6 Secrets to Success … that I intend to live by. Last Friday, my boss, Sonya, invited Iain Ewing of Ewing Communications, for a sharing session. Every Friday, we have this session called “Friday Huddle”, where we have someone speak on a variety of topics. I don’t guarantee that these are sure-fire ways to achieving success, but they sure are pretty good guides for any one to live by. Be Honest. Your lies will catch up with you one day. And you won’t know when. So isn’t it better for you to just be honest everyday? Work hard. Some will call me crazy, but I am gonna put in more hours and maximize these hours by working or doing work-related stuff. How many more hours is ‘more’? Well, Iain mentions that he works 75 hours a week. He calls 44 hour weeks “slacking off”, but I wouldn’t put it that way. However, I do hope to achieve 75 hours every week, that is, 12 hours from Monday to Saturday, and 3 hours on Sunday. Try to work smarter everyday. Read. There’s no short cut around this, and you’ve just got to clock the hours. Iain shares that reading books about your field of work can make you an expert. Reading books outside your scope of work, books of every subject, can help you to develop lateral thinking skills. And reading classics (like Xenophon’s The Anabasis) will help you achieve wisdom. I do believe that reading helps a person develop their thinking skills, so I’m all for it! Enjoy the journey. Try not to let anyone get under your skin. I asked Iain this: “Isn’t there anyone who just irks you?” And his answer was an outright, “No.” I do think it’ll do me good to not let other people affect me, my decisions, my moods, and my disposition. So this is something I’ll definitely have to work on! Also, don’t try to rush the process (be it work, or anything else). Just enjoy your experiences, because they shape you. Volunteer. I guess it’s all about Karma. If you do good for others, more good will come your way too. And you never know who you’ll meet when you do voluntary work! Iain also kids with Inez, one of our interns, that “the best way to meet a nice, young man is through volunteering!” Well, not my aim, but I’ll start giving back to society in my own little ways. Exploring opportunities now! Have fun. If work doesn’t give you fun, if having kids doesn’t give you fun, find something that does! I believe that it doesn’t have to be a group activity, or even an activity you share with your partner. But the important thing is that everyone should have something in their lives which they find joy in doing. It keeps you sane and happy! - From Iain Ewing’s “The Success Curve” Posted via email from daphnemaia’s posterous Yasmin Ahmad (1958-2009) Yasmin Ahmad really was one of Malaysia’s greatest talents of all times. Who could forget her touching and sometimes heart-wrenching TV commercials? They were really something to look forward to, amidst every major festive seasons in Malaysia. She told of stories of family love, mostly, something close to all our hearts. Yasmin Ahmad also wrote and directed a number of critically-acclaimed movies, many of which won local, regional, and international awards - Rabun (2003), Sepet (2004), Gubra (2006), Mukhsin (2006), Muallaf (2008), Talentime (2009) - of which Sepet and Muallaf were my favourites. Tonight, Yasmin Ahmad passed away, leaving a huge gap in the Malaysian arts scene. I regret not having stayed another 2 hrs for the Muallaf meet-and-greet session last year, after a screening of the movie at The Picturehouse @ The Cathay, with Rinaz. I enjoyed the movie tremendously. Now that Yasmin is gone, I’ve missed the opportunity. We’ll miss you, Yasmin. The whole nation is mourning for you. Photo credit: Audi Khalid (2009) Photo extracted from: Jayleif Postcard from UK Guess what came in the mail all the way from UK? A postcard from Jeff! Woo hoo! What a nice surprise to end my weekend! Thanks, dearie! (I think it came earlier, though, but my housemate has not been collecting the mail from the mailbox regularly) Hehe! I love getting mail. Can you spell HORRIBLE DAY? Horrible morning. I woke up at 6am to go to the Ministry of Manpower at Keppel Road. Arrived there early, waited, entered the office, was told I have slight fever. Was questioned about my travel and social activities. Certified okay. Went to the counter, was told my medical report is rejected because clinic’s stamp is not clear. Doctor also forgot to check one of the boxes. Spoke to 3 different officers. Got scolded by their Operations Manager. Kept calling clinic but there was no response. Decided to cab to the clinic at Aljunied. Flagged a cab along Keppel Road. Cab driver started the meter even before he stopped. 