A Hot and Dry Bangkok

The swamp that is right beside my business partner's office is all dried up. I have been there a few times in the last few years. It was always wet except this time. Little signs like this is worrying.

News about Global warming in Financial Times which has an article that argue that developed countries who contributed most to the global warming has lots to gain and also has the money to cope with any changes brought forth by the warming trend. Whereas underdeveloped countries will not have the economic means to deal with the changes. Straits Times reports the lessening of the icebergs and milder winter.

How we as human race react to the change? This is history as it unfolds....

Thailand - the Land of Smiles

It is always nice to come to Thailand. The food is yummy and cost is reasonable. The people are gentle and polite. The girls are gorgeous and very feminine. It looks like it is business as usual. Maybe the disturbance is somewhere else in Thailand. I hope the problems are resolves and peace can prevail. Violence and disruption just hurt everyone including the perpetrators.

My wish is peace and prosperity for the Gentle Land of Smiles - please stay Gentle.

Heatwave in Bangkok

Bangkok is hot, very hot. Temperature is at 40 celcius. My friend, S says it is due to the El Nino effect. The heat is much higher than usual. A Singaporean, S has live in Bangkok for more than 6 years. She feel that this is unusually hot.

Where I am, everything is normal even though my wife heard the news there are "disturbances" from terrorists impersonating as miltary personnel.

Today, I did not do well with my food intake. I had food in the lounge, eat again during the flight, then have lunch and dinner. Will my weight yo-yo back to 87kgs again? The good thing is I did not have carbo.

Thai really knows how to cook. Hence I can stop eating....

Hurray, weight and weight, weight and...

90.5 FM was humming "work and work...work and work" this morning. And me?! After looking at the weighing scale, it is weight and weight... weight and weight. Guess why I am so euphoric?

Good news. NO! Fantastic news! My weighing tells me I am at 86.1kg this morning. Yeah, man! I am making so progress. I was not updating on my diet progress because my weight is like a yo-yo on a string. It is up, it is down. So up and down. When up, I feels guilty. I reprimand myself for eating up all the good food during entertainment dinner.

Well, I am off again for another working trip. Hence more delicious, yummy, tempting good food. I am tempted by the food devil all the time. Will see if I can resist well. Wish me luck:)

Musings

What kind of training will be good for a group with two new members? Team building activities? Communication Styles? Product Knowledge? Business Process? Book Reviews?

I have also open up my training to staff from other department. What kind of train should I give to them? Discover yourself type of tests? Self management skills? Influencing skills? Mind training?

Decisions, decisions, decisions! This will be what I thinking of when I am free for the next few weeks.

The Rise of the Creative Class

I read a few pages of this book by Florida. He basically refute Daniel Pink's Free Agent Nation position that more and more people are becoming free agent. He quoted statistics that prove that self employment is on the decline in US. The creatives are still working for large institutions.

I will read this book next time and review it here.

Last Man Standing

I have colleagues over from US. They requested dinner at the KL tower. It is the tallest resturant in KL with pananormic view of the city. The view was clear and the city was a flood of lights. It is good to meet up with friends from half the world away with good food. Food is buffet with a station for local flavors and another station for western. Dessert was a fabulous spread of about 30 items - healthy cut fruits, yummy chocolate dips, cakes, mini tarts, mango glutinous rice, ice cream, sigh! I could go on forever...

I heard my counterpart in Europe has resigned. This mean I am now the last man remaining in the business at my level. The higher ups were gone a long time ago. It is getting lonely....

Where are the Taxi when you NEED them?

I thought I wake up early to get to the airport as it is Monday morning. I called the usual 6552 1111 Comfortlink for a cab. Engaged. Tried again, engaged. After three tries, I managed to get through. "Do not hang up. Cablink is despatching your order now..." "Press 2 to try again" No luck. Hangup and redial - engaged. So my wife help me by bring out the phone book. We tried limosine service, every other cabline available. Some like Comfortlink are engaged. Others only operates during the office hours.

This is madness when you try to get a cab and not getting anywhere with all the different numbers and multiple tries. Finally and it took more than half an hour to get confirmation a cab is coming. I was lucky. I managed to get through in the nick of time for my flight

Monday is a bad day to call a cab. And if it rains, you might as well give up.

Angels, thanks for all your help.

Superb Sunday, Manic Monday

Sunday, God take a rest after busy for the first 6 days creating heaven, earth, man and all the things we know. At least this is the first few paragraphs of the bible tells us.

Sunday is a rest day for our family as well. We did not create heaven neither did we do all the wondrous things God did. However, like all other regular city folks, we worked and our kids worked in school. It is a good day of enjoying the freedom to do what we like. The boys played computer games, shoot basketball and some homework. B3 play with his swing racer and swim. My wife read the Sunday Times and do whatever she does. I relax at the poolside reading the papers and a book.

Yes, tomorrow is Manic Monday, sorry Sumiko Tan, I plagarize your headline. Yes, I am so "sian".

A Simple Sunday Morning at Swensen's

Cabin fever. This is the term for being coop up in the house for long time. This is especially appropriate for Toronto during the long, dark and cold winters.

So I decided to read in a cool, airconditioned place out of the cabin. The place that yuppies hang out. Talking about yuppies, I rarely heard this term use nowadays. The nearest mall for me is Compass Point and since my wife and baby boy is there, Starbucks will not be a good choice. Swensen has breakfast menu! This is new market Swensen is tapping into. The breakfast is good value. For $7.90 you can get pancake, hash brown, two sausages, juice (orange or apple) and coffee or tea. Not bad value considering McDonald breakfast will cost $6 with one drink. The food is serve in real plate and cutlery. Omelette set breakfast is even cheaper at $6.90.

