Jobless??? No longer!!

I must have made known (too loudly) that I was jobless! Well.... control tower has made the announcement - by an executive decision (meaning - no point arguing otherwise), the helpdesk shall be located in Gurgaon, New Delhi, India. Sigh!! The consolation that I have is that I am allowed to hire a local supervisor to help me manage the operations. That also means that I would have bandwidth to take on more functions.

For whatever reasons, I seemed to have impressed a few of the Pongo project team members - especially my soon to be new boss. One of the other team members even called me Farmer Sam - because I stand out in the field!! My face went beetroot red at that. Luckily this was over a teleconference, so nobody saw that.

My soon to be new boss has now added on the AP Technical training coordination and liaison and training related functions onto me. Just when I thought that i would be out of that since my current boss is handling training matters. Details still needs to be worked out.

Even though I do not have anyone hired yet (up to 7 vacancies will be available by early next week), I have already been "volunteered" to take on email responses for the Americas. That had been a consequence of having my E Authoring team in India handling software questions (by email) from Europe. Middle East and Africa (EMEA).

Currently, I have initiated communications with India HR for the hiring process. In addition, IT has also been contacted to get the telephony systems ordered and installed within the next 2 months. Work Place Services has been contacted to get the seating space allocated.

Next steps - plans for training these new hires up to speed before the Helpdesk becomes operational (optimistically by mid 2008). This would also include visit(s) to the Gurgaon site.

Crossing my fingers!!

Before I finish - I would like all of you to view - Achmed the dead terrorist video that I have on the side - It is absolutely hilarious. There is even a Christmas version on YouTube.

Overnight in Singapore

Finally, control tower says that by an executive decision, the plane needs to land in India. And I will be allowed to have a local supervisor to help manage the daily operations. Details needs to be worked out next week. That includes extra duties in internal training management for Asia Pacific.

But still, with no details, I took my boredom to Singapore on a 2 days 1 night trip. Stayed with a friend (who does not want her name mentioned on my blog). Took Aeroline down for a RM160 return trip fare (which is a heck of a lot cheaper than flying). Why such a short trip to Singapore?? Simply to fulfill my annual practice of purchasing the Singapore coins for that year - especially the Chinese new year themed collections. Most years, I have an excuse to go to Singapore to make my purchases. This year, with no one reporting to me in Singapore and no business to justify a business trip, I had to go there just to get my collections.

I ended up getting $10 Proof coin, $2 Proof coin and also $2 proof like coin (otherwise called Brilliant Uncirculated). I also managed to get a couple of the smallest looking gold coins, a couple of thematic issues from 2007 (Rustic Coast and Orchid series) which looks really nice with colors added to the coins.

And in line with the coming Chinese New year - 10 sets of the 2008 Singapore coin issues sold as Hong Bao sets. Only certain special people will get that from me and it is less than a handful.

Why Singapore coin collections? Simple - they have a very small numbers issued thereby making their numismatic value higher than say- USA which issues in much larger numbers.

Virtually jobless and bored to death

I never thought that the day will come when I am in a state which the Cantonese says " Sit also cannot, Stand also cannot". In other words, I am having a period of almost relative calm and almost no work to do. I mean real work!!

Sure, I get the occasional message to review, assess some DEFOA claims and approve (or disapprove) them. My team of E Authors are essentially on auto pilot. I am just waiting for a new development to be made public before I can re-direct this team in India. Miyuki comes to me occasionally for advice on training matters. These I can do with more than one eye closed.

I am still waiting for approval to come to hire the new team. I am still waiting for the directive on where this new team is to be located. That has not come and looks like it will be some time yet.

So I am amusing myself looking for a new job. Vincent lent me this book called 100 Bullshit Jobs by Stanley Bing. If you read through the preamble carefully, you will realize that there is an ounce of truth in what he terms as the Bullshit factor in all our jobs. The book takes some liberal assumptions. Amongst them
- A fair amount of bullshit in anybody's job is, a priori, a good thing
- the ability to bullshit is what separates happy beasts from miserable mankind
- there are costs for obtaining and maintaining a job that is fundamentally bullshit
- yadda, yadda, yadda

As a blogger, that is one of the jobs classified in the book as one of the 100 Bullshit jobs. Couldn't agree more. But other than the last job, which is YOU (the reader), all my current jobs do not qualify to be among the 100 bullshit jobs. That can't be right.

Some of the more obvious bullshit jobs are
- Advertising Executive
- Aromatherapist
- Backup dancer
- Certified Massage Therapist
- Chairman (now that I can live with)
- Feng Shui consultant
- Food Critic
- Game show host
- Headhunter
- Lawyer
- Marriage counselor
- Motivational speaker
- Personal trainer
- Vice President of the USA

You get the drift (I hope)

Control tower - where and when can I land??

2008 beginning

I started blogging almost a year ago. The trigger was the untimely death of a colleague during a company event in Singapore. Almost half of the business organization was in Singapore for a New Product Introduction and training and Stephen Dutton passed away from a major brain hemorrhage. His untimely death got me thinking that I should leave at least the chronicles of my life behind and hence this blog.

The start of this new year also saw a couple of my colleagues losing their loved ones. They died of old age with some medical complications. Mao Hongming became an orphan on Christmas eve. his mum passed away early 2007 and his dad on Xmas eve. Nate is in the midst of her mum's wake in Bangkok. Her mum passed away on New year day.

I am still on holding pattern as my control tower has gone on leave and still have not informed me of the airport to land in. So I bug the hell out of people who are working in the office.

The new year brought some cheer. Added a few more people to my Facebook. It looks like I have more girl friends than guy friends. But who's complaining? Not me!!

Happy New Year parties

It is the last day of the year. And I am still gorging myself. 2 New Year parties in a row.
First one was at Madeline's. She invited her colleagues from Shiseido (current and ex).
Most came in pairs.

Something must have disconnected between my time and their time. I have never met such a bunch of sweet young things who drinks like a fish!!! Or maybe it is just them.

Finished off past midnite. That is after finishing off garlic bread, sandwiches, mushroom soup, fried chicken, spaghetti, spiked melon juice beer, vodka, Choya and chocolate fondue. Burppppeddd!!!

Next night was a gathering at one of the Church member's house. Sister Jessy has a nice corner house with a vast garden. We sure needed that for the 70 odd people form the church and friends. This party was a BYO (bring your own). I brought 6 Ayamas chickens (3 different varieties. Esther made cakes, brownies and bless her soul - Chinese Tea. That was such a nice difference.We also had fried mee, meehoon, Thai style salad, genuine fake konyakku jelly, fruits, Kajang satay, curry chicken and many more.

Someone even setup an iced kacang stand.

All I can say (again) is burrppedd!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!