6th June 2009

Annual Neo's Family Outing is here again!

Tentatively, it's going to be on the 6th June 2009, Saturday - 2pm @ East Coast Park (Again).

I'm trying to tie down the details by Wednesday:
1) Which carpark to meet
2) What time everyone can make it. I have a huge family - Total of 26 pax full force turnout possible, with domestic helpers counted in.
3) Program for the day, for kids and for the adults.
4) Food. Yes, as Mum stays with me, we always prepare light food to bring. (Usually Bee Hoon, Fried Chicken Wings & Sandwich by Mrs Neo)
5) Dinner location.

- - - - -

It usually goes something like this:

2pm - Meet at "whichever" carpark
2.15pm - Whatever
3pm - Swimming in the sea with Mr Neo
4pm - Shower
4.30pm - Kids run around the park aimlessly and screaming all they want while adults chit chat
5.30pm - The all time bubble blowing session
5.45pm - Feeling tired from all that blowing
5.50pm - Drink some coke and do whatever
6.30pm - Pack up and go for Dinner @ East Coast Lagoon
7.30pm - Do whatever else you want or go home from here.

- - - - -

Exciting event right? Heehee.


After my babies are born, they may be too young to go to beaches for the first few years.

So lets' have fun! Or we may have to wait at least 2 years for my babies to be 2year old for them to join in the gathering at East Coast!

Singing Sessions

Most nights nowadays Mrs Neo & Myself started a singing regime to "teach" the babies rhythem and beat. We do mostly really traditional nursery songs, both in english and chinese.

My all time favourite is "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star".
I'll sing this every night.

Tonight was no exception.
We were singing a few songs together when Mrs Neo started to do dedication;

Mrs Neo: Ok babies, Daddy will sing "Mr Sun" from Barney
*Mr Neo Sings Mr Sun*
Mrs Neo: Now please sing "Hickery Dickery Dock"
*Mr Neo Sings Hickery Dickery Dock*
Mrs Neo: Ok, now sing "The Song That Never Ends"
Mr Neo: *Duhz*
Mrs Neo: Daddy will sing until we sleep ok. Heehee

Wonder how the song goes?
Well it's like this.

Four Seasons Hotel - Company Night Event

Not the best event ever, but another company event for brand awareness at Four Seasons Hotel, Singapore.

We are sort of the sponsors, on a SE.Asia wide tour, covering 7 countries, celebrating the works of talented architects.
We have done 4 countries now, 3 more to go by the end of June 2009.

It was fun and i hope benificial. At least people who turned up are specially invited and very renowned. A group of around 100pax, not inclusive of exibitors made good size to migle and network.

I'm glad the Singapore leg was on Friday evening. Any other day would be bad for me.
I also wonder why, but i can do it on even Monday for other countries, but in Singapore, Friday would be the best, as the next day is a non working day.

Here's a group photo! My boss? Oh he's taking the photo. Heehe. So he's not in it.

We had durians after that.
Heehee

L is for

L is for Liu Lian.

Mum brought some durians from a "i don't know who" selling durians from Malaysia over our neighbourhood.

And we had them tonight!
Babies were very excited about it and as Mum & I was opening the durian, they were kicking Mrs Neo. Heehee.

Durians are good for pregnant mums at this stage.
It's like a tonic. 有补.

Lock it up

Stupid hp.. I can't believe it don't allow me to type in a text field.
Or maybe it does not recgonise it as a text field for me to type in it...

End up I have to log in to hotmail to send this post up.
•arghh!•

But I was seriously considering to set a password to my site.
A log in page or sort. Password can be simple.
Maybe my name or something my friends will know.

This way, nobody will chance upon my site.

Why do I want to do that?
Seriously, I don't know. The private feature on blogspot is also not what
I'm looking for.

I wonder if I can add a dhtml to the site.
But then how to set a flag to ensure that users with direct link have to go through the first page leh...

Aiyah.. Sleep first..

Level 2

Latest Development on my block. The floor area does not look so big.
Well, it's never big anyway.

2011 4th Quarter is the latest date.
I wonder why they always change the date.

Rice Dumpling Festival

It's here again!
Ba Zhang everywhere.

For my family, my mum will do it herself. I can do it too really.
But she won't let me help her this year as she says i'll really slow her down.

The typical, worst as a help senario.



Here's Mum working hard in the kitchen

And some of the finished products

It's really nice, the ones she makes, not too much rice and with a lot of fillings.
I can give you one, if you want to try.

:)

Connected

Yippie!

I felt the babies move!
23th May 2009, 0606Hrs.

Mrs Neo suddenly moved my hands to her belly, waking me up.
I kept my hands there as i guess it's really a simple understood sign that she wants me to feel the babies.

