthy way of sustaining life and continuing the effort to keep one sane.

On the other hand, Singapore is even fabulous in food, their cheap and my stomach accepts their not so 'provoking' food with no problem... Haha. And I didn't know their night city is so vibrant, complete with the shot from the tallest hotel in Asia, it was facinating !

Isin't it pretty?

Quality my arse

Haven't been blogging for months already, not because I'm lazy but because I don't have enough time and accessibility to internet to online and post.... OK, maybe I'm lazy but the main reason I lack of the mood to blog is because of the amount of stamina my work is extorting on me.

Maybe I ought to say that my company is facing one of its greatest joke of its history, 3 same quality incident over the past 1 month. THREE!!! Very pathetic, I wonder how the customer really think about it, kena then kena then kena again, over and over.... if people slap you then say sorry, tomorrow slap you again then apologize, then the very next day slap you AGAIN.... fooohh....

It all started because of escapee in the production, coupled with QA failure to screen it out in their normal screening method, even the big boss cannot take this kind of crap.

So that leaves all the engineers working day and night for the containment and corrective action, plus with the micro-management style imposed due to the 'impotency' nature of our management, we were left with very little time and strength to focus on others. Come to think of it, I am still playing FFXII in my PS2 (after 2 months), WoW still level 35 (after 1 month) and the last time I really spend time with my gal was like 2 months ago.... this is ridiculous, never met into such dark age before.

Well for what's worth, I think I need to learn how to improvise my working attitude and method, if you keep fire-fighting in your work for a long duration of time without any sign of improvement, then it's either:

• You're useless, or
• You need to expose to some other elements for upgrade (whether mind or physical)

Coz I am pretty sure I'm not the former, I would have to really make effort to make the later came true. Maybe I should make a resolution that I will never put myself in such a dangerous position ever again in my life. At least Monday is a holiday, as much as I want to rest my spirit and soul this weekend, I can't help but think of what dreaded situation will I face when I go to work Tuesday, well, can always worry about that later. I need my much needed rest this weekend.

.

.

.

Off to my beauty sleep!

Too much demand

Human is a very bitchy species, you give them 10 cents, they ask for 1 dollar, you give them tiger prawn, they ask for abalone... the chinese got a proverb called "得寸进尺", which literally means give them an inch and they ask for a feet (measurement).

Lets start a story of company "M", it's a pioneer company, set in the peaceful Industrial Area, overseeing a tranquil river lake. Company initially subsidizing RM1.50 per meal but the employee complaint that the food sux (because these people previously had the luxury of choosing 8 different caterer, now it's down to 1 and they complain the food is monotonous and sux).

OK loh, management understand the plight, requested a reformation of caterer...

1 month later, a new caterer came in, it's from an established source and the food is 2 fold better than previous caterer. And yet employees complain that despite the good food, it's expensive and lack depth (whatever that means). Management listen to them, discussed with big big boss and reform the caterer again....

This time in the form of FREE food from morning till afternoon, all the way until the night. Give a special instruction to the caterer to serve only 'nutritious food'. It's by far the best food benefit in the region, and yet today, I heard this complaint...

"Aiyo, today I didn't finish my food... give so much to eat, sure will get fat 1 lahh, die loh, will die of diabetes and heart disease loh..."
"This Marigold juice drink no good 1, less vitamins compare to xxx...."

I don't know really how is it to feed human and to make them happy, if so bad then just go OUT and eat lah, yet these bunch of stingy kiasu people eat EVERYDAY inside the cafeteria, and they won't stop complaining....

How lah you tell me?

Stone age colleague

Cannot tahan lah today, so must blog this down first before I break down and laugh. Talked about a colleague of mine – Porda, the other day regarding the job load allocation technique which pisses me off, and today he made my day again. Time is morning, I’m still experiencing my morning blue and systematically addressing my job work and suddenly he popped out behind my back and ask the one million dollar question

"Eh, you all always play those chatting program.... How you all chat 1 har? My computer doesn't seem to have"

Fooh… I went speechless for like 2 seconds. Then I tell him politely “You download it from the internet”. He ask me how, so because today I’m a very good guy, so I teach him how to use google and what to search for…

Then another one million dollar question

"I want to use our company email to register for MSN should be ok right? They should be able to register all types of email one right?"

Again, speechless for another 2 seconds before courtesy and politeness told me I should answer him again. I say “No lah, you need to have hotmail or yahoo mail to register 1…

The final one million dollar question

"I don't have hotmail or yahoo mail wor, how?"

Nia ma pom pom eh, want me to teach him how to sign up for hotmail and yahoo or not ?! KNN, bugger already 35+ years old d somemore don’t know all these crap! How can these ppl survive I really don’t know, even my technicians and operators also know how to use MSN and yahoo to chat with me, this is a fricking SENIOR engineer. I ought to take over his place, in fact, I think I will just do that, since I kinda like his job. I understand there is a lot of pathetic people in this world, but up to this point is really world record type already.

