irony - mental patients

irony is when a mental patient calls another person crazy...

mental patients

visits to the mental institute has always been interesting.

apart from experiencing lots of interesting people, i also get the chance to learn lots of things.

for today, i learned that mental patients are very thin-skinned, aka sensitive and insecure. as a result, they can get agitated very easily and possibly turn aggressive anytime. and i said this cos as i waited for my turn to see the doctor, i heard a loud angry male voice. i turned my head and noted there was an elderly gentleman by the service counter. for some reasons, he was clearly unhappy with the staff. he was saying something like i want to see the doctor and you don't need to talk like that to me. the service staff tried to explain to him again that he needed to wait for a while more as the doctor would only arrive at 10am (it was 8-ish at that time).

next thing i knew, the elderly male patient got aggressive and shouted angrily at the service staff. by then, the security personnel, staff nurses, etc had gathered around him and tried pacifying him. it was quite a scene. and then suddenly, the elderly man broke down and started crying like a little boy. and just as quickly, the staff nurses and the security personnel ushered him to a room. 

it was kinda a surprising twist of event for me. the whole incident reminded me of my mum. 

her moods can change suddenly and she can be just as emotional.

it's such incidents that keep me on my toes all the time.

mental patient?

i was at the mental institute this morning to collect mum's medicine. and as i waited for the doctor's arrival, i spoke with the nurse. she was very nice and chatted with me saying how good i look and has a nice frame but need to watch my weight yadda yadda yadda. after seeing the doctor, i went back to the same nurse to make a new appointment.

she took a look at the card and exclaimed: oh, this is for your mother and not for you ahhh? ...

i wondered what was on her mind when she spoke with me earlier...

lol!

once an elder, always an elder

my cousin came to the house to pay a visit to mum.

he was one of the very few who would drop by once every couple of months to check on her. and i usually do not tell her of the visit until closer to his visit cos i didn't want her to get anxious. anyway, his visit came and went. and during the visit, it was so very clear that mum really had a "once an elder, always an elder" mentality. as usual, i sat quietly by her side as they chatted. and she went on and on, question after question, asking him details of his life. details that she consistently asked me. the following were some of the questions she asked:

• where do you work now?
• what time do you wake up?
• how come you wake up so early?
• what time do you work until?
• etc

it was kinda interesting to listen to their conversation. and my cousin clearly played along. i supposed the fact that he knew how to handle an old person with signs of dementia as his father-in-law is also suffering from dementia. so, he entertained her queries and went along with the conversation even when the topic went a little off, such as, "your mother came to my dream and tell me to take care of myself..." and he went "i supposed you dream about her becos she has some message for you." it was rather clear. he was "entertaining" her. but it was with good intention that he did that. could see my mum was cheerful as she was superbly chatty during the hour-plus that he was here.

:-)

generalist vs specialist

went for an interview last thursday.

it was a japanese company. not too keen before i went. nonetheless, i decided it would be useful to give myself a chance to look at opportunities. the interview went smoothly. the local incumbent spoke to me in the presence of his japanese function reporting manager. it was kinda interesting cos throughout the interview, only the singapore guy spoke while the japanese guy sat, took notes and just smiled. he seemed very cordial and accommodating.

the scope of the job sounded very broad. lots of new areas of go into and learn if i were to accept this position. if i were to take on the job, it would expand my coverage from a specialist to a generalist. challenging to a certain extend in that sense. they sounded sufficiently happy with me and asked me to think about it. no rush from what i can see. they will get back to the headhunter after 2 weeks. if both parties are keen, the next stage would be to meet the md based in singapore.

i walked out of the interview feeling like its a potential for a new beginning. other than that, i did not feel as excited as i did when i went for the first interview with co a.  have updated this to my headhunter and told him i am still open to further talks if they are keen. will keep my options open as of now...

:-)

single (unmarried) child as caregiver

nothing bitter about it, but just stating it as a fact - the single/ unmarried (many a times, gay) child of a family almost always end up looking after the parent when they grow old. this was what i saw of many of my friends (and myself). 

without thinking too deeply about this, can i say that this development perhaps help contribute to the sustenance of gay genes in the population? that lineages with gay genes in the family tend to survive better as a family. that the gay-family member is part of nature's way of relieving the stress of having an old person in the family that would otherwise be a strain on the straight off-springs? and through this, straight members of the family that carry the recessive gay genes continue to pass this gene to future generations...

ok, ok... my mind running a little off for the moment. all things being equal, and from my observation, maybe it is a blessing to have a single child after all...

:-)

friend requests in fb

reflection and question of the day for me - why do you add me if you do not post status updates in your fb? this question was post to me by an (old) friend whom i had reconnected recently and whom i had added in facebook. he accepted my friend request but saw nothing in my facebook status updates. pre-empting questions from him, i told him to expect to see nothing in my status updates and that was when he asked me the question. i suspected he also felt cheated by this imbalance in information sharing for after all, we access people's facebook to read their status updates and to get a glimpse into their lives. that was how i framed his reaction when he asked me the question above.  

but his question set me thinking...

of cos, my initial response to him was - so that i can keep in touch with him, but thinking further, i could think of a few reasons and these include (1) i could stalk him, haha... no la, i meant, so that i could be posted about things that happen in his life, or (2) so that i can have a repository of friends. 

frankly, for the first, it was not really the main reason cos i do not have the habit of checking out people's postings. i did that for my previous attempts in facebook but found it to be rather stressful and sometimes very disappointing. it was so difficult and stressful to be blasted daily with views that differ so significantly from mine. and i end up feeling very disappointed with my friends. i guess we have this hidden desire for our friends to share our same thoughts. no? the second reason was probably why i chose to add friends despite not using facebook the "conventional way", and that is - to have a repository of friends. a repository that allow me to keep in touch as and when i want to. not much different from having a phonebook in that sense. haha...

well, since i am talking about fb and friends, i do also want to add that i do not request for friends unless i feel there is a certain level of connection. and on the same token, i do not accept requests readily. i do so only for people whom i have the desire to add. 