And then there was this beat, like a little tap. Haha.
I was so exicited, i woke up, bright and fresh. I even have to hold my breath, close my eyes, to make sure that i have a better feel.

Heehee Baby on the left was doing a light tap, a few times, maybe 6times and i asked if Baby on the right was moving.

Mrs Neo says the other may be sleeping, but i still went ahead to feel the other.
Then, all of a sudden! Baby of the right, i felt was stretching his legs!!
It was a big movement and i bet if i was looking at the belly, i will have seen that action!

Hahaha it was so amazing.
I felt them for the first time. They were in there, moving and adjusting themselves.
It was so cute!
Heehee. You'll only know what i mean if you have been through this process of parenthood.

It's Awesome.

Love Mrs Neo, Love my Babies.

Congratulations Li Eng

Quitter No. 19.

It's sad to see the founders of the company leave and want to do something else.
But i guess their soul are tired.

Everyone needs a break. Family is the only reason why we work.
We earn the money to make the family go on.

Whatever that it, i hope she will be happy.
It's hard to keep in contact, even though i say "Let's keep in touch ok".

But, yup, with upper managements, its' quite hard, can't gossip.
How to catch up? Catching up for dinner should be full of gossips and jokes to make the gathering fun.

If it's going to be like - so how's the stock market? Did u hear about the apartment for sale for S$2million that i am looking at?

How fun can that be.

Nevertheless. She's a nice lady.
All the best to her and her family. Our roads will cross again, some point of time.
She stays in Sengkang you know.

Neighbours to be.

Nikko Hotel - Jakarta

Travelling into Jakarta was a nightmare.
Traffic was slow and also the entrance of the hotel did not do justice to it's grand building. It was a really small rear entrance. But it's under construction. So it may be better after it's all done up.

There's a main building and a new wing. They are looking at renovating the main wing too, thus the renovation outside the driveway of the hotel.
This trip, i am glad i am staying in the new wing.

Hotel: Nikko Hotel, Jakarta
Star: 4
Feels like: 4


Pros:
Service level was high, maybe due to the fact that labour was cheap in Indonesia and there was someone, to do almost every single thing you can imagine.
So i carried nothing, push no doors, press no lift and asked for no directions.
Every, really everything was attended to. I gave a tip (standard amount) of 2,000 local currency, which breakdowns to S$0.28.

The people manning the concierge spoke good english, was polite and accommodating.
I paid USD 150 per night + internet + breakfast, yup, i was really pushing my budget to the limit there. I am only allowed USD 150 per night with the internet and breakfast and first out, i spend to the limit.

Well..

Rooms were a decent size, comes with a digital safe and full cable TV. Washroom had a shower room and a tub, which i had no time to use. Necessities was plentiful.
Papers were slotted into the room at 5am in the morning. So it's a nice hotel for a business trip.

For a leisure trip, the huge shopping centres around will put Singapore's Vivo to shame for it's sheer massive size and outrageous themes. Great World City's washroom is really nothing compared to what they have.



Cons:
Located right in the city town centre, it's near a fountain, which is really the one that we see on TV when there's a protest. So it can get "busy" there.

You also have to love Japanese Food as the restaurant, being in Nikko Hotel, only serve Japanese Dishes. I had it for 2 nights and was glad i was not staying any longer.

Ventilation in the room can be improved. My room was still ok. But my colleague's room had a ciggy smell.

I also have many problems withVPN. I get connected tonight and tomorrow morning i can't get in.


Overall it's really quite a nice place to be for work.
Simply for it's location which is utmost important due to the heavy traffic.
I spend 2hours travelling to a 30mins appointment. So, yes. Location is very very important.

I rate it 7.5 out of 10.
It's really nice. I will tag this hotel for my next trip there.

New Shit - Day 1

I wonder what i plunge myself into.

At the airport at 7.10am. Checking into the flight for 9.05am heading for Indonesia - Jakarta.
I'll be going to 4 countries very frequently now.
Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand & Brunei.

But i am glad they are all nearby and 3hours flight can get me to the places i work on.

Appointments and client visitations felt the same as Singapore.
However, people are more willing to meet me compared to Singapore as i come as a Principal,
a foriegn party that came to show their presence.

I get coffee or ice water, which i do not get in Singapore.
Meetings are always in board room with the bosses of the business.

So in a way, i guess it's a step up when the bosses are willing to meet you.

That said, i am still a sales man. Although i try not to sell so much (Which is hard, as i am so used to it after so many years) and really talk to people on a bigger picture and express our capability to offer solutions and not just a product.

It's all about bullshit really.

My new job scope is simple.
1) Say a lot of fancy things to impress the client.
2) Have the dealers hit their sales target, which in turns makes me hit my target.
3) Have little sleep and type a lot of emails and reports.

Same shit, different day.

