Monday bluezzz...
Bad news day or maybe I'm just irritable cos it's Monday - bleeeh!
I heard from Peter that a rockclimber fell to her death yesterday. I didn't know her personally, but I knew who she was : young, fun, bubbly person.
Regretfully, I wished overall safety attitudes are better in Taiwan. It scares me still to know that they belay without a brake hand, or simulataneously belaying 2 climbers with 1 belay device? Last month, a dive boat left without it's full load of 8 divers - they drifted for 4 day until one of them swam all day for a nearby island. What was the boat driver thinking?
It is more than a matter of who's system is better. It is about ensuring one's life.
And HP's travel desk again rejected my travel expense claim forms. I hate them with a vengence. Perhaps they just hate the TDC-cNB team. You know what, so do I. Maybe I'm not the only one.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Monday, May 19, 2008
I cracked and I squealed
Had you ever danced with the devil in the pale moon light?
I ate lunch with my boss' boss today and gave him the absolute low-down on what I felt was wrong with the office and my co-workers.
Yeah, I squealed on everyone.
The goal was peaceful - for a better office atmosphere with team spirit and cooperation. I know it is possible because it is de rigueur in the rest of HP!
Will I live to regret this moment? Perhaps. If I do, then I live and I learn.
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Palo Alto, California
I forgot to bring my residence card while leaving Taiwan for US. Some difficulty at customs and I was almost tempted to go home. To be forced to spend 1 week with my yucky co-workers was not something I looked forward to anyways...
But being the responsible employee that I am.. I went nontheless. :(
But being the responsible employee that I am.. I went nontheless. :(
And I discovered I love California. It is so me! People here cycle to work on their racers - I drool at the bikes. We tried to walk to the nearby mall - Stanford Shopping Centre, the hotel folks said 10min walk. I am guessing Californians are very athletic people, it took us almost half an hour. Then again, we walked a little, whined about how tired we are, and how we only see trees and no buildings..
And I discovered I do get jetlagged. 1st time in my life. Slept at 1.30am, woke up 3.30am. Nothing I did helped get me into bed. Read newspapers, read Bible, read emails... GROAN! At 6am, I gave up and took brisk jog in the park across the hotel. (Brisk cos it is COLD in the mornings!) Many Caliornians up and about - cycling, jogging... I love it here!
Last night we had dinner at Santana Row. It was so cool.
Now, how do I get myself a job here in Cupertino or Palo Alto? Anybody?
On a similar vein, Steph got herself a job in Cupertino! You go gal! I will be visiting! She's finally making up for the fact that she refused to transfer over to Seoul 2 years ago. (Cos I love Korean food and I need free accomodation when I visit - hey, it's not always about you u know!).
And I discovered I do get jetlagged. 1st time in my life. Slept at 1.30am, woke up 3.30am. Nothing I did helped get me into bed. Read newspapers, read Bible, read emails... GROAN! At 6am, I gave up and took brisk jog in the park across the hotel. (Brisk cos it is COLD in the mornings!) Many Caliornians up and about - cycling, jogging... I love it here!
Last night we had dinner at Santana Row. It was so cool.
Now, how do I get myself a job here in Cupertino or Palo Alto? Anybody?
On a similar vein, Steph got herself a job in Cupertino! You go gal! I will be visiting! She's finally making up for the fact that she refused to transfer over to Seoul 2 years ago. (Cos I love Korean food and I need free accomodation when I visit - hey, it's not always about you u know!).
My ride to SF airport was a stretch limo.... Jesus loves me! (see left pix)My ride home from Taoyuan airport was a van... Sigh! (see right pix)
Thursday, May 08, 2008
Turbulence
Clear air turbulence weather (CAT), colloquially referred to as "air pockets", is the erratic movement of air masses in the absence of any visual cues, such as clouds. Clear-Air Turbulence is caused when bodies of air moving at widely different speeds meet; at high altitudes (7,000-12,000 metres/23,000-39,000 feet) this is frequently encountered around jet streams or sometimes near mountain ranges.
Turbulences can be compared to little irks in life that bugs you but what's worse, it causes you to takes your eyes off the more important things in life - that destination you were heading for. We need to keep our eye on the prize and not sweat the small things in life - the air pockets!
Turbulences can be compared to little irks in life that bugs you but what's worse, it causes you to takes your eyes off the more important things in life - that destination you were heading for. We need to keep our eye on the prize and not sweat the small things in life - the air pockets!
