First piece of art

I did my first art piece in class today.  Ok, it doesn't look very professional yet but it's my first try.  At least I didn't make a mess out of my model's hand.  Soon, I will be able to do a couples version!!

无言的眼泪

There are some times when you are free to cry but alot of times, you just need to hide your tears.  The 'behind-the-scene" works are always very difficult because behind every successful man, there's a woman.  It's not for recognition that the woman do everything she can to make her man look good.  It is not even for any rewards at the end of the day.  It is purely to exchange for a simple "I love you" from the man she loves.

Deep inside every woman, there's a need for a home.  Not just a house.  I am no exception.  Since young, I always envision my perfect home.  A place where my hubby can come home to, a place he can find solace in after fighting some politics in a war torn office, a place where I can make breakie for him every morning, bring him the papers, send him to the door, kiss him goodbye as he sets forth for work, prepare dinner and wait for him to come home, prepare the bath for him, slow dance the night away under the dim light of our living room, massage away his tiredness, match his work clothes for him....etc.  I guess that is every girl's secret dream.  But in order for that to come to past, I need a man who will embrace that kind of environment. Someone who values family time together.

A very different Christmas

Dear Ivy,

I think of you today.  I am missing you again.  My Christmases will never be the same without you.  I actually wrote alot but decided to press the delete key.  My random doodle below should paint a thousand words :) Come tomorrow night, I should be doing what we normally do...you wait for my post yah?

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all of you!  May you continue to be showered with lots of love as you enjoy this special day with your family and your loved ones!

You needed me

Wide awake

Arrrghhhh.....There's so much on my mind right now, I can't get to sleep. I tried warm milk, soothing music, aroma therapy....nothing is working. I kept reading the same whatsapp messages over and over again and I think I messed up my entire bio clock by just reading messages. When I close my eyes, those words starting floating around. So I dont dare to close my eyes. It didn't help that my feet hurts every time I accidentally rub them against the blanket. Those blisters have burst. I didn't know that my bus is not available at the bus stop opposite 313 so I walked one bus stop up. Wasn't a pleasant experience. Next time, bring plaster!!!

Wanted to write something but my mind is blank. Maybe I'll go read some CVs. Hopefully, some of them is boring enough to knock me out!

Random picture

Got this from FB.  I'd say...dump him!  Coz he places his interest above yours....unless you don't mind being his sex slave and suffocate for the rest of your life under his tyranny. 2 weeks also cannot tahan...And then there are those who always say "My ex used to do this for me, buy that for me....etc" Errr...great!  Go back to her if you miss her THAT much because I'm freaking different and I don't need to do what she does just to satisfy your whims and fancies! I'm happy being myself =^-^=

Bursting the balloon

In 2010, Singapore has been ranked the 9th most expensive Asia city.  In 2011, our little island has jumped 6 places and now proudly stands in the third rank!!  As a nation who always thrive to be the top in almost everything, I think we are not doing too bad jumping 6 ranks in the span of a short 1 year!  Top spot goes to Tokyo and following closely behind, is Hong Kong.  Singapore, with such a short history in her treasure chest, takes one of the top 3 spot.  I think we did quite well.

In order to push us up to the top rank, our garmen has been pain-stickingly thinking of various ways to increase cost while maintaining our salary at its present level. Why is that so?  Well, if our salary increase proportionately with the cost of living, then we won't see products and services as expensive and thus, the whole works for helping us to reach the top of the charts will not relevant.  Moreover, increasing both cost and income at the same time might cause hyper-inflation. Then again, there's a minority chosen few who will not be affected because they have been receiving good basic salary on top of their bonuses.  In addition, they are always able to find reasons for justifying their pay increment...something like, you need to pay more to get good people...you know what I mean.

Of course, with cost increase...we need to sympathize with these chosen ones because they too need to pay more for first class airfares, top notch restaurants dining, a few more houses in different countries, private jet maybe?  So how are they going to survive when everything increases and not their salary! And because the amount increased in one person's salary might equal to the salary of about 270 low income folks, I might be able to conclude that these chosen lot causes inflation!  And since most of our services are Monopolized, I can also deduce that we are in the whirlpool of cost-push inflation. I'm afraid that I might not be able to afford a can of coke in future! 

