Master post: This Singapore nerd's musings on himself

Looks like a good idea to house all my musings on myself in one neat package here.

Part 12 (photo journal)

Part 11 (photo journal)

Part 10 (photo journal)

Part 9

Part 8

Part 7

 Part 6 (photo journal)

 Part 5

Part 4

Part 3

Part 2

 Part 1

All in a day's work in Singapore - real-life office stories as told to me (Part 7)

"Work can never be finished. We should always complete what we set out to do. Though both sayings are contradictory, they can be resolved by a third saying: Find a job you love and you will never work a day in your life." 

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"Two pleasant-looking female colleagues were debating the various interpretations of an internal company-wide contest and concluded that the rules are confusing OR they are bimbos. I'm happy to say that they are wrong. The correct conjunction used should be 'AND', not 'OR'."

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"Today, I need to cramp two days' work into one. If I can't deliver, it means that I'm inefficient and lack time-management skills. If I somehow make it, then it only gives the impression that I've been slacking all these years. Damned if I do, damned if I don't. Or maybe I should just call in sick? Then I'll be labelled as a weakling. Damned again!"

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"Common sense dictates that we should always clear the most important or urgent emails, but I always enjoy replying immediately to those without common sense."

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"It is the sign of changing times when the first thing my foreign business visitors asked after shaking my hand was not for my name-card, but for the right visitor Wi-Fi network to log in."

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" My Untried and Untested Office Survival tips when the Boss is on leave"

1. Email all projects that need your boss's approval and you will be effectively free for the rest of the day, unless if your boss happened to be on-the-ball and replies emails, in which case, you will need to repeat this step until he gets fed-up/ impressed by your 'hard work'.

2. Plan dept or inter-dept lunches so that there will be at least one common gossip agenda item.

3. Make [Alt+Tab] your best friend to switch screen should some idiots turn up at your cubicle and disrupt your full-time Facebooking or doing holiday research. Said idiots are most likely not your colleagues since they will be as busy as you doing the same thing.

4. Learn the delay/scheduled email sending function to give the illusion of your omnipresence at your desk where in fact, you are out for extended brunch cum lunch or gone for the day to catch the 6pm movie.

"My tried and tested tips on surviving happily in the office"

1. While you can steal a peek at your colleagues' screen, don't be a busybody and comment whatever is on their screen, unless initiated by the colleague.


2. If your colleague buy snacks or cheapsake souvenirs from overseas, accept them graciously even if you are faking it.

3. If you are leaving your computer for extended period of time and can't be bothered to lock your screen, at least show your desktop or email programme and not face-palm sites like Facebook or travel sites researching for your next holiday.

4. If you are goofing during working hours by watching YouTube videos or playing online games, don't be an idiot and announce to the whole dept by blasting your speakers.

5. Don't compare salary or working hours. Life is unfair, get over it. You win some, you lose some.

6. Make common enemy from other departments amongst your colleagues, great for bonding.

Click here for more 'All in a day's work in Singapore'

 

HACKED!!!!

I finally managed to hack this Winston blog account using password ChickMagnet. Now I can write any nonsense I want and nobody can stop me! But after reading his posts I think he has written much worse than anything I can think of. And maybe I should return the only thing in the world that he has control.

Words of wisdom (Part 2)

Senses

Best Taste – Anything cooked with love from your kitchen.
Best Sight – Your spouse drooling on the pillow while sleeping.
Best Sound – Your mum’s voice on the overseas call reminding you to wear and eat more.
Best Touch – Soothing tummy rub for your cat/dog (Non-pet-owners to replace pets with kids)
Best Smell – Your blanket after more than 3 months of daily usage. (6 months and above for best effect)

 :)

To have a frown-free day ahead, you don't need to wear your power-suit or your most alluring perfume. You just need to wear a smile. However, the most effortless item one can have with them is often left behind at home before they go to work each morning, and only realised what they have forgotten when they saw it on the faces of others.