Nuff said I have enough dosage for today so I will be avoiding him for like 2 hours, these days I have seen kids with serious attitude problem coz they play too much cyber games, but this is like the other side of extreme point.... culture shock to me man. I found the one and only guy in my company who doesn’t know how to use a chatting program. It’s rare but it happens

Blur colleague (Porda)

Everyone that knows me knew that I have a very big tolerance to everything in life, I can tolerate if someone accidently spill coffee at me, I can tolerate if someone mistaken me for someone and beat me up, I can tolerate if you jump queue and drive in front of my car. But I cannot tolerate people that push his/her job to me and somemore demand me a deadline!

Have this colleague who asked me to help him snap a picture of a unit yesterday, so fine....snap picture only ma, what so hard about it, somemore he don't have camera, so I say ok, out of good grace, I will help you take picture and send it to you.

Then he ask since you're at it, can you take the picture, identify the area of defect and then put into Excel spreadsheet and then send to me, wah! Now want me to help him DO his job d, I say "Nope, you do, this is your task, not mine, you can identify your defect yourself", then he argue say since I already open up the package, I can do it lah, I smarter lah, can see defect better lah, all kinds of bullshit (normally I would think it's compliment)... chinese he say "顺便" (Shun bien), shun bien my ass lah, can he pump petrol time "shun bien" pump my car? Can he buy milk powder for me coz he "shun bien" buy for his kids?
CRAP lah these people....

and if it's not enough, he have the AUDACITY to say "Can send me before lunch right?"
CCB, that time already 12:00pm -.-"

OK fine. You know what? I ain't gonna send. I told him "I'll do when I'm free...." (which basically means fuck off and die, but I doubt he catch my drift coz he's a bit blur)
Now I'm free, but I won't do it yet, why? Coz these people pisses me off.
I plan to give him end of this week for things that could be done in 10 minutes.

Retards that I know in my life....

Sense of sympathy

One of my colleague resigned on Monday, he’s responsible for the tester handler and ESD matters which is currently what I’m taking over. Not really angry of him leaving me a bunch of unfinished business, but was actually felt a sense of sympathy in him. Why? Coz during his last day of work, at 8pm, he sent some forwards to me with a lot of mp3 and wma songs…. Actually those songs were ok, they were all Chinese oldies that I listen during my primary / secondary school time, but on his last forwards, he say something like this “ I like to listen to songs during the night, it reminds me of my young times when I was studying, everyday ride the bike and can flirt with gals everytime, that time everyone have a common goal of passing exams, no backstabbing and politics…. I can’t go back to that life anymore but I never forget what kind of life I want to live. Bye”

I was like wow, his mail struck even on a cold hearted mortal like me.... he always strike me as the type who had endured a lot of storms and weather during factory life, therefore he is like those old wisdom guru who is looking forward on day’s end, but I didn’t know he was thinking like this. Then another part of me so wanted to agree with him, drop all I have and maybe work in some crap workshop, or maybe just go Australia and pluck apple and strawberry…. I’m pretty sure if I have no family or those detos, I might just live that way, probably get me a nice foreign chick who looks like Jessica Alba… OK maybe not.

Everyone knows working sux, especially in fast pace environment where things can go from mundane to turbo speed at a click. They say it’s the price to pay for your salary receive, but I review back my salary… it’s just junior pay. So maybe I’m underpaid, or I’m doing it wrong in my direction at work. Either way I need a change, either myself or my work environment.

Regardless, that currently ex-colleague of mine went to become a staff in a famous college in KL, which happened to be my alma matter. Good luck dude.

Working environment #part 1

Most of my friends knew that I am a loyal employee, I work in a place and I will continue to strive to be a better employee because I hope to have a better increment each year and I also believe that if I put myself to a company, they will eventually appreatiate my work and accept me as a family.



Take for example my first working place, "CI". I thought that I will be working there forever, bought my first charade when I was working there and I was set to start off my career there, they promise that I will become an executive after a 3 months probation and I was naive enough to listen to them. 3 months passed, and I am still a trainee with no vision of my future. So I quit the job and ended in other place...



"CS", my 2nd official job. Got the title engineer, wow, thought it was cool. Yeah, it's all basically the name only, the work was fun though, the amount of job load can actually let you forget that you have a car, you have a family, heck! Even you have a name. But I learnt alot of stuff there, and through my good mentor I manage to fix alot of stuff that all engineer was employed to fix in a sub-con world. Then I move on coz my mentor was reassigned to another department and I needed a boost in my income.


Now there's "AT", if you want me to describe "AT" work environment, I would say it's a resort hotel + free snooker center attached. Imagine free breakfast, unlimited lunch hour, free tea break and best of all, 1st world facilities. I don't think there's any other company out there that can beat this, maybe on par but never beat. Everyone is talking about ergonomics, you can't spend all your time working lah, must flex your wrist if you sit down in front of computer too long lah, must circulate your blood by walking around lah.... basically all the things that justify that you can walk to the cafeteria out there at any time. If that's not all, the food they serve must be of standard, found a hair in your dish and the cafeteria operator is in for a rough time. Now due to business model change and some of the global acquisition going around, I am no longer in "AT" but in "MV".




"MV" basically follows all the old rule of "AT" except for the fact that everyone is churning additional workload due to new place, new setup, new style.... hence alot of new crap. To put it mildly it's no longer resort but it's like a coal mine with air conditioning. Everyone likes air conditioning, but everyone agrees that coal mine is not the right place to work. But I will continue to work here, until I became a Saturday night, or I die before reaching TGIF.