25 meters away! Insisted cab driver restart the meter. He called me a miser. I called him a bloody cheat. Wanted to take another cab, but he said he’d restart it, so off we went. Arrived at clinic with a $14 cab fare receipt. Gave the medical report to the clinic assistant, with the cab receipt. Explained the situation to her nicely. She said it’s my fault I didn’t check. I retorted that I didn’t pay $60 for an unprofessional and incomplete medical report. We argued for a bit. Finally the clinic reimbursed me $30 in cab fares for both ways because a couple of other patients at the clinic were starting to leave when I insisted their doctor is unprofessional and slip-shod in his medical examination. Took the reimbursement and left. Now heading back to MOM to re-queue. It’s such an awful day for me, and it’s barely 9:30am! So if you think you are having a bad day, think again. First day back at work After 3.5 months of bumming around, sending out countless resumes, waiting nervously while wondering if any company will call me up soon, and going for many many tiring interviews that ended in rejection, I’m finally gainfully employed again. It’s a total career change for me this time round, and I’m no longer in HR. Does that mean I can’t write about HR stuff anymore? Nah. I’ll still write what I feel like writing! Haha. Now I’m working in a PR consultancy firm, and doing basically new media stuff. Today was a good day, for my first, although it started out not so good (it rained heavily, I got drenched despite having an umbrella above my head, and it was flooding in Tanjong Pagar, making my shoes waterlogged). *sighs* Instead of the usual orientation on the first day, I’ve started doing some work with another colleague on a project’s proposal, which he is gonna present on Friday. It’s all rather interesting and exciting for me because it’s a whole new experience learning and doing these things. I’m really happy right now. I’ve got what I want (a job in a PR agency), my colleagues seem like nice people who can guide me along, and I enjoy what I’m doing so far. That’s enough for now! After work this evening, I went out with Elise, and we had dinner at Food Republic at Orchard, while I told her all about my first day at work. It meant a lot to me, because not everyone would be so interested as she was, not everyone would’ve been such a good listener, and not everyone would’ve asked all the right questions. I’m blessed - I have a job that seems to be heading where I want to be, I have a wonderful best friend who’s happy for me too, and many many friends to help and teach me things when I don’t know, on Plurk and Twitter! Gonna shower and go to bed now. It’s been a tiring day, definitely. May have to work overtime tomorrow as we prepare for presentation on Friday morning. So, bonne nuit! Red Eye (Movie Review) Tonight, while the parents were out, I entertained myself watching Red Eye (2005) on Singapore’s Mediacorp Channel 5. I saw the trailer yesterday, and made a mental note to catch it today. Didn’t regret a moment of it! Starring Rachel McAdams (did you know she has an honours degree in Fine Arts majoring in Theatre? Gotta love a smart, beautiful and talented woman) and a less known Irish actor Cillian Murphy (who was really quite the yums other than the fact that he’s a psycho terrorist), this movie was set on a red eye flight flying between Los Angeles and Miami. It’s a rather complicated terrorist assassination plot targetted at a politician in the US. McAdams’ role was that of a hotel manager, who was threatened with her father’s life, if she did not assist the terrorist (Murphy) by switching the room of the targetted politician to one which chosen by the terrorists. However, the delivery of the story is not as complicated as it sounds, and in fact, was well-planned, I thought. It was easy to follow, not to mention exciting. Major ouch moment: when McAdams plunged a pen into the throat of the terrorist, through his neck. *grimaces at memory of scene* Best quotes by Lisa Reisert (Rachel McAdams): There are no customers who are assholes. Only customers with special needs. - to her assistant Cynthia, while she’s dealing with some difficult customers You can fill up a comment card. And after that, you can take the comment card, n shove it up your ass! - to above-mentioned customers when they ask her (unreasonably) to fire Cynthia Probably one of the best action/thriller films I’ve seen recently. The best has still got to be Taken (2008), starring Liam Neeson, which I watched earlier this year. Incoherent thoughts about Michael Jackson His death shocked the world - 50, surely, was too young for a man like him to die, they say. It probably wasn’t, considering the number of people younger than him who die everyday. But his death was on everyone’s lips by the time everyone logged on to the internet this morning. Because he was a name that everyone identified with. Because he was such a huge