Shopping

Why do women like shopping so much?
Isn't shopping a waste of time and energy?
What is there to gain from all these shopping?
For clueless men who don't know how women think, just replace "shopping" with "football" and everything will be clear. This comes from someone who has attained enlightenment after years of undergoing retail-therapy.

Pirates

We are used to looking at online piracy from the viewpoint of the downloaders. We should shine the spotlight on the magnanimous uploaders instead. They provide a buffet spread of content like movies, TV shows, books, software and songs online for everyone to download for FREE and asking neither fame nor fortune in return. They should be hailed, not jailed.

Life

If we want peace and love in our lives, we have to take the effort to make them, preferably on a daily basis ;P

 *****

I know of someone who likes to meddle in everything but no one appreciates. I would recommend everyone to take sometime to do absolutely nothing which your body and mind would certainly appreciate.

*****

I've learnt that when you have your loved ones by your side, no matter where in the world or what you are doing, it is never a waste of time.

More Words of Wisdom

Why Seven Deadly Sins are considered sins ONLY if you don't practice them

Lust

If great men didn't fall at the feet of beauties like Cleopatra and Marilyn Monroe, history would be so boring and we wouldn't have tomes and movies on their steamy sexploits.

Gluttony

Life would be meaningless if we eat to live and not live to eat. Prisoners on death row don't ask for a chance to read 50 Shades of Grey or listen to Pharrell Williams' Happy. They want their last meal to be out of this world before they go out of this world.

Greed

Modern civilisation as we know it wouldn't exist if one person don't desire to have just a bit more than the next. New York with its cathedrals of capitalism would only be a figment of our imagination.

Sloth

All work and no play makes Jake a dead man at his desk without anyone realising it for days, thinking that he was the most hardworking chap to arrive the earliest and the last to leave. We should all stop and smell the roses and live an enchanted life.

Wrath

We owe a huge gratitude to a raving mad whistle-blower Edward Snowden to sound the death knell that echoes across the world, reminding us that we are living in a paranoid world gone mad.

Envy

An envious JFK succeeded in landing a man safely on the moon and back. And a bunch of green-eyed Chinese tycoons will ensure that the world's tallest buildings continue to sprout at their own backyards, pushing civil engineering to its limit, and Dubai out of the way.

Pride

Without it, we will be swimming in a sea of mediocrity not knowing the limits of human capabilities in achieving the highest, fastest or the strongest with trailblazers like Issac Newton, Usain Bolt and Steve Jobs being superheroes that exist only in our wildest dreams.

All in a day's work in Singapore - real-life office stories as told to me (Part 6)

"I was having lunch at my neighbourhood coffee-shop and had an interesting time observing the congregation of elderly folks seated at the next table. The loudest ones dominated the conversation, and they would repeat their lines a few times to the rest who were either zoned out or playing with their phones. Hey, this is exactly like my weekly department meetings!"

"After witnessing quite a few major changes in my department in recent months under new leadership, I'm beginning to see myself as a character in Game of Thrones, trying hard to survive the cloak and dagger intrigue and the office skullduggery. While I'm contemplating forging alliances, I'm also wary of going to meetings behind closed doors or getting invitation to lunches in unfamiliar territories. I just hope my character survives in the next season!"

*****

"For buying afternoon tea snack for the department for no special reason - $10. For realising that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach - priceless. For my new Lady Boss mentioned above in her first month at the helm - I am your loyal servant till the end of time."

"First my new Lady Boss bought the bunch of us tea snacks and breakfast. Next, she was the only one today who voiced that my new CK polo tee was nice. Though she is still on official probation, to me, she has excelled beautifully in becoming my next BFF. Comparatively, my girlfriend turned wife needed more than a year. Tsk tsk tsk."

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"I've decided to stop grumbling about the lack of work ethics from my Gen Y intern. You know how some old arcade games will stop calculating points after it hit a ceiling and just show 999,999 points? My intern has reached that limit... with a 'minus' sign in front."

