All dogs go to heaven

Many years back, J told me that she once run away from home with her dog, Chelsea, when her mum scolded Chelsea and threathened to get rid of her. She took her bag and left home with Chelsea. The entire family went looking for her but in vain. Actually she was just sitting at the void deck a block away from day to night. I really find her behavior adorable and admire her for her love towards Chelsea. Recently I heard of another person.. Mmm.. let's just call her Panda heehee... Panda ran away from home too with her dog, Miko. But at least its only for a walk and reutrned after she cooled down.

I have always wanted to keep a dog but never had the time to do so. My favorites are Husky & Retriever but both are too big to be kept in HDB. Wonder if I have to wait till I am retired before I can afford the time to own a dog. sigh... If i have a dog, I would bring her out every weekend to the beach or park, laze at home watching TV together or simple wander the street at night....

Too good to be true???

This afternoon, I received a letter from my manager.... its a promotion letter. 3 promotions in 3 1/2 years seems too good to be true but I don't seems to be excited or happy. Of course I welcome the pay increment but it doesn't seems to sound attractive to me anymore....

At times when I take a break and smoke at the roof top, I keep asking myself what am I working for..... There is no answer... Initially when I joined this company, its just for a living. Earning barely 2k a month then work became a way for me to escape from reality and become a self-challenge till now I don't even why I am working so hard. I don't even know where is the destination..... Just when I have decided to leave for another job, this promotion came and hold me back.... not really for the money but for the person who recommended me for promotion. If I were to leave at this time, it would reflect badly on his judgement....

Lost & Found

Its been a week since I got my first PDA phone, HTC Touch Dual. Other than no WIFI & rather soft speaker, basically I have no other complaint about the phone. Now I can even write my blog while on the move.

A few days ago, I found 2 of my primary school friends through Friendster. After losing contact for more than 16years, its really surprise to be able to come into contact again. I am really looking forward for the gathering.

Japan-ChiBa-Ichihara

Finally back to Singapore after 2 days in Japan. It was a tired but fruitful trip. Flew off from Singapore on Thursday night, reached Japan, Narita Airport at 7am in the morning. It was only 2deg C that morning and I was freezing like hell standing outside the airport smoking. My first impression of Japan... the air is so fresh and the streets are clean. From Narita Airport, I took another hour of train ride to Chiba then another train to Yawatajuku & finally a cab to company. By the time I reached, I was totally exhausted.....



Working in this company for 3 years plus, this was my first time visiting our plant in Japan. The only person I know in Japan is my ex SVP who was transfered back to Japan from Singapore recently. He is also the one who requested me to go all the way to Japan to do the presentation. Luckily the presentation went on very smoothly & received many positive feedback. I still remember when I did my first presentation in Singapore during the Technical Discussion Conference 2 years back, my ex SVP commented that the presentation was very short & not informative. My confidence was totally crushed that time......

Previously when my ex SVP was in Singapore, I never had the chance to really speak to him but this trip I get to spend a lot of time with him over lunch & dinner. He taught me alot about the culture & history in Japan & I also get to know more about him & his thinking over many things. We had dinner in this restuarant near the hotel I stayed that night. One thing special about this restuarant is that they have their own chicken farm therefore the chicken are much more fresh than the ones in supermarket. This is the first time I had chicken sashimi, meaning raw chicken. The texture of cooked & raw chicken are totally different. I guess alot depend on the freshness & also the skill of the chief. Breast meat & thigh meat is totally different in texture & liver is even weird. We spent about 4 hours in the restaurant eating, drinking & chatting. He even took the effort to prepare maps for me to visit Tokyo the next day but in the end, I gave up the idea of going after looking at the map of the Japan railway lines. Just JR railway alone, there are 35lines & some stations have more than 10 platforms.

The next day, I took a train to ChiBa & spent a few hours walking around alone. ChiBa is a prefecture much smaller than Tokyo with only 2 shopping malls. After having my lunch in a small resturant, I headed for the airport. That day was the highest temperature in the 2 days I spent in Japan. Although it was 12deg C but with the wind blowing, I was still feeling pretty cold.
After 7 hours of flight, I returned to Sinapore on Sunday morning.

Though the time spent in Japan was short but I really enjoyed the trip.