Tag: taiwan

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the otnaicus daily

Edition 234 – A Heck Of A Week

The title of the post kind of describes my week. The week holds both ups and downs and I shall try to recap in this post.

Last Sunday, I had my first meal in a Taiwanese’s home. It was a gathering of friends and we had steamboat. Even though a lot of faces were strange faces to me and a couple of friends, I still enjoyed the evening thoroughly. Took tonnes of pictures of friend’s baby. The baby is very brave. Let so many people carry and yet not a single sound from him. A very outgoing baby indeed. Haha.

Then Monday came. And I was alone. My PM wasn’t around, away for reservist training. So everything thing to do with the project came to me. Meetings, documentation, following up on things, emails, conferences, etc. So much so that I didn’t have time to do any development work that’s currently on my table. But in the end, I felt that I accomplished something. That something is what one cannot achieved if one is sheltered by another person above. True, you get all the “arrows” and “knives” that are being thrown around but that’s how we grow. I guess being thrown into the deep end of the pool has it’s merits. You either sink or learn to swim very very quickly. I’m glad that I’m coping. But since I didn’t really keep track of the project very closely from the beginning, a lot of things I still have to consult with my PM and so I guess this weekend may have a long conference all with him in store.

And so, Friday is here. I’m glad for the rest that the weekends bring. Next week is one more week without the PM around. Hopefully I can get most things sorted out with him during the weekend while he’s out from camp. And hope next week is not such a taxing week. Thank God for his guidance throughout the entire week. Tiring but I think, to a certain extent, quite fruitful.

Time to get back to work. Until the next time, cheers… :Þ

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the otnaicus daily

Edition 232 – Long Overdue Edition

And so I’m back in Taipei. And plenty of things happened since my last entry and this one. Well, okay.. Not that many things. Just a couple worth mentioning and I shall mention them in this entry.

The CHCTV Expo Christmas Drama Team 2007

First and foremost, here’s the picture (above) of the Christmas drama team that I promised. Long overdue. I want to post more but then the fact that I’m in Taipei and the photos are not with me prevents me from posting more. Anyhow, there’s the fantastic Expo Christmas drama team, the one that I’m very proud of…

 CHCTV Appreciation 2007

On to the next event. The TV Ministry had it’s appreciation on 2 January 2008 at Settler’s Cafe, Holland Village. It’s a different kind of appreciation that the ones we’re used to. This time round, we gather, short speech and then it’s free and easy till the end. Lots of noise made as Settler’s Cafe, for the uninitiated, is a place where one can sit down and play various board and card games. One of the noisier games played that night: Taboo!!! Not many pictures taken. Just that one group photo I have and that group is not the TV Ministry’s full strength. We had a simple lucky draw at the end. 3rd prize was a $30 Takashimaya voucher, 2nd was $50 and 1st was $80. The amazing thing: all won by Saturday team members. It was pretty unbelievable though. But important thing was that we all had fun fellowshipping and making plenty of noise.

And that weekend, I flew back to Taipei. Week 1 of 4 is almost over and I’m looking forward to flying back for CNY. Productive week, I must say. And the next two weeks is going to be challenging because my PM will be away for In-Camp Training, a.k.a reservist. Hope nothing major crops up.

FL and WX in Taipei for the weekend. So going to hang out with them a bit while they’re here. It’s such a blessings to have friends coming up to Taipei while I’m here. Get to hang with them. Makes the time I spend here that much more bearable.

Sheesh, I make it sound as if I’m dying here. But I really am praying and hoping that it’s really going to end soon. I want to be back in SG permanently for a while and not just one month. I miss home. I miss church. I miss Debbie. I’m missing my friends’ weddings. And this time round, I’m missing my anniversary with Debbie. Argh!!!!

Okay, I shall stop complaining. It’s getting late and I shall head off to bed. Until the next time in the near near future, cheers… :Þ

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the otnaicus daily

Edition 227 – God Is Good!!

The day is finally here. I’m going back to Singapore tomorrow morning. Have been looking forward to this day since the day I arrived here. Praise the Lord that the day has finally arrived.

