Special Treatment of Smoke

I think I am getting tanned, no idea how, I spent most of my time at work

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My manager went to TianJin for a presales meeting and checked into a local hotel. The front desk staff asked him if he smokes, he said no. The girl then said "Oh, we then need to do some anti-smoke treatment to your room".

"Anti-smoke treatment?", my manager with great suspicision, thinking it is another trick to put a chargable service on the bill.

"Oh, we need to take away the ashtray".

Difficult Client

Uncle Walton cooked me the curry chicken and the fish belly stew when I was in Hong Kong. Uncle Walton, his wife, my mom and I went to a small tea house at the hill top. We also picked the fresh beans and lettuce in the farm nearby.


My mom reheated the chicken curry and threw in those fresh veggies, our lunch looked so colorful!
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I arrived in the client in KL on Monday only to realize the static data is not completed. To make it worse, the consulant who works on the static data was on vacation and she took the build machine with her.

Being penny counting, the client got very upset that they have to pay for my expense while I cannot do my job. I also felt pretty bad that I knew nothing about the project until I came. However, I was scheduled to come to KL next week. Because there are 2 national holidays in that week, thus, our project manager swapped the time with my Tokyo client. I was panicking telling the client I think I cannot do any work except going through the requirements with front and risk officers in a workshop. However, the project plan has only allocated 1 day for workshop, we cannot kill the rest of the week by extending the workshop. Also, there is only 14.5 days allocated for me in phase I.

The client is very tight in their budget, their project manager kept asking why I am here and I couldn't give him a satisfactory answer. The worse is yet to happen,, we cannot seem to contact our project manager, who has devised this schedule.

Being grilled by their project manager (he kept interrupting our conversation with comments like “didn’t we talk about this with xxx? There is really a problem with your internal communication”, I still have to conduct the workshop with the front, risk officers. I did my best to keep calm and being as honest as I can. I want to find a solution.

At the end of the day, I said to him, suppose you think it is impossible for me to work on your report at my demo database, I need 1 day from you to draft up the specifications. I will then ask our company to absorb my expense on Wednesday, and I will then take Thursday and Friday off. He didn’t seem happy but accept it as an option.

I then went back, trying hard to call our project manager. I finally got to him yet he explained that I would have to work on the demo database and then transfer my work from the demo database to the client’s at end of May. I am skeptical that the client will buy into this. Yet he was determined this is the plan and the client have no other choice but to take it. All parties agreed to have a conference call the next day.

I was so very nervous, got up and then did some work, and ran to the office to give our project manager a call before the conference call. He sounded all confident that his plans will work. However, after we have appeared so not professional, I really see no reason why it is going to succeed.

During the conference call, again the complaints flew off from the client’s project manager. The bank’s treasurer is also in the room. Our project manager attacked the client with 2 points. One, Joey is on site this week because you are being cheap not willing to have her next week. Second, suppose you wouldn’t want Joey this week, we will have no other time for you (indeed, my schedule has been booked until mid June).

I tried to easy the tension, promising that I can go about do the work at the demo database and guaranteeing the reports can be delivered on time. Our company (that’s I) should and will absorb any extra time needed for the migration. In explaining “We really wanted to help you save money, although there are additional work needed to be done, we are willing to do it” Gee… This is the only way we can save us some face?

Party with Noriko

Party Queen Noriko and I, the picture was taken last year after a belly dancing lesson.
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We had a girls night out on Friday. It was Akiko's birthday so we took her to a Champaign place in Ebisu. Honestly, I am not much of a champaign person, I prefer beer to the delicate bubbles(they all taste like fizzy white wine to me). No guy in the office seemed to want to join us, perhaps they are embarrassed to be the only man in the group.

But we later went to a Kyushu restaurant, featuring everything about horse and cow. We had raw horse meat, served like sasimi and beef stomach hotpot (nabe). Going so well with beer. Tomo asked Hiroko what type of dog she has, Hiroko answered "In Katagana, it is 'NaNa'" (the dog's name). For some reason, all Japanese ladies crack up. They should know that is the so typical of Hiroko.