Inflation and unemployment has always been very good friends.  Infact, they are so close that everytime inflation visits, unemployment would drop by and stay for a while...just to visit a good friend.  We are no longer looking at seasonal unemployment but cyclical! That is because our very friendly garmen loves foreign friends and invited them in hoards to come in and train us to be more competitive!  Yes, I'm talking about 60 people fighting for one job.  Don't mistaken my intention, I have no objection to having good talents to exchange pointers.  But there are just some who can't really make it.  You watch them work, you know they come from another planet...somewhere far far away in outer space!  They are not here to give, they are here to take.  Thank goodness, our garmen woke up from their deep slumber and decided that enough is enough.

The higher cost of living still worries me a fair bit. The recent wayang comes from the taxi companies increasing fares.  Just like what happen back in 2007, Comfort Delgro is the first to lead with the increase.  They state that this increase will help the cabbies take home more income.  I seriously don't see how that would help since an increase in fare (AGAIN) would deter consumers from using its services.  Those big guys said that they would not increase rental of the taxis...they forgot to add the word 'YET'.  In a recent media release, Comfort Delgro (with presence in Singapore, UK, Ireland, 14 cities in China, Australia, Vietnam and Malaysia) reported that the Q3 (ending September 2011) net profit attributable to shareholders increased by 12.5% to $69.1 million, bringing the net profit attributable to shareholders for the year-to-date to $179.1 million.  I think a small 12.5% increase is insufficient to satisfy the appetite of the big brothers.

This little balloon will burst one day if more pressure is continually being pumped in!

Naughty or nice

Ex-boss called

Received an unexpected call from my ex-boss with an unexpected request!  He said that he is looking for more staff and ask if I have friends to recommend.  He said "You know the entire background of our business, you know how our company function, you know what we do and how we do it, you know the jobscope, I think you are the best person to help us...if you are willing."  Frankly, who in the right mind would ask an employee who resigned because she can't stand your management style to recommend people???  And what was my response to him? I said yes!  hahaha....yah yah, I'm a softy.  It's not that I forgive easily, I just don't see the need to waste my energy on bearing grudges for long.  My baby wouldn't like that too!  But I guess whatever he has done to me was to make me a stronger person and I appreciate him for that.  He was tough so that I can be tougher.  Morever, I have to reiterate that he did train up alot of very good and strong sales person under him.  What shocked me most was when he said "I heard you are dating and he is from S*****l!!  This is so not fair!  How did he know?????  Has my ex-boss been spying on me since my departure from the company?  Anyway, I told him that I will help to look out and get them to contact him directly if there's any suitable one.

Oh by the way, for those who have been following my Penelope Ragdoll series, I am please to announce that the final chapter has come to a close.  Penelope has decided to be with Marculius, the Prince of Nefetara planet.  Despite what Taroki said about the people in the stars not agreeing with the match, Penelope decided that her future is what she makes it to be.  It doesn't depend on others.  I'll start new stories soon...stay tune!  Website will be provided at a later date!

The deal is sealed

If not for my freaking $8K commission, I swear I wouldn't have treated this candidate so nicely!  I hate it when he ask millions of questions before agreeing to accept the offer.  And he doesn't ask all the questions at one go, he asked them on separate days.  First he said that he will let me know the answer on Thursday and then he said he can only let me know on Friday which of course he didn't.  On Monday, he came back and said that he is only accepting the offer and not the job.  WTF!!  So when I ask for one more reference as there is one guy I wasn't able to contact....he got the nerve to tell me that those two are the only reference he has and if those references are the bottleneck for my client to accept him, then he will go accept his other offers because (in his exact words) "I have many other offers waiting for me to accept!"  WTF WTF WTF!!!!  Luckily my client is ok with only one reference, else I will have to call his ex-bosses directly without having to go through him to get me the contacts.  When I told him that I have sent the reference check outcome to the client, he freaking ask me to give him an answer within one hour on what time he can go down to sign the offer in the next day!  (Shit him! My client need time to prepare the letter and it doesn't help that he was unwilling to send me soft copies of his certs as requested by the client...his reason - it is unsafe to send such things over the email -_-").  I was already at my limit.  If he pushes me any further, I would have just cancelled the deal and tell my client that the candidate is not interested anymore! I have to freaking control my temper and speak to him in the nicest possible way.  It's a good thing he signed on the dotted line today.  Case close!  I hope my other candidates are not like that!  Else, I die.