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"I was commiserating with a male colleague on how a mutual female colleague has touched us in places nobody has touched before. A pain in the ass is much worse than a kick in the groin."

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"I realised that there's such a thing as 'Old Man colours' when it comes to work shirts. And I have to thank my pastel-loving male colleagues in my department for being my fashion consultants in leading by example on colours that I shouldn't touch."

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Not bad for my neighbourhood coffee shop to have a waterfall feature...but only during torrential downpour like now.  I'll expect delays for the morning commuters who will utter this to their bosses "Blame it on the rain", which is also the title of a song by Milli Vanilli a quarter of a century ago. Nope, never heard of it as it is before my time. Girl you know it's true. 

Click here for more 'All in a day's work in Singapore'

Train rides are fun (part 2)

 

When official signage (as opposed to ads) start to appear on the ground, it is not in response to an ageing society of crooked backs and low eye level. It is to cater to a new generation of screen addicts (低头族) who have forgotten the colour of the sky.

The civic-minded train passengers like me will queue up diligently at the platform by the side of the door. But there are always those sneaky ones who will cut queue and rush in when the door opens. Years of watching soccer has taught me defensive manoeuvres and man-marking tactics to ensure that I don't let in an early goal without a fight! 

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Our bodies pressed against each other, while she breathed on my chest. Her perfume lingered even at the end of the day. I'm blushing just starring at her. How I HATE squeezing into a packed train at rush hour like sardines on my way home, standing next to an old woman with pungent perfume and bad breath! 

*****

A pint-sized granny sat next to me on the train today and immediately assumed the self-appointed role of 'Life Guru' scrutinising the fellow commuters around her. She pointed to one lad's 'improper way' of holding the hand strap which could lead to 'dislocation of the wrist', and discreetly to another girl to inform her of her peeking bra strap. By then I had immediately sucked in my gut, half-expecting her to poke her finger into my love handles and proclaimed to the train "Ah boy, too fat!". Luckily I've arrived at my stop.

*****

My rush hour commute in a packed train is like visiting a Chinese temple where rows upon rows of imposing and immobile buddhas, deities and door gods materialise around me. And when I need to exit, I have to squeeze past them with whispers of "excuse me" or "sorry" to get their blessings. And you'll be cursed for life if you ever bump or step on them. Maybe I should have an incense stick on hand to pay my respect the next time, and the statues will give me a wide berth on my way out of the train. 

*****

I observed with much amusement at the train ticket office lady counting her stack of ten $5 notes a whopping five times. Two times is being meticulous with three pushing it, and five times is just plain OCD. Same as the guy who counted in his mind five times with the lady in order to make this observation. 

Train Rides are fun (Part 1) 

 

10 things I learnt in New York

1. Almost all major apparel brands have their global flagship stores here. Even the Japanese casual wear Uniqlo.

2. Security at Statue of Liberty and Empire State Building are on par, if not stricter than the JFK airport. 

3. All American set meal portions are as large as the US continent. For an Asian like me living in a little red dot, one set is good for two.

4. Patience is not a virtue found in any drivers in Manhattan. Once the green light is on, so does the honking. 

5. If you get homesick in New York and crave for that familiar taste of home, just look out for the Golden Arches.

6. It pays to change your greenbacks from legitimate money-changers. All my crisp new $100 bills were subjected to scrutiny by the cashiers who would mark them with a special pen to determine whether that Benjamin Franklin is the real deal or a doppelganger.

7. Police officers are useless in pointing clueless tourists to the right directions. Street-vendors are often friendlier and more knowledgeable.

8. McDonald's and sandwich shop Pret A Manger restricted me from taking pictures of their food preparation and display areas respectively. Are they worried that I'd report their poor hygiene practice to the authority or steal their secret recipe?

9. An apologetic smile goes a long way in defusing any awkward or embarrassing situations that NY first-timers find themselves in. Works every time.