sensation (admit it, even if you’re not a fan!), and rather sudden. That’s why it was a shock. Unlike the death of another public figure, Michael Jackson’s demise quickly became something people couldn’t ignore because everyone knows him. Everyone young and old who had access to music and/or television would’ve known the phenomenon that was Michael Jackson. To say that he was famous is an understatement (although some might argue he was more infamous than famous due to recent legal troubles), because everyone must have heard of his music and known it. Michael Jackson wasn’t an icon in the music industry. He was the icon of pop music, the timeless superstar whose music everyone knew. I don’t claim to be a huge fan of Michael Jackson. I liked his music, and even loved some of the songs he’s sung during his 40 years long music career. I don’t claim to fully know or understand or believe reports I’ve read about him, but I think it’s plain mean to be making jokes about the man after his demise, and I really wonder what others will say at the funerals of people who make jokes about the dead. BTW, about him “turning white”, actually he had a skin problem called vitiligo (the de-pigmentation of the skin), a condition rather common among the Indian population, Mexicans, and those of African-descent. It causes white patches of varying sizes to appear on the skin (commonly on limbs, around the eyes, on the back, etc), which can be rather unsightly. I suppose that was what made him undergo plastic surgery to completely stop his skin from producing melanin. So stop being mean about it. How would you like to be dark-skinned and have white patches all over? He could’ve felt insecure about it, but which of us have never felt insecure about our appearance at one point or another in our lives? My New Nest I’m really happy in my new home now, and I’m glad I moved in early instead of waiting out the contract, so I can settle in before I begin work next week. This new place feels like a hostel, with 4 bedrooms, and 7 occupants in total. I’m the only one who takes a single room, while the rest are in a double room. Everyone keeps to their room mostly, and mind their own business. There’s a TV in the living room, but everyone keeps the volume to manageable levels, so as not to disturb other occupants in the flat. There is no cleaning roster, but everyone seems to just clean up according to some unspoken schedule anyway. The flat is clean, well-aired, and bright in the day. And everyone cleans up after themselves after cooking in the kitchen. Although my room is a partitioned room (which, admittedly, I did not notice earlier, but that is fine with me, because I don’t intend to have any noisy activities going on in my bedroom, haha!), I am really thankful for this because there are no windows, and it means complete quiet and complete darkness, void of traffic sounds, and also no streetlights streaming in from the windows at night. I’m really quite light sensitive, and I really prefer to sleep in a very dark room. I really have very good sleep sessions these days, and I have no more headaches! The table in the room is a bit small, but it’s okay, that keeps me from keeping too much junk on the table and forces me to keep my books and files away after I finish studying! The bed is too huge (which takes up too much space in the room), but that’s okay, because I can then roll around, have a friend stay over, and pile clean laundry on  half the bed when I’m too lazy or busy to fold it. Haha! There aren’t enough shelves in the room, but that’s okay, because it forces me to throw away things I don’t need, and discourages me from hoarding junk! I like this place. Grace in Small Things - 16 June 09 Lis wasn’t well this afternoon, so when Nick texted to ask me out for lunch, I went ahead. We ate at Bedok interchange. The minced meat mushroom noodles I had was really quite the yums! I’m packing to go home tomorrow! Hurray! With Elise! Yay! Grace in Small Things - 15 June 09 Spent the day with Elise at Orchard, and Nick joined us later. Had Soup Spoon’s Tokyo Chicken Stew for dinner (my favourite)! Celebrated Jon’s birthday (in advance) with yummy chocolate cake! Elise didn’t completely give away the surprise, although she nearly did. Grace in Small Things - 14 June 09 Missed out on doing “GiST” during the period of time that my sis was back from the UK. I’ve been bringing her and her fiance (and in-laws) around, so I’ve been kind of too busy to blog regularly! Gonna re-start this! Today I finally moved away from the other room at the not-so-nice area. Gerald and Hendri helped me move. We were aided by Uncle Robert Lim, a nice man in his sixties, who provided us with transport (Cell number: 90216143). We managed to move everything from one flat to another within a record time of 60 mins! The