Bad Habit Weakness

Few words: Last time when I always lepak, people ask me to get a job. Now that I have a job, people ask me why I don’t come out lepak one? wdafuq!


When my boss first handed me the appraisal form, I think he did smile. Heedlessly, I just put it on my table and in no time, it was stacked with documents. After few days, the appraisal reappeared and casually I just flipped through the form but unintentionally I come across a column which requires me to fill in my weakness. “This is some serious shit!”

When they asked for your weakness, basically, they are trying to make the self-conscious you to betray you. You get what I mean, no? They aren’t really interested in your weakness. What they really interested in are the potential excuses they don’t give you bonus.

Come to think of it, my boss did not smile, it was a smirk instead!

In any case, here I am trying hard to fill up this appraisal form. But frankly speaking, I’d develop a number of bad habits for the past six months.

One thing for sure, I’m always rushing. For the past six months, I’ve been late for at least dozens of times and most of the time if I really made it on time, it is marginally passed. And so I have developed a kind of a chic talk every time I start my car “Let’s do it”; credit taken from Mission Impossible. You know, just a small motivation talk between me and my car. Although as weird as it sound, this motivation really works. Without knowing it, I started to whisper to my car every time I start my car, just to feel like Tom Cruise once in a while. One fine morning, I was fetching my mum to dentistry. Casually I did it again when I started my car, “Let’s do it” and my mum was like “DO WHAT?” with wild-eyed. Glaring in by my mum like this, I won’t want to tell her that I’m talking to a car. Silently, I just put in the first gear and drive.

Also, over the past six months, people have been calling me all sorts of name but all aren’t my real name. Department manager called me Chow, the marketing representative refers me as Jeff in her email and the worse one is from the plating department lady: ‘Stiff’ and that is not even a name. It is more like an adjective but compliment still taken, good eyes lady! Anyhow for the past six months I had not corrected a single person that called me wrongly. I guess for me, a name is just a name.

Lately, I’m into photography so it is a norm for photo enthusiasm like me to practice my framing and composing every chance I have. The great different that distinguishes between professional and amateur is the professional compose their shot in mind whereas amateur usually frame them by fingers. So whenever I see something worth taking, I’ll heedlessly frame the shot with my fingers. Although I tried to minimize this bad habit but sometimes I just can’t help and box my shot with fingers. This is another chic act; holding steadily, controlling my breathing, shooting: It is my second nature but when my mum sees it, she yells, “DO WHAT?” Once again, glared in so intensively by my mum, I just walked away silently.

Although I was supposed to literally send all my emails in English but sometimes I just couldn’t. There are limitations to English words’ expression. Thus, I tend to use stronger words like ‘sibeh’, ‘dulan’, ‘geng’, ‘die die’ and such word of this format in my email. Anyhow, I only limit this in my casual email, albeit sometimes in my formal email as well. Nevertheless there is once when I used this in my email to my manager, it is a one to one email so I thought to myself ‘why so serious?’ and I did that. Well, first of all the word is stronger and secondly it simplify my intention holistically. ‘Customer is not happy and demand us to provide a new solution to our existence control plan’ now can be simplified to ‘deep shit, customer dulan’. But that particular email is escalated to everyone in my manager next reply. Best of all, senior managers are in the loop as well, FML!

After mirroring so many of my bad habits, I have stuck back to reality facing my appraisal most difficult question again. Come to such extent, in any case, I have to write something down.

PLEASE IDENTIFY YOUR WEAKNESS: NONE.

The Write Stuff

Few words: V.A.C.A.T.I.O.N and I need it so badly. A mini escape from work sound just so fine.

Coming to such extent, it is neither about keeping readers nor making pocket money anymore. To be frank, this post was supposed to be uploaded few weeks ago but it was left idling till now. One thing for sure is I can’t give commitment to blogging anymore. It’s ironic how desperate I am to chase customer cycle time each day and how reckless I could to abandon blogging. Well, life has to go on.