:-)

plantar fasciitis

plantar fasciitis is not a brand of margarine.

haha... it is a condition known commonly as jogger's heel. according to wikipedia, it is "a disorder of the insertion site of ligament on the bone and is characterized by scarring, inflammation, or structural breakdown of the foot's plantar fascia. and it is often caused by overuse injury of the plantar fascia, increases in exercise, weight or age". so yup, that was what was diagnosed by the specialist at the hospital this morning when i went to check my painful sole. and to manage it, i have been scheduled for physiotherapy as well as some stretching exercises. in addition, i have also been referred to the podiatrist to review the arch of my feet and to assess if i need to change my orthotics.

heh heh. i supposed all these are signs of age catching up. no need to panic, just need to manage it.

:-)

learning from social media

i was listening to the radio this morning and the deejay went on quite a bit about how one should not use social media, how one should show courtesy to people they interact with by not checking their smart phone during a conversation, etc. and as they talked, they also bitched about how people tend to want to feed their ego by posting selfies in social media, by tweeting what they eat, where they go, etc. and as they spoke, my mind started drifting. i started thinking of how social media could instead help us develop ourselves.

that as we use social media. we should, rather than use it in a narcissistic manner of capturing every possible moment/ selfies to feed our ego, make it into a tool for self-development.

and i say this becos i see the potential and for that matter, benefited by using it that way. specific case in point is my blog. by keeping my habit of blogging, i was able to look at my posts over time, note the trends of my postings (by tagging them according to themes). and from this, i was able to see areas of myself that i never know i have in me. i was able to see myself from a different perspective and from there, learned more about myself. often my blind areas emerges. and this self-awareness allowed me to proceed to the next step - self-management. for example, i found my "wtf" was super high compared to say "lol". it suggested to me that i had been overly pessimistic. and with this realisation, i started to remind myself to see things from a positive point of view. so... yeah. we can blog and use social media blindly and be sentimental over our posts. but i would suggest our postings, over time, provides a very useful wealth of data for us to learn about ourselves.

we should make full use of this data.

:-)

death

today, i send words of encouragement to dan. it was the funeral of his dad and i wanted to boost his morale at the time of the cremation. not too long after that, as i scrolled my friend list in my phone, i learned that another friend's dad had passed away exactly a month ago. i felt the immediate need to send my condolences to him. he was, after all, someone whom i had been rather close to in the mid-90s. and after that, for unknown reasons, i decided to check the status update page in my facebook, just to find out that another friend's mum passed away yesterday. 

it was uncanny. i do not usually scroll my friend list nor check my friend's status updates in facebook. and i don't know what came over me, as i composed my messages to these friends, i felt a lump in my throat and i teared a little. maybe it's becos i learned of the news altogether and the magnitude of it affected me. i could almost feel their pains as they mourn their loss. much as i have learned to better celebrate life than to mourn death, it still hits me when it happens. death, just like birth, is a reality and we must not be consumed by it when it comes.

i wish my friends strength during this moment of grief.

panties

i was reminded of this event that happened some years back... i had thought about it but till now, i still have not gotten a good answer for this - in a public bus, do you or do you not tell a lady standing in front of you that her fly is open and her pink polka dotted panties is staring at your face. and if the answer is tell, how?

and yes, this incident actually happened to me!

:-)

coming-out, my definition

this post is an adaptation of one of my responses to a comment by a reader sometime back. he had shared his name with me and i appreciated it. it was not something i would do when i first tip-toed into the gay scene back in the mid-90s and it reflected the start of his journey of coming-out as a gay man. anyway, i wanted to make this post as i wanted to re-capture my thoughts about this thing called "coming out". this is a phrase that had been over-used but under-understood, to me at least. to most people, "coming out" is as simple as telling someone they are gay. and i believe all of us have used it in that manner at some point in time. i have. i mean, there are no other terms that better describe such an event right? short, sharp, succinct, and hey, almost everyone will understand it. no? i vaguely remembered writing about "coming out" some long time back. i donno. anyway...

but yes, this blog entry is for arvind.

i wrote this comment when he decided to share with me his name. i really appreciate and respect him for doing that. by identifying himself to me, he has acknowledged his existence as a real person. and it is not often that people do that, especially when they are still closeted. as for me, i did not dare use my real name when i first entered the scene in the 90s. i started by being anonymous, and then went on to use the pseudonym "terence". it went on for many years until i got tired of it and decided that i am who i am and that i must be able to accept myself. that moment marked my coming out journey. and today, i have found a balance between telling and not telling people about my sexuality. then again, straight people don't tell people they are straight, so why do gay people need to do so?

i believe many of us use pseudonyms becos of we want to hide behind a veil of anonymity, yet struggle with wanting to have an identity to people we interact with. the kinda "i need to protect myself vs i need to be accepted" dilemma. to do the former consistently makes life so empty. and to a large extend, the veil of anonymity could be attributed to one simple fact - that we will not acknowledge our own sexuality. and as a result, we cannot accept ourselves as gay (for most of us, subconsciously). and in not being able to do so, we impose all sorts of barriers around ourselves, with the reasons of protecting ourselves. this thought reminded me so much of the video that suggests that we gay men are often the worst victims of our own homophobia (subconsciously) becos we want to conform, we want to be accepted. that the fears are being manifested in measures that are directed inwards towards ourselves. it can be very destructive many a times. for me, after acknowledging my sexuality, i heave learned to eventually accept it. and through the years, i have learned that by letting go of my fears (and barriers), i was able to eventually accept, embrace and be comfortable with my own sexuality. it's a very gradual process. ultimately, it is about finding our own balance in the way we live our lives and be confident of ourselves as a normal human being - a person who is not restricted by our sexuality. a person that is comfortable with ourselves. that, to me is how i define "coming out" now.

coming out is a process of finding and being at peace with ourselves.

seen from this perspective, i can quickly understand that there are different stages in coming out. and it start with a person acknowledging his/ her sexuality, followed by a longer duration of finding him/ herself and learning to love him/ herself. it is a journey of self-discovery and self-acceptance. coming out is not about telling people we are gay. that is the most simplistic definition that many gay person adopt and i think it does not do the arduous process any justice. many gay persons are at different stages of this coming out journey and thus everyone has his/ her level of comfort when it comes to opening up about his/ her sexuality. if we can accept this, we can then respect every individual's space for secrecy. 

