Transit in LA

This is the first time in my life, I travelled to USA, and travelled in a business class flight. But unfortunately, my camera went dead on me while I was trying to take a picture in the flight. T_T

The flight is about 17 hours, I don't know if that includes the transit time in Taiwan or not, as I have totally lost count while travelling through the time zones.

I arrived in LA international airport yesterday evening, the infrastructures here are huge, and there are lots of people around. Got around asking for hotel shuttle, and finally got into the hotel around dinner time. I was too tired to have any dinner, and straight went to bed after a quick shower. And I am now all refresh, at midnight 1.30am... sigh, I am so going to suffer from jetlag in the coming days...

The tiping system here is rather strange to me, I find it rather hard to understand.

This long and tired journey made me wonder, when people were sold out of their countries during war, to come to USA working as a slave, what kind of torments they had gone through? Not to mention they were no business class, no clean water supply, didn't speak English, travelled much longer...

I may be naive saying this after landing into this country for less than a day, without exploring anything -- to me, USA is a scary country. I don't know why people flocking in here, I may understand it better one year later. I am having the same fear as someone who entered into the society for the first time, whereby you have more freedom than when you are in the school; but at the same time, the underlying rules are more complicated and you have more responsibilities.

I am going to test my violin when arriving at the destination tomorrow. I wonder how's my violin adapting it.

Going to Kansas

After hearing the news for months, I am finally going to Kansas.

There are lots of packing over the past few days, as I have only started planning the trip after getting the visa mid of March.

It has been a while since I last had a long trip like this. I thought I would already be used to it, but it seems that the nerves are still in tension.

The future boss has already arranged an overnight site visit on the second week. I hope the jetlag would leave me by then.

There are a lot of not-so-happy memories from my previous overseas assignment with other employer. I hope that this time, by taking a step out, I would be able to change my perception, and to be able to face the bad memories head on and overcome it. I may not have learned all the lessons, but I hope I had become wiser.

Different Species

I went to an island, which is duty free, and rich with oil. Naturally, in an island like this, you will get cheap alcohols, expats, and young ladies.

When I was working during the day, I had already started to wonder, if this island is lack of female populations. I doubt was answered when I entered the night club last night, apparently all the young ladies were there. All of them were dressing little, wearing lots of make ups.

I was told some time ago, that the girls here are more expensive than a bucket of drinks. I witnessed it last night. Half a dozen of chilled bottled Carlsberg only costs you RM21; a drink with a lady costs RM28 (note: this is per drink), extra services not inclusive. I won't say the "quality" is competible with those in the country's capital, but I guess you can't ask too much with the price you pay.

These ladies were sitting around the drinking tables, their eyes glowed when they saw expats entering the pub, but turned into confusion when they saw me walking behind the chief consultant. Now that I think of it, it seems that everytime I visited places like this, I was with a group of men.

Throughout the night, I got those strange stares from guys and gals in the pub. In summary, ladies tried to find out if I am one of them, who snatched their business away before they even walked close to the expat; while guys looked at me, trying to find out if I am one of those ladies, who entered the business on the first day, wearing unappealing jeans and huge T-shirt, not knowing the dress codes. The ladies had their "Manageress" come over to check on us, while the guys observed afar. It was like a gang of wolves, saw a lone species venturing into their territory, while the hunters were watching.

I saw a few white men on the next table, surrounded a local lady, with lots of body contact. Later, one of them decided not to play with the crowd, he got another lady and they walked towards the other side of the pub. I think he made a right choice, cause this second lady has a better body than the other one, she literally wears just bikini in the pub. Her youth defies Newton's gravitational law.

I went to the toilet, there were about 10 ladies crowding over the basin, next to the toilet bowl -- putting make ups, chit-chatting, adjusting the bras, even have dinner on the basin. There were one or two of them feeling unwell, squatting down next to the basin, leaning against the wall, hands on their head with painful expressions. The toilet was like their backstage, you see the real faces of them. I had unwelcome glares from the female population in the toilet.

Each time I enter pubs like this, I felt I have entered another world, a world of natural instinct. I have a very strange feelings when I see these ladies and these guys. I feel that I am not a female, nor a male, and do not know how to suit myself.

I guess those guys who went with me were suffering too, cause it would be odd if they were to call for accompanies from the ladies in front of me.

Social Etiquette

When I started dealing with clients, I always face the problem with the social etiquette, especially when it comes to meal time.

I know when I am a supplier, it is better for me to buy the client a meal. But some customer may not like it, so to avoid the whole misunderstanding all together, just avoid meeting customer before meal time.