Noriko then dragged me to the night clubing area in Rippongi. She is completely wild everytime she partys. In addition, she is so attractive that I had to drive away many guys away from the half-drunk Noriko. I kept an eye on her while talking to people in a very crowded bar.

People who come to the bar are looking for some sort of fix, I think. We are all suffering from attention-deficit? I had very nice conversation with 2 guys, who are also in Tokyo for business. I don't believe a single word they say, not because they look insincere but this is a pub. Everyone could come and bluff and then disappear. Having fun is top on the list, making friends is not.

There was a white guy dressed in suit, kept following us (or rather Noriko) after I decided it is time to take Noriko away from this group of hungry wolves. His stories are very good, a lawyer interviewing with some famous investment banks, stories about his mom and sister, the recently burglary happened in his New Jesey home... Blah blah blah... It is very entertaining. Noriko cannot careless about his stories, she is just attention hungry, while I kept asking questions and drew more information out of the kid "How did you afford Harvard law school?", "Where do you live in New Jesey?" and so on. Whether it is true or not has nothing to do with me, but it is still quite fun to have a free entertainment while waiting for cabs.

Traumatised by One-Way Ticket

The Tokyo office manager explained me that the travel agent refused to issue me an one-way ticket from Tokyo to Kuala Lumpur because

1. I might be blocked in Narita airport by Japanese immigration officer - It is definitely ridiculous. Japanese immigration officer only wants to make sure that you have the ticket leaving Japan, not the ticket coming back to Japan.

2. The Malaysia immigration might refuse my entry because I can show no proof of leaving the country. - What? You can easily go to Singapore by train, by bus within 3 hours. Says who you need to fly out of Kuala Lumpur to another country? In addition, I have never been questioned how I am going to leave Kuala Lumpur in my half dozen times of visiting. I am granded the 90-day visitor's VISA on landing.

3. The airline might refused me boarding the air plane because there is a chance Malaysia goverment could refuse my entry - It is highly impossible however, I have explained them that I will purchase a ticket to leave the country if that's the case, they still refuse to issue me the ticket.

I spent half an hour explaining to the brain-damaged travel agent with the best of my patience. She could only reply me "this is written in the hand book, I cannot sell you the one-way ticket but you can buy a round trip ticket".

Hand-Carry Luggage

Do you want a piece of me?

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Security check at all international flights are serious about liquids in bottles. After my losing luggage experience, I don’t want to place the responsibility of delivering my luggage to other’s hand. I decided to try my luck with the security staff.

In Auckland airport, before going to the passport control, a lady asked me to weight my roller, which is 10 kg, way beyond the 7 kg limit. However, who cares? Suppose the airline doesn’t pick on me, it is not your call to not allow me board. I was trying to be nice and it was really too early in the morning. I took out the books I bought along the way, all my toiletries. The roller finally weighted around 8 kg and she was OK.

As I was stuffing the books and bottles into my handbag, she said that I am not allowed to carry them to the plane. I ignored her demand, tried to explain it is impossible for me to leave them in Auckland as I have no relatives or home here. We stood silent for seconds, I was trying to figure out a way to get out of this place but my brain wasn’t really functioning at that point of the time. I have no brain power to figure out the dim and mystery world her plankton-size brain inhabits.

She demanded me to put everything on the scale, the third time. I dutifully followed her instruction slowly, but showing no intention to leave anything behind. She got angry and told me stop telling her how to do her job. I knew I was breaching the regulation but I don’t want to let the airline company to have a chance to mess around with my luggage again because I don’t want to miss my connection flight to Beijing.

As people coming in piling up the queue, she had to let me go (because my stuff was still on the scale, she accused me of holding other people). Her fat face and small eyes were filled with the hatred. She cursed “You will be surprised”.