the critical starting point of coming out, thus, is to make the first step of acknowledging our sexuality. once we do that, we must go through the learning process of finding our comfort zone - the balance between what to tell, what not to tell, when to tell, and who to tell to. this balance is dynamic and moves as we mature. what is important is that we are at peace with this point of balance. in this continuum of grey between black and white, we can have on one end, a person who is totally comfortable to tell everyone he/ she is gay and on the other end, someone who can accept his/ her sexuality but will not tell anyone unless he/ she is absolutely comfortable with it. yet, both may be totally at peace with their own level of discretion as they have found their balance. many readers of this humble self-indulgent blog of mine are gay. and i believe many have accepted their sexuality, but i cannot say the same about whether they have found their balance. i wish them well in their journey of self-discovery. as for me, yes, i have found my balance as of now. i am comfortable with it. but my journey as a gay person will continue for i learn new things about myself everyday.

:-)

dreams again

my nights had been filled with dreams recently. and although i do not really remember the specific details, i was able to list out broad themes of the dream. here're two of the dreams i had last night. these were the only two i remembered amongst the few i had.

not in sequence, but i dreamt of peeing blood. i was standing in front of a urinal to pee and it was a really long one (the piss duration i meant, lol...). the urine started off clear and then the colour of the urine turned rusty. and before long, the urine became clear and globs of bright red blood started coming out. and then i started peeing blood. pure bright red blood. kinda scary right? but in my dream, i was not afraid. i remembered i was going "here we go again"... that was the whole dream. weird right?

and in another dream, i think it was a dream within a dream. i couldn't recall the dream per se. but in the dream, i dreamt (yup, like the movie inception) something about the loss of the offer. and i woke up (still in the first layer dream), i lamented about how every one in the hr department had left and that i was the last one remaining. the dream ended there. kinda funny right?

:-)

bs, my best friend

i wrote quite a few posts about bs previously.

he has been one of my closest friend since my army days back in the mid-80s. and he's a very special friend who had been with me through thick and thin for so many years. he had been living in the states with his wife and kids since 1998 and whenever he returned, we would make sure we meet up for a drink minimally. but for some reasons lately, i somehow felt a widening gap between us. it felt kinda odd when we meet.

this was how i felt today. he's home over the weekend before he flies to thailand for an overseas assignment. i told mum a lie that i would be doing house visiting to some muslim friends in order to meet him this afternoon. and when we met, there was of cos the very warm feeling of reconnecting. it felt like we have not parted. but when we sat down for a drink, there was a moment of awkward silence. and the conversation was all over the place. admittedly, i felt the need to quickly end the meet.

i supposed we are really, and finally, drifting apart after all these years. 

hmmm...

asics gt2000

got myself a pair of new shoes. and i really don't have much of a choice. considering i have a collapse arch of my feet due to a fractured metatarsal. and so, i got what the sales guy recommended. an asics gt2000. very good with the support and the cushioning of the feet. has worked reasonably well for me these two days. nonetheless, my soles still hurt and i still face challenges walking properly when i wake up in the mornings. 

will be heading to the sports medicine this wednesday!

picture from http://www.wigglestatic.com

work pants

in anticipation of my new job, i bought 2 pairs of new work pants. and as always, i had to alter the length. also, i bought a size smaller than my current waist so that i can motivate myself to slim down a little. and also executive wear that is a little tight and fitting is so yummy right? but lo and behold, i have lost the offer and i am gonna gorge myself to death and get fat... so i won't be able to wear the pants. ok, i was joking about the yummy and the gorging part. but seriously, i need to manage my weight a little bit. always good to be a little less heavy than my current weight.

haha... 

job search status

now that co a (as mentioned in a previous post) had rejected me, my job search status is:

• co b had put me through more than 3 rounds of interviews. i have been told there will be 2-3 more to go through. and in anticipation of co a's offer, they have rushed through to put together an offer for me. i will follow through with the interviews but it is highly unlikely that i would sign up with them. for all the stuff they want the candidate to do, to report to two reporting managers, and in the capacity as an individual contributor, i thought it would be more than challenging. and to have an environment that has lots of accountability issues, it would not be realistic for anyone human to undertake that role. this is what i feel about the position as of now. can i be convinced otherwise? perhaps, i have a couple of interviews more to go through.

• separately, a headhunter had linked me up with a japanese mnc. the interview will be on this coming thursday. it will be a local role with direct influence over the regional office and in the capacity of a head of department covering both ops and development. this is interesting cos i have all these while been focusing on development and frankly, am not very into the ops role. other than this, i am also not too keen on the role as it is from a japanese mnc and i am strongly aware that japanese companies has this very very tribe-centric mentality. so...

• my ex-staff had also introduced a headhunter to me. i will be linking up with him and see how we can proceed with the job search process.

positively speaking, with co a's rejection, i am now open to more opportunities. let's see how things go. as i said, i will just take things slow. admittedly, co a and co b came about becos of the referral from my ex-boss. it took me by surprise and it was really too smooth. so smooth until i cannot really believe it. and although, i am not superstitious, the chinese almanac's suggestion for people born on the year of the horse not to do things too rashly this year. and co a's rejection perhaps is a reminder to me that i should indeed not be overly too rash about accepting it. also the chinese almanac's predictions that next year would be full of possibilities, even career-wise. and thus, i shall take a break and not be rash about it.

