Thursday, 20 November 2014

First Christmas party of the year!






It’s only mid-November, but I don’t care! This evening I attended the first official Christmas (or “Holiday”) party of the year, and I can’t wait for more to start flowing through!
            It’s strange being somewhere hot and stuffy, celebrating on rooftops without a jumper or scarf in sight, but if it’s nearly Christmas I don’t care what my surroundings are, that means it’s nearly home time, and it means it’s time to start getting excited!
            Singapore has already started to get Christmas decorations up, and whilst they are slightly off the mark (often brightly coloured and neon rather than reds and gold) they are making the effort, and that is helping to cancel out my confusion at the ridiculous heat. Roll on Christmas – I’m ready for you! 

Wednesday, 19 November 2014

Kicking up a stink...


It’ been nearly a year since I started at my current job, and in my world, that’s the very most my patience can stand of bad management and poor teamwork. And so it was, just as Nick jetted out of Singapore, that I decided to start kicking up a stink.
            Having spent a full week and 60 hours in transit to have a meeting with a boss who failed to make himself available once during an entire week, it was the perfect time for the shit storm to begin, and so it did.
            Not only is the management for my team practically non-existent, so is the planning and progression outlines, and having been scammed out of the job title that I applied for when I first expressed interest in working here (it was one thing on the job spec and a much lower title on my offer letter, but I took it because the application process had taken me three full months and I was counting days, not weeks, until the move when the letter finally came through) the countdown to getting things sorted is now getting dangerous short. This needs to be resolved, and it needs to be resolved now. 
            As discussed during a number of one on one meetings, conference calls and emails that have been exchanged today, one full year to shift papers is too long, and my patience is getting really bloody short. A deadline for this company looms.  
            Nick couldn’t have left the country at a better time, and whilst all I really want to do this weekend is mooch around and wallow a bit, I think it’s probably for the best that we have a weekend in Hong Kong lined up to distract me from all the mess too. Christmas can’t come soon enough!

Monday, 17 November 2014

Settling back in


Following a string of delays and hold ups I ended up spending a full 30 hours travelling back to Singapore (not including waiting and at the airport before my first scheduled flight of the day). Whilst the 24 hour journey had sounded bad enough, I was hoping that landing in Singapore at around midnight on Saturday, I would have time to get back to the flat and into bed in good time for a relatively normal nights sleep.
            Sadly, this was not the case, and by the time I had made it back to the flat it was already 6am by the time I climbed into bed. By 7am I had clearer disturbed Nick enough for him to be fully awake, and there followed a lovely, very slow breakfast in bed (tea and bagels whilst watching Wallace and Gromit).
            The rest of the day passed in a bit of a daze. We popped out for lunch which was lovely, but by 3pm I had passed out on the sofa and missed most of the afternoon. Then there was a bowl of cereal for dinner before I went back to bed and slept solidly from 8:30 through to my alarm at 7:30 this morning. Normally I am not physically able to stay asleep for this long, but I guess I really needed some time catching up following the big time change and a very long and uncomfortable journey back to the sun.
            Fingers crossed the massive sleep last night means that I am back on track enough for a lot of work and good behaviour this week – I have a lot of bad American eating to make up for! 

Friday, 14 November 2014

Homeward Bound


Following a lovely bit of time spent with my lovely Charlie and Heidi, I am now back at the airport, getting ready to head home to the sun and unbearable heat. Not only does this mean that I get to go and see Nick and spend at least a day mooching around trying to get over the inevitable jetlag, it also marks the beginning of the end – the end of my first year in Singapore!
            The countdown to home time and Christmas really and truly is now on.  We have a couple more trips planned for this year before the final flight home for Christmas, but with the big US trip done and dusted, the promise of home is now getting dangerously real!
            Once I have finally made it through the 24 hour flight without any inflight entertainment to keep me occupied I will be back in Singapore and counting down the weeks on one hand until it’s time to go home.
            In the next few weeks I am going to be spending quite a bit of time on planes, traveling back and forth from Hong Kong and the Gillies, but the last flight, the one back to the UK, is the one that I’m really looking forward to.  
Cheidi! xxx


I made it through the end of the working week (FINALLY) and now it’s time to see Charlie and Heidi for a lovely evening and a bit of a girly sleep over before I finally start the journey back to Singapore to whether Nick (and our poor flat) has survived having to look after himself again.
The scary monster CalTrain 
            Having made the mission trip over to Palo Alto to meet up with Cheidi, via the BART and the scary double-decker CalTrain, I arrived just in time for a quick drink at a bar that provides free peanuts where you an toss the empty shells on the floor and listen to punk rock, before heading to a lovely Italian restaurant called Terun, that served up beautiful thin crust pizzas and salads in a covered, heated outside garden area.
            We sat for hours, talking nonsense and drinking wine before finally heading home for tea and a good nights sleep on a very comfortable airbed.
            The following morning there was just time for a nice homemade breakfast and a quick stop at Starbucks before we were in the car and on our way to the airport. It was a depressingly flying visit, but a lovely way to end a trip to our HQ that really wasn’t as lovely as it could have been. I am very happy to be on my way home, but I’ll miss my Americans between now and Christmas – only a couple of weeks to go!