An exclusive interview with Mr McDou

The retrenchment wind has been blowing and the KPO Daily recently did an exclusive interview with the CEO of My Favorite Pork Group, Mc Dou.

Q: I heard your company is laying off staff. Are you undergoing a retrenchment exercise?
A: No, this is not a retrenchment. We’re just streamlining.

Q: Is this retrenchment and cost cutting?
Of course not, it’s just that we’re moving towards a leaner organisation. We are financially sound and have lots of money to burn.

Q: How many people will be affected, or retrenched rather?
A: All those who will be affected will be affected. I say again – there is absolutely NO retrenchment. My company is d*** rich and we can weather any storms. My butchers, chefs and all other staff are with me.

Q: How many butchers, chefs and other staff are you retrenching? What’re your compensation benefits?
A: I must say our benefits are competitive with the market rate. Oh oops…. I mean if we do retrench but since we aren’t, I can’t comment.

Q: Can we talk to one of your retrenched staff?
A: Of course not! You think I’m mad?!...ehem… I repeat, there’s absolutely no retrenchment! Which paper are you from again, you irritating fool!? I want to speak to your editor!!!

How suay can one get? – Faulty accessories and faulty service

My one-week old sony ericsson handphone couldn’t be charged all of a sudden this morning. The son was sick, of course mum was of course, very kan cheong. And so, she rushed down to one of the four sparsely located repair centres in wisma to have the boy checked. She was quite glad that was almost no queue. The service staff told her the fault lies with the charger BUT they couldn’t make a replacement today cuz they were stocktaking today. She offered to help charge the boy for half an hour to give him power that could last him for a day.

When mom went back to fetch the boy, the staff was out for lunch and no one else knew there was a patient resting at the counter, so they asked the mom to help herself. She reiterated the problem to a nonchalant staff who was serving a customer told her to come back to tomorrow and queue again. She was on the verge of using WTF in front of her son (bad education) when the first staff strolled back from her lunch.

The outcome? Come again tomorrow and look for her, no need to get in the line. And she strolled into the staff office.

Plans

I’m still full of germs, in my nose, throat and head. My friends said it’s the best time to tackle me (when my defence is down). But illness doesn't stop me from thinking...

Rumour has it that my company is retrenching, so I’ve had it all thought out (cuz even my boss advised me to look at recruit diligently)

If I’m one of those to disappear, I’ll:

• Make sure I can as many farewell lunches as possible (and spread them out through a course of 3 months while I look for another job)
• Ta pau some stationery from office
• Take some cup noodles from the pantry
• Stay at home and perfect the skill of cooking fish to outdo my mum
• Use the compensation $ to backpack to US and Canada, and set up a Chinese restaurant “Porky Express” to compete with Panda Express, earn enough $ and come back to Spore as a top 10 young entrepreneur
• Finally buy a laptop so i can finally update my facebook, apply for jobs and watch youtube.
  
  If I’m lucky/unlucky enough to stay:

• Try to push away or avoid workload re-distribution, and take my time to finish them
• Make an effort to find out why those who left, left
• Leave immediately when there’s good job offerSurf the internet in office

My mind is not blank

I can't think of anything today except this - plain bagel with philadelphia cheese spread... yum yum



Here's more.

The bandung way of life 粉红佳人

• Insist on having things YOUR way – whether you are right or wrong – stick to your principles.
• Never say sorry, even if you broke other people’s stuff, they have to appreciate the lucky parts that are intact. It’s these stupid people’s fault for showing their things to you or let you touch their stuff.
• Make yourself heard – when you are busy and people around you fail to notice, complain them to the boss for not offering help. Human beings should love one another!
• Take a nap after lunch, in the office – 休息是为了走更长的路.
• Jump at any opportunities for freebies, be it meals, or gifts etc – grab all you can to save $$$ 拿到好彩.

Conditions which resulted in Terms

Being in this company has made me think a lot. I’ve coined or applied some of the most ordinary but apt terms:-

The Daily Talk Show

We used to have a boss who called for daily meetings at 9.30am sharp, where only he talked and we listened and agreed whole-heartedly, and superficially. This was serious business and absolutely no latecoming be condoned. Otherwise, you would be questioned for “fumbling” (don’t know what that means till today). He also tolerated no “mickey mousey” work and expected everyone to have "concepts" and there was no hurry to complete projects beacuse things could always be done incrementally, everything was work in progress. In less than a month, we all became mickey mice.

Got the concept?

Self-help Group
After every daily talk show, the mickey mice would have their own self-help group meetings to share their woes, and to F*** this and that. Subsequently, the boss took the yellow bus home to Disneyland and under the era of another boss who was petering out at some point, there were also chaos and the remaining team and affected new members formed the green tea latte self-help group. Meetings took place at Starbucks which introduced the anti-stress drink.