:-)

giving closure

the hiring manager called me yesterday. a day later than what he had told me he would call. disappointing right? if he has any idea how disappointed the rejection would be to me, he would have called me straight away and not promised to call and then only call a day later.

but to me, whether he call or not was no longer an issue. i do not need any further explanations from him. i know that he had screwed up. a senior person who screwed up for not getting the hiring protocol right and in the end resulting in me being rejected despite the offer being made. other than me, he had also told the whole team i would be joining. and as such, with this screwed up, i can only expect the morale of the team to be affected. nonetheless, it did not matter to me. i actually had a very good sleep after the whole rejection. it was simple as that. i was disappointed but i had had my closure, or at least an acceptance of what had happened, and i have decided to move on. 

and when he called, i was all so composed. he sounded totally apologetic. and he tried very weakly to explain the reasons of the rejection. he said it was due to budget review. to me, it was a very weak lie. simple as that. no one, no company would ever approve a position just to reject a person. anyway, i simply told him that i acknowledged the outcome and that i will manage my side of things. no further need to explain all the screw-ups he created on my part. he offered to introduce some headhunters to me to better manage the screw-ups on my side. i simply said i appreciated his offer and thanked him for it although i frankly do not think he will follow through with this. whatever. to me, i empathised with him too and simply want to give him his closure. i understand his difficulties and i will manage my side of things, i said. we ended the conversation within 2min. it was kinda odd, i was giving him the closure rather than the other way round, it felt. but that was how the conversation went. i was on the upper hand.

after the short conversation, i wrote an email to thank him for the opportunity to discuss the position and also to his boss to thank her for the time to chat. i thought i should walk out of the rejection with my head held high and in the most professional manner. it is their loss not to have me in their team, i told myself. i slept well last night, but dreamt a dream that lamented how most had left the hr department and i am left behind. otherwise, i will just move on. and for now, i have decided to take a mental, emotional, psychological break from this whole process that had stretched more than a month. 

i needed it. 

i deserved it. 

deal's off

yup, the offer that came in didn't work out.

i got an sms from the hiring manager this afternoon that he couldn't get approval to recruit me. i was totally speechless. for a while, i thought he was testing me and wanted to use that as a preamble before negotiating the package. after all, both he and his boss had interviewed me, put me through an external agency leadership competency assessment, wrote an email to me to formally make a offer, short of a package and the comp and ben staff had also linked up with me to request for payslips etc as proof of my current package. it was all so obstacle-free (other than the fact that the whole process was long and the wait was tiring). 

i didn't know how to react. i had told my boss about the possible offer. i had, for that matter, just spoken with him again about it this morning. and my previous chief had called me to check on the progress and she had expressed her well wishes and congratulated me, saying how smooth things had been, etc. and news had spread quite a bit about my impending departure.

and then this. but once the initial shock left, i felt a deep sense of disappointment. i spoke with my previous head who now is handling a project for them and he was furious about this outcome too. he learned that they had proceeded with the whole recruitment process without first getting top management approval for the headcount, something they should do given that the grade they were proposing for me was a senior grade. i can understand all the issues and the lack of adherence to protocol but i cannot accept. this is the hr department that i am talking about! how can the hr department commit such a basic mistake? it doesn't reflect well on them.

well, i must say i am rather numb now. numb for the fact that this whole process had been long drawn and very emotionally draining. the process was full of positivity yet intersperse with long silence.  and then this outcome. simply cannot accept. but well, i have to move on. life's like that i supposed. this is the second time such a crazy thing happened to me. first was two years ago when i was made to wait 8 months for a job after all the positive signals and endorsement up to the incoming ceo of a big company. but was told they would be using an internal candidate eventually. and i understand this to be a case of them giving in to the views of the outgoing ceo. politics. sighs.

i really am not looking towards managing my office staff now. i just want to take a good rest over this long weekend. monday is a public holiday here and it helps provide me that extra time to just cool off and blank off. 

but for now, i just wanna sleep.

chiropractor's birthday... nope

i texted my chiropractor birthday wishes on the morning of 1 oct. it is my habit to send people i am more familiar with birthday greetings in the morning. 

but once i hit send, i realised i had made a mistake. his birthday was supposed to be on the 1 nov. i had apparently left my calendar on the nov month the night before. and when i switched on my phone and check the calendar in the morning, i mistakenly assume the "1" as 1 oct.

it was actually rather embarrassing. but yeah, we had a good laugh over it. and certainly, i was sure it brightened up his day a little bit.

lol!

late dad's birthday

3 oct was dad's birthday.

i had forgotten about it until my second sis texted me and told me she remembered and was observing a moment's silence. funny. she's the only one amongst all of us who was so totally scarred by dad but she's the only one who remembered. as for me, i have already let him go. of cos, i do remember him and the memories linger but i no longer get reminded of him on such dates. i can see my second sis is still very much trying to prove to herself (and by telling us) that she remembers him. perhaps she still has many misforgivings about him within her that she have not let go.

then again, 3 oct was not his real birthday. my dad's real birthday was some time in nov. we found out after his death cos we consulted the tombstone maker who calculated his real gregorian birthdate from his lunar birthdate, which my mum said was accurate. apparently, my late-dad was smuggled into singapore from china and my grandparents hid him at him until he was 3 years old. they went on to register him with the authorities and gave a fake date of birth.

so... i guess this reinforce my strong believe that concepts such as dates, time, etc are very much human construct to create a point of reference. there is really no meaning to it and that the meaning is created and a value placed on it by us. and through this, we get attached to it. and in all reality, this attachment created the suffering that we all feeling. but when we think about it properly, the date itself is empty. 

buddhist teaching apply here as well...

:-)

speculations

after talking to my staff about her impending resignation, we both decided that it would be fair to sound out our department head. this is needed cos she has to tender these two days and my offer is likely to come in in the next couple of days. and i wanted to be fair to the company cos when both of us leaves, there will be a huge gap considering my function would be totally vacated. interestingly, after that, rumours start going around. people start asking if we are resigning. well, that was what my staff told me. i was not around as i had gone for my job interview.

anyway, after my interview and when i was in office again, i chanced upon one of the head of department and she asked me "so, is it true?" i was like, "errrr.... it what true?" i asked back. "that you'll be moving on" she replied. i nodded my head and asked her how she knew about it. i was curious cos it was only 2-3 hours ago that i had talked about it to my department head. her reply took my by surprised. she said "actually, i heard about it from someone since last week" 

wow... she heard about it, even before i told anyone! really, that is the mood in office these days. i was told that many people had expected both my staff and i to tender soon. and so, there had been lots of speculations about when we will do it since quite a while back. i learned from my staff this afternoon that my department head lamented about my moving on cos he said something to the effect that i had made a huge contribution during my time and that the company would be losing a very good person.

well, nice to hear of this endorsement. but i was reminded of something i read before - love your job, but don't love your company. you never know when the company will stop loving you.

