Signs of strength

Sometimes I think tears are not a sign of weakness. It can often represent the sign of strength. The strength of emotion, the strength of resolution or even the strength of faith.




There are no tears when you do not care. There are no tears when you do not feel. There are no tears when you do not believe. With that, I believe that tears are not signs of weakness.



A friend’s (referred as Girl from here on) family is going through a lot lately. Quoting another friend’s words, her situation is “the plate is more than full”. There are so many things at home to worry about that nothing else has a higher priority at the moment. Daddy had a little health attack and was paralyzed 3 months ago. She was a little crushed at that time but fortunately the father was one tough guy, not only that he woke up, he has been recovering well. In 3 months he managed the impossible and recovered and is still recovering as we speak.

I really admire this uncle from what I hear from Girl’s description. What an enthusiastic uncle he is. With all these pain and suffering he maintained a high spirit and here he is from completely paralyzed, he’s walking with his head high again. Miracles do happen, without you realizing it. I said a couple of times to her “one of these days I gotta get to know your dad, he sounds so awesome.” He’s got a will of steel no kidding.

Just when things were getting better, Girl’s grandmother was admitted to hospital.

Another emotional blow I guess.

I’ve been where she was when my grandpa was around. Maybe the situation is not entirely the same but the anxiety couldn’t be much different. You have other things to do, other things to worry about but yet the person you care is just the biggest issue that hogs your mind the whole time. Why is this why is that why is why and why is this happening.

Even the smallest thing could tip you off.

But hey, like I said, if her dad is such an awesome guy, the mother must be an even greater person isn’t it? There’s nothing she could not defeat, even sickness. If it’s really something she couldn’t defeat, then it’s fate, all we can do is to gladly accept what’s coming, and make her as happy as possible before facing the inevitable.

I’m not trying to sound cruel. I’m trying to say miracle happens, when you least expect it.

As long as you look at things positively.

For now, I’m just hoping that granny recovers, so that there’s no shadows behind her smiley. I also hope daddy recovers, and she’d laugh like a mad woman again.

Good luck ;)

Signing off.

Happy Thaipusam~~

I was having this little chat with my colleague about what’s the holiday about because today is a public holiday here in Malaysia due to Thaipusam. Malaysia is a country with 3 main races and Thaipusam happens to be a major festival for Indians. I kinda fell ashamed all of a sudden (not sure why I never felt sorry in the last 27 years) that I kinda have very little knowledge about what Thaipusam’s about. So my principle is, when in doubt, ask.


Here’s the little conversation I had with my colleague over the chat:

====================

7:18 AM Me

Bro
morning
can shout good morning from over there ar?
Ekekeke

7:19 AM Colleague
bole
hehe
everyone thaipusam mood


7:22 AM Me
oh yeah happy thaipusam btw
relay that message to everyone~


7:22 AM Colleague
hahaha 3where got happy thaipusam one lol
\thx tho


7:23 AM Me
actually, what's thaipusam about ah?
got story one ar?
light defeated darkness?


7:23 AM Colleague
got many story one
most popular or standard story is one dude
a king actually by the name of idumban was a devotee of lord muruga
so one day he asked a boon (dunno wat he ask la maybe 500 wives) and made a promise to do anything the lord asked for it
so he was told to move a mountain
he split the mountain in two and carried it on his shoulder as a penance (dun ask how he split it la)
those days the ppl all very strong
hehe


7:26 AM Me
what's a boon ar?


7:27 AM Colleague
like a wish
confirm granted one but nowdays all the gods very busy so nobody gets any
plus got inflation la etc


7:30 AM Me
so what does that have to do with thaiposam?


7:34 AM Colleague
it was on this day he carried the mountain


7:42 AM Me
oohhh
is this the official story?


7:43 AM Colleague
yup this is the standard one


7:44 AM Me
got a bit more non-standard one ah? that one was boring


7:44 AM Colleague
got different ones la but this is the most standard one


7:44 AM Me
without knowing what his wish for, that story is kinda dumb


7:44 AM Colleague
today is auspicious as the start " poosam" first appears in the hindu month of "thai" - hence thaipoosam
it is the day when lord muruga got married to his second wife
who was his secret lover
and opposed by his parents


7:45 AM Me
so he moved a mountain and got married to another woman besides his wife on the same day
he damn free right?