Diving Suit
There’s a guy who loves to wear tight shirts and pants, so much so his clothes cling onto his body like a diving suit, even his biceps can’t save the day.

Find that Female Dog!

One of my colleagues (yes, just colleagues) read my blog on the stars lookalike and threw in a few brilliant suggestions. She also spotted George Lam, Bae Yong June and Sadako. Besides stars, she also found a bichon (a breed of dog but sounds like Bitch-on) in this photo. We thought she looks more like a poodle. Place of origin: TK Land.



Anyway, the answer is at http://limology.blogspot.com/

My Kind of Guys

1) Multi-talented, versatile actor. I like him since 《大时代》.

(the non-RA one on the right hor sucking coke)

2) Any idea who this is?

That's HIM! You just feel happy n can't stop laughing when you see his face.

Here's an interesting and funny interview on him http://asianfanatics.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t199842.html

3) Charming

No, not Tom Cruise.

How deep is my love for him? i named the snowy owl that appears so very often in my blog "Tom Hanks".

4) Irresistible

The Ox-bridge grad - Genius! More pictures http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&q=mr+bean&gbv=2

Powerful colorful test

I talked to someone recently and she said becos of some change in her company, she has lost her power and people started showing their true colours. Anyway, as the wise men (who are mostly dead) had said:

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. -Abraham Lincoln

Personality can open doors, but only character can keep them open. - Elmer G. Letterman

So the best test of “colour” and friendship will be to relinquish your powerful and wealth (that is if you have any). I’m glad and maybe not so glad that I don’t have these happy problems. Damn!

My bilingual standard

This entry is to prove to my colleague I really can read and write (and type) in Chinese. I thought the translation of jokes and the rougher language between English and Chinese (which was actually a translation module) can be a good show-off. Let me try:
Damn you = 他妈的
A**hole =王八蛋
F*** = The closest match is still the Q word in Cantonese

I can never forget my American lecturer, Mr St XX, who taught in Mandarin and has a Chinese name 沈XX. He always encouraged us never be shy to use the “F***” word cuz it’s not a bad word but an expression of emotions.

“Come on class, say it with me, loud and clear… Say F***!” I’m glad I’ve not disappointed him, and I thank my friends we have been so encouraging and spontaneous.

Actually, 骂粗话没什么了不起的，能指桑骂槐，语带双关才是最高境界！

Stars Found!

The most entertaining part of my job or being in the company rather, is star watching. They come from all walks of fame from HK to Japan to Hollywood. Some photos to make you envious.

HK

This is a 99% William So lookalike.

JAPAN

Hamtaro and friend, Bunny (which is just a common animal found in any pet shop).

Oops, they’re actually dating the same guy!

HOLLYWOOD

Made for Hollywood: Can he not score 100% for this?

Secret Agents

There seems to be a surge of secret agents around me recently. I met an ex-colleague and he told me he just left his job. My next natural question was “Where will you be going?” He was tight lipped but he tried his best: "Malaysia". So I asked “Is it the public of private sector?” He said I would know in due course. Sounds like top secret, so it’s probably the FBI but my friend said possibly the Interpol.

I met up with an old friend recently and we were updating each other, sharing what we knew about other friends. Some of our friends are said to be leading ambiguous lives, so we have appointed each other to investigate from different sources. I now call him 007. My sources are currently off the line but he assured me that they will fall into our traps soon. Oh yes, I am 001.

Count your hair.... I mean hairstyle

Here’s how my hairstyle (we still call it "style" whether or not there is "style") has changed over the past 2 years.


2007: The mushroom head -my friends esp gals prefer me in this hair. Maybe I’ll go get some wigs. Dunno why this woman so scared of me.









When I bun it up, I look like a confident auntie.












2008: chopped off my hair – I prefer this carefree, easy to manage short hair. Good for travel – don’t even need to wash my hair!











The jagged fringe. Mc Dull is oblivious to my hair style, whatever it is.












The hair gets in your eyes fringe (pls ignore those people around me) . Some grumpy looking guy must be envious of my hair.

But glad my trademark – the big head remains.

Friends

Me and my old friend used to hang out as a group, as often as few times a week or every day. ALL the couples in the group have broken up (some became enemies) and each leading his/her own life, some more exciting than the others (keep changing partners). I was quite upset at first but such is life! And those you thought would be friends forever have totally vanished! The so-so ones are the dark horses ad I hope it’s friendship for a long long time to come.

But new groups of friends will come along! Today is a gift, that’s why we call it the present!

And who would have thought that a nocturnal owl can become friends with an eternally sleeping pig?