new room has a double bed. I have six (yes, 6!) seemingly nice housemates who pretty much keep to themselves but are polite enough. The new flat is nearer to the MRT, and near a main road. After moving, we hopped on to a cab, with a nice lady driver in it. We asked her for suggestions for lunch places. She suggested Sik Wai Sin! We had really good food at Sik Wai Sin - steamed fish head with bean paste, stir-fried kailan with beef slices, and tofu with prawns. I managed to unpack most of my things by the time the sun set. Hope all of you have a great Monday, a great start to a great week! I can has hedgehog, please? I really want an African Pygmy Hedgehog! I’ve been talking about it for months, but still have not managed to lay my hands on one. These li’l critters are small, domesticated hedgehogs that are kept as pets in some countries, but are without a doubt illegal in Singapore. Look at them. How can you bear to call them “illegal”? So cute! One of my favourite videos has got to be this one, of Shming swimming in a tub. Shming is probably about 5 yrs old now if he’s still alive. He has some weight problems, so don’t laugh at him. But he’s so adorable, you just have to watch this! (The baby talk in the background is a bit annoying, so just ignore it or mute the video). Shming swimming If you find more cute videos, share them with me! I can has hedgehog, please? Brilliant ideas don’t always work I’m so amazed by my own brilliance that I just have to blog this. (Sometimes I’m so brilliant I blind myself when I look into a shiny surface, hurhur). Some time back I had this brilliant idea that I should keep all my storage devices together in one place. So I unearthed this nice pouch from the deep recesses of my wardrobe and proceeded to store my external HDD, my 16GB Cruzer and my pretty, cherished 1GB swarovski crystals-studded thumb drive, and various memory cards with their card readers in it. Isn’t it a brilliant idea? Then late last night, I wanted to use one of the thumbdrives, and I just could not find it. In all my brilliance, I did not remember my brilliant idea of just a month ago, and so I looked high and low, even did a lot of packing (to move, and) to find the dratted thing but simply did not remember my brilliant plan of being able to find all my storage devices by just pulling out that pouch. Eventually, only when Rinaz’s husband, Cartcart said something to me on Plurk about keeping the thumbdrives with my keys, did the words “bunch of keys” cross my mind, reminding me that I had that brilliant plan to keep my whole bunch of storage devices together! I didn’t even remember that I’d packed that pouch into a box along with my books yesterday! So you see, brilliant plans of being organized just doesn’t suit me very well. Once I get organized, I can’t find my things anymore. So I should just let my room be a mess. That way, I’ll never lose anything! Thoughts about Moving You never really appreciate the statement “Throw away what you don’t need” until you have to move, and the pile of junk you’ve amassed over the years seems like too daunting a mountain to conquer. Things I’m not gonna miss when I move away from my current apartment: The housemates (a real nightmare, but what’s new, I always get stuck with nightmarish housemates, but let’s hope I have none of these in the new apartment!) The long walk from the MRT station to my home which is, really, none too safe Having to cross an overhead bridge over the expressway in order to get to the hawker centre, the supermarket, the post office, the clinic, the market, the convenience store, the fastfood places, etc. You get the point. The loud sounds of cars whooshing by 24-7 on the expressway right outside my window The dust from the expressway which discourages me from leaving any door or window open at all The four storeys walk up to the flat (there’s an elevator, but it’s too far away, too inconvenient to use) Having to walk quite a distance to the nearest bus stop. I have so many things to pack, throw away, bring home to JB (family home and permanent storage space), give away, and to sell. There’s a box of things I’m preparing, to leave at the stair landing of my block (yes, yes I know I cursed those people but I’m leaving only one small box and I intend to get the box back later cos I need it for other stuff), which will contain usable / new things that I want to give away. Things I don’t use. Like that bar of aromatherapy green tea soap I got from the Christmas gift exchange, and the fancy drinking straws from movie giveaways, note books that I don’t use and will never use, etc. My junk will soon be someone else’s junk! *rubs hands evilly* And they won’t know what hit them until the next time they have to move! Muahahahahahahahahaha! Protected: Zero point one per cent