Desmond was late for work again this morn...

I didnt notice him until he walked past my desk to the toilet. I turned and saw his back as he was heading to the pantry for the toilet keys. The reason that he caught my eye was becoz i was thinking its impossible for this company to have any "cool" looking Chinese Guy. Plus it was a dark blue burberry shirt and he had it tucked out. I have never seen him tucked any shirt out except for the time we went drinking in shanghai during the last biz trip.

When I realised it was Desmond, i "psst" him and said "hey u gg drinking today?" He gave me a shy smile and "chey" me and walked off.

When he came back, I noticed he had his shirt TUCKED IN!

I rolled my eyes and msn him.
"Bro!! WHAT DID YOU DO! U look so cool and suave this mornin, sooo happening and now u look so SQUARE!!" BAsically he looked soooo TU TU in hokkien (" 土 土" in mandarin)."

He replied "What is happening? What is Square" Wah pianz! How to explain sg terms to him? Tough man! So i said happening means cool lah! Why u tuck in! Just now look sooo good!"

He said "Coz you make fun of me just now abt my shirt lor! Anyway i dun like this shirt. My gf bought it" Wah pianz! I slapped my forehand in disbelief and walked to his room

I saw him and said "Why u tuck in ur shirt sooo much! Tuck out some more!!! U know what u look like? U look like when u very small and gg to kindergarten and your mum help u wear ur school uniform and TUCK ALL UR SHIRT IN!! Soooo ugly!!"

Desmond grinned but trying to act cool, he "ni ni neh neh" me and said "oki oki" trying to humour me or like i was "forcing" him. Or he was just shy. I said "Your shirt very nice what! And just now so cool! Why tuck in!!!!!" Barry was in the room and laughed.

Desmond said "Aiya, this shirt nice meh? I dun like." I said to him "Who cares what u like! U wear a shirt and its the GALS who are looking at u! What matters is what WE GALS LIKE U silly! Who cares what u think! Ur gf has good taste! U look nice in this!!! SO u should wear shirts that gals like! U have such bad taste! No wonder U havent got to pick up any gals when u go drinking!!! Rite rite Barry rite??!!" I turned to Barry for support and he laughed and said yes. Desmond surrended and made "feeble" attempt to tuck out his shirt a LITTLE.

I towered over him and said firmly "MORE! Dun be stingy! Tuck out lah! This morn u look soo Good!" In attempt to cover up his "willingless" to look cool, he pretend to look "hassled" and said okie okie!!! U so mafan and TUCK OUT HIS SHIRT again! Haa haa

I smile at him pleased with his "co-operation" and pat his head saying "Good! Now u look cool again" and walked out! Ha ha ha! Oh poor Desmond! :)

An "unexpected" bright morning...

Struggling to wake this morn.
Doreen called at 11pm and we didnt end the call till abt 2am. And it was only when her phone card gave way and ended the call itself. I couldnt sleep immediately and so by the time i fell zzzzz, was prob abt 3-4am.But it was worth catching up and chatting with her. Havent had such long chat with doreen for a while!

I woke up and while standing in the bathroom, i was wondering what was so different in the bathroom. It took me a full min to realise. FOR ONCE after 3 months, there was actually sunlight coming through the bathroom window!!! So the difference was i didnt have to turn on the bathroom light this morn! I was actually SHOCKED to even discover that there was sun and my toilet can be sooo bright! Talk abt bad weather spells in HK and all those polluted sky....

Back at work, everyone seem to like all my clothes in sg. I find it funny. And shoes too. At least its a slim cut and it tampers to your body line, HK clothes always make u look like u are pregnant because they like to pile the layers. Its nice on some but horrid on some. Esp i am so thin, it looks like i am a hanger!!!!HA!

Lunch over "smells assault"...

Lunch was GOOD!

I had Thai food at Lee Theatre. Rosa had her training counter part A.from states to come down to ASia and they are heading to japan together next week. Being typical caucasian, A. is crazy abt oriental food.

I have always been next to Sweet Basil Thai since ISE jap is next to it but never thot of trying it. So it came as a pleasant surprise when the dishes we ordered was very good. We order the 4 PP set even though there were like 5 of us but the portions were enuff.

We had pork neck as starters, coconut milk prawn soup, spring roll, veges, curry chicken and stir fried lamb slice. Everything was great except the lamb which i thot was a little chewy.

A. was funny. Thru' out lunch we were swopping stories and it was hilarious!!! Esp when we came to the topic of SMELLY FEET! BAD SMELL IS THE MOST UNFORGIVABLE SIN and MOST INTRUSIVE!! And Fandy shared her story abt being stuck in a full plane and the guy next to her took off his shoes and oh GOD it stank!!!! We were like OMG! U poor gal!!! I could totally empathise as i had the smelly feet causasian sitting next to me and scratching his bloody stinking feet before me (It smells really like some gone out salted fish)!!! Difference was i could get up and swop seat but Fandy couldnt! So A. asked her what airline and Fandy said "Airfrance" and A said "that explains!" I laughed my head off!!! If u dun get the joke, i canx tell u off my blog either, u have to figure it out.