7:46 AM Colleague
LOL
his second wife was his gf
his 1st wife was arranged marriage


7:46 AM Me
nutsing batta to dooo (nothing better to do)



7:46 AM Colleague
nopez
no astro ma


=============================

I LOLed a little at what he said. The conversation stopped because the work volume picked up, so it had to end. Seems that it’s a fun day as long as I learn something new. Haha.

Ok. Lunch’s over, back to work~~



Signing off.

Back to Gym

It’s a public holiday and my team and I are all in the office, minus our team leader and his dog, plus our dear SME. It’s so relaxing, none of us feels like working but the ANZ market that we are service is operating BAU, so there’s no helping it. Work remains efficiently done. Ok that’s a lie. We’re working but not exactly 100% efficient. Else you won’t even be seeing this blog that I’m writing.


Just so that you know, someone just commented “this is the noisiest department ever”. It’s someone in our same department so we should take that as a compliment.

Let’s start with yesterday.

It feels good to be back to gym, just as it feels good to return to blogging. Working the muscles always feels good but it seems that it’s never enough for it to be effective for me to lose weight. The last gym I went to I even spent 3 months time with a personal trainer. He was boasting about how effective his weight lost routine is and how effective it can be if I can keep up with it. With all that said and he had to refund me after 3 months because it was proven all bullshit. He said his last trainee lost 8KG in a month. And I didn’t even lose 8 grams in 3 months. Plus when the training was ongoing he kept complimenting about how well I was keeping up and all that shit. Speaking of bluffs.

Anyway, I came to a gym again because of my colleagues. Some girls in the department has been going to gym and for one of them it seems to be mighty effective. I appreciate the spirit of sharing because that’s the cutest attribute in any human being but yet I’m still skeptical about all this hype about going to gym. I still think playing basketball is the best way to keep myself in shape. Sad thing is that there are not many chances nowadays. Let’s hope I get to play some this Sunday, I simply love playing the game.

The gym looked good, less crowded than the last one I’ve been to, the equipments seem newer and all. The only set back was there were some stupid sales people that almost got me to decide that I won’t ever want to come again. Look I’m not being mean or something, I was from sales line too. Doing sales is easy, you listen to what people want, create a need for them, and let them decide if they want to satisfy their need, and then close the deal. You gotta improvise. The sales manager that approached me last night was a disaster, I have no idea how he got the title manager and I am already thinking that he’s the reason that the gym is not too crowded. So that’s both a good and bad. I already told him I have a commitment with another gym at the moment but I am already planning to switch.

So I just want to first take up the free trial that’s available and then sign up with this gym as soon as my membership with another gym expires. I made that clear the moment I walked into the gym. When the so called sales manager approached me, I reiterated it just so that he understands it. Somehow in this world there are some sales people that are so stone head that they dunno how to do negotiation, all the known is to offer whatever they can offer and then force the clients to sign on the papers. I already told him “I WILL BE JOINING SOON, ONCE MY MEMBERSHIP EXPIRES” and all he cared about is “SIGN THIS SO THAT WE CAN CHARGE YOU NOW!” NOW NOW NOW!!

OMG my whole point is not to be charged now because I do not want to bear the cost of 2 gyms of the same time, while all he says that I’m giving you a good price and I will charge you now since you want to join later any way.

NOW NOW NOW

NOW NOW NOW

NOW NOW NOW

NOW NOW NOW

NOW NOW NOW

NOW NOW NOW

NOW NOW NOW

NOW NOW NOW



OMFG I was so damn pissed I wanted to walk out. And if my colleague didn’t come in the check on what happened and summon the manager’s manager, I would have walked out already. I have no patient to speak with idiots plus I was already nice enough to try to explain to him for 1 hour because I ALREADY AM GOING TO JOIN THE GYM. Talk about screw ups. Meeehhhh.