This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Protected: Disappointment This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Protected: Confusion over something that may be nothing This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: I hate conflicts! I honestly hate conflicts, but have the uncanny knack for getting into these situations anyway. I guess I’ve gotten into one too many - especially online - and I just need to explain this one last time. This entry is going to be a rambling of sorts - perhaps it would serve well to just be a note of sorts of my own reflections, or perhaps it would help people around me to be able to understand me better. (I figure, since I always get into misunderstandings). But whatever it is, I am going to be dead honest in what I’m going to say here, just so people will possibly stop misunderstanding me, once and for all. I hate conflicts, and I hate upsetting people. I know I do it sometimes, maybe even on rather high frequencies at certain times of the year, but I never want to upset people intentionally. I get upset when people around me get upset, whether by my doing or not, so I’d rather have everyone happy and smiley, as I am most inclined to be. If you know me, you’d know that my default face is a smiley one, and I’d really like to be that way all the time. I am a very friendly person, and I warm up to people rather easily - but please do not take that the wrong way. It most certainly does not indicate any sign of my desire to get involved with you (if I am interested, you will be able to tell) and it does not mean anything else much (I treat everyone like this). You can come up to me and have a conversation with me any time, but please kindly do not curse (aka use vulgarities) senselessly before me (especially if you do not know me well enough). I am a very emotional person; rash, you may say; and I often act without thinking, although I have been trying very hard to control these urges (to say and do things that I will regret later on). I am a fiercely private person, although I freely share about myself, in that I do not like uninvited people to intrude upon my life and the lives of my friends and loved ones. If you compromise my privacy, I will not be very nice (and that’s a very big understatement). And also, if you so much as dare to give me any suspicion that you can or will harm my family or loved ones, I will make sure you regret sorely ever having that thought. Things that I prefer not to disclose (and prefer that you do not ask unless completely necessary) : my company name, my address, my / my family’s financial situation, people I am dating, my personal activities, and other people’s secrets. I do not share other people’s secrets, so please stop asking. A secret belongs to its owner, and is not mine to tell, so please go ask that person if you are interested. I can be a very stubborn person (although easily swayed by people I like), and I will argue till the cows come home, to prove that I am right. If I like you, I may concede or agree to disagree. It depends. It goes without saying that I am very opinionated, especially on certain things as my being deadly against racism, elitism, anything that alienates people from one thing or another (big believer of equal opportunities here), and things like religion, education, etc. (But as nobody is perfect, I have to admit that I discriminate too - I discriminate against stupid and ignorant people who know that they are ignorant, yet do not do anything to make themselves less ignorant). I am very sensitive towards the above things, and tend to react very badly if people make racist comments, show segregation or discrimination, etc. If you do so, I will most certainly not hesitate to tell you that you are a piece of cow dung, and walk away from you, even if you are my friend. I used to be a Language major, and I am still very passionate about the English Language, so oftentimes I will probably pick apart something that you’ve said (especially if you have committed a boo-boo like making a passing comment that ever so slightly reeks of racism or something) and analyze it to see what you really mean. I will take it to be the first thing that comes to mind, and I will start picking on you for that. I have been wrong on some occasions, but hey, if I can misunderstand, other people can, too, and you shouldn’t be saying those things then! Sarcasm is not really my forte (I’ve seen people who have perfected it to an art), but when I’m riled, I can be poisonous. Trust is everything to me - if you break the trust, it will take me a long time to trust you again, and you’d have to work doubly hard to earn that trust back. It goes without saying that I’m not quite so forgiving towards friends who have once betrayed me, boyfriends who have cheated on me, people who