But the problem comes, when I am dealing with consultants. I am the client, the consultant is helping us to solve the project on site, shall I buy them a dinner instead?

I have also faced a difficult situation -- my client, is an engineering purchaser, his customer is my enduser. Meanwhile, my company's contractor is close to the enduser, as they have been working on the job site.

So, when I went to the enduser's site, the enduser asked the contractor and my client out for a meal. The contractor asked me to tag along.

Under this circumstances, who should pay the bill? With my logic, it would be me. But the gang is huge! And I don't know most of them.

In the end, I skipped the dinner with them.

So, back to the story, I am going out for a dinner with the consultants in 10 minutes time. I guess I shall pay the bill tonight, what do you think?

There is another thing I should learn, which is the art of paying the bills. Cause I am dealing mostly with men, i.e. when there are business meals, I am most likely to be the only female on the table. It sometimes embarrassed the men on the table, to have female paying the bills for them... sigh... so hard to learn the social etiquette...

Alice in the Wonderland

I couldn't recall much of this show, as I watched it when I was very young.
I was showed on the TV, and it was splitted into 3 parts -- One part a day.
Though couldn't recall much, I really loved that show, as the idea of shrinking small, and growing big was fascinating. I also remember that I loved the tea party Alice had.

So, when the movie "Alice in the Wonderland -- Tea with the Mad Hatter" came out, I wanted to watch. And went with my friend today.

The 3D effect was interesting, it was my first experience.

But somehow, the Wonderland is no longer as colourful as I remembered. The people are too vivid, that it looked almost ugly. Perhaps I have beautified the Wonderland in my memory. Alice has proven herself, that she is still carrying all her true characters. To me, she has recalled the Alice in my memory.

The show ended pretty quickly, but I could still feel the sadness of the Hatter.

Lousy people

I am upset today, because she teamed up with Ms. Azreal, who is our sub-contractor, to take advantage of me. I was also tricked by Mr. Woodchild in the incident.

I felt that there is no one in this office, who can be trusted. I can't help but wonder, if there are any justice in this world? People always asked me to be patient, swallow the bitterness of life, and don't bother with small things.

Yes, these are small things, but they are like the stone in your shoe, it will tear your foot if you continue having it in your shoe. They are damn irritating. Our HR not only failed to facilitate us a convenient working environment, but putting stones in our shoes.

We all acted like small children in the office, fighting among ourselves, and waiting for the MD to announce the victory. I really can't waste more life with these idiots, but I have no choice. Because if I take up this assignment in the USA, I would be bonded two years after the training.

What kind of kharma do I need to have, in order to stand straight in front of these people? I wonder if this is the psycology of someone who do not want to improve themselves -- they just enjoy doing all the monkey tricks everyday, and being announced as the winner all time?

Sometimes I really wish to be the one that could witness their fall.

Tour de Langkawi and My Car Windscreen

Short talk: I just came back from Singapore, trying to see some professional testing our designed products. It was a great fun, and I was told by the tester (working for 28 years!) that he would like to take me as his apprentice after I completed the training in USA. Ego point overload... ding ding ding.

Saturday morning, I woke up by hearing my car alarm. When I walked out, I was told that the rear windscreen on my car was broken by stones. The stones flew across when the civil worker was trimming the grass.

A picture of the grass cutting machine, and a typical attire of the grass trimming worker.

This is how my car looked like, when I walked out of the house:

We called the owner of the grass trimming company, but we weren't optimistic about them paying the compensation.

In any case, I followed the procedure to report the police and also went to the garage to ask for quotation. I also found out from the insurance company, that the windscreens for my car model are not insured, so I could just forget about getting a report from the police station next week.

Meanwhile, it also happened that the Tour de Langkawi was taken place outside the police station, causing horrible traffic jam, as the roads were closed. While I got stuck in the police station, I went to the fence to watch the cyclists. Many people got down from their vehicles to see the event, to curse the event, and to get some fresh air.

It took nearly 30 minutes before I saw the first cyclist passing in front of the police station.... then a whole crowd came...
then after 5 more minutes, the last two passed by, and the road was re-opened again.

I drove the car to the garage to replace the glass, as I was worried if the rain falls anytime of the day, my car would get all wet.

The owner of the grass trimming company came in the afternoon, we negotiated the price, and he paid 50% of my repair costs.

By the end of the day, I collected the car with new screen, and now I need to find a place to tint the glass.

My whole Saturday gone, money gone, but I am glad the problem was solved quick. Living in Malaysia, you just can't live a day without a car.