Anyway, the matter was solved in the end without me being charge and able to take up the trial but so much time was wasted and I was only able to try out the facilities for an hour, which for a gym session it’s only pretty much like a warm up. Gahhh. Idiots. Full of them all over the place.

All in all, I kinda like the gym because of the small crowd. I think I’d like to come back soon and join the membership since some nice friends are coming here after work. Having someone to hang out with is never a bad idea, plus it’s healthy. Lol.



Hhhmmmm back to gym. ok lar.



Signing off.

No boss day + 1

Tomorrow is a public holiday, Thaipusam.
Happy Thaipusam to all my friends that's celebrating!


It’s a public holiday and I need to come back to work.

However I am telling you that I am not depressed at all. First of all my team leader isn’t going to come tomorrow because he’s not on shift and he doesn’t do servicing on the phone so although all of us needs to come back and talk on the phone with the pity merchants while he gets to go off to enjoy his holiday. Well it’s not like I care because I get pay extra and I get to enjoy a working day without an idiot strolling around making weird request and dumb announcements and spamming my email box with all the spam mails. Better yet he’s not gonna return until next Monday.

~~Lucky~~

Gosh, I am looking forward to tomorrow already, surely a very efficient day, and the day after!

Off to gym!

Signing off, with a great spirit!

KWorld M120 1080p-capable Media Player

KWorld M120 1080p-capable Media Player


I saw this media player and it seems pretty good, any one has an idea how much this costs and where i can get it?

Poor management.

I am a little sien right now that I dun even feel like doing anything at work after hanging up my last call. I swear I will curse the next person that gets through my phone line.


Let me explain a little, I’m a person that likes to get things done properly. I dun like accidents, as in, human error. Whenever something might go wrong I’d usually see it coming because that’s how my brain operates. I also like to inform the people around that would be affected by these circumstances so that everyone would be prepared. That’s just how I am. That’s also how I expect from someone in a managerial position to be able to do.

Now now you need to understand that I’m not asking for a lot. I understand that no one is perfect and you simply cant be prepared for everything. You can plan ahead but things will go wrong and you have to improvise or make compromises.

What tips me off is that there isn’t any sort of planning involved, and things just go out of control and everybody has to pick up shits just because someone didn’t manage things properly. That really really really (x 10000) annoys me. That was never short of what my current team leader is doing, he never fails to annoy me with all these little things that he’s not capable of doing.

Now I do not want to just start shooting without any justifications, so let me lay it out for you and you can judge for yourself.

In a call center environment everything runs on a schedule, from a certain time to a certain time, how many people should be logged in to take calls. When members of the team are away on leave there needs to be adjustments being made to the schedule and there should be proper communication within the team so that the rest of the team. Reason is simple because when we are short handed it would be the members that are at work that take the punishments. Same amount of calls are being taken by less members means there would be more calls for everybody to be juggled along with all the work that’s already need done.

So what happens when you feel “what the fuck” a couple of times a day?

There’s a team of 5 for our team.

First of all, 1 member was missing today early in the morning, due to some family issues that she needs to attend to. The managerial person that should know the best knows it but didn’t say a word about it, and I had to ask and find out from a senior that’s close to her. So, 1 member down.

Fine, I’ll let that slide.

Secondly, while we are 1 member short already which means that we are getting more calls per person as the volume is unchanged. So the priority at the moment was to maintain the service quality so that the members do not get flooded by calls. However, being an idiot as he is, he took one member away to do a call coaching (a minor meeting that talks about call ratings) AT THE PEAK HOURS. Oh geez man, can’t you improvise? Do the right thing at the right time man, that’s why you are hired as a manager, to MANAGE things.

The third thing that tips me off today was when another member gone missing after mid day. I had no idea that he was on half day. As a team leader he did not even have a courtesy to inform the team so that we are prepared for the situation. It’d be worse if he actually does not know about it. Oh god how can a moron like this be even hired to one of the highest profile team in this company?

