Flu + Winter = Torture

Im down with flu. Arggh. BAd throat, bad nose, bad head. JS has been nice taking care of me and helping me to look for medicine and herbal tea. He even got hold of a wrapper of this herbal tea thingie, and he actually intends to go look for it. Touched! Doesnt matter if he manage to find it but the fact that he was willing to keep a wrapper and take the trouble to go look for herbal medicine for me does make me feel well taken care of. And yes. Thank you. Cos you have been taking care of me, big or small issues.

Temperature these days are still around 0 ~ 14 deg. The wind is the killer part. It is still bearable for now but i know moving forward, it will be worst.

Hmm...

No more nonsense from tom onwards. I have been busy settling some work from SG office while im here. Trying to get some stuff started here. So tom is the onset of the real challenge that Im here for. Im glad it is moving in action. He was so busy he didnt have time for me. Finally today after dinner, we sat down and spoke for 3 hours. Always a motivator and a mentor. Very grateful to be in his team.

And I just found another mentor. JS is my best buddy now. Joke, laugh, talk rubbish, bitch, talk serious work, and he even mentors me on accounting stuff, which i havent been really much attention during uni days and somehow when he put it across to me, I could absorb it better.

These days the training that i attend with the trainees are getting technical also, all the science stuff i studied 18 years of my life came into use once again.

Anyway, I wanna talk about CHINESE culture here man. Jia lat. Im going to touch on the ugly side of things. Look, im not sure if it was the culture, the one-child policy or the upbringing of some of these chinese that makes people behave this way. They are mostly pretty self- centred and like it or not, they talk damn loudly. They like to get drunk in the restaurants and my last trip here, I witnessed right in front of me, how a guy got drunk while eating steamboat. Guess what, when i looked at the table, he had beer, and the chinese white wine, like two bottles. So in his drunken stupor, he started breaking glasses and since he couldnt stand properly, he lost his balance and guess what? He dipped his hand into the steamboat pot for a good 3 seconds and I saw it. I doubt he felt much pain there and then. It is ok if he was drunk and he is a quiet drunken soul. But he wasnt and it is a norm to see people getting drunk after meals because they like to drink BAI JIU (traditional chinese wine with alcohol content from 40% to 70%). They get real rowdy and violent. Scares me pretty much sometimes.

Today is the worst man. We were having dinner halfway then suddenly across the table a woman was screaming and crying. Woah, just when i turned my head to look at that table, the guy gave a RESOUNDING SLAP Across the cheeks of that woman and started pushing her and shouting at her. MY GOD! I dun think it matters what happened because if I were her, I would just pack and immediately go to the police I swear. Apparently according to my colleagues, tom morning the woman will ask for forgiveness from the man. What the hell. Why are woman leading this kind of life? He is just a plain bastard for doing what he did in public. Cannot stand men who lays his hand on a woman. For whatever reason. We were all pretty stunned. And then the couple who was eating with the woman and the man, helped the woman walk out of the restaurant. She looked pretty drunk cos she could hardly walk, but i wasnt sure if it was because she was too shocked or that she was drunk cos she was sobbing away.

Civiliation and culture comes a long way man.

Its also pretty scary when couples quarrel on the streets cos they simple yell at each other like nobody's business. These are the crude and uncivilised ones, definitely look very spoilt brat. Guess what, you can already see kids shouting and screaming their way through in public. I guess the one child policy, together with the increasing wealth of the chinese family are breeding generations and generations of spoilt brats that is a little beyond control.

One last bit of my complaint which i HATE! The public toilets. ARGGGHHH. It is a torture man. And it is certainly a shame to have nice shopping centres with shitty toilets. I do not understand. Anyway, the pizza hut has the best toilet in that area. BEST!!! I will make sure that i use the toilet at pizza hut whenever i can just so that i can avoid having to use the rest.

Long way to go my dear China.

BUt of course, this is not the case for ALL chinese but it is pretty common to see the above happening.

My first snow experience

It snowed finally while we were queuing at Pizza hut yesterday afternoon.

It was a pretty tiring flight as always. Midnight flights save time but drain all energy.

The strong wind at sub zero temperature made the walk from the hotel to the shopping mall barely bearable.

The snow made it all worthwhile though. IT was like a drizzly snow. But nice!

The temperature today is yet again 0 - 9 deg celscius. Apparently the past two years the snow was pretty heavy. This year, according to the locals, wont differ much.

This trip was so rush for me, i left a few important stuff behind! Amongst them, my camera, my samsung charger,my epilator, my notebook, and my this very handy lappie cover!