I always thought life is a bit of work and fun but turn out I was wrong. Life is a bit of fun but mostly overlapped by work. Put simply, life first priority goes to making money. So if you’re a smart one, look for a job that you really interested in. I was lucky enough to have a job related to writing; well, in such a way. In such a way though…

It started in childhood, when I developed the bad habits of passing or rather throwing notes to friends in the middle of class. But this writing never lasts long because at some point people just throw without writing. Then the computer and internet come along with their email, this has totally changed the whole perspective of writing. Writing is not only limited to paper, ink and pen anymore. But internet only available for the rich, so email is a big NO for me at that time. Some years later, my parent bought me a mobile phone; a bulky Nokia 3310. But back then the calling rate was extremely expensive so most of the time we only able to text or SMS. Come to think of it, I never complaint to text; in fact I love texting because it is more expressive than speaking. Those day I could stay awake in the middle of the night just to wait for a reply. That was how obsessed I'm to writing.

In my early university years, I decided to step in for blogging. I was writing about my daily routine for a year; both in cheers and flames. But it wasn’t till the third year, when more and more people discovered my blog and eventually I start getting question like “Blog updated?” from anonymous; I'd really feel like a newspaper editor at some time. Haha. Writing actually kept me from falling asleep and through writing I know a few more friends. And whenever I feel like sleeping at work, I open up my mailbox and happily replying emails. Of course, not all mails are happy one. The one I found happy to reply to so far is to my friends. The customer mails are normally not so friendly one; occasionally you will find some amusing one too.

From blogging about daily routine turning to monthly routine and it won’t be long before it turns to quarterly routine. Usually, I only write when I have something in mind but for the past few months I just let this something slip passed my mind. Before I knew it, I totally forget about it. Then I realize, I need to jot it down in my notepad. When I open my notepad today, it is an accumulation of keywords and frankly speaking, I don’t even know where to start with. So I decided to write a new one today.

As I said earlier, life first priority is working and when you work from nine to five, the only time left for you is to recharge. Sadly, blogging is not one of the recharging agenda. Once again, coming to such extent it is neither about keeping readers nor making pocket money anymore. I still blog because I love writing.

Thank you and best regards.

Of Money Thru The Net

Few words: It has been a while since my last visit to the gym and yes, I’ve gain weight; ALOT :(


Caution: This entry going to be one hella technical one. There will be some online trading terms that you might/not heard of, I’ll try my best to explain them to you. Enjoy!

The only good thing going to work every day is their paycheck. That’s the sole motivation to work and that’s what kicks my ass up early in the morning; not the alarm. The only negative of this is impulsive buying. Well you see, being a good paycheck receiver for almost four months now have indeed boost up my buying power. Just when your buying power is equal to those of a capable man; eventually you’ll lose control and start buying those silly little thing you don’t even want, yet still manage to cost you an arm, a leg or maybe a head. That’s when Bill Gates started to have houses he didn’t even know. But for my case, I’m a poor man to start with so I start looking for cheap stuff to buy. FML!

I can consider myself as an online bargain hunter; most of the gadgets I owned were bought via the internet so I can humbly say I’m quite a veteran in this. Of course, there are pros and cons buying through internet. I can’t say it’s totally free of risk; most of the time, it’s full of risk but it all depends on your judgement. I mean there are folks out there who really want to run a business and there are conmen out there as well.

You see, most of the internet-based business doesn’t need a shop; hence they’re able to sell their product at a cheaper price. Also, they deal in a larger volume and usually they manage to get all sorts of promotion and discount direct from the manufacturer, hence the cheapest you can get. All in all, they have more variety as they’re dealing on an open platform (read about globalization to understand this). From my previous experience, I save about MYR 300+ dealing online; some local trader can jack the price up by 20-40%. The drawback of this is you need to pay extra MYR 10-30 for the postage fees.

I’m not saying you must buy from internet; in fact don’t start one if you’re not familiar with this. Yet, I’m just suggesting you another option. But if you’re new towards this thing, deal above MYR 200 is off your story. The concept is simple; MYR 200 is better than MYR 2000 for a lesson. Don’t ever accept deal above MYR 200 unless it’s a COD (Cash on Delivery); simply means that you ask the trader out for a face to face dealing method. If you’re okay with the product you pay, otherwise you decline. Play safe! They can give you their FB, address or even their photocopy of their IC; but a cheat is a cheat. The golden rule is to always check their selling history and google their name, bank accounts and etc. If you’re doubt, even for one second; cancel the whole deal. Trust me, there are many cheaters out there.