The second challenger is at the security gate. They let go my hand bag and roller, however, pick on my toiletries sealed in plastic bag. The containers might be big, however, the liquid inside was certainly less than 100 ml. The old security officer said that he had to throw away my face wash foam. Fine, I let him. He almost wanted to throw away my contact lens solution, but I quickly recalled that is exempted. So I saved one bottle. As for my lotion, I fetched the small toner sample and pour the liquid to my hand and applied them generously on my face. The officer was so annoyed because he wants to get back to work. I then slowly squeeze the face lotion into the toner bottle. Not leaving a single drop. The officer was like “you might have a day to do that but I have other work to do”. What else can I do? It is your business if you are not happy.

After all these hassles, I finally got the precious right to get closer to the gate. I was a very angry with a burning face. These security measures are only inconveniencing travelers, they didn’t find out the nail files in my cosmetic bag, the sharp tweezers that could easily turn into a weapon and the lighter in my pocket. I think these rigid security regulations would easily turn an ordinary citizen into a terrorist.

Trip to ShangHaiGuan

This section of the great wall was built across a lake.

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My other title is the chief entertainment officer in Beijing office, thus, I was given the job of planning an outing in spring. We finally found the weekend when every one is in Beijing, which is the past weekend.

We took the train to ShangHaiGuan, the direct translation is the Mountain-Sea Passage, which is the eastern starting point of the great wall. The English equivalent should be New Castle suppose mirroring Hadrian’s wall with the great wall.

Along the railway track, we saw lots of soil buns between the farmlands and the track. I was told those are the tombs of the locals. I was so surprised of its simplicity. Each of them looks like the miniature sand dune you can spot near any construction site. If not because it is the season of ancestor tomb visiting season, thus, each of them has some colorful paper stripes under a stone, you can hardly tell it is a tomb. It is also astonishing to observe the number of the soil dune. Oh well, I guess my anthropology study friends should have a lot to write if they were there with me.

Checked into the hotel, we walked around this seaside town. The air quality was definitely better. The great wall divides the small city into half. You can see the section that hasn’t been “renovated”, the 10 meters high walls were built with grey bricks, which were sealed together with sticky rice glue. It is so hard to believe they were like 2000 years old, wow!

I hate the way they renovate historical site, they basically hire the poor farmer and instruct them to chisel away the old bricks so they can put on the brand new bricks, freshly made from the local supplier.

Regardless, there are still a lot to be seen. We hired the car (and the driver) to go to the section of great wall where it crosses a lake. The part of great wall is not very well-known and we had the whole park to ourselves. The mountain area in this part of China has very poor soil composition. Basically nothing can be grown out of it except from the peach and plum trees. The wall winds down the hill top to the lake yet goes up again to another mountain. The hills are pretty steep, it is really beyond my imagination how the wall was constructed 2000 years ago.

Standing on top of the wall on the hill top, looking out to the no-tree mountain far away with sun setting, this very much reminds me of my trip to Hadrian’s wall few years back. However, it certainly doesn’t rain as much as in Northern England.

Auckland Presales

Knowing it is so easy for airline to mess around transferring check-in luggage, plus the 8-hour lag I had to wait in Sydney for the connecting flight to Auckland, I requested to pick up my check-in luggage at Sydney. As luck would have it, my flight from ShangHai to Sydney was delayed by 5 hours. I quickly went to the transfer counter in Sydney requesting them to pick up my luggage from the belt to my Quanta flight to Auckland.

I have got the promise, the delivery of my luggage was depending on the mercy of the efficiency of the Sydney airport crew. After arriving at Auckland after 34 hours of traveling, Quanta managed to lose my luggage. Almost burst into tears, the luggage department assured me that my bag was on the next flight to Auckland. Fine, I then wait for another 2 hours for it to turn up. I kept encouraging myself, things can get worse. 2 hours wait is certainly better than turning up in front of the clients in jeans tomorrow.

Finally arrived in the hotel at 2 am, I need to get up early to meet with the presales team at 7am since I have missed out the internal meeting on the very day.