:-)

my staff tendered

my staff finally tendered her resignation today.

but before that, i thought we had a very interesting start to the day. i started by charting out all the goals that we need to achieve this month (that's my start of the month routine). and i told her to make sure she spare some energy to list out all the processes she manages and to write them down. after that, we went for our morning coffee and i spend a relatively long time coaching her on her career progression.

funny right? a boss giving advice to his staff about how to chart out careers and about how to move forward with the new employer. i wanted to do so cos she is pondering between two offers and couldn't convince herself which is a better choice. i was glad that after the conversation, she cleared her thoughts and will be heading down to her new employer's office to sign the contract tomorrow.

:-)

another interview

i had reverted to the company (let's call it co a) about my expectations. and as i waited for this company to revert with the package proper, the second company (let's call it co b) also called me up for an interview today. 

co a will probably take a couple more days to revert given that the person who can approve any proposal is on leave and will only be back tomorrow earliest. as for co b, they are aware of my advanced stage of conversation with co a (though not in specific terms), they are trying to hurry through the series of interviews. and today, i met up with their consultant to allow him to make an assessment of me before he could generate a report about whether my personality fits the corporate profile.

after the hour-long chat, i asked a pointed question. from your point of view, do you think i can fit into the company? i was glad he gave a frank answer. he quickly said yes, but also added that since i am aware i am a reflective person and that communication is not my best skill set, then it would do me very well to manage this aspect if i want to be fully effective when and if i join them. 

but frankly speaking, between co a and co b, i had already decided to proceed with co a. the skill set and fit and expectations are somewhat more within my comfort zone. also co b requires me to report to two persons in the capacity as an individual contributor. this is not something i look forward to, considering i thrive in teams and would very much prefer to have a leadership role where i have my own team to lead.

lets see how co a revert with a package. i had been forewarned that co a has the habit of pressing down the basic salary and that if i feel strongly about it, i must be prepared to negotiate for it. let's see how things go. i am not a good negotiator but at least i had started off by asking for a larger percentage of increase. and so, if they offer something slightly lower, it would still be fine. 

heh...

huge owl!

went for my usual evening walk last night and on my way home, i saw this huge owl perched on the railing beside the canal behind my condo. it stood there quietly and when it saw me moving towards it, it got a little frightened and started to look towards its left and right. managed to grab this shot using my iphone and i must say - the resolution was terrible, given the dim condition and the distance i was at. but yeah, you can just see how huge it was. my guess was that it was at least 40-50cm tall. i stood there quietly observing it but it flew off very quietly when it saw me take a couple of steps closer.

what a sight!

:-)

police catch

the local police force has put up lots of such cardboard standees showing a policeman holding up his arm in a stop sign. of cos the words on the standees made it very clear that it was about stopping theft. but a colleague of mine, who has a really good sense of humour, made use of it to his advantage...

he brought his son to the candy store. and his son pestered him about wanting candies. quickly, he pointed the standee to his son and said "policeman say cannot buy, if you buy, policeman will catch"... the son never pestered him anymore after that...

hahah!

"james kissed me"

seemed like my sleep these nights are all filled with interesting dreams. and last night was no different. i dreamt about james, my ex. we broke up almost 10 years ago. and these days, we hardly contact each other except for occasional smses where he would ask if he could bring our dog out for the day. this occurs no more than 5 times a year - chinese new year, christmas, school semester breaks (twice a year) and the end of the year school holidays. and somehow last night, for some reasons, i dreamt of him.

in the dream, he was hanging on to something. i cannot recall the scene other than the fact that he was holding on to something. and rather precariously too, i must add. so i reached out to help him and he responded. i grab his hand and as he pulled himself towards me, i could feel the tensions (of anticipation). for some reasons, it felt very good to know that he responded to me, considering he had been keeping this very cold distant space between us. our face got closer and eventually, we kissed. the dream ended there.

hmmm...

dentist

just paid a visit to the dentist. needed to do so as i had been feeling rather uneasy with regards my oral health lately. other than biting my tongue twice over the past month, i also had bleeding gums and difficulties flossing my teeth! it seemed like they have moved and the spaces between some teeth are getting tighter.

so, yup, finally made an appointment and managed to get a last minute slot on the spot. after getting my scaling and polishing done. the dentist did a check and told me there was nothing worrisome other than a case of infected gums. and as for biting my tongue, he advised that i only needed to be careful when eating. otherwise, there was not other issues and that my teeth were not overly sharp, at least not to the point of endangering my tongue.

:-)

children's day

1 oct is, or rather was, children's day in singapore.

as a kid, we look forward to this day, a day where we sing children's day song (in malay) and where we have parties in class. i think this practice is still going on, except that the day it is commemorated had been moved to the first friday of october (so i learned). apparently, parents had complained that by having it fixed on 1 oct, their kids would lose out on one school break day when 1 oct falls on a weekend...

logical and very good consideration to thus move the date to one that floats, and one that can benefit all kids. it is a good move, but would have been really much better had its motivation been from benefitting all kids rather than from parents who demanded it to be so becos of their own kids. anyway...

happy children's day in advance!

:-)

proud moment

i chanced upon an ex-colleague from my previous employment.

we spoke for a short moment and he made an interesting comment. a comment that made me very happy. not that i was basking in past glories, but i was really happy i made a difference. and this feedback reinforced my confidence in my abilities. and admittedly, i have never had much confidence in myself when it comes to leading units given my lack of recent experience. anyway, he called out to me (and without second thought): "hey sir!" and cheerfully, we exchange initial greetings after which he said, "the unit you headed had totally stagnated. it picked up with you took leadership and peaked while you were there. and once you left, the unit's performance dropped and stagnated. very sad..."

as i said, i was happy to have made a difference. and very glad that he was happy to see me and spoke to me so enthusiastically. i consider such people-factors important proxies to how successful i had been in what i do, and not just work-related objectives. all things being equal, to me, work-related objectives often take a lower priority.