Due to this impulsive buying, recently I ordered some (read: five) clothing from a pre-order bulk sales trader. Pre-order is basically a selling method by gathering a number of customers, then order in a bulk. The good side of this is you can save on the oversea transportation fees but the down side is you need quite a big number of customers to initiate the order. If the number is below the trader expectation, you might need to wait which is normally one or two months; but for my case, it’s only a day. Delivery arrived the next day; pretty good timing I guess.

Checked on the delivery and erh…this is my first time buying cloth online. The design is alright, the colour is good and the delivery is speedy; but you might want to add this in your rule book if you want to buy cloth online next time: check on their quality first (at least ask). SHAME ON YOU, SO CALLED VETERAN!

Still can wear la. Plus I get a free gift, albeit not useful to me :(
Perhaps my ol' roommate need it?

Office Weight Gain

Few words: When your life becomes routine, you’re exactly a machine. You've just replaced your life with AA size battery. Congratulations!


One of every white collar biggest fear is gaining weight. You can’t fight the gravity on this; I mean you’re sitting there eight hours a day with light to no movement. Why is that not possible? Of course you’re constantly typing, but the rule of thumb is if the task you’re doing doesn’t involve sweating, that can’t be considered a cardio exercise. Moreover, the air-cond is not helping at all. Hence you gain weight or to be precise: 99.9% extra virgin fat.

I have to come clean, I’ve indeed gain some weight; to be exact a sinful-shit-load of 3 kilos spare tyres. Because of this, I tell myself I must start exercising no matter what so recently I’ve start hitting gym again; albeit without success. Contrarily, I’ve gain one more kilo after going gym. FML!

Seriously I don’t know why this is happening to me. Let me just recall….

Let's see, this is my desk (default view - higher chances during audits).

And this is my desk (non-default view).

Yet, even till now, I still don’t know why I've gain weight despite all the exercises. I wonder where went wrong. Darn! Should I stop gym?

University's Sugar, Work's Grenade.

Few words: Maxis is giving me free call on my birthday, but I’m too busy to use it. FML!


Working life is so much different than university life. Metaphorically, it’s like comparing durian with mangosteen, both come in pair yet they taste totally another way. Same like working and university life, they often related but they’re totally different things.

In university, when a lecturer ask you a question. You raised up your hand high, you answer with pride to gain one mark. Extra marks will be given if you can give additional information relevant to the lecturer’s question. More marks will be given if you’re able to give reasoning to support your answer. But, if you still apply that in your working career, trust me, you won’t have any soon.

In working life, additional information or extra answer will only expose you for more questions. Don’t try to impress your customers by giving them your extra piece of your mind; that’s one way ticket to hell. Bear in mind, if you were to be frank with customer; you’re actually exposing the company secret. I’m not saying that you can’t tell, but think twice and think again for your salary sake. Although it’s unwritten but lying is a basic job scope for every employee. Feel bad about lying? Don’t worry; your paycheck already covers for it. If possible, try to give your customer whatever they want but still keeping it short and simple. Trust me, this is all based on my experience; I learned it the hard way though.

In university, when the lecturer asks for suggestion; you’re free to suggest. When you make a wrong suggestion, the class will laugh about it and that is it. In working life, when the boss asks for suggestion; you don’t make a voice if you have not done your homework. Suggestion is meant for management level only. Every suggestion you made mirror your IQ. If you make a wrong suggestion that day, they might refer you as retard for the whole year. Even if it’s a good suggestion; let’s just say a 5 stars suggestion. The boss will nod his head and asked you to execute your suggestion for a week and see how’s the outcome; ALL ON YOUR OWN. Now you see, why suggestion is only meant for management level because they can always ask somebody to execute his suggestion. Even if it is a bad one, the manager can always blame it to their subordinates.

In university, whenever you had trouble with your team members, you can always consult your lecturer. They are more than glad to help. In working life, whenever you had trouble with your team members, try to settle it ASAP. Never try to bring this case to the boss; there is this ‘first come first die basis’. The one that meet the boss first is usually the less independent one, and guess what? Bosses don’t like dependant staff. Golden advice from my boss “Identify those who slow you down, break their neck and close the case before it get to me”.

In university, your CGPA almost equal to your capability. High CGPA guys are well respected. In working life, you can trash your CGPA away, no one give a darn about it. You can have all the A’s you want even with a 4.00/4.00 CGPA but when you’re not performing, you’re only being labeled as epic phail nerd who only know how to read [fullstops].

