I started on my new job on 2nd Feb doing HR. My dept's rather small with just 4 of us. My first week was spent doing some housekeeping in the office, filing & getting familar with how things are done. Week 2 was more bz as they slowly handed over tasks to me. So far I'm happy at work. I like what I'm doing and I like my colleagues in the dept. I hope it'll continue to be so for at least a year!
Unfortunately I was struck by the "HR Dept Curse". According to a senior, almost all new colleagues in this department fell sick soon after they started work. I brushed it off at first but I was suddenly down with a throat infection and fever on my 5th day of work (last friday). My temperature hovered around 38degrees for almost 2 days and it was painful to swallow anything. I'm alright now but I'm surprised by how sudden I fell ill without warning.
I'm not sure if it's the bad air or new environment or timing (chinese new yr period) or the curse. It could have been the bad luck of those born in the year of the Goat. We goats supposedly are the most unlucky ones this year coz we offend the "Tai Sui" deity. So when I felt better last Sunday, I went to the temple to pray for a smoother year ahead. Last Friday (the 13th) I was stepped by a lady in heels when she lost her balance in the mrt train. My poor foot still feels painful now! Seems like the praying has yet to take effect!
I wanted to visit my "pet rabbit" Dahuang only to be informed by my friend that it has been sold. It was taken back by the supplier and returned a few days later then sold. I hope Dahuang has found a good owner who loves him & takes good care of him. I'm beginning to miss Dahuang already :(
Yesterday was Valentine's Day and I spent it in a most unromantic but happy way. I went for lunch at Bugis's Shokudo then shopped around there till evening. After that we went to my home to watch TV and I cooked udon noodle soup for him. And we continued watching TV till 11pm then he went home. No flowers, no chocolates, no gifts, no expensive romantic meal. It's just the 2 of us spending time together with my AhKe & McDull.
Today we went for class together followed by a movie at Plaza Sing. We watched Valkyrie, starring Tom Cruise. It's quite a serious film with a lot of talking and few action. Quite sad too, especially coz it's based on a true story. If you're looking for a WWII movie with a interesting plot and exciting pace, watch "Black Book".
That's the updates for the past 2 weeks. Hope for more happy days to come!
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Friday, January 30, 2009
Where's my pet?
Dahuang's gone! :(
My friend went to visit Dahuang a few days ago and it wasn't there anymore. The pet shop employee told him it was returned to the supplier. I felt very sad to hear that coz i have a bad feeling it might be put to sleep. Its skin problem will take a long time to heal and it has grown to a size comparable to that of a cat. Rabbits of that size will not be as popular as the small cuter ones, so it won't be sold easily. Instead of spending $$ to care for a sick rabbit which can't be sold easily, isn't it cheaper to kill it?
I hope Dahuang's still alive and be back at the pet shop soon or at SPCA / House Rabbit Society waiting for a good owner.
My friend went to visit Dahuang a few days ago and it wasn't there anymore. The pet shop employee told him it was returned to the supplier. I felt very sad to hear that coz i have a bad feeling it might be put to sleep. Its skin problem will take a long time to heal and it has grown to a size comparable to that of a cat. Rabbits of that size will not be as popular as the small cuter ones, so it won't be sold easily. Instead of spending $$ to care for a sick rabbit which can't be sold easily, isn't it cheaper to kill it?
I hope Dahuang's still alive and be back at the pet shop soon or at SPCA / House Rabbit Society waiting for a good owner.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Bad service
Much has been said about the poor service standards of establishments in Singapore. Despite the many initiatives to improve the standards, I hardly see any improvement coz I had 2 unpleasant experiences within a week.
First was a trip to K-Box at Hougang Plaza on a weekend night. The place wasn't packed due to its ulu location. We estimated only about 10 rooms were in use & 5 staff were on duty that day. Less customers didn't mean better service. They took forever to prepare our drinks or refill the titbits and kept mixing up our drink orders. The compulsary $6 titbits was only refilled once despite constant reminder to do so. If you want to charge people so much for some peanuts, make sure you give them quantity worth their price! And the drinks? Twice they served us cold drinks when we ordered the hot version. Knowing it'll take forever for them to bring the correct drink, we made do with the wrong drinks. We don't mind the run-down place with sofas patched with masking tapes, but at least give us good service! My friend vowed never to go to this branch again.