The US men and women I love

These were the wonderful men and women I met in the US. I can’t give them a miss again!


A road marshal at Yosemite Park.








The performers at Disneyland and it’s sister park - California Adventure Park who seemed to enjoy every second at work. Disneyland really seemed to be the happiest place on earth!










The technician who came up to me when I had problem with the Disney coin machine, repaired it and offered me a penny to slot into the machine. He knew I was trying to take his photo while he was working on the machine, so he paused to pose for me!





And there was this nice black Muni (bus) driver we met in San Francisco in March but didn’t take his picture. Now I ready can’t recall how this helpful, friendly driver looked like but definitely not Obama. He got us out of the Presidio (the park leading in to the Golden Gate Bridge) even though he just happened to pass by (for a toilet break) and not supposed to stop, otherwise we would be strapped there for an hour before the next bus came. And before we alighted, he said ‘God bless you”. Sooooo nice! Thank you!

Made for USA

I 'm back in Singapore for barely a week from my 2-week USA holiday and I miss the US already! The past few days, i've been sleeping b4 ten and waking up at six plus and reaching office before 8.30am (this is what really bothers me).


It was scorching in LA the first few days we were there, then our jackets proved to be too thin for San Francisco and Las Vegas. We had to queue a good 45 mins under the hot sun for the latest finding nemo submarine ride. I tell you – going into the underground air-conditioned capsule was heavenly!

Hate hate hate group tours and will never do it again cos it’s all about coach rides!. What was worse – the tour guide was a Taiwanese who pronounced “almond” as “amen”. I was glad he used mandarin as the first language! A newly wed couple from Singapore joined the tour for their honeymoon… so romantic???

Anyway, I skewed the itinerary whenever i could and opted out of those optional tours (basically bus tours that passed by an area and you take photos from the bus that came with additional charges and the tour guide was obviously not too happy about) and combed Beverly Hills, Hollywood and downtown LA and even ate the Pink’s hotdog! We caught mamma mia in Vegas and with the limited time we had there (only evenings were free), we did hotel hopping (both the posh and sleazy ones) till past midnight the 2 days we were there.

Ok… now for the highlight… on my connecting flight from Tokyo to LA, I went to the toilet which has this huge sign that said “please close door gently”, which I did… and the door came down on me! 2 air stewardesses rushed in to see if I was ok. Then they cordoned off the area.

Anyway, some 30 photos of the 1500++ i took http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLanding.action?c=154cfbnf.70b2ju0r&x=0&y=-srxzth&localeid=en_US Can't put up photos of posters of nude gals.

And d*** the trans island 857 driver who drove off the suntec bus stop before i could even make out the bus no. 2 days ago. It was almost 7pm, tired and hungry as i was and he parked so close to the bus in front of him, stopped there for a few seconds and swerved out of the bus lane and drove off. Bet he couldn 't even see if there were passengers approaching. Anyway, the bus company's feedback mechanism is useless cuz i had this problem 2 years, sent in my feedback and the same old thing still happens. Wonder why they still bother to have the feedback channel around.

Family Dinner, plus a colleague

We had a family dinner recently. Go to our invited guest's blog for the details http://www.limology.blogspot.com/

<-- My painless husband.

F1 Night Race Was Great!??

Nice picture of Singapore's skyline yah? I took this at my company's F1 party last friday. Our office has a good view of the circuit so there we were. Food was ok, company was good and we could see the cars zooming by (but not which was which). They looked like specks of dust from the 37th floor and

when night fell, all the camera could capture was the 2 lighted tracks.

And it was minutes of boredom after the cards passed these 2 tracks we could see, before the cars sped past in seconds. But indeed, it was thrilling to hear the roar of the engines - live.

I was quite proud to tell (i.e boasting) some of my frens about the party (b4 it happened) and they happily told me they had THE tickets to the races.

Hurray F1!!!

Actually, doesn't Little India look just as good as the city at night?

If I struck lottery

I was watching tv recently and there's this Euromillions lottery across 9 countries in Europe. So those who bought the tickets (we can call them the hopefuls or the gamblers) were asked what theyintended to do with the $$$ if they won the USD27 million lottery (I think so). And one British man said he would give part of his winnings to Lehman Brothers. SOme gals said they would buy a pony.

For me, i would probably start a company and employ the people I hate.

Have fun with your bosses!

After telling you howboring my office, here's some fun and joy to share. First, some top guy in my company said "a SET of twins". It's like a set of chopsticks, a set of team, a set of people and a set of eyes.

And here's something more - A picture says a thousand words.

Someones, but i won't who, have been bringing joy and laughter to the office with photoshop. We went beyond work.