10. On the morning when I was in front of my workstation after more than 10 days away on holiday, I momentarily forgot my log-in password. That put a smile on my face knowing that the money was well-spent. In life, we often forget that there are things not worth remembering.


 More on my New York trip:
(Mis)adventures in New York:

Final musings on World Cup before the final match

 

My neighbourhood coffee shop is a lifelong Argentina supporter as seen from their uniform's colour combination. Luckily it wasn't green & yellow

 
The best World Cup teams in each continent are Germany (Europe), Japan (Asia) and Mexico (Americas)... which are judged purely on the design of their cool jerseys decked on toned torsos under the sweltering heat. The matches have evolved into a 90min catwalk for me looking at the next jersey to buy while the legions of female fans would wait for the jerseys to come off at the end of the match for the real show to begin.

 *****

At least one advantage of being jet lagged is that I have no trouble waking up at 4am to catch the World Cup match since my body has no trouble thinking it is 4pm.

 *****

Please be more forgiving on the train if a fellow passenger is dozing on your shoulder. Most likely this person is holding a temporary month-long contract work as a World Cup fanatic which will end on Monday. Those fresh-faced people without dark eye bags are either not soccer fans, or supporters of England or Spain.

 ***** 

Semi-final match Netherlands vs Argentina
First time I'm disappointed at a World Cup result. Penalty shootout is such a cruel 'anti-soccer' gesture and should be abolished. Might as well do a coin toss to save the time and trouble. The Beautiful Game should be played until there's a result no matter how long it takes, even if a player decides to score an own-goal to end the nonsense.

  ***** 

First post on World Cup:
http://winstonchongsingapore.blogspot.sg/2014/06/more-on-world-cup.html 

Second post on World Cup:
http://winstonchongsingapore.blogspot.sg/2014/06/more-on-world-cup_22.html 

More musings on soccer:

http://winstonchongsingapore.blogspot.sg/2014/02/musings-on-soccer-english-game-not.html 

 

(Mis)adventures in New York

Isn't it ironic that for my New York trip:

- I did more research than anything I've done in office.
- I had muscle ache and sunburn within one day more than I ever would in one year in tropical Singapore.
- I was more exhausted in one week here than my month-long company teamwork event that I organised.
It begs the question whether I'd be better off working than holidaying.

*****

Dear New Yorkers,

I speak with a different accent doesn't mean I know less English than you. I come from a foreign land doesn't mean I know less pop culture and current affairs than you. I carry a camera and map doesn't mean I am gullible and easily conned by you. Having said that, though I'm Asian, it doesn't mean I'm smarter than you.

*****

Soundtrack of Manhattan streets

Car drivers' impatient prolonged honking; siren from police car, ambulance and fire engine- all feature different tone and rhythm; and chatter from a dozen different languages. Glad I can temporarily mute this soundtrack at 20 floor above street level in my hotel room and get some peace and quiet from this loud metropolis. NY, please be gentle to this first-timer.

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Subway

Managed to commit all the mistakes on the massive and massively confusing Manhattan subway system on the first day here despite having made detailed pre-planning. We attempted to pass through the same toll gate twice by mistake, missed our stop, and entered the wrong direction platform. My tip for first-timers like me: Only a true-blue New Yorker can navigate the maze. For the rest of us, just treat the detours as part of the fun and enjoy the ride!

*****

Spending the entire 24/7 with another person on holiday can be a helluva experience. Here's our typical conversation:
Me: You shop too much!
Wife: You shoot too much!
Me: You spend too much!
Wife: You speak too much!
Me: sigh...

 *****

 *****

It was a pity I wasn't able to meet my family in New York who were in the Chan Bros My Star Guide tour with Elvin Ng. However our truckloads of chocolates bought separately are able to meet at our house. Right now, they are having an emergency meeting to determine the Sequence Ranking of Consumption prior to the family's 2-day weekend feasting. Reese's peanut butter cup looks worried.


More on my New York trip:
10 Things I Learnt in New York