The next incident was at Swensens (Bugis branch). We weren't given any plain water while the rest of the customers were. First the waitress taking order didn't serve it. Then the waitress serving the 1st dish didn't serve. Next another waitress who collected the plates didn't serve. The same waitress who served us earlier didn't serve us water when she brought the ice-cream later. When we noted that everyone else was served plain water the moment they sat down, we checked with 1 of the staff if plain water is chargeable (nope, it isn't). The male staff immediately apologized and promptly served us our plain water. When our ice-cream came, it had melted a little. And one of the ice-cream order was wrong. We're not sure if this is a serious lack in attentiveness of the waitresses or a case of racial discrimination. But this made us very pissed off with the service in the restaurant. We're never going to Bugis Swensens again!
Compared to the service I've experienced in Taiwan & Japan, Singapore sure has a long way to go!
First was a trip to K-Box at Hougang Plaza on a weekend night. The place wasn't packed due to its ulu location. We estimated only about 10 rooms were in use & 5 staff were on duty that day. Less customers didn't mean better service. They took forever to prepare our drinks or refill the titbits and kept mixing up our drink orders. The compulsary $6 titbits was only refilled once despite constant reminder to do so. If you want to charge people so much for some peanuts, make sure you give them quantity worth their price! And the drinks? Twice they served us cold drinks when we ordered the hot version. Knowing it'll take forever for them to bring the correct drink, we made do with the wrong drinks. We don't mind the run-down place with sofas patched with masking tapes, but at least give us good service! My friend vowed never to go to this branch again.
The next incident was at Swensens (Bugis branch). We weren't given any plain water while the rest of the customers were. First the waitress taking order didn't serve it. Then the waitress serving the 1st dish didn't serve. Next another waitress who collected the plates didn't serve. The same waitress who served us earlier didn't serve us water when she brought the ice-cream later. When we noted that everyone else was served plain water the moment they sat down, we checked with 1 of the staff if plain water is chargeable (nope, it isn't). The male staff immediately apologized and promptly served us our plain water. When our ice-cream came, it had melted a little. And one of the ice-cream order was wrong. We're not sure if this is a serious lack in attentiveness of the waitresses or a case of racial discrimination. But this made us very pissed off with the service in the restaurant. We're never going to Bugis Swensens again!
Compared to the service I've experienced in Taiwan & Japan, Singapore sure has a long way to go!
Friday, January 23, 2009
2nd last wk of work
This week's been rather crazy physically & emotionally.
On Monday I rushed down for interview after school. The night before my mind was filled with model answers to what I guess the interviewers would ask so I didn't sleep well. On Tuesday I met my friend for shopping & dinner after school and reached home at almost 11pm. There was a school excursion trip to the S'pore River on Wed. The trip was quite fun & educational but tiring due to the super hot weather. Back in school by 2pm and I went off to meet my friend for another round of shopping & dinner & visiting my "pet rabbit" till 11pm+. Quite happy I bought a cheerful pretty dress at Bugis Village for only $23.40! I guess all the walking made me very hungry and I over-ate that day and ended up vomiting at night. Knocked out by 11pm after taking medication for stomach problems.
In case you are wondering, my "pet rabbit" is that brown rabbit mentioned in my previous post. My poor little "大黄" is still under treatment for skin problem. He's been sick for 2 weeks. Apparently he's allegic to the bedding used and scratched his neck until it bled and the fur on it dropped off. I felt so sad to see him in that condition. During the visit on Wed, I managed to ask more about his condition from the vet on duty. She told me the air-con in the shop was spoilt for about a week and the warm conditions in the shop worsened his skin problem. She told me she couldn't sleep at night too coz her mind was on 大黄, especially coz he's losing weight despite eating normally. After the chat with her, I'm comforted to know he's under good care and will recover (though it takes time). She also assured me they will not send it to SPCA or put it to sleep if it isn't sold off. I wish I could cuddle 大黄 and tell him he'll be fine soon!
Tired from 2 consecutive nights of staying up late, I was quite short-tempered yesterday. It didn't help that I had 5 hours of Sec 1 English lessons at one go with a short 30mins break in between. The Sec 1 students are mostly monkeys with some showing traits of a monster. The 1st two classes in the morning were ok. After recess, the monkeys started their nonsense, causing me to be very frustrated & sarcastic. To me, if you aren't interested to learn, then your mind can switch off but don't disturb those who wants to learn. But all these irresponsible & selfish monkeys wanted the whole class to suffer. Many times I just stood there waiting for them to shut up. By the 4th lesson my throat was painful and I didn't have the voice to talk loudly and lost my patience with them.