Then A. shared with us abt a story of her colleague back in US office and she had a smelling problem. The poor gal didnt even know she smells and everyone had an issue but couldnt say a thing coz in US, this sort of thing has to be handled tactfully or you may get slap with a legal suit! So she said her boss asked her to TELL the gal and she tried calling the "Equal oppotunity" organisation and they refuse to help her as she was "ON THE WRONG SIDE" being the employer and not employee. I must admit I thought that was rather silly.

Anycase, someone somehow manage to discreetly told the poor gal and she went to A. and confide and asked if it was true. A. told her yes she does. So they went thru every detail from head to toe to find out what needs to be changed. And to our horror, the gal only wash her hair ONCE A WEEK and hasnt been to dentist for 3 years. So A. said "U GO HOME NOW GAL TO WASH YOUR HAIR!" I laughed my head off! And the gal found out later she had gum dieases and which was why she stinks. So it was like getting rid of one smell after another! Poor gal but really, not wash hair for a week????? Gross.... Anycase, the highlight was the gal has a BF! I was flabberghasted. I asked didnt the BF tell the gal anything?? And A said exactly that was what her boss asked A. Her boss asked what nationality was the bf and A. said "French" and teh boss said "That explains it!! but i'm not smelly!!" Hoo Hoo Hoo!

(PS: Did anyone tell u abt the joke on why French invent perfume? Ha ha. I heard this joke so often here. Ha ha. )

After lunch, I went to toilet to brush my teeth and Joanne came in and looks like she saw a goddess. She was like "Oh can u pass me some of ur floss? i had something stuck and the first person i thot of was u!" And now she concede that it was a good idea to at least have floss in the office. Later i found out she had some tooth crown and i was think age 27 is such a tender age to not have a complete set of real teeth!!! And these people are astonished at my brushing teeth habit? I am ASTONISHED at their habit.

Comment

heard a funny comment today.

I was going to the washroom when the lady from Hugo Boss team came out of the meeting and asked if she could tagged along with me as i had the key. As we were chatting, she asked me what project i was working on. After she heard, she said "Oh u do look like a Anna Sui gal" I was pleasantly surprised, i'm even looking the part now? heh.

A new definition on "homely" food

Had lunch with Joanne, Ida, Fandy and 2 more other gals. They brought me to this Thai food place behind Time square (Lantern Street). Its small place, that doesnt surprise me. What surprised me was when they didnt have place at the shop and the owner brought us up to his place upstairs and open tables to sit me and my colleagues! I was obviously shocked.

I was joking that its almost like we are heading to someone's house for causal lunch! I had to walk up this narrow stair case and into this empty living room. The owner was pretty nice and he turn on the TV and aircon to make us as comfy as possible. I found the whole experience amusing. Only in Hk will u have such a situation.

The food was pretty good and cheap. Only Hk30 between the table of 6. The prawn crab cake was nice. But conversation for me is almost nil coz there is nothing much to say.

Emily from finance was very sweet. She gave me this black sesame shui jing bao thing. So far she is one of the most sociable person in the office, restricted by our language barrier. Luckily i understood her. Another credit for watching cantonese VCDS when I was young! :P

Black rain in HK

The weather in HK has been crazy. Just had black rain and amber rain warning last few days.
Rain rain rain, that's all i have experienced so far. Saw the news. they even have this thing call microburst where the downward pressure forces the wind to travel at 100km/hr and uprooted all the trees. Its crazy. But such burst onlt last abt 15mins.

Nothing much to write, been sleeping all weekend. Tired.Bill apparently caught some nasty flu from aouth africa and so i missed him this time in HK. Damn. was hoping to see some familiar face.

Sg and image of our bad english?

The most commonly repeated statement i have heard since i came to HK in march always amaze me. They always say "You are from singapore?! You dun have the accent!!" When i protest, they would say "its true! Singapore's english is so hard to understand!" Then it amazes them further when they realise i could speak decent Mandarin without the "other sort of ang-mo accent".

It kinda made me wonder. Is it such a BAD image that singaporeans are projecting overseas? Is that why the govt are trying sooo hard to rid the singlish or speak proper english campaign? We seem to have such an appalling image on our singlish accent to everyone from everywhere!

I got kinda concerned and asked Allen (A taiwan new zealander), he was the 30th person to exclaim on my "heritage". (yes, i'm keeping count).

"Why do everyone thinks ALL singaporean speak badly?" He said "Maybe becoz of that Chinese movie about the kids and school system in singapore" I was like "Oh my god! That is just movies! Its not like a default rule that everyone from Singapore must speak like that!" He laughed.

A movie. Can u believe it???

PS: i miss speaking mandarin....

Made it thru presentations.. Phew!

The presentation was moved from wed to thurs.