Sigh! I missed university life, period; if at all possible with salary. But I'd enjoy Bacardi with assignments :-)

Work is an awful song

Few words: Yellow is the new crime. Ridiculously absurd! One thing that really bother me is why only youtube broadcasting the truth? Haih..so PO-Ri-TIK one.

I just got my first paycheck last two weeks and half of it already gone. People say the happiest day is when you get your salary, it’s indeed; but that happiness only last for a day.

Your job scope will get bigger so take this chance to learn more.

And I thought that is just another power-responsibility gimmick, you know so that the boss looks cooler in front of you. Nevertheless, that gimmick becomes reality somehow. No doubt, my job load is increasing day by day; from sitting there doing nothing to light document reviewing and finally to what every engineer do.

So, what do every engineer do?

I get this a lot, especially from my mum. For the elders, engineer is someone who repair machine, design machine, operate machine or build machine. If the machine my mum referring to is a computer, a mouse, a printer or a desk phone; the answer would be hell yeah, I operating them all day long. But I think the machine my mum referring to would be something twice or ten times my size, then sadly NO mum. Undeniably, there are engineer doing that but most of the ‘modern’ engineer nowadays is sitting in the office, clicking on the computer and filing customer complains. When I tell my mum what I’m doing every day, she then compares me to a PR officer. Yes mum, engineer is a PR officer with an engineering degree, no different.

Then why spend another year studying?

Maybe I have shitload time on my hand to kill? (Dead silent)

Working in a big company, like it or not, you have to work with a lot of people. That is when your social skill comes in handy. Just like when you’re in your university rushing your fellow lazy coursemate to finish their parts in some group report. That thing still haunts you even when you’re working. No doubt, there are lazy engineers too. When you talk to them about deadline, there would be 3 scenarios.

1. They ignore you.
2. They ignore you.
3. They still ignore you.

You see, when you’re a newbie, old engineers, technicians and staff take your word for granted. They treat you like a toddle; your deadline threat is weightless to them. That’s when you need to bring in the manager. Sometimes I would refer a manager as lubricant, just bring in the manager, and everything become so damn lubricating. Try CC the manager in the e-mail you send, guaranteed a reply in 5 minutes saying Yes Your Majesty. To start a mental war or just to add a few kilos to your deadline threat, you purposely phone that lazy engineer and tell them, you accidentally BCC their boss. That would be fun.

But still, one good thing of being a white collar office guy is you get treated occasionally; not every day though. Maybe once in a blue moon, when some big shot guy went on a business trip, they will bring some souvenir back. You know, just to brag how much they enjoy going on tour by company money. Even if they forget, I can guarantee you, they ‘die die’ also grab something from the airport souvenir shop. Why? Company money mar, no harm.

Of course, this is nothing if you compare to my previous boss who used to treat us secret recipe on our birthday. But even so, a treat is a treat. As long as it’s free, I’m happy :)

But it contains peanuts. Darn! *scratching*

Job Tales of A Knight

Few words: I don’t normally do this, but I will for today - Some stupid clerk of some university misread my brother's offer letter even after I triple check with him. We prepared everything and travel all the way there, but that stupid clerk regretfully comes out to make an apology saying he misread the letter. “GO DAI LA!”

ALKISAH...

There was a engineer knight who just come out from the academia. The knight then humbly submit his resume to every castles in his country with the hope of getting employed. Amazingly, just right after he graduated, a semiconductor company castle called for his service. With brave heart, he went through the numerous tests given by the King and by no time he was appointed as a QRA Knight in that castle. Being new to the castle, the King ordered his men to guide that knight. Each day, the knight went through boring hellish training in order to be capable to handle the customers’ complaint barbarian's attack.

The knight’s primary weapon would be his famous Microsoft Axe-cel, rumored that once used by Thor which is capable to calculate and plot millions of data into different charts and graphs. Wielding his Axe-cel, the barbarian is forced to distance themselves from the knight and this give the knight time to prepare excuses reasoning. To be honest, Axe-cel is already a familiar weapon to the knight; in fact, he had been using Axe-cel ever since he is in the academia. But of course, the purpose of wielding Axe-cel is so different now compare to merely for firewood chopping in the academia. The knight is also armed with Words-dom staff, Power-pointed lance and many more.