It's funny what you think about while flying... ok ok, the digital entertainment on Cathay Pacific sucks. And the fact that it took half a day to get across the Taiwan Straits is simply ridiculous. I hope President Ma gets direct flights between Taiwan and China going soon!
I'm in Shanghai for OOBE (out of box experience). And we rode Shanghai's Maglav trains from the airport into the city. So, for the 2nd time in so many days, I got to ride another high speed train. Unlike Taiwan's version, Shanghai's operate on magnetic levitation to float on rails instead of the conventional steel wheels. It hit top speed of 305km/h - and I just learned that it goes up to max of 400km/h in the day time (I landed at night). Guess I'm on the Maglev back to the airport instead of cabbing in.
I'm in Shanghai for OOBE (out of box experience). And we rode Shanghai's Maglav trains from the airport into the city. So, for the 2nd time in so many days, I got to ride another high speed train. Unlike Taiwan's version, Shanghai's operate on magnetic levitation to float on rails instead of the conventional steel wheels. It hit top speed of 305km/h - and I just learned that it goes up to max of 400km/h in the day time (I landed at night). Guess I'm on the Maglev back to the airport instead of cabbing in.
And my Hyatt on the Bund hotel room is really nice. Traveling within Asia is always so nice...
Of cos when in China, there's time for a massage every night. They have the best massage spas, at affordable prices and the best part, open til 2am every night. Sharon told me to go to the Dragonfly. That I went back 2 nights in a row speaks for itself.
Tuesday, May 06, 2008
Halo is cool!
Halo is HP's video conferencing facility, I experienced for the first time today. It allows up to 4 way conferencing and is simply awesome. No lag and it feels as if the various parties are in the same room.
www.hp.com/halo
This morning, the service guys did a teardown of a notebook. I got to see a notebook stripped down to the various components. Very interesting and educational. Essentially everything's mounted onto 3 parts, the LCD, the base pan top and bottom.
Learn something new each day - some days you wake up to a new world of learnings - literally.
www.hp.com/halo
This morning, the service guys did a teardown of a notebook. I got to see a notebook stripped down to the various components. Very interesting and educational. Essentially everything's mounted onto 3 parts, the LCD, the base pan top and bottom.
Learn something new each day - some days you wake up to a new world of learnings - literally.
Monday, May 05, 2008
There is only one way to put an end to evil, and that is to do good for evil - Leo Tolstoy
Ron Rolheiser's last week's column titled, Hatred and the Gospel was so profoundly written that it is reproduced here for your reading pleasure.
There is a popular theme within Christian apologetics that goes something like this: Christianity is the most hated of all religions and that is a certain proof of its truth. The logic works this way: If we are so unfairly hated, we must be doing something right. Truth and innocence draw hatred. Jesus was hated, and so are we!We need to be careful with that because, among other things, today, thanks to certain radical fundamentalists claiming to be Muslim, Islam is probably the most hated of all religions, and hated not because of what is true and best inside of it. Not only innocence and truth draw hatred. Being hated is not always a good sign or an indication that you (alone among the unfaithful) are holding to the real truth. It may be that you have made a vow of alienation rather than of love. Both eventually make you hated.Being hated is only a criterion of carrying the truth if you have made a vow of love. Jesus wasn�t trying to be divisive and unpopular, he was trying to speak his truth in ways that precisely didn�t alienate and didn�t provoke hatred. But that isn�t always possible. He was trying to love others, purely and in the truth, but it eventually made him an object of hatred.That isn�t surprising.There is a certain proclivity within human nature to hate innocence and goodness. We see this illustrated in many books and movies. Notice how in so many stories that depict the struggle between good and evil, invariably, the bad will eventually train its sights on and fixate on what is its opposite, innocence and goodness. In most every dramatic epic, eventually the guns of the bad guys will end up trained upon the most innocent and loving person in town. It�s the saint who invariably bears the brunt of wound and hurt inside of a community. It is the saint who eventually is the scapegoat. It happened to Jesus. It happens to all goodness; by its stripes we are healed.Why?Because such is the anatomy of hatred. Hatred is a perverse form of love, love�s grief. It�s what love becomes when, because of wound and circumstance, it cannot be warm and reciprocal. Rollo May once famously stated that hatred is not the opposite of love. Indifference is. Hatred might instead be described as cold, wounded, frustrated, and grieving love, love gone sour. You can�t conjure-up