:-)

dream about mmmf sex

two nights ago, i had a very weird dream about sex. but no, it was not a wet dream. i dont think i ever had any wet dreams since my teens! haha... tmi. but yeah, it was really far from it, it was a dream involving sex but the whole feel was very non-sexual. here's how the dream went.

for some reasons, i was with two colleagues of mine. let's call them dan and meng. dan, like me, was a former military person and he joined my company last year. as for meng, i have worked very closely with him and his team in several projects over the past months. meng is someone i admire as he has this way with people, the way he communicates and the way he wins people over. very suave.

in the dream, dan had apparently invited meng and i to a whorehouse. yes, a prostitute's den. it was in celebration of something we had completed. i remembered feeling very out of place. i was not interested in girls! but i played along. and with this invite, the scene changed quickly to that of a room, at times it was dimly lit, and at times when i wanted details, it seemed sufficiently bright. ok, in the room, there was a young lady. she was in her 20s. dan mentioned something along the line about enjoying ourselves and loudly declared that the fun is on him (he will pay for it). i remembered vaguely that it will cost sgd350 per person. meng politely replied that we should all pay our share but dan insisted on paying.

anyway, the scene quickly changed. and next thing i knew, all of us were naked (i think i was, but i wasn't sure, i was watching the whole event as it unfolded in front of me). i saw dan lying supine (on his back) on the bed. his buttocks was on the edge of the bed and his leg dangled by the side. and before i knew it, meng went over and sat on him, both facing me. yup, dan was literally screwing meng from his back and they asked the prostitute over to serve meng. all these while, i was just standing in front of them, watching them. the "camera" in the dream zoomed in to show a close up of the screwing and the sucking that was happening at that point in time. and soon enough, one of them (cannot recall who) asked me to join in....

the dream ended there. as i said, it was a dream involving mmf sex and would possibly end up with an mmmf foursome. but no, for some weird reasons, it was not erotic to me. the whole thing seemed so clinical (short of a better word). and despite the two persons in the dream were dan and meng, i really cannot connect the sex scene with the real persons. and if i recalled correctly, i was stirred from my sleep and even in that half-asleep state, i do not even recall having a hard on!

haha... whatever the case, i make no heads or tail of the dream. 

horrible man @ clinic

i went to the clinic yesterday to consult the doctor about my painful sole and to get a referral to the hospital. and whilst waiting for my turn at the different stages of the visit, i witnessed the most horrible side of a person. here's the story.

i arrived and there was this person, a man in his late 40s (probably about my age) standing at the appointment counter. this was the counter that we would have to go to to make appointments with whichever hospital that we were referred to. and so, this man was standing there and he handed over the instructions from the doctor to the clinic assistant. as she was trying to make the appointment for him, he asked her if the hospital has a particular service and whether it can be claimed from his medisave account. the clinic assistant advised him that each hospital has a slightly different service and some do not allow claims. she added that if he has a specific hospital in mind, he could do the check and she could help make the appointment for him. this feedback, and i thought it was a fair feedback, saw the man going into frenzy. he got angry, pointed his finger at the clinic assistant and said she should call the hospital and tell him instead of asking him to call. he did not give her any chance to respond but continued berating how terrible the polyclinic and the clinic assistant was. 

i did not follow-through what happened after that as i proceeded to see the doctor. when i was waiting for my turn at the pharmacy, this man was there too. he waited by the pharmacy assistant's desk for less than 5 minutes before he turned to her and asked why they had to take such a long time. he claimed, half shouting, that he had diarrhoea and needed the medicine quickly and the slowness was causing him a lot of stress and discomfort. erring on the safe side, the pharmacy assistant went in and hastened the process for him. in no time he got his prescription. that was about the same time i got mine too.

i proceeded to the payment counter and the man was there too. the casher advised him about the amount he had to pay and he shouted out, what? why so expensive?!!! give me the details of the bill and he made the casher go through item by item. he questioned the cost of every single item. and for each item, he asked in a very rude manner whether he can claim government subsidies for them. and for those that he couldn't, he said he didn't want them and wanted to change to a cheaper version, if they have. there was no way the cashier could proceed with him and asked him to head back to the pharmacy for advice. he did. and he poured out all the medication and wanted to change some of them.

i didn't see what happened next. i left the place. but i was very perplexed about the existence of such characters. there was totally no sense of respect for people, and on top of that, he told lies to get ahead of people. very ugly. when such things happen, my heart goes out to the service staff. they totally do not deserve such treatment. they were simply doing their work.

sighs.

f1 over?

well, f1 grand prix (i still cannot imagine how some people still pronounce it as "grand pricks"), came and went and frankly, it didn't really affect me, not that i bothered about it in the first place.

the f1 grand prix this year marked the start of the second 5-year contract and was sponsored by singapore airlines (sia). previously, it was sponsored by singtel, a local telecoms company. and as the papers today diplomatically described, the spectator base this year was more aligned to the lifestyle of the f1 and sia (read - rich and famous) compared to previous years where singtel was the sponsor. and the papers politely described the spectator then were more "singaporean". well, i read it to mean - heartlander aka middle-low class. and the article also talked about how high-end f&b businesses saw as much as a 30% jump in business over the f1-weekend. well... enough said. in all, it simply meant this - with the latest sponsor, singapore had successfully positioned itself as a luxury destination for the rich and famous, for them to dine, wine and be merry.

then again, to me, as a singaporean aka heartlander, this was not for me and there was no place for me unless i want to spend minimally sgd300-plus dollars, dress myself up, mix around in the most pretentious manner with people up there and watch fast cars zoom and scream by. but no, with that kinda money, i'll rather have a nice solid dinner with people closest to me, and i can even throw in a cake and a couple bottles of alcohol!

haha...

offer, at last

the offer came in this afternoon. finally, a sense of relief. 

i texted my chief and she asked if i am happy. frankly, i am a little burned out through the whole process and having my staff having an offer ahead of me. but yeah, reflecting, i am happy, not exhilarated, just happy and pleased with the outcome. then again, i held back myself cos there is still the negotiation before the final contract signing. and until then, anything can happen.

just need to continue to manage my expectations...

weird questions

mum's momentary forgetfulness has gotten to the point where she asks me questions that were totally not-logical... this evening, she asked if my brother is dead. she really thought he had passed away sometime back. 

and in order not to make her panic or stressed out, i simply manage the conversation in as normal a tone as possible. and to jolt her memory a little bit, i asked simple questions like how many children has she got (she answered correctly - 4). and i asked her to give the names of all four children, which she did correctly. and then when i asked her to give me the age of the 4 children, she went - first one 55 (correct), second one 53 (correct), third one (aka me)... she stopped, thought for a while, and said - twenty... 

woohh...