The presales team seems to work together for a very long while, a strange bundle. I cannot tell that they are really that into their jobs or this is just a typical way of talking among colleagues. At any point of the day, their conversation is 100% about the clients, the software, and their wild speculation of possible clients’ perception about their presentation, or even to themselves personally. The level of their paranoid is like a teenage girl dreaming about her prom date.

They made fun of the clients, prying into their personal lives and laughed out loud about the how young the IT head’s second wife is (I am very impressed with their information gathering effort). While seeing the clients, they wore another face but giggling to themselves occasionally. During the presentation, 3 of them who worked together laughed a great deal while the clients, our sales and I stood completely silent. I really couldn’t understand what’s so funny and felt a bit embarrassed.

The presentation to my standard is not very professional. The presales woman is trying to hide the fact that there are actually 2 separate systems we are trying to sell them. However, when the clients asked why the valuations are done separately, she wasn’t giving a explanation but a spin. Even sweet and innocent I could sense something is fishy.

I can feel the presale woman doesn’t like me. She seems to be the center of this work force (she laughed the most loudly, chunked out ill-tasted jokes one after another). However, I turned up and more or less took away the spot light from her. I am younger and my make-up is lighter. I spoke conservatively and I don’t blindly laugh at the clients’ remark.

She ignored me after my debut in front of the client. She wouldn’t talk to me at all on the dinning table or in the meeting room. She only talked to her long-term comrades. At the end of our presentation, she asked me to build a report to show certain functionality. I did it in the background and indicated it can be shown now. She was urged by another colleague to check out my work. She came around reluctantly and had a quick look and instructed me to demo it to the client.

Half way through the demo, the client pointed out my report is missing a very crucial element. She then quickly joined at the clients’ side, questioning whether it can be done. Interesting, she didn’t think that way before asking me to do the demo.

One of this team seemed very keen to convince me to relocate to their office (because I seemed to be the only one who knows the risk stuff, should be useful to her work). “To work with them on daily basis?” I ask myself “I would rather quit” is the answer.

Before Going to New Zealand

There are days where everything looks just alright and BOOM, something happens which mercilessly ruins your day. Beijing is getting warm and I am leaving for Auckland in the evening.

I cycled to the office. I am getting more and more painstakingly meticulous about managing my finance (almost like how I manage my toilet). I realize that my premium account actually charge me very high service charge if the minimum balance cannot be met.

The first thing I did was to transfer money to my uncle’s account and withdrew everything that’s left. Banking with foreign bank in China is really pointless. The foreign banks cannot issue credit cards, cannot provide the ATM service, either can they help you pay bills. They are also not allowed to sell any RMB investment products. I banked with them really is to experience the premium account service, you know, personal banking assistance and separate waiting room, and of course, money wiring is free of charge.

Getting no really benefit other than the free wiring, plus being charged for a fee. I decided to close it, then went back to the office, went home to pick up my luggage and taxied to the airport. Unfortunately, my phone rang saying that my fund transfer request was wrongly entered. The lady who called was the one who helped me filled up the form earlier the day.

I got a bit upset and angry, implying this should be her responsibility. She came back really quick saying that I have reviewed the signed the slip. OK, fine, we have to figure out solution, pointing fingers doesn’t help.

Although it turns out that I can do this transfer online, however, I was still upset. This is just like having the chopsticks placing on the dinning table being not parallel or perpendicular to the table edge. You can certainly eat with them the way they are but it is just not pleasant.

The Summer Palace

I went to hang out with my brother’s friend and her daughter in the summer palace on Sunday. Her daughter is totally not like her. My brother’s friend is an elegant, soft-spoken, long-leg lady. However, her daughter’s is almost like a mixture of a little boy and an 80-year old woman.

She resembles her dad, no doubt. What irritates me is her expressionless face and dead-fish eyes. She talks the whole lot deal but repeatedly talking about the same thing or idea. If you deliberately ignore her, she would nudge your arm with the back of her hand lightly, repeatedly and persistently, exactly like how old women do.