I had a latte and "Authentic Happiness". Reading the book and sipping latte. B1 and B2 joined us after mummy called them and read out the menu. It sounds so yummy that they cannot resist. B3 does his drawings, Mummy read "We want you to be rich" by Donald Trump, B2 does Science homework and B1 read the comic, Alchemist. This is family togetherness, family bonding and family time. Three hours in a nice environment for $31. It is a good deal!

Pure and Simple Pleasure.

Reflect

Sometimes, I wonder what life is about. What do we have to study? Why do we have to work? Why we get married and have kids? Why some do not and some become monks? Why we grow old and die? Life is a cycle and always going in a circle - from cradle to grave and reproduce more of ourself. Life has ups and downs. Plenty of joys and periods of pain and uncertainty. Is this God's Will or part of a master design? What about the animals? What are they thinking? How do they feel? How come we do not see any dead sparrows or any dead stray cats around? Why? Where did all the wildlife in the city go when it is time for them to go to heaven?

Why only some are rich and many have to live in poverty? Why must there be crime? Why do people kill or rape another? Why are there diseases and human and animals have to get sick? Why do we have to eat to live? Why? Why? Why???

Heard of Sungei Api Api?

It is in Pasir Ris Park right at the end of Elias Rd. There is a bicycle rental kiosk and bbq pits. It has cycling trails, boardwalk into the mangrove swamp, public toilets, free car parks and is very shady. There are bungalows bought by HDB, PSC, PUB and other local big companies for their staff benefits. The bungalows are very nice. It is good to live the lifestyle of the rich for vacations or even a long weekend. Right in the middle of the sea between the coastline and the islands opposite were two kelongs. The kelongs are fairly big and established. It is like an interesting place to visit too.

B3 turn 6 today

My baby turn 6 today and we celebrated his birthday with a McDonald meal in school. He has interesting classmates in Nafa. One girl had a French father and a Malay mother, another had an American father and Malaysian Chinese mother. A third girl just relocated back from Shanghai while her father remains there. Just from the kids in school, it is easy to tell how global the world has become.

Parents from all over the world, parents in different part of the world. The globe has become a village. Ethnic groups start to blur in Singapore as kids of inter-racial marriage become more and more common.

The Best Gift....

B2 (middle son) informed me he scored 50 out 50 for his Science test. He is the top scorer in P6. It is a small school. He is very pleased with himself. Mummy has worked with him a lot recently and the result is showing.

This is the best gift I got from him. I am very proud of him. He is showing if he put in his efforts he can drive results. He just need mummy to close supervise and motivate him.

B1(eldest) is putting in more time on his school work. The pressure is on. His fellow classmate, CK who used to be at the top boy in class is lamenting that it is not fair that he works so hard and another classmate who plays with gameboy all the time gets better results than him(CK). I explained to B1 that is such a thing call intelligence. He also need to know perception may not be reality. The boy who play a lot in school may be working very hard at home. I gave him examples I know when I was in school. A lot of my classmates and schoolmates plays very hard in school. At home, I discover they have done extra homework with tuition to help them. Their results were tops! Many of them have scholarships for the university later.

The Pursuit of Happiness

What is happiness? Does money buy happiness? Is happiness more important than peace or health? Why happiness? Why not nirvana? Why not money? How about rich?

I am thinking about happiness recently. There is a whole raft of new books on happiness. Authentic Happiness has the most cited. I am thinking of using some of the questionaire in there for my younger colleagues and find out the results.

Old Guard - Inflight Supervisor, The BDP

BDP is Best Demonstrated Practice. Or the best example.

Today, I took a flight from KL to Sin. Short sector, about 40 mins. When I reach the aircraft door, there was an old gentleman in grey suit. I now know this guy is a inflight supervisor instead of a crew chief. This old guy had his reading glass on. He has a receding hairline, may be bald would be a better description. He was extremely courteous. He notices I have a Starbuck coffee with me. Since my hand was busy, he showed me to my seat and put my luggage up to the luggage compartment for me. I am very impressed by him. He has done something the SQ crews have not done for long time. Nowadays, the crews will show you to your seat and the open the luggage compartment and wait patiently for you to put up your luggage yourself.

Kudos to you, Victor Lim. I hope SQ recognise you and give you a service award.

The verdict is out....

Old Town Kopitiam kaya toast is better than the Kluang Koptiam in The Curve. The butter does not have the rancid taste and the toast is like Ah Kun's - crusty outside and soft and moist inside. The kaya is sweet and brown in colour. Taste a little like coconut sugar. I still prefer Ah Kun's kaya which has a rich pandan taste. The other favorite kaya of mine is Mei Chin in Marine Parade. Mei Chin is a tradition coffee shop. Extremely hot and humid during the afternoon. The kaya is heavenly and the custard puffs are delicious.

Home Sweet Home

Will be going home tomorrow. I am looking forward to sleep in my own bed. Look forward is a nice warm feeling. Yes, a home is an anchor, a sacrum, a place to recover and restore.

Famous Kluang Coffee at Railway Station

I had tea and kaya toast from the Kluang Famous Railway Station Coffee shop franchise. The tea was ok except milk may be a little strong and hence very filling. The kaya bun was not so good as the butter tasted stale and smell very strongly of being in the fridge for too long. The price is reasonable at RM3.25 for toast and tea. In Singapore, Ah Kun cost twice as much. Ah Kun's butter taste good as the butter are kept in ice rather than the refrigerator.

Warm Welcome for My New Teammates

I met two new teammates today, Michelle and KY. Both joined us for a two or three days now. It is good to welcome new comers to the team. We have been shorthanded for a while now. Michelle is a number cruncher and KY will run the office.