That gave me more time to find out existing mkting campaign scope, existing vendors, cost structure for the whole region and on top, understand the potential vendor's offering as well as evaluate the trade off in switching.

Stress is understatement. Spent hours on long distance calls to vendors and luckily, Allen the existing vendor is such a nice chap and he patiently walk thru the scope and cost structure for me in 2 key regions. That was like 3 hour long dist call and my ears were like on fire by 10pm.
So today was D-DAY.
Had to do 2 presentations one after another. Before i started, I was crossing my finger that I read my MD correctly in the essence of my presentation. The last thing i need is to screw up my first 2 regional presentations in front of a room full of 12 key people.

After the presentations, I felt so drained! Its like completion of a marathon!
The good new is my boss told me that he heard pretty good reviews abt the presentations and that he thinks i'm doing a very good job apparently! So he said he felt even more a pity that no one reminded him to attend my presentations despite him requesting it.

Hoo Hoo. Actually his absence means Less stress for me. Bad enuff to have the MD next to me, dun need another boss to add on the heat!

But I guess what "saved my arse" was that i bothered to do the price study from Allen even though I wasnt doing a cost feasibility. But as luck would have it, my MD asked for it so suddenly, but i had the answers with me, so i guess that really put me in good light. Thank god! All the stress and late nites the last 2 days seemed worth while after all!

Had dinner had Habibi an Indian restaurant at Wellington street coz Lucky & billie are in town. So we had a group dinner together to unwind. And now, its really time for bed since i had less than 6 hours sleep combined in last 2 days!

"Singapore Girl"

heard a saying few days back being said to me.

"You can take a gal out of singapore, but you canx take Singapore out of the gal"

chuckles...

Work work work...

how many times have i said it? Work is crazy. I mean typhoon crazy.

Today there was a presentation by vendor. Before i can grapple with everything he described, i have to do a repeat presentation for the regional country director tomorrow morning. that leaves me with like 3 more hours to prepapre the material. I dun even know what is the current system! And in that 3 hours, i have a quotation and contract to review and system features queries to sort out.

I wish i have 48 hrs, but somehow, time passes by so quickly that you wonder what had happen to the first 24hrs...

Back to work...

Another hectic trip to/fro shanghai

U know, I told ALL my frens that I am really not the best person to travel with on plane. For one simple reason, my flights ALWAYS, ALWAYS get delayed!!!!

Its always either technical problem or weather. Always. And this time, moving to HK, my luck hasnt changed. It got worse!!!

I thot the most impossible thing of being rerouted to a completely new destination was the worse i could get on my last biz trip. This time, due to RED RAIN in HK, the bad weather caused so many flights to be canceled and delayed!!!So me and Desmond got stranded in shanghai airport from 3pm till 9pm. Even when we board the plane, we were stuck inside the plane for another 1.5hrs before the air control traffic allowed us to take off. By the time i reached HK, it was midnite and i got home about 1.30am. How brillant. I was soo freaking tired considering i didnt have any decent sleep the nite before.

Our fight to shanghai was postponed from 10am to 11am. So basically my whole trip agenda got screwed. I was running all over to meet vendors and office people and meetings. I never had such a rushed trip! By the time the meeting with Anson ended, it was close to 10pm and i had to hunt for food with desmond.

Desmond and I found this chinese dim sum place in shanghai near our Ramada Plaza shanghai hotel. He was eager for his drinks @Rouge 18 and so dinner wasnt the main highlight.

The drinking place was pretty hip and at least music cool enuff. Not crappy retro and R&B. Thanksfully! The view was fasincinatin facing the pudong oriental pearl. The shanghai gals were all over the blondie boys of coz and there was a decent amt of gay guys there too. The good thing out of the dribking session was that desmond and I got to know each other better in a more relaxed mood and so more office gossips were shared. haa haa. By the time i went back the hotel, he was definitely more pissed high than i was but i was freezing cold. Heaven knows why. It was a rainy day and so it was just a yucky weather basically. I didnt sleep till like 6am and my neighbor had to turn on his tv so loud at 7am till 8am. So effectively i didnt sleep till 8am to 10am. 2 hours. and i had to rush off for next 2 meetings at 11am. bloody hell! Taxi drivers and traffic in shaghai is madness.

Like what wendy said, "You feel like you have EARN back your LIFE after each cab ride. Its worse than bangkok and the drivers are reckless. Its a test of luck with your destiny. "

So thinking we could try to head back to HK earlier as Desmond had a teleconference meeting at 9pm, we rushed to airport, only to be told we couldnt fly. Wait wait.with nothing to do except to drink, we sat around and spend money on fod and drinks. I was still feeling the after effects from the drinks the nite before so i curb the alochol intake. Shanghai airport is pretty boring, but at least it has space so i dun feel constricted. But still, i rather be home in bed.

Anycase, by the time i went to bed, it was 3am. Talk about being freaking tired. Next week is going to be soooo bz that i cannot imagine.