He cant even analyst the simplest things to come up with a solution. All he does all day ever since he joined is asking “need your kind assistance” “need your expertise” “need your opinion” “what do you think” and yada yada yada. If I were mean enough I’d be guessing that he’s from another planet with an organism that has no central nervous system, called the brain.

I just wanna scream right now.

Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh



Signing off.

"FUCK YOU" and Photo Session

I told myself at work today “gah that's it, I want to post a blog entry today”

So here I am thinking as I type, to see what comes out. Sometimes it's a good way of self talking, without doing it you'll never know what you want. Thinking is good, thinking out loud is even better. Since shouting to yourself could cause you being sent to some mental hospital by your family or friends, the best way to do it seems to be writing.

Been hearing a song for a while and thought it was pretty catchy. I didn't pay much attention to it in the beginning because although I thought it has a catchy tune, it also have some weird lyrics. So one day I read it at BerryPuiyan's blog (Here) and I thought I like it. So I did a little search. This song by Cee Lo Green gave me a little trouble as the song title “Forget You” was quite a challenge to find. There's so little entry on the Internet about let alone any links to download it. So I decided to find it from Cee Lo Green's album list.

Then I found it.

I laughed to myself a little bit when I found out the actual song title to be “Fuck You” instead of the radio version “Forget You”. That explains why I felt the lyrics was a little strange. The song instantly became one of my favourite song and it's been repeating on my MP3 list quite regularly for a while (yet I still cant remember the lyrics) because it's catchy and fun to listen to.

Well that's a good thing, to have something fun to kill time while driving. Haha.

Another thing that happened today was a photo shooting session. The company I work as seems to think putting our team photo on a calender and distribute to us is some kind of reward that would boost morale. Honestly I dunno and I'm not even sure that my team mates want to see my team leader's face for the rest of the year on a calender. That might cause the calender to be kept in drawers instead of being displayed. That deserves a LOL indeed.

Everyone was required to come in their most formal dress today, so I came in a suit and a tie. That almost got me killed. The tie almost suffocates me and the suit was made about 6 years ago and it's already feeling like a tight fit. Damn I gotta loose some pounds. Anyway, I was saying, everyone was SUPPOSED to come in ball gowns and all that but when I arrived, I immediately noticed that half the floor gives a shit about it. Another LOL indeed.

Early morning for some reason my team leader (in probation) was damn excited about it. That reason remains unknown. Anyway, he was shouting and barking and all that and was questioning why I wasn’t in black? He claimed that he gave clear instruction yesterday. I rolled my eyes and I was quite sure I didn’t hear it. I checked with others and some seemed to hear it yesterday. So my conclusion is either he was giving stupid instructions while I was busy on the phone talking to merchants or my brain has selectively blocked out useless information. Too busy to care, and too insignificant to care about. Too bad, that's how important he is to me. I gave him so many opportunities to earn himself some credibility and he didn’t do it, so this is what he gets from me. Anyway, I pointed out the fact that my suit was black although I was wearing a white shirt, and shoved him aside and continued with my daily work.

The photo session went well, many people were looking good including some pretty girls from other departments, of course we have our own cute ladies in our department. I'm not comparing, just in case someone isn’t happy.

It'd be nicer if Mr. Team leader didn’t try to put his arms around my shoulders, I thought my body language clearly showed I didn’t like it but he didn’t it anyway. Well I’ve never expecting him to be smart enough to pick up signs anyway, so he's just being an idiot as he always have been, I’m not complaining any further. I just checked some pictures form my camera and it seems so damn obvious, funny that he actually didn’t notice it. One of a kind, indeed.

Anyway, I think I wanna sort the pictures a little and post them up facebook.

So for now, signing off.

aahhh... Fridays

I have a love-hate relationship with Fridays.


On one hand I love Fridays because usually it’s such a casual day. Calls at work are usually slow. Pace is slow and relaxing. It’s the end of the week so when the merchants are calling in they are most the time quite laid back. Joking and small talks are welcome as well. It’s cool. Plus the casual wear that we are allowed to wear every week in office, it just adds on to the relaxing weekend mood.