The condemned Sec 1 repeat boy who wrote a written threat to me challenged me openly in class today. The school gave everyone chocolate coins for Chinese New Year and the students asked if they could eat it in class. I disallowed as it's part of the school rules. This condemned one remarked loudly he'll eat it in class and that I can go complain to the principal and see what happens coz he's not afraid. Although he tried to encourage the rest to eat it in class as an act of defiance against me, none did it. I'm not sure if they are afraid of getting into trouble or they dislike him too coz I heard he's been bullying his classmates. This monster has serious social problems. I hope he solves his problems through professional help soon or risk being hacked to death by gangs one day for his irritating behavior.
My only encouragement this week came from a Sec 1 boy in the same class as the condemned one who told me I'm the only teacher he respects. He didn't give me the reason why but I guessed it's because I'm usually cheerful during lessons, so much so that he asked me why I'm always smiling. He also asked me how I could tolerate the noise level, to which I answered I treat everyone as invisible. It isn't the best answer from a teacher but it made him laugh. When he was done with his work he told me "Miss Chan, I'm going into my own world for 30sec to be away from the noise." I think that's his way of telling me he's also going to treat everyone as invisible for a while.
Mon, Wed & Fri is my time with the upper Sec monsters. Today's lesson with the Sec 3 was frustrating. There's this fat asshole who causes trouble for us at every lesson. Today's no exception. I don't know why the moment I stepped into class, he spouted vulgarities in between asking where my co-teacher is. Then he stood very close up in front of me, challenging me to a 1-to-1 fight. I just ignored him and secretly hoped that he'll be beaten to death one day.
None of monsters paid attention during previous lessons and couldn't do the worksheet today. And only a handful of them brought their textbook. When we were at the computer lab, those idiots defied instructions and kept chatting on msn, play games, surf internet. When warnings failed, I switched off the monitor, but the moment i walked off, they switched it on. I was so fed up I just switched off the CPU or the main switch. That's when I would hear even more vulgarities. Out of a class of 34, there were only about 4 students who listened and did their work diligently during lesson. The rest? Condemned.
There's this very grouchy teacher in school who hardly smiles and treated me as invisible when we were doing group discussion on my first day of work. I don't know what's her problem then. Now I think I know why. She complains about the students everyday. I could feel her frustrations with the monsters through her daily complaints. She always say things like "What do they think they are?! So rude, say all the vulgarities! Give up on these people! I can't spend time on these trouble-makers and ignore those who wants to learn!!"
I feel the same too. Why waste time on people who don't want to learn at the expense of those who wants to learn? If you aren't interested to learn, so be it. At the end of the day it's your own problem when you fail your exams. If you want to act like a hooligan and offend others and get beaten up, hacked to death or sent to prison, it's also not my problem. That's the attitude I have towards these scums of society. And that's why I know I'm not suitable to teach because I don't want to try loving these scums. It's better for me to leave teaching for the sake of the students and myself. May they meet better teachers who love them for who they are.
Finally it's the long-awaited weekend. 3 more days of teaching to go next week and I'm released from hell!
On Monday I rushed down for interview after school. The night before my mind was filled with model answers to what I guess the interviewers would ask so I didn't sleep well. On Tuesday I met my friend for shopping & dinner after school and reached home at almost 11pm. There was a school excursion trip to the S'pore River on Wed. The trip was quite fun & educational but tiring due to the super hot weather. Back in school by 2pm and I went off to meet my friend for another round of shopping & dinner & visiting my "pet rabbit" till 11pm+. Quite happy I bought a cheerful pretty dress at Bugis Village for only $23.40! I guess all the walking made me very hungry and I over-ate that day and ended up vomiting at night. Knocked out by 11pm after taking medication for stomach problems.
In case you are wondering, my "pet rabbit" is that brown rabbit mentioned in my previous post. My poor little "大黄" is still under treatment for skin problem. He's been sick for 2 weeks. Apparently he's allegic to the bedding used and scratched his neck until it bled and the fur on it dropped off. I felt so sad to see him in that condition. During the visit on Wed, I managed to ask more about his condition from the vet on duty. She told me the air-con in the shop was spoilt for about a week and the warm conditions in the shop worsened his skin problem. She told me she couldn't sleep at night too coz her mind was on 大黄, especially coz he's losing weight despite eating normally. After the chat with her, I'm comforted to know he's under good care and will recover (though it takes time). She also assured me they will not send it to SPCA or put it to sleep if it isn't sold off. I wish I could cuddle 大黄 and tell him he'll be fine soon!