:-)

deal's off?

i wrote in to the bank monday to check if they have made a decision with regards hiring me. ok, i did not phrased it that way, but yup, that was the intention behind that innocent email to express my interest in joining the team and look forward to hearing from them. 

i decided to write in as i was feeling unsettled with the lack of response from the bank after 2 weeks. it had been 2 days after i wrote in and they did not respond. kinda disappointing. i had expected an established organisation to be more forthcoming in at least keeping candidates in touch when it comes the hiring process, especially when it involves a senior position. i can either interpret this lack of response to be a case of them not wanting to pursue this further, or that they needed more time to work through their internal processes. 

whatever the case, it makes me think twice about whether i should join them given their lack of professionalism in handling this little issue. will just let things be for now...

hmmm....

my staff's turn

we were chatting about job-search and my staff throw the bombshell at me...

boss, i need to tell you that i got an offer. i will be tendering very soon... she said. there was a momentary silence after that but i took it in ok and we continued talking. told her that i was relieved she got a job and found out that she would be asking for an early release. sighs. her resignation would mean i will be faced with some resistance when i tender too. management would want to hold me back for a while more to allow a smooth transition. 

yikes!

weird dress sense

i cannot help but find it really weird to see people tuck in their tee-shirt into their boxer shorts and wearing their pants in such a way that it exposes the boxer shorts. that was what i saw this morning. and to make it even more wrong (visually), the person was a young nerdy china chinese who wears a huge black pair of spectacles...

hmmm, or maybe that was why...

haha...

"you always make me reflect"

i wrote about joyce 4 years ago. she's my neighbour and although we lived in the same estate, we hardly meet. and for that matter, both of us had been living in the same estate since its completion in the late 90s. i have literally "watched" her grow up over the last many many years. well, as a friend since we connect in 2008(?) although technically, i had gotten to know her since her teenage, junior college years through her blog. and she's now all grown up, adult and all, and she's a working woman now. 

and of late, i have had the great opportunity to chance upon her when i head out to work at about 7.40am. and often, it would be a hi-bye kinda thing. things that acquaintances do when they meet, except that joyce is more than an acquaintance. there was some sort of connection i supposed. anyway, i would often send her a "hi" text after that. and a simple sweet exchange of short texts would usually follow. and in one of our most recent exchanges, she said "what you say always make me reflect" or something along that line...

admittedly, i was surprised by this reply. i didn't know how to respond. nobody had ever given me such a feedback before. then again, thinking about it, i was glad i did. hopefully, in reflecting, she had learned something new, about life, about herself.

:-)

grooming

how do you frame the idea of grooming?

loving oneself? respecting others? basic requirement? vanity?

i am sure all of us groom ourselves to varying degree and has different ideas of what basic grooming is. for me, grooming is about maintaining a certain level of hygiene and to be able to project myself in a respectable manner whereby i am comfortable with myself, and where i respect the basic de forum needed of the context (be it place, occasion, etc) i am in.

what about you?

no coffee

have been asked to reduce my coffee intake from two cups a day to a cup a day when i went for my check up last week. it could be contributing directly to my reflux, the doctor said.

and that was what i did since. in fact, i went further than that. i stopped taking coffee altogether. it was a challenge i gave myself. it was not difficult over the weekend as there was a couple of other clear choices for me. i opted for chin chow (glass jelly) drink. might as well, i thought, since i was feeling dehydrated and wanted to take as much fluid as possible. but today was kinda difficult. after all, coffee was a routine for me. a habit that i had established since many many years ago. 

i kept wondering what to drink as i walked to work. no coffee, i told myself. should i drink tea? hmmm... tea is also acidic and contains caffein and drinking it would defeat the whole purpose of not drinking coffee, i told myself. should i drink this or that or... i kept asking myself as i walked. in the end, i settled with a milo drink. i supposed this is less of an evil compared to coffee or tea. haha... and for today alone, i downed 3 milo drinks! gosh, at this rate, i might just end up getting fat!

haha...

chicken & makolli

we had a relaxing evening today and mum was in a rather cheerful mood. we had our dinner and our routine shopping after that. and mum was cheerful enough to want to buy a roast chicken for supper. yes, she actually asked for a roast chicken.

and so i got a roast chicken, and a bottle of makolli to go with it.

yums...

:-)

poor adriana

yup, the titling is a little misleading.

but this post is not about adriana. if it is, i would say she's a sad slut. she's been hounding me since 3-4 years ago despite the fact that i am gay. and despite not responding and keeping her in my spam box, she continue to stalk me... but yeah, it is not about adriana. this post is about spammers - people who are the outliers of the society and choose to disturb people for whatever reasons they might have. spammers are rather irritating, they continue to flood your mailbox and you cannot wish them away. they continue to exist and we will just have to accept their existence.

sighs...

painful feet

the sole of my feet have been hurting very bad for the past couple of months. 

i had initially thought it was due to my changing to a new pair of work shoes and that i needed time to break in to the shoes. but it had been more than 2 months and i am still suffering from the pain. in fact, the pains are worst in the mornings. at times, it was so bad i could hardly walk. i think it i need to revisit a podiatrist to take a look... 

i probably need to change my custom-made insoles (orthotics).