May I present to you my "new" boss - Kungfu Peter

as well as master wu gui, the tortoise, now turtle






My boss has seen all these, and he seems to be enjoying all the attention.

Enjoy the weekend!

Use my brains!

I'm so bored at work working on the nothings... can die. And this morning, the aircon died... added on to my woes. I'm also becoming more stupid each day. The only comfort is the Recruit section in ST everty Saturday and recently one more to assure myself that i can still think - I actually came up with this while watching tv - which is the most environmentally friendly animal?

(Scroll down)







It's the kangaroo! (cuz it carries its own bag around). I'm really intellectually deprived, isn't it?

Oh yes, and the manager from Chan Brothers finally called to apologise after seeeing my letter in the ST forum the same day. He said it was all his agent's fault. He had told him to look into the matter but he forgot all about it, busy preparing for the upcoming travel fair. The manager promised to mail us a cheque for the exchange rate difference and even took down my address. And it has been 3 weeks since we spoke. Maybe he needs another letter to remind him so he can remind his agent? Besides using his brain, he also needs to use his heart.

Chan Brothers - Fly-by-night

In early March this year, my sister and I wanted to book a free and easy holiday to the US for mid March, so we went to an established travel agency, Chan Brothers Travel. The trip to Portland and San Francisco was wonderful but the experience with Chan Brothers was unexpectedly disappointing.

We had enjoyed a two-night stay at the Mark Spencer hotel in Portland until we checked out. The hotel staff refused to honour the hotel voucher issued by Chan Brothers, saying that they were unaware of the arrangement. We tried explaining to them that the accommodation had been paid for in Singapore as part of the package, but to no avail. The hotel suggested we make the payment first and then seek a refund from our travel agency when we return to Singapore. As we were in a hurry to catch a flight, we had no choice but to settle the bill on our credit card.

Upon coming back to Singapore, we reported the case to Chan Brothers. We specified the refund be made to us in Sing dollar. They did manage to us get a direct refund from the hotel to our credit card but it was in US dollar and due to a difference in the exchange rate, the refund was S$15 short of what was debited. We went back to Chan Brothers but they said there was nothing they could do. They were unable to compensate us the difference. The tour officer that helped us book the tour package and whom we subsequently called, always seemed freaking impatient over the phone and in his emails, and it has been almost two weeks since he informed us that his manager would contact us on the exchange rate matter.

To Chan Brothers, S$15 may be a small sum (at least that was the impression we got) but that is not the point!!! We do not think it is fair for consumers to bear the extra cost due to miscommunications (or lack of it) between the travel agency and its hotel. The explanation given to us was there was problem with the computer system.

I thnk it might have been better to travel with the fly-by-night travel agencies at People's Park than with the cannot-make-it Chan Brothers. Or do your own booking online.

Ways to experience San Francisco

Hey there, I went to Portland San Francisco 2 weeks ago and have MY way to enjoy the hilly city (i.e SF).

Take the cable car, ride up and down SF, especially the stretch bewtween fishermen's wharf and union square, be entertained by the 2 drivers onboard and watch them change the direction of the cars at the terminals.

Try to find the free Presidio Downtown at the Embarcado station (bus stop rather hard to locate), take it to the Presidio Visitor Center and change to the Presidio bus to see the Golden Gate Bridge. Free one.

Don't worry if you lose your in the Presidio, just look out for this friendly, superstar lookalike Muni (no.43?) driver who tries his best to give directions and takes you THERE.

Eat dim sum at Chinatown (siew mai at Hoang Ah, Pagoda St is great but provided u can locate it), then walk up and down the hilly district to burn some calories. Chinatown in SF is like HK in the 70s and 80s. Reminds me of Sheung Wan. Look out for the "Goach" bags

Visit Alcatraz and learn how to escape from the prisons.

Shop at Union Square and especially at Old Navy...catch the weekend sales. I bought 4 pairs of shoes at one goal

MUST go UC Berkeley, talk to some smart people there and not forget to try out the wonderfully tasty gigantic honey oatmeal sandwich from cafe montessori along telegraph ave. Amoeba music is worth a visit

For cartoon junkies, catch the simpsons and the family guy on tv in the evenings. Lose some moral values

Take the F line streetcar to catch a glimpse of the city, then spot some blacks and homeless yelling or maybe fighting along 6th and 7th Market Street, striking crowd...

Go to Ferry Plaza Market if you can spare some time

Must drink Starbucks. Everyone has a cup in their hand, so don't lose out (bring your kiasu-ism with you). Coffee especially comforting in winter (it was 5deg when i went).

Try to meet some new friends on the plane ride to Japan, most of them are Japanese. Remeber to learn some manners and bring them back to Singapore. Will talk about Portland later when i'm in the mood.