Tired from 2 consecutive nights of staying up late, I was quite short-tempered yesterday. It didn't help that I had 5 hours of Sec 1 English lessons at one go with a short 30mins break in between. The Sec 1 students are mostly monkeys with some showing traits of a monster. The 1st two classes in the morning were ok. After recess, the monkeys started their nonsense, causing me to be very frustrated & sarcastic. To me, if you aren't interested to learn, then your mind can switch off but don't disturb those who wants to learn. But all these irresponsible & selfish monkeys wanted the whole class to suffer. Many times I just stood there waiting for them to shut up. By the 4th lesson my throat was painful and I didn't have the voice to talk loudly and lost my patience with them.
The condemned Sec 1 repeat boy who wrote a written threat to me challenged me openly in class today. The school gave everyone chocolate coins for Chinese New Year and the students asked if they could eat it in class. I disallowed as it's part of the school rules. This condemned one remarked loudly he'll eat it in class and that I can go complain to the principal and see what happens coz he's not afraid. Although he tried to encourage the rest to eat it in class as an act of defiance against me, none did it. I'm not sure if they are afraid of getting into trouble or they dislike him too coz I heard he's been bullying his classmates. This monster has serious social problems. I hope he solves his problems through professional help soon or risk being hacked to death by gangs one day for his irritating behavior.
My only encouragement this week came from a Sec 1 boy in the same class as the condemned one who told me I'm the only teacher he respects. He didn't give me the reason why but I guessed it's because I'm usually cheerful during lessons, so much so that he asked me why I'm always smiling. He also asked me how I could tolerate the noise level, to which I answered I treat everyone as invisible. It isn't the best answer from a teacher but it made him laugh. When he was done with his work he told me "Miss Chan, I'm going into my own world for 30sec to be away from the noise." I think that's his way of telling me he's also going to treat everyone as invisible for a while.
Mon, Wed & Fri is my time with the upper Sec monsters. Today's lesson with the Sec 3 was frustrating. There's this fat asshole who causes trouble for us at every lesson. Today's no exception. I don't know why the moment I stepped into class, he spouted vulgarities in between asking where my co-teacher is. Then he stood very close up in front of me, challenging me to a 1-to-1 fight. I just ignored him and secretly hoped that he'll be beaten to death one day.
None of monsters paid attention during previous lessons and couldn't do the worksheet today. And only a handful of them brought their textbook. When we were at the computer lab, those idiots defied instructions and kept chatting on msn, play games, surf internet. When warnings failed, I switched off the monitor, but the moment i walked off, they switched it on. I was so fed up I just switched off the CPU or the main switch. That's when I would hear even more vulgarities. Out of a class of 34, there were only about 4 students who listened and did their work diligently during lesson. The rest? Condemned.
There's this very grouchy teacher in school who hardly smiles and treated me as invisible when we were doing group discussion on my first day of work. I don't know what's her problem then. Now I think I know why. She complains about the students everyday. I could feel her frustrations with the monsters through her daily complaints. She always say things like "What do they think they are?! So rude, say all the vulgarities! Give up on these people! I can't spend time on these trouble-makers and ignore those who wants to learn!!"
I feel the same too. Why waste time on people who don't want to learn at the expense of those who wants to learn? If you aren't interested to learn, so be it. At the end of the day it's your own problem when you fail your exams. If you want to act like a hooligan and offend others and get beaten up, hacked to death or sent to prison, it's also not my problem. That's the attitude I have towards these scums of society. And that's why I know I'm not suitable to teach because I don't want to try loving these scums. It's better for me to leave teaching for the sake of the students and myself. May they meet better teachers who love them for who they are.
Finally it's the long-awaited weekend. 3 more days of teaching to go next week and I'm released from hell!
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Found a job!
The company I went to for interview yesterday offered me the job today. Though the salary is lower than what I hope for, overall the renumeration package & benefits are quite ok. Plus I get to learn new things as it's a different industry even though it's still HR work. Most importantly it's a path back to HR. Starting work on 2nd Feb, 2 days after my last day with the school. Good for me as it keeps my momentum going!
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