Also, every knight is blessed with a special ability by the Queen herself, and so does the new knight. He has granted with the skill to detect the country smallest defects with the help of a microscope lens. With that lens, the knight is able to see every minor crack up to 200 magnifications. For that reason too, the Queen has ordered the knight to train more just to master his new ability; that include his weekend. FML!

Above all that, the knight was also appointed to manage a team of operators soldiers. These soldiers is able to survive the most terrible scolding and still able to work for 12 hours a day with just a lunch or dinner break. The knight is truly amazed with the soldier's spirit, almost comparable to machine. With the aid from the supervisor head soldier and technicians lieutenants, luckily, everything goes just fine for the last two weeks. Of course every now and then, the soldiers will make some mistake. Once the mistake is sensed by the barbarians, they will start attacking the new knight without mercy. That’s the time when the knight start prepare statistic all sort of chanting with his Axe-cel to defend the castle; particularly himself.

Frankly speaking, the duty of the knight until today is still bearable, he only need to be on guard for 8 hours a day. Of course, the stingy King will not reward him more if he work overtime, but often it’s encouraged to work OT more by the royal family and maybe once in a blue moon, token of appreciation in term of medal will be given. So far, the job is still tolerable, but one thing the knight very beh tahan with is waking up early in the morning and drive his kancil ride his deer all the way to castle. It’s so tiring to wake up early, you know.

So if the King asked:

“Yes, you earned yours and please pay me now!”

Yours truly,
QRA Knight.

An Engineer's Life

Few words: As luck would have it, a boxer trained his whole life just for a few minutes fame on stage. Boxer’s life is something admirable.


You see, when you’re young, I’m sure your parent will inject this into your brain. Be a professional when you grow up whether a doctor, lawyer or an engineer. And hence, we without doubt filled this three in our ambition list every year. Engineer is somehow one of the top three jobs where every parent wanted their children to be. I’m not so sure with doctor or lawyer but an engineer?

I doubt.

Dear Parents,

To be an engineer, you have to study another year than most of the course out there but what you can earn is the same or even less than the other course. Let’s take business for example; many billionaires out there are successful businessmen, seldom are engineers. When you’re in form 3 doing your PMR, do you still remember the threat given by most of the teachers? “Get a good result if you don't want yourself ended up in an Art class” and hence we do everything we can just to not be in an Art Class.

Let me tell you what, the earning of those from Art stream be it a business, marketing or management is higher than us, engineer. You say engineer is a professional, yes we are but in term of financial, we are far behind than those from Art stream. I don’t understand why the teachers equalize Art Class with low grade; I bet some of them purposely fall short in their PMR.

Sadly speaking, to put this in work ecosystem, business student study to be an employer while engineering student study to be their employee.

Then, there is this professionalism issue. No doubt in the eye of society, engineer is a respected profession. Nevertheless, that is many years ago maybe in the 1970’s or 1980’s when there is still not much engineers. In 2011, engineers are everywhere. Yes, no doubt the professionalism is still there; that is when we do not tell them our salary. Once they know our salary, respect is still there but not for the professionalism but for the admiration of spending four years to earn less than other profession. Till today I still strongly believe that money represent everything including respect, you may say I’m a materialistic, but won’t everyone is like that today?

I bet Art Class students are laughing at us now.

Upon landing my first step in the job industry, I realize that engineer is just a title. You may be called as an engineer but what you did is just like everyone else. Being an engineer not necessary being someone wearing safety helmet reading plan like what describe in our kindergarten dictionary.

Realistically, being an engineer is no different than a normal office worker; you sit in the office waiting for lunch time, clicking on your FB when your boss is not around and happily going off work like everyone else. It’s sad to say but it’s true, if I were to put you in an office, you can’t differentiate who is an engineer and who is not because they look just the same.

As I’m saying this, I’m not referring to all engineers out there; I mean there are of course some engineers that can earn a lot more than Art stream student but I’m only saying this for the majority of the engineers out there. It might be wrong but that is what I observed as fresh graduate engineer.

The only good side of being an engineer is when you’re meeting your parents in law, you can always brag a little about your job since engineer in the eye of older generation is a well respected profession. Just don’t tell them your salary, nevertheless :)

Yours Sincerely,
Humble Engineer