The weather is pretty dry. Everyday i just have to diligently moisturise my biggest organ. I was NEVER so diligent. But since the last trip and my experience with the red & cracked skin, Which thankfully I managed to salvage, I will not take anymore chances.

Today I joined in their training. As usual, I enjoyed listening to his talks. They are very useful, informative, motivational and simply easy to understand.

It is tough having to go for training yet having work deliverables which I cannot really delay. It will be pretty intense but I believe I will get out better off. I just need about 1 more day to adjust back to this environment again and this is one of the worst things I hate about travelling so frequently - Adjusting.

I need time to adjust when I reach China before I get back my momentum for work. I need time back in SG before I settle down each time I return. I dun like this transition period because each time Im put in that situation, I feel so lost and pretty useless.

Time to sleep early BECAUSE I NEED TO BE AT THE OFFICE AT 730am!

Good night. I will come back with more juicy write ups once i get more brain power.

8 immortals place (china) + my Farewell entry (SG - Now)

Im gonna leave in less than 5 days' time. Im writing now because I dun think i have much time the next few days to pen an entry.

Im so gonna miss all of you.

I bought a lot of stuff from Marks and spencer and some tidbits from candy empire. This is going to be a long trip for me, the 2nd longest away from home after my exchange. Nevertheless, Im looking forward to it. This marks the opening of another door for me to enter. Until I go in and finish what I have to do, I cant say for sure if this is going to be a good trip or not. Im glad, however, that I have company and I dun have to travel alone.

I havent been sleeping well and in fact, my sleep debt is ballooning these days. I have got a lot of things to cover, to hand over, a lot of loose ends to tie and I just have to maximize my presence here to clear as much stuff as possible. I can always sleep in the plane. I can always sleep early when I go over. Maybe that's why im not sleeping enough.

Im going to come back as a better person next year.

Wait for me peeps!
Talk to me on MSN at night.
Email me and keep me in the loop of whatever that is happening.
I will continue to update my blog though i cannot view it.

NIGHTY!

ARGGHH

I cant upload photos onto my blog. AGAIN!

Im kind of stressed up now. Lots of work to do and I have to finish them before I leave this weekend.

Talk later. I will.

Really fun so far

I havent laughed so much in so many days since a long time ago. Haha...

I enjoy the company a lot!

It's cold here. Im not sure if it was the dryness or the cold, my skin actually started "cracking" and there were like red lines showing. It's itchy and painful. I freaked out upon seeing how bad the condition was.

I have to keep replenishing the moisture. Pretty demanding.

Today. HAha.. Even though I have been staying in hotels for so long, today, for the first time, I decided to fill the tub up with hot water and I had an incredible bath!! Woah... espcially under such weather condition, the warm water makes the blood circulate so well I almost fell alseep in my tub!

I got great deals from the night market. Im pretty happy with my purchases.

I cant wait to get back to SG. BEcause I think my skin needs to take abreak from such harsh weather.

Like no tomorrow

It doesnt matter if we make it in the end.

All that matters now is that we are both going to make the dream a reality.

Nobody has done this. Nobody knows how and what is going to happen or what the way should be.

Because you made me see and believe in something I never was able to, and because this is the best time, Im with you.

Im no longer lost. No longer confused. I know now, that there is no point getting worried about things not within my control and that was exactly what I was so affected by the past week. Now I have let all the fear go. If it is meant to be, it is meant to be.

I have the freedom to lead my life the way I want to. I have the freedom to happiness. No one can take it away from me. And I shall embrace life today, like there is no tomorrow.

Once in a lifetime opportunity

This is an incredulous night. Hmm...

I think i would have to just come over as early as possible to assist him. And he made me feel that whatever i was holding on and trying so hard to fight for is really insignificant. Not on a negative light though. That was an ultra motivation boost.

"Your shoulders grow as you age".

That is so true.

Sometimes I can shoulder the responsibilities, but not the stress. When i am at my top form, I can handle both. There are also times when i can shoulder none and I need someone to be there for me. Not to shoulder for me, but to make me believe that I can continue to shoulder and that I can move on. That is what I need. Im very glad to have people around me so far who can assist in me moving on when I am stuck.

I have the best mentors around me at every stage of my career. Im really grateful and thankful for that. They have been one of the greatest people in my life to either make me see that I can achieve so much and go so far, or they just train and guide me to take me to another level. These mentors play a very important role not just in my career, but in my life as well. They are trulygreat people whom I respect and will go all out for them if they need me.

It is pretty disheartening to see you down. I hope that I am of some help in one way or anothe.