Sony Ericsson C905

Mrs Neo's new Sony Ericsson C905.

Would i have imagine this is what would have become of a Ericsson phone? Remember the Ericsson 768? Or the Sony cellphone that looked like a television controller?

No! No! No!

It's really out of my imagination that throwing 2 brand together would give such dramatic results. It's like a - and a - becomes a +.

C905, Mrs Neo saw the eye catching, baby color, cute looking, fierce pink while i was getting the BB Bold.

Since its like 3yrs since she had a mobile phone change (previous set also a SE.), I encouraged her to take it, but since she had no indentifications with her, we reservered it and came back for it the next day (Yesterday).

I was playing with it today and please, please don't play play with it ok.

Other then the fierce pink, the camera screams of high detailed sharpness. Over 8megapixels. And its a mobile phone. The rear lens cover engraves a proud "Cybershot" logo, reminding me of it's capability. Autofocus and flash are the usual.

The buttons were soft and easy on the fingers. The slider (Yes, its a slide phone) is eager to pop and finishes with a sweet "tuck" sound that adds a sense of classy, sleek aire.

Jam packed with a 2GB M2 memory card (Free), it sits in Mrs Neo ugly blue, hmmm do i even call it a pouch, wanting to snap up some pictures with its huge memory that is still very much free.

Oh my god! Did i just see a GPS?
S**t! Yes! It comes with a build in GPS that allows you not only yo know where you are (in case you are lost while hopping on to buses), but also allows you to tag your location to your photos!

Did i say there's wi-fi?
Did i mention Google Map?
Ermm, did i say they come with PlayNow(TM) and like Radio?

How about streaming? Bluetooth?
Did i say how cool the ringtones are? Did i? Did i?

Do you know it's in the ultra, uber, super chic, fushia pink?

The Sony Ericsson, C905.

Fierce.

The Decision

The Blackberry Bold 9000

It was really hard to decide which path i wish to take.
Life is full of choices and each time you come across one, you have to make a decision that affects your life.

Worst thing is, there is no rooms for regrets. No way to look back and wonder (but yes you can wonder, with no results) what if i did this and that the last time, instead of choosing the way i took.

Aiyah. What the heck. All those nonsense aside.

Today i brought the Blackberry Bold 9000 (Company Paid).

I guess i made my choice.
I don't want ot be JUST THE KING OF MY KAMPONG!

My First

My First International Order!

Came in at 2.46pm from a nearby country.
Heehee. It's not a huge amount.

But it's the first.
I don't recall, but it's like 30 emails going around and finally i set the price for the dealers to dive in, and in this case, i am glad i made a right choice.

The price was right, the client was happy and the order was sealed.

WohoOOoo!

Opportunities doesn't come by often.

Opportunities doesn't come by often.

But when it comes, it swamps me.
Company "Z" offers me a job today.

The offer is attractive, i must say, better then what i am offered currently.

Aiyoh, but it's a "Kampong" job again lor. Based in Singapore.
Do i want to be "King of the Kampong" again?

Why does this have to happen together?
Do i stay? Do i try this new company out?

Hai...

You! Stop asking me the same damn questions

Colleague: Eh, this is the Master Set, so how?

Mr Neo: You can show, but cannot give away.

Colleague: But what if the client insist?

Mr Neo: Nopes, it's a Master.

Colleague: So if he tells me to leave it with him?

Mr Neo: Nope, sorry. It's the Master set and you have to bring it back.

Colleague: Even if the client is angry with me?

Mr Neo: Please explain to the client that it's the Master. He will understand.

Colleague: So i cannot bring this out?

Mr Neo: You can, but bring it back

Colleague: But i bring out and someone wants to hold on to it how?

Mr Neo: No "name of person", It's a Master Set, if someone wants, tell him/her that you can request for a new set, however, inform them that it will take 3 working days to courier it in from USA.

Colleague: I think they will want to hold on to it lor. I think i better don't bring it out. I am sure they will want it.

Mr Neo: Okay. Your wish.

-----

Duhz.

Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh!!!

Labour Day - A change

Another long weekend.

But who's complaining? Heehee.
After 3 years in "Company X", they decided to let me do something else.
And today, 1st May 2009, it's the official shift date.

Yippie.
It's really mixed emotions, i am glad that i have this opportunity to venture into this new role,
however, as this position requires me to travel quite frequently, i feel i will miss my family too.
Especially when my babies are born in September this year.
However, i guess it's never good enough to be the "King of my Kampong!".

The time to pack my barang and take a step out of Singapore.
It's not like i am going away forever! It's just 4days a week.
That's further broken down into 3nights away (Cas' the 4th night i will arrive back in SG).

So, it's really not that bad (Except for the frequency of travel).
Aiii... Jump head in first then say la!