Very energetic yet not smart enough to entertain herself, she was running around with other kids. I was saying to myself, oh yeah, perhaps she is very good with making friends. Later I realized the boy was chasing after her only because she had hit him earlier.

The Foodie Heaven

Yummy roast pork belly dish (Mankit went there again with my mom's friend and took the picture)

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Foods in Hong Kong is certainly better. However, you need to know where to look. After meeting up with mom in the airport, we took the bus to the city center. While transfering in MongKok subway station, my mom asked me if I am hungry. Not really hungry since I carefully ate every single bite of my meal in the flight (my first meal of the day) but knowing my own mother, I nodded.

She bought me a drink (PS1) and made me wait at the corner at a crowded street. I was so bored because I finished my drink in one or two gulps. As I was counting how many people are crossing the street, she turned back from nowhere with 2 boxes. And we rushed home to enjoy the meals.

The roast pig belly was the famous dish in this local restaurant (永合隆). It seems like every one in KowLong knows about it. The box with the meat has got the hole on top, to let out the steam because the pork was just freshly out of the oven. If the steam is trapped in the box, the skin is going to be soggy. The skin was so perfectly crispy, while the meat is tender and fully of flavor. I almost wonder if I am eating a roast duck.

Perfect match with the Thai rice (PS2).

PS1. The drink was the specialty of Hong Kong. Cantonese thinks we need to constantly replenish our body and rebalance the ying and yang. Thus, the soft drink stores are very popular in Hong Kong. I was drinking the cold sweetened soup of some strange plant's root. It is supposed to cool down my liver.

PS2. It is very interesting that Hong Kong only import Thai fragrant rice. Very different from the rice in Taiwan, Taiwan rice is closer to Japanese rice, short grain and sticky. The Thai rice smell always make me think of Hong Kong.

Hong Kong Project Housing

I took 2 days off and flew to Hong Kong to meet with Mom. It has been ages since we hung out together in Hong Kong. It was a very pleasant memories after I grew up. I hated to go to Hong Kong every summer when I was a kid, those were the time my palates and wallet were not fully developed. Oh well, I wasn't too much of the shopping type (I prefer collecting financial products) but there are still a lot to see. The smell of Thai fragrant rice and steamed fish in the highly dense neighborhood is still one of my fondest childhood memories.

We stayed in the uncle Tomas's flat in LokFu, which is the government housing (project in New York state?). I guess that's the part of Hong Kong tourists won't see. The concentration of human beings living in a unit square feet is amazing. Hong Kong government really did the wonder of the world. Most of the apartment buildings have about 35 floors. Every floor has about 8 units. Every unit is about 500 square feet. Not quite impressive, however, imagine there are around 100 such buildings concentrated around one subway station?

Hong Kong government designs these type of housing with standardised models, models for the wall, models for the door, models for the drainange. Basically each floors were built exactly the same way to save cost. Of course, they are all made in Mainland China, then shipped to Hong Kong for the final assembly. You can easily be lost among these 100 identical buildings with identical smell of food and bleach.

There are shops, restaurants, supermarkets and traditional markets in the bottom floors, which are all interlinked. Of course, the subway station. There are endless people moving about the stair well, lifts, shops... I felt a bit suffocated. The stress of living in such an environment is beyond my imagination.

This flat is owned by uncle Tomas. Flats in this apartment complex were sold in discount to people who used to live in the government rental project. My mom's family (my grandmom, 3 uncles and my mom) used to live in the rental property, 250 square feet with only one sink. The sink is used for veggie washing and teeth brushing. The bathroom is about 16 square feet, it has one squater toilet in the middle. We need to cover it with a wooden board when taking a shower. However, it was such a new and fun idea to do that when visiting my grandmom in Hong Kong when I was a kid.

Although it still sounds terribly stressed, Uncle Tomas' flat now is considered pretty cool in Hong Kong. Of course, most people move out as soon as they can afford a non-government housing.