"this is where i leave you"

went for the midnight show with bee last night. it's been a long while since we went for any shows and he booked tickets for this show on friday after reading the synopsis. he did a search for reviews of the show last evening at the cinema and oooo, apparently, the ratings were bad, very very bad. one even gave it a 1 star out of 10 stars! we wanted to make a request for a change of shows but could not find any nice ones. in the end, we decided to just head in and that we would leave halfway if it was really as bad as the reviews described.

but we were pleasantly surprised. it was actually a very heartwarming movie. very competent acting by all and a very interesting storyline. and amidst all the chaos, there were lots of whacky moments. i thought it brought out very nicely the dynamics between family members, and all the issues and challenges families face rather well. and i was rather taken aback by the very interesting twist towards the end of the movie. then again, the way relationships were handled was probably what one could expect of an american family rather than an asian family. in asian families, relationships would probably break down when faced with some of the issues played out.

then again, i could be wrong. it all depends on the maturity of the individuals.

but yeah, we enjoyed the show very much.

ps: i also noted interestingly that there were no minorities (such as african-americans or asian-americans (as what one would expect in all hollywood productions) in the show although there was an increased treatment/ coverage on gays/ lesbians. perhaps gays/ lesbians are now considered the "new" minority? hmmm...

crying nephew

i nephew is now 21months old and he is turning into a cry baby. 

there are several reasons for this and they include sibling rivalry, crying for attention and insecurity. whenever his sister pulls away stuff from him, or when his mother didn't give him the attention he wants, or when he gets ticked off, he would prone down, drop his head onto the floor and starts to wail. often, there were no tears. 

i was irked by this response of his and would often tell him this is not the right behaviour. as for his mother, she would give in to him all the time. she would pick him up every time he goes into this wailing mode. to me, it was a reinforcing kinda thing and should not have happened. and last week, when he went into this wailing mode, i picked him up and told him not to do so, sensing he couldn't get through me, he wailed even louder. i raised my voice firmed and told him not to do so and he wailed even louder. his mother came and wanted to carry him but i stopped her. seeing this, he went even louder and it looked like he was going to collapse from crying. the mother's heart soften and wanted to take him from me. i told her not to. this repeated a few times and i could sense his mother getting angry with me. i relented and gave him to her. i advised her to read up on handling such behaviour and she curtly responded that she had no time.

awkward silence occurred for a couple of days after that incident. in the end, i told myself that i had done what i needed to do. the responsibility of bringing up the kid lies with the parents. i can only partake in this responsibility when i visit them and from an advisory angle. if the child grows up wrong, i will have to just let him be.

above all, i do remind myself that after my mum passes away, i must slowly wean myself off them.

don't take sour stuffs!

i was at the market yesterday. 

mum and i noted that the buah rambai is in season. asked mum if she wanted but she declined. like me, she didn't like this fruit. the maid, who was standing beside us was curious and asked if it tastes bad. i told her it tastes a little sour and hearing this, her eyes sparkled and she exclaimed sour?! good good! i could almost imagined her asking me to buy for her.

i didn't feel good about this and my immediate response was to tell her that sour food is not good if taken in excessive amounts. you see, in her attempts to reduce weight she had been constantly asking me to buy lime for her. she had started on this slimming down efforts since a couple of months back and apart from eating reduced amounts of food, she would also drink lime juice almost daily. well, i can see her size has reduced significantly and compared to her relatively fat frame when she first arrived, she is rather slim and shapely now. but if she goes on this way, the likelihood of getting stomach ulcer is very high!

anyway, back to yesterday. i told her quite abruptly sour good? what good? if you keep taking sour things, your stomach will tear and you will get sick. and if you continue, you might end up with stomach cancer! just look at all the lime you are taking all these while! and as i said it almost immediately after her response and she immediately retracted. her face changed and she quietly said ok ok. she maintained an awkward silence for a while after that. i knew i might have come across as harsh sounding, but i find it difficult to have a maid who is showing her vanity increasingly.

and today at the market, she did not ask me to buy lime for her. 

financial position

i met up with my banking agent recently and he gave me a run down of my investments. i must admit i am not a person who loves money to the point of actively monitoring my investments. money is to allow me to sustain and i do not have the habit to constantly monitor and manage my monies. so...

anyway, through one of my attempts to invest last year, i got to know this banker. apart from helping me, he also took a look at my port folio and he almost fell off the chair. i had been losing a significant amount of my investments over the years! and with that he asked if i could allow him to review and make some recommendations. i agreed and eventually allowed him to manage my portfolio for me. i must say that was one of the better decisions i have made regarding my money management.

it's been a year and today, he has managed to get rid of all non-performing products, purchased (with my consent) products that are profitable, and almost reduced my loss to no more than a couple of thousands. couple with that, i have purchased some mid-term insurance that would help me when i retire. i had also been able to slowly reduced my housing loans since then. so nett-nett, i must say my financial position is a lot better compared to say 2 years ago, despite the fact that my cash available did not seemed to have grown (or for that matter decreased). so... 

i really need to learn to manage my monies.

financial jolt this month

the recent repair works to my pipe leakages set me back by sgd2.2k this month. this was something unexpected and i must say, i am feeling the pinch now. usually, i would only feel the pinch 2-3 days before my pay day but this month, it is still a week-plus away.

no good, no good...

sleepy mum

mum has been rather stable over the past months but i note she had been very sleepy over the last couple of weeks. she'd fall asleep and complain of insufficient sleep. and her forgetfulness had worsen significantly. i suspect it's cos her body has been slowly deprived of oxygen.

and so i took her spo2 level reading (oxygen saturation level of her blood) yesterday and noted it was in the range of mid-high-70%. it was not a good reading. a normal person would be above 95% and for her, about mid-high-80%. i was concerned and decided to give her some additional puffs of salbutamol as i increased her oxygen machine up to 4.5l. it helped. the spo2 level went up about mid-80% but the level dropped quickly to the 70%-range again very quickly. this was not good. it suggests her lungs are getting worst. i took the reading again today and noted the same trend. 

if this goes on, she'll be in deep trouble. need to do some immediate intervention. for a start, i have started giving her the nebuliser and prednisolone. for now, her oxygen-level has gone up to the high-80%. let's hope her condition stabilises in the next couple of days.