have lied to me, or even just hid truths from me. I am not perfect - I cannot claim to be a saint all the time. But I have never intentionally lied to anyone, especially not if it causes hurt or harm to anyone. Although I don’t like to harm people or make them unhappy, it does not mean that I do not know how to. I have trouble with trivial things like keeping appointments, remembering anniversaries and birthdays, where I kept my notebook, reminding myself not to leave things like my cellphone and keys in the refridgerator, etc. But I do not forget bad deeds done towards me easily. I can forgive, but I do not easily forget (although with age I might). I believe in karma, and I do not do evil things to people (as much as I can help it) because I know that one day I will pay for it. The first and foremost thing that I do not do is to seduce someone else’s boyfriend / fiance / husband / partner. Plus, I believe that if he can cheat one someone with me, he can definitely cheat on me with someone else. It’s logic. I won’t say I have never done it before, but I can say now that I will not do it again. While I am not that big a fan of conventional behaviour, there are still certain things I believe should not be done - girls and boys should not talk about their sexual activities while in mixed company (a joke here and there is fine), people should not curse or indulge in extreme use vulgar language in mixed company. I have no respect for such people, because I believe that they do not respect themselves and do not respect others. I guess I would say that I am a very harmless person, and everyone should treat me as though I am a nice fluffy kitty, until the point where you step on my toes and refuse to apologize (in which situation, my tiger claws come out and I might maul you to death, haha). Other than that, I really am very cute (hurhur) and agreeable, and friendly, and easy to get along with. So you should truly try to get along with me, because if you don’t, you’re probably one of the 1% of people in my life who don’t. Protected: Sacrificing a dream This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Protected: You know you’re obsessed when… This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Protected: Henderson Waves This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Protected: Void This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Protected: Work Rant This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Protected: Easy Saturday This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Protected: My Wanderlust This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Protected: Where is the restart button? This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Public blog Hi! I’m currently blogging at daphnemaia.sg . I will still maintain this blog for close friends and for myself, so those who have the password can still continue reading about my (sometimes mundane) daily life here. Thanks to all for visiting this blog during the past 2 months! Protected: Reflections This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: Executives and Production Staff In my job, I often meet unpleasant people, especially at the corporate level, i.e executives. However, when I go to the production level, I often see cheerful, smiling faces, people who respect me and like me not because I am higher-ranked than they are, not because I am the HR personnel in-charge of their welfare, but simply because we are colleagues. That’s how I treat them, and that is how they treat me in return. We are all colleagues, and no one pulls ranks at the production level. As I live near to the office, and so do many of them, we often bump into one another on the way to work, since we all walk to the office. And we’ll chat happily on the way to work, joking and laughing. Sometimes, after work, I have dinner with them at the nearby hawker centre. And you can really feel their warmth towards you. I had one worker who had decided to go home to get married, so his fellow colleagues had a sort of farewell dinner and they invited me along. At first they were kind of shy to ask me, because they were afraid I wouldn’t want to go with them. But I assured them that I would love to go, and I did enjoy myself. Most of them are from China, and although I don’t always understand what they are saying, and they sometimes have to repeat jokes to me at least 3 times before I get it, I still must say that I have the best laughs with them in our company. Anyway, at the farewell dinner, we were drinking beer and honestly speaking, I think my director would faint if she sees me doing so, because she is a big believer of propriety and stuff like that. But I find that I enjoy their company, so what the heck. Sometimes, when I’m in a really bad mood, I just go down to Level 3, the