But…. God’s blessings doesn’t end there. This afternoon, my PM informed me that there is a change to the traveling schedule for us and that we would be back in Singapore for Christmas and New Year. Hey, that is good news indeed. But then in my heart I was thinking, I will still miss being involved in the Christmas production this year. Oh well, something is better than nothing, or so the saying goes.

Then I received the schedule on paper. My heart leapt. I would’ve jumped up and down if I was not in the office. The even better news? That I would not have to come back to Taipei until early next year!! Which means that I get to spend some time back in Singapore with my dearest, at church, with my cell group, etc. And also, I can get involved in Christmas Drama!! WOOT!!! You just can’t imagine how happy I am right now.

And after some shifting of flight bookings here and there, I managed to convince my boss to allow me and a colleague to purchase a promotional two-to-fly ticket from SIA. So when I come back to Taiwan next year, it’ll be on SIA. This is so exciting. After getting the news, not much mood left to work.

All I can say is: PRAISE THE LORD!!!! Until the next time, cheers… :Þ

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the otnaicus daily

Edition 226 – Frustrations

Going to unload a bit in this post, so pardon me.

It was a pretty decent day today except for one conversation over Skype that kind of drove me almost over the edge of losing my temper.

So here’s the situation. I was asked to make changes to a program that is used to submit a SMS or MMS for sending. And so I made the changes, tested the program out and it all worked fine and dandy. So I called my fellow developers who are going to use the program. And after a brief discussion, a comment was made that the changes did not meet what he had in mind. I was like can I read your mind? You never even tell me what you had in mind in the first place and I’m expected to know? And it’s not like this is the only thing I’m working on now. I don’t mind making changes, just let me know what is expected and I’ll try my best to work to what is expected. Argh….

Anyway, it’s all behind me now. Just wanted to rant a bit. Friday is fast approaching and I don’t want anything to spoil the mood. Looking forward to boarding that plane on Friday morning and zooming back to Singapore.

Until next time, cheers… :Þ

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the otnaicus daily

Edition 225 – 野柳, 台灣

yehliu_peninsula

So here’s the promised post about 野柳. As you can see from the panorama above, 野柳 is a peninsula situated along the northern coast of Taiwan. It’s an area filled with beautiful rock formations due to sea, and possibly wind, erosion. Went there with a colleague on 24 November 2007.

We made the journey by bus to the place. The bus ride takes about 1.5 hours and that’s excluding the time required for us to take public transport to the bus terminal. All in all, a one-way journey took as about 2 hours. And thank God for the good weather while we were there.

yehliu_queens_headThis place is also famous for a rock formation that is known as the Queen’s Head. Why? See picture left. Doesn’t it look vaguely like a queen’s head? Unfortunately, you can only see this outline from a certain angle. From another angle, it looks like a bird’s head. It took quite a while for us to take a picture with the Queen’s head. Tonnes of people were trying to take a picture. A Caucasian even tried to take a photo of the rock from afar using a 200mm lens. He held the camera and lens up for like 5-10 minutes before he finally got a picture. After a while I got pretty frustrated, just snapped a couple and went off. Couldn’t be bothered to get a quality picture without anybody in the background.

yehliu_compositeOne of my better-liked pictures on the right. Had to venture of a bit into a prohibited area to get this picture taken. It was just a perfect spot, what with a high vantage point and away from people obscuring the fore and background. The picture on the far right is a not-so-properly executed picture of me “lifting” the rock behind me. Oh well, it was a good try anyway. And of course, my favourite… Me sitting on the rock “meditating”. Just had to climb up upon that rock after seeing another guy do just that. The rock looks big but the surface area on which I was sitting is pretty small. Getting up there wasn’t a piece of cake either.

Here are just a small subset of the pictures I took. You can head over to my gallery to view more. I have some stitched panoramas there and I’ll be uploading some more pictures as soon as the gallery server allows me to upload more. So enjoy the pictures. Cheers…. :Þ