On the other hand I hate Fridays because it’s usually such an anti-climax days for work, because when merchants are trying to settle all the shits before they go and enjoy their weekend, they will try to blame it on us for not being able to settle things because those lazy asses only deal with things last minute just before weekends.

It’s usually the most happening night of the week. There’s no work the next morning, so no one bothers to sleep early. Everything that’s planned usually falls on this last day of the week. That’s something I love because whenever there’s something planned I will almost always have time to go for it. However that’s also something I hate because usually there’s so much going on and very often I have to choose where I want to be.



Anyway, tonight is a buffet dinner night, a pre-wedding dinner for one of my buddies since primary school. Congratulations to her for her getting married. Wish her happy ever after.

Fridays. hhhmmmm

Signing off.

A meeting - What's been heard?

There's so much to write about I have no idea where to start.

About work, about life about emotions. Lots.

It's 3 days since my last entry, I cant really chronologically organize what I've been through. Sometimes when many things happened you tend to only remember the recent ones, sometimes only the more important ones. Sometimes none.

Let's just talk about what happened today.

We had a skip level meeting with our boss's boss today.

A skip level meeting is a special thing for our company. Every quarter we have a meeting with our boss's boss, to address problems that our boss is unable to resolve, and also to address problems about our boss. We had no problems with our first 2 bosses. However in the last 3 quarters, we have been talking about the same matter, our 3^rd boss who is currently still in probation just doesn’t cut it. He's not good enough and he dun seem to ever going to be good enough.

Wonder if you can understand this but let me try and explain my situation before I tell you what happened in the meeting.

I've been in the same company and the same department since end of August 2010. It's already a high profile team when I joined. Half of the team is a risk management team with THE highest record and best result in the world, and a couple of new hires including myself were recruited to form a new department. It's a high profile new department because the company basically fired everyone in Sydney, and then migrated the whole operation to KL. It's the first year of the migration and the success of the team meant a lot for our new team leader at that time as well us new hires, because it will justify our stay, also our future in this company.

We have had 2 Team Leaders before this current one. Both of them were one of a kind. As in, beyond good. The first guy is nice, has an analytical mind, very quick risk judgment, excellent knowledge in what he needs to do in his role. He was an idol for us. All of us new hires grew tremendously while he was leading us in terms of product knowledge, service quality, call handling, escalation handling, analytical skills, presentation skills etc. etc.

However it was unfortunately that he did not have that much of time with us, his time limit was 6 months and he has moved on to a higher management role after he has proven his worth to the company by demonstrating the success in migrating the team from Sydney to KL and also maintained the world class result of the original roster of the other half of the risk team.

Then we had a secondment leader in his absence.

He was a totally different kind, he was quick, analytical and also have excellent decision making skills. He saved our time and thought us efficiency and also judging risk with a broader perspective, for the benefit of the big picture. He was with us only very shortly as he was only our acting team leader.

Then 9 months ago we had a new team leader.

A disaster.

He has no experience in a credit card call center although he was from another call center previously. However what he knew and what we are doing was not the same at all. He was from a servicing line, he wants to please customer. We are a risk management team, half the team does loss prevention, and the other half does loss recovery. In other words, the team controls the company's losses, to keep it to the minimum.

He never adjusted.

He is still the servicing man he was when he joined, he never grasped the concept of risk management, he has a huge problem with decision making, he has a huge problem in gaining the trust of the team after 9 months. Half the team have not many issues with him because we are already tired of raising issues to him because he never sees beyond the surface, half the team has so many issues with him because they cannot do things well without a decisive leader. Problem is that even until today he still has no idea what's going on and no idea what are the problems.

He is still thinking half the team has no problem with him, and the other team have a problem with him just because they dun like him. Like I said, he never understood the problem.

We gave him so much support and patience when he first joined. It was himself that destroyed his own credibility in the beginning. He lied and he did all the petty things and there are also all the things that he just isn’t capable of doing. He became unfavorable for the team and has been that way ever since. He may have gained some product knowledge, maybe some process knowledge but in terms of leadership skills and also charisma in terms of a leader, he's just a failure.