Production floor, and walk around, helping the workers do mundane things like folding stuff, cutting stuff, and talking to them. I ask them about their work, and how they are getting along with their fellow colleagues, and sometimes I learn about some unhappiness or disagreement, and I would try to help them sort it out. I really believe that every HR should practise this - talking to the employees in the company, building interpersonal relationships at all levels of the organization - and not just sit in the HR office, thinking that everything is fine and dandy. Anyway. Today I am thankful for 2 persons from our Print Production department - Ruichun and Fuzhi. Today I had a horrible day at work. Not only I was scolded, backstabbed, and maligned, I also ended up crying in my director’s office. I was pulling a long face, and then had to work overtime to do something that’s really out of my job scope. I normally don’t mind doing extra work, but this is really completely ridiculous! I, as HR exec, was doing the work of a graphic designer, because someone else went home without completing the task. And someone forgot to put in my order for dinner, as they were consolidating the list of dinner packs to buy. So you can imagine how grumpy I was. The job I was working on took forever, and I felt so incompetent because I could not do it well (no surprise, since I wasn’t trained as a designer or layout artist). But I had this lovely girl, Ruichun, who taught me and helped me while she was juggling her own work. She’s also from China, and she’s a Layout Artist. Without her help this evening, I would have crumbled. She also taught me the correct processes for submitting the files to production for printing. She could’ve gone home earlier, but she was delayed because she was juggling her work and helping me at the same time. So I am thankful for her. After work, I walked towards home with Ruichun, but didn’t go straight to my own place. Instead, I went to the block opposite mine, because a new Layout Artist had arrived from our Changsha branch in China. She is being sent to Singapore (HQ) for training for 2 years, and it’s her first time in Singapore. She had hopped on to a taxi at Changi, and I had given her the address of the flat, and requested her to wait for me downstairs, at the void deck. When I arrived, just minutes after her taxi had dropped her off, she was sitting on the bench at the void deck. She jumped up when she saw me rushing towards her, and she gave me a hearty handshake and cheerfully said Hello! She was smiling, and immediately I felt a sort of affinity with her. Her name is Li Fuzhi but everyone in Changsha calls her Fulizhi (I think it’s some sort of nickname, a play on her name which sounds like lychee?) Anyway, Fulizhi, as I now know her, is really cute. Although plain in looks, she has beautiful complexion, and her smile is genial and warm. I helped her carry some of her bags up to the staff apartment, and she kept thanking me. She didn’t know I lived nearby, so she was really feeling apologetic that I had to come by so late to pass her the keys and to bring her to the apartment. When I explained that the office was just nearby, and my own place was just in the opposite block of apartments, she asked if I had just come immediately from work. She then asked me if I had my dinner (to which I replied, no) and she immediately whipped out a packet of biscuits from her back, and asked me to eat it! Gosh, what a cute girl! I really wanted to give her a hug, because no one else (besides Ruichun) had been so nice to me today! Anyway, I told her that it’s alright, that I will be going home to eat dinner, and she should keep the biscuits in case she got hungry in the night. After I showed her the room that was to be hers for the next two years, she said that she wanted to walk me home! She said that it’s very nice of me to show her to the flat, and help her carry her bags, so she wanted to accompany me walk home! Haha. How not to like a girl like that? In the end, on her insistence, I said that I will let her walk me down to her void deck, and then I would head back by myself to the block opposite. And she agreed. As we parted at the void deck, she kept thanking me profusely, and waving to me, and she even waited till I went into my elevator, before going upstairs again in hers. Although I’ve only known her for a few minutes, I’m thankful for this new colleague, Fulizhi. How I wish, how I wish… How I wish all the corporate staff in my company would also be as warm and as sincere as these non-executive staff. The company would really be a better place if everyone just stopped the politicking, and stopped trying to abuse their power. Protected: Random: San Francisco: Part IV This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below: Password: