my weekend roundup & emails

It has been a busy week and I was hoping that I could catch up with my blogging last weekend. I’ve got so many things to blog about but I didn’t have enough time. One thing are the loving goodies I received from Odette. I received my orders of lunchcards about two weeks ago. I’ll blog about it maybe this week if I have some spare time.

What made me busy aside from work?

Hubby was sick all weekend. It started last week Thursday when he was having persistent colds. Friday came, he was having slight fever and some dry coughing. Saturday, he’s feeling all sore and chilly that he needed to wear his pajamas and a sweater with fox fur to keep him warm.

Our Friday and Saturday were spent with foodies, DVDs and lots of sleeping. Just looking at Hubby dozing off after taking his medicines, my eyes also get droopy at the same time.

Last night, I was so worried of his rising temperature. Every two hours or so, I would suddenly wake up to check on him, like if he needs a new shirt as he sweats heavily even if he’s telling me he’s cold. I gave him a cold press on his forehead to minimize his temp. After several cold presses, his temperature finally came to “almost normal” (as I don’t have a thermometer at hand).

I feel relieved this morning when I touched his neck and forehead. It was a brand new experience for me as Hubby seldom gets sick.

Luckily, I still managed to grab some 5 hours (all in all) of sleep throughout the night. It’s not really good to have your first day of the week, at work, feeling all sluggish then dozing off to your desk by noontime. It’s global crisis everywhere and there is no complete assurance that your job is still there when you wake up from your “dozing off to your desk” moment.

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In the office, first thing I do among my morning routines is to open my Outlook and check for incoming mails. I had five in my Inbox:

1. First one was sent by a colleague last Friday (8 May). So that means she went to work on a Friday? (which is equivalent to a Sunday). Anyways, it was about me moving on the other side of the building where I’ll be sitting next to this colleague. New office. New seatmate.

2. Second mail was sent by my guy friend P yesterday (9 May) at 1:58 AM! P works for an audit firm and the reason he’s still awake at this hour is because of audit deadlines. We were supposed to go out last Friday but he cancelled it since his manager had asked him to work in the weekend.

3. Still on 9 May, third one was from my boss. This, of course, is work-related.

4. Fourth one was from my other guy friend who is love-struck to my other girl friend. He just sent one of those forwarded mails with big “.wmv” attachments. Subject: The VocaPeople. I haven’t opened it yet due to the fact that the speakers of my office PC are disabled. I dunno why.

5. And the last one was from a former colleague who now works in the island of Cayman. She sent me an invitation to twit with her in the Twitter world. Unfortunately, Twitter is blocked in the office. “Tin don’t worry, I’ll twit you na lang sa Plurk. Lol”

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Right now, I am waiting for the IT guy to get my things (PC, files and office thingies) moved on my new office with my new seatmate.

And I hope I won’t forget to send an invitation to Tin (to plurk instead).

it's the same crisis

Here’s another Quarter-Life Crisis article e-mailed to me by a friend last year.

Beware: Long read!

Quarter-life crisis
By Gena Valerie Chua

I first heard it three months after graduation, over lunch with college blockmates.

Blockmate 1 (earns twice as much as any of us): I'm depressed. Work sucks. Is there any job that sucks more than mine?

Blockmate 2 (recently quit his job): Mine did. I was bored every day. I'm applying abroad. Do you know how much you can earn there?

Blockmate 3 (confessed bum): Money isn't worth your unhappiness. You should be dating more, I'll set you up with a friend.

Blockmate 1 says: But how can I be happy without money? Great dramatic sigh, I'm having a quarter- life crisis. Who are you setting me up with?


And there it was, the mystifying term that single-handedly captured our 22-year-old chaos. At first it sounded funny, but when the thought sank in, we were all quiet for an uncomfortably long period of time. Did we have it too?

Since then, I've heard the phrase thrown around a lot. After graduation get-togethers have been surprisingly frequent. It could be a withdrawal symptom, you're all desperate to hold on to the certainty you had in school. Now that everything has become so unstructured, we cling on dearly to the people whom we shared such carefree, and sometimes
careless days with. We reminisce about how our lives used to be, and how they are now. Many of us are in our third or fourth jobs. More and more are leaving the country to "find greener pastures," joining that ever-growing diaspora like spores drawn to more fertile ground.

There is a shared sense of "lostness," not because we have nowhere to be. No, we are all lucky enough to be somewhere, but most want to be somewhere else. Everyone tells us we are meant to be great, or at least achieve a slice of greatness. We are of that generation, the generation that has it all. The generation that never had to work for anything because it's all instant and automated. The natural expectation to surpass those before us poses an unnerving problem: What happens if we don't?

Maybe the pressure has been there for centuries, but never like this. The world used to be enormous, a planet of rocks we only see in science books. But now the world is shrinking.

Everything, everyone is within reach. The overwhelming proximity of it all has turned us claustrophobic. Wherever we find ourselves becomes too small a place. We are always looking for that something, the thing that will supposedly match our destined greatness.

Upon writing this article I decided to Google the term. Lo and behold, the omniscient Wikipedia had some interesting answers. Quarter-life crisis is a medical term for the phase following adolescence, usually for ages 21-30.

Some "symptoms" include:
(1) feeling not good enough about one's job
(2) frustration with relationships
(3) insecurity about life goals
(4) nostalgia for school
(5) a sense that everyone is doing better than you.

Furthermore, the stage occurs shortly after young, educated professionals enter the "real world", when they realize that it is tougher, more competitive and less forgiving than they imagined.

So it's not a 21st century thing after all. Ah, but Wikipedia doesn't stop there. It goes on to say that today, "the era when having a professional career meant a life of occupational security has come to an end." Indeed, it is no longer enough to get a well-paying job and do it for the rest of your life.

The lines used to be clearly drawn: you were a dentist, a doctor, an engineer, a businessman. Today, things are not as black and white. Our "real world" is now literally the entire world. We take our internships in multi-national corporations, study abroad on exchange programs, and attend art seminars in New York . We find worldwide options exceeding the imagination of those before us: techie jobs in Silicon Valley, trading in the Hong Kong stock market, even advertising for Google in hidden GoogleLand. I had a classmate who took up forensics in Maryland, while another one graduated from a famous fashion school in London . We are constantly considering so many options, debating which ones we can qualify for and which ones will ultimately help us define ourselves.

Older folks say this is generation me, me, me. We want it all now, now, now — even when we really have no idea what we want. So we end up wanting it all. They (my parents, friends of my parents, parents of my friends) shake their heads in disapproval at our inability to stay in one job.

They say we can't stand any ounce of discomfort, any morsel of unhappiness. It's true. We are impatient, always fleeing from one place to another — because that is what we grew up doing. Change has always been inevitable, but if there was ever a time when each year sees changes that used to span a century, this would have to be it.

As adolescents, none of our music icons had the longevity of The Beatles — every three weeks it was a new genre of sound. One minute we were shrieking fans of the Backstreet Boys, and the next we were cult followers of Matchbox 20. We have no memory of dinosaur computers; to us everything runs at 5Mbps. Our shelves of Britannica have gathered dust; we only have to go to YouTube and streams of video would unravel. We had the networking craze Friendster, but even that didn't last.

Soon we were creating separate accounts for Multiply, Facebook and self-blogs. We shop on sites of local strangers and order via cellphone banking. Oh yes, don't even get me started on cellphones. They have rendered everything else useless: watches, cameras, music players, calculators, dictionaries, even mirrors.

Every time the world changes a part of itself, we've had to change along with it. I'm not saying we should go back to the era of i'll-be-waiting-two-weeks-for-your-snail-mail. I cannot leave the house without my phone. Maybe we've become little brats of technology, the spawn of an age always trying to outdo itself. If patience is a virtue, then the remarkable deficiency of it has become our unconscious vice. Our adult lives are an extension of our adolescent years, when coolness was attained by downloading mp3s of a newbie rock band before everyone else did. We are always on the move.

We are fickle-minded, discontent and extremely volatile — which according to Wikipedia, are natural to those in their 20's. But to be in your 20s at a time when clients at work are Australians you will never see past email correspondence, then it becomes a world that gives you only two choices: move, or get left behind.

We are expected to march out into the world with iPod in backpocket, one earphone pounding against an eardrum. With our bountiful gifts from mother technology and our cross-cultural media grub, we're supposed to find a way to make ourselves great. Now more than ever, we have to prove ourselves worthy of the time we were born into. So who can blame us, for wanting to run all the time? The pressure is immense. So much is running
after us and worse, there is so much we are trying to keep up with. Like the reluctant monster Incredible Hulk, we are always growing out of proportion, our clothes tearing as we expand. And so we run, gasping for air, looking for a place that can contain us.

I'm grateful for being born in an era that constantly pushes itself forward. But we were raised in a period long past mere survival, where the worst blunder you can commit is not so much failure but mediocrity. And so we make this plea: don't be so hard on us. It may now be less challenging to defy boundaries, but the world out there is still as tough as ever. Let us have our little crisis; spare us the time that we never seem to have enough of. Give us the chance to find our own corner, where we can dig and shovel and bury ourselves in.

Because when the clouds clear up — when we can finally stop twiddling our thumbs and wringing our hands in restlessness — you will see what we have built out of our chaos, and you will be damn proud.

screwed up

while i usually enjoy a short relaxing nap on the bus, last night was different. one of my bus-mates forgot his shot of depressant that he got so hyper he won't let anyone in the bus to sleep. he kept bugging all of us with his jokes, non-sense blabberings [since he speaks Hindi most of the time] and loud singing.

the bus was also on a happy state last night on our way home but we got caught up in a heavy traffic after some 15 minutes on the road. what more could get worst on my excited weekend happiness. the usual one hour ride home took us two hours! it has dampen my spirits in the end.

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still on the bus.

an hour after we left the office, that hyper guy started a heated discussion with the other bus-mates on South Indian movies that for him are exaggerated and funny in a bad way. all of them are talking all at the same time. Mrs. S and I were wondering if they ever understood each other's opinion on the subject matter. it was like chaos. Mrs. S thought that we were on a fish market. I thought it was funny and irritating at the same time.

thirty minutes later, i was the one on the hot seat. Mr. S asked me to translate "sexy" to Tagalog/Filipino. I said it's also "seksi", just a different spelling. he wondered why it has to be the same. and i told him i don't know.

few weeks ago, this same guy asked me several words to translate in our Philippine mother tongue but i would refuse to do so on some words that are "bad".

anyways, this guy just keeps on challenging me so he came up with a phrase instead of words.

mr. s: so how do you say "life is screwed up" in your language?
me: what? ahmm, wait....
mr. s: "life is screwed up". you don't know?
me: [looooonnngggg silence]................[gawd! i'm struggling with words i can't find]
mr. s: are you sure you're a Filipino? [laughing]
me: yes i am but i don't know how to translate such a metaphor in our language. hmmm...can i have it as an assignment?
mr. s: oh my goodness, she's not a Filipino...hahahaha!
me: hehehe,,,bye bye! have a nice weekend [bidding goodbye to my busmates as i stepped out of the bus]

outside the bus...
me: whoooooooooooooooh! [long sigh]

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this afternoon, i sent text messages to my friends about my "assignment".

friend 1's translation: "palpak ang buhay"

friend of friend 1's translation: "magulo ang buhay"

friend 2's translation: "ang buhay ay turnilyo"

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how about you? can you help me please?

"life is screwed up"

a feel of india

this morning, Mrs. S hopped-in on our company bus wearing a nice striped yellow traditional dress for Indian women called Salwar kameez. and upon seeing her jewelries and bangles? Wow! all matching with the yellow golden color of her dress. including the bindi.


she asked me if i want to try putting a bindi on my forehead and i was a bit apprehensive about it since i don't want curious eyes to question me in our workplace. but anyhows, Mrs. S managed to pull out one long golden bindi from her purse and put it on my forehead. Mr. Sj approved of it as he thinks it's cute and pretty in me. but the other indian guy, Mr. B, argued that it's better if i have the round one with black color because the gold one won't be visible in a distance of 5 meters. anyhows, they still liked it and even took pictures of me to show it off with our officemates.


*shame*

i looked at myself in the mirror and i have admitted to myself that it really looks nice. but since the golden color complements my skin, it's almost unnoticeable.

some of my officemates actually took second glances when they noticed i was wearing bindi.

i took it off after lunch and decorated my puncher with it. :)

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bindi is a decoration applied on the center of women's two eyebrows. they have varying colors which you can match with your colorful Salwar kameez. they also have varying sizes and designs. you can have the bead-like, the plain ones or the studs. anyone can pretty much use the bindi as a fashion statement, unlike before when it's only meant to symbolize a woman being married or sometimes, as part of a religious affiliation or ceremony. [Source][picture]

Salwar Kameez [Source]

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Update: according to my Hindu officemate, the red round bindi symbolizes that your husband is still alive. if you're a widow, you only wear the black round bindi. she also said that there's a nerve in between the two eyebrows and so the bindi serves a protection from anything harmful. in addition to the bindi, Hindu married women also put red powder on their forehead where the hair parts. that red powder is called kumkum.

going filipini

this week, i've met two newly-hired filipinos in the office, Ms. R in regional finance and Mr. J in IT.

yay!

is the company having a transition here?

i was thinking [and a lot of Pana** officemates, too] that the company is going Kabayan this year. even in the company bus lately, i hear them [in their language] talking [and wondering, i think] why our very small population is increasing. except for the occasional english conversation they have, i don't understand them most of the time so i'm not sure what they really think about this recent move of the company.

to think that there is a recession, why are we hiring new people? and new people here means filipinos being hired.

this was the latest talk of the town and i don't care if they feel threathen with our growing presence [if that's how you call 10-15 filipinos roaming around the dubai office out of more or less 200 employees]

here's a little statistics report [not official, just based on my judgment?] in our dubai office:

50% -- pana
40% -- lebanese
8% or maybe less -- filipinos [or filipini as the arabs call us]
2% -- others

i remember one conversation from two pana officemates while we were in the company bus going home to sharjah.

pana 1: [talking to pana 2] have you seen the new employee hired in the accounts [finance]? i've heard she's a filipino.
pana 2: yeah i've heard that one but i haven't seen her. [then turning to me] is she your friend?
me: nope. i haven't met her yet but Ms. J told me she's part of the regional finance. maybe tomorrow i'll come by her cabin.
pana 1: are you filipinos good in finance?
me: yeah. not only in finance but also in other fields. we've got a lot of good nurses, doctors, engineers, teachers in the philippines and also abroad. why?
pana 1: coz in my previous company there were also a lot of filipinos but they are mostly secretaries or receptionists.
me: well you haven't met the rest of the filipino professionals here in uae. [almost in fighting mode] besides, i'm also in the finance department.
pana 2: [to pana 1] maybe that is why there are hiring filipinos now in accounts coz those lebanese [who are the bosses] know they are good.
me: just last week, my lebanese boss had asked me if i have a friend who is good in accounts [finance] and should be Filipini.
pana 2: they're still hiring?
me: i think so.

[i saw myself grinning in my window reflection]

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**pana = indian

express lane

everybody in the office are surprised that people from sharjah came early.

office timings start at 9am.

we came at 8am!!!

i was half-asleep already when we took the al wahda road (sharjah) at 7.45am. then before taking the ittihad road, the bus should be taking a right turn going to al khan area. the bus never took the right turn. it went straight up to ittihad road and has never slowed down a bit. my eyes flew open the moment i realized this and at first i can't believe that we were taking the road that is usually heavily congested with vehicles bound to dubai. road-blocks gone, the road was clear and it was like a friday (weekend here)!

The RTA's project that began in 2006, completion is targeted on June 2009.

i think the RTA deserves the thumbs up today for a job well done. their al ittihad road project, even if it's not yet 100% complete, is already working well. from the usual 1 and a half hour trip/traffic, it was down to 15 minutes only!

the downside for me today? i did not have my usual 1-hour sleep time in the bus. even my colleague clara is sleepy already.

why i haven't blogged for 11 months (Part 2)

July 2008
busy with job-hunting in this very strange world. sending our CVs through e-mail and company websites. busy browsing the classifieds and making phone calls to headhunters. and braving the almost 40 degrees hot and humid dubai for walk-ins and scheduled interviews. almost every night before going to bed, hubby and i were doubting our sanity for coming here without secured jobs. then we'll end up either missing pinas or ranting about the bad smell all over the place (outside the flat).

mid-July 2008
got my job as an accountant in a trading company, which actually pays well. i thought i was on my happiest coz i need not worry anymore for jobhunting. but lo and behold, it's like my worst nightmare coming to life for the next 3 months of my dubai adventure! i realized this on my very first day. but i just kept telling myself that i am brave enough to face anything and everything in that company. hubby got the bad vibes, too! and asked me to back out. but then i was too proud to back out. it's one thing i both regret and not (see November 2008).

August 2008
my job was very demanding. actually, the boss is, who is a lebanese but would brag about being americanized just because he studied in the US for college! for everyday, i would need a good enough reason to convince myself that i love my job. i actually love the job but not the boss and the very heightened working environment my boss is imposing around the company. he yells at you, slams the door, throws a pen or a heap of papers, curses you, degrades the filipino people, tells you you're stupid, tells the whole staff that filipinos are stupid but 90% of his staff are filipinos and would not hire any other nationality! duh!!!

on the first week of the month, an indian accountant got fired for a very simple reason: the indian took home the warehouse keys because the office was already closed when he got back from the warehouse. and the one they replaced for him, liza, also a pinay, got fired on the last week of the month just because the poor girl can't take the yelling and the cursing. she was a nervous "cry baby" (as i quote my boss) everytime she sees him. it was pure hell everyday but i could proudly say that i had stormed it. not a single drop of tear.

on a happy note, hubby got a job, too!

September 2008
ramadan it is. happiness it should be because we had shortened work periods. instead of the usual 8.30 to 6.30, we were having 8.30-4.30. yes, i could have been happier but no. it was my worst nightmare! i would be asked by the boss to go to the office by 7am (and i live at sharjah that time!) for morning finance meetings, re: month-end FS, supplier updates, project contracts, bank guarantees, import LCs, forex rates, forward rates, collections, payments, etc. meetings are very time-and-energy-consuming. i'm almost out of my wits everytime. meetings would usually start before lunchtime (around 10 or 11) and would end after 4-5 looonnnggg hours of blabbers and yellings (from the boss, as expected). then he'll be out of the office for some time. and just before the clock strikes at 4.30, the phone will be ringing asking me to stay until he arrives in the office. the moment he comes, he'd make me do this and do that task after task. he would not even bother to ask you if it's okay to stay until the wee hours of the evening! that was at the same time as trying to be as numb as i can be for his really bad temper. even if there's really nothing wrong, you'll get yelled out at your face. the worst time i had was having lunch at 5pm (that was me without breakfast)! i remember calling my friend grace crying over the phone for the cruel boss i have. i pitied myself so much that i couldn't finish my pack lunch. i just cried while grace would try to give me encouraging words that God would not give me something that i can't handle. that kept me up just for that night because the following days were still very vivid to me that just narrating it here makes me go back to my nervous and traumatic days.

mid-September 2008
it was the 15th of the month and supposedly, i should be celebrating my 2nd month in the company. that morning, my boss was having a fit at all the staff. he was mad angry about anything and everything he sees. and even if there's nothing virtually wrong, he would find something to be angry about. he was really mad! an hour before lunch, my boss called for me and wanted me to report about the company's finance thingy. impromptu. i had my confidence though because i know what i'm working on. but then he began asking me about customer orders and supplier orders that the ones got fired were previously handling. i had no idea what he was talking about and he was expecting so much of me. i was not superhuman. and he doesn't care. he damn doesn't care. that stirred my physically, mentally and emotionally tired self. i was on the verge of crying and my voice would crack everytime i answer him back. no one had ever shouted at me like that in my entire life. i still remember him saying "i don't care about your feelings! i only care about my money and my business! in my company, i am god!"

it was too much to bear that those exclamation points are not enough to demonstrate how he almost tear my eardrums.

i was literally trembling and relieved at the same time when he dismissed me. my phone then rang and i was trying very hard to calm myself. the number's not registered on my phone but thought it was my friend's work phone. it was like desperate of me to talk to someone that time. i know my voice croaked at my first "hello". the girl at the other end is not my friend. she's a recruitment assistant in a company i'm not familiar with (i would later find it's a network of advertising companies). she saw my cv at bayt.com and asks me if i'm still interested for an accounting job. i haven't sent an application to them, i was sure. but i was glad of the opportunity that came knocking at me. she thought i was hesitant to take the job (she's also kabayan) so she just kept convincing me that i should try it out coz the position offered is really nice and that the company would take care of my transfer. in one week i got interviewed by the recruitment manager and by the cfo, then being offered the job with a nice package, and the promise that they would do anything to ease out my transfer to them. thank you Lord!

last week of September 2008
i filed my resignation. my boss was unbelievably calm that night and he was all too kind to humble himself and convince me not to resign. eventually he agreed that i leave the company but only after 5 weeks. too kind words. and too good to be true.

the next days were mad hell again! i don't want to narrate it anymore except for the fact that he held my salary for september!

October 2008
my boss was pressuring me too much that i barely have time to take notice that my period have lapsed. i was delayed for 20 days! i have my weight checked and i just lost 8 pounds from the 88 pounds that i barely have when i first arrived in dubai. i even thought i was pregnant (which made me and hubby so ecstatic!). when my period finally came, i got depressed the more because i knew that the delay was all because of stress! it was the first time i missed my period for more than 10 days!

my work has become a health issue! and that was serious for me.

then even on my last day at work, my boss gave me enough problems to torture me for the rest of 2008!

my visa got cancelled without my last pay (two-months salary!) and i had a 6-month labor ban. that means i cannot take another job within uae unless a freezone company or a government sector would offer me a job!

November 2008
i exited to kish, iran and got my company visit visa the other day. sponsored by the new company that hired me.

on my first day at work, the HR executive toured me around the company and i was warmly welcomed.

in two weeks time, i got my residence visa! up till now, i am really thankful to my company's HR people. they handled my job ban through one of the companies' free zone entities. i just got lucky, i guess. our PRO was right, i just have to relax.

amidst too much cruelty from the past months, God was all along planning a better life for me!

aside from that, i also got bitten by Edward Cullen! i watched Twilight with flatmate Ate Rhoda! we were both in love!

December 2008
i had terrible bed bug bites! they're still haunting me from time to time. and the marks haven't vanished completely. anyone knows a good cream/lotion to lather on???

good news here: i gained back my 88 pounds and more! i'm now 91 pounds! =P i know i'm still on the petite-slim side of the fence but i'm working on it. every one pound i gain is like happiness to me already.

holiday season here, we celebrated with bountiful of pinoy food and sweets and some videoke with our flatmates. it was bittersweet. trying to enjoy the food and the singing while missing our "pinoy pasko".

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okay that's it. too much catching up here. it was a very boring story indeed. but for me, it's a part of my "moving on" for 2009.

my previous year had been a mixture of emotions, failures, struggles and luck. i am very thankful that God has opened up opportunities for me, not only to be happy, but also to be strong enough to survive what "has been".

why i haven't blogged for 11 months (part 1)

Yay! i would certainly need my scratchy memory lane here.

April 2008
me and arci were too busy with the usual audit work on weekdays and juggling our time travelling to and from ortigas on weekends for our SAP Business One classes. Aside from that, we were preparing for our presentation on the 62nd Annual PICPA Convention (pics here) from 30 April to 3 May. all our days were fully booked the moment we wake up at 6am till we get home tired from practice at 11pm.

May 2008
got an email from eins that our tickets for dubai are already booked on june, which means a "go signal" for me to file my resignation. i had one month notice period. enough time to turn-over my work to jessie, to shop for clothes (i ! i ) and to get married (very un-planned!). it was a whirlwind civil wedding on the 21st of may.

welcome to married life!

June 2008
me and hubby's birthday month. we boarded our plane (emirates) at naia on the 27th (hubby's birthday) and arrived at dubai airport "very early morning" of the 28th.

i don't know if it was just me or what but i got really scared when i saw arabs in their white kanduras at the immigration lane. and not just that, imagine our surprise for the scorching heat of dubai. it was around 35 degrees at 1am!

to be continued...