We have 0 respect for him. The reason that we still talk to him politely simply because he is of a higher position and he has the power to mess with our career.

The most motivated team and most independent team and one of the highest profile team will just torn apart and then fall apart. All the hard work in the last 2 years would have mean nothing. It's a little saddening to even think about it.

It's a skip level.

Some of us held back. We who are known to speak what we think, spoke what we thought. We gave our boss's boss the picture, for the 3^rd time, or more. I lost count. The message is simple.

He's not good enough, not even close.

We do not want him as our leader.

End of story.

It was brutal. However we do not know how much have been communicated.

At the end of the meeting we have no idea what he's thinking. We were dismissed because time's up and he needed to attend a call conference. There was no conclusion, just as the last few meetings when we discussed the same matters. I'm not quite sure about him but I think when the same issues are brought up over and over again it means that nothing is going anywhere.

We can only wait.

Waiting is such an exhausting thing to do. To think that this new boss actually has a huge opportunity with staying, it's already disheartening.

We can only hope for the best, and prepare for the worst.

I never believed in any higher beings, but if there are in fact something like that, maybe it's time for you to hear a collective prayers and make something happen.

Oh and if you actually exist, save the people in Queensland. The flood is killing them.

Cheers.

Signing off.

Hanging Out

Hanging out is fun.

What? You dun think? You must be really sad, really really sad.

I mean seriously. Who doesn’t like hanging out with people that they can have a conversation with? Having a conversation is such an healthy thing. No I don't mean debate. No not arguing also. Nah not discussing. Nope I'm not talking your boy/girl/”somewhere-in-between friend.

I mean friends, genuinely friends.

No hanging out does not involve you sitting beside his table playing with your hand phone texting other people that isn’t physically there, that's call hanging AROUND, not hanging out.

No hanging out does not involve you going next to someone doing nothing and saying nothing important just so that you have an excuse being next to him/her. That's called being a pest.

No hanging out doesn’t mean whatever you do in the office. Period.

OK, sometimes it is but not all the time. I take back the word “period”.

I like people that I can have an intellectual conversation with. There are some people on this earth that they are so brilliant that it saves your energy to talk to them. Now that's eco saving, screw the inverters.

Some friends are so awesomely smart when you are talking to them, 3 words into the sentence they start to nod to give you signal of yes he/she understands what you are currently talking about so you dun have to do any pointless elaboration. Sometimes elaborating stuffs are FUN but no not all the time.

My point is, having a conversation involve both parties LISTENING to each other. Not TALKING to each other.

Now now, I understand that some of you might have something to say about that statement BUT I dont care. As long as you do not agree with the statement above, you are wrong, now go back to facebook and continue surfing because reading this blog is wasting your time.

Anyway, back to hanging out.

I've got this friend that we've both been saying “hey let's hang out” for more than a year and it didn’t happen. Due to some change to her career path we cant talk trash in the office anymore because that would involve her calling or us calling her on the phone and we are not supposed to even call each other during work for the fact that we work in a call center. Phew, that was a long sentence.

So, I was saying, it was her birthday a couple of days ago and some of the work mates were meeting up with her to celebrate her birthday. There's something I had to do and I just couldn’t adjust the time to make it happen. So being a total ass I called her a day before her birthday and told her “happy birthday”, and then I asked her to come out AFTER her birthday for a lunch, tea and more-if-necessary hang out session.

I always knew she was smart but there weren't chances for us to talk about anything in length. We had a nice chat today. Having a decent conversation is such a magical thing for you to like a person. I mean of course in the middle of that somewhere it includes about bitching about something that you both hates but hey, there are a lot of other things that you could talk about too. Things that you don't mind sharing because none of us would go around spreading what we talked about. That's a precious thing to have.

So the point this point entry is: People! I know all of us have this person or these persons that you have been wanting to go out with to have a nice chat, go somewhere together, do something together, eat something together or whatever. Give those people a call. Today, now. Who knows, you might discover a better side of your already-good friend(s).

I'd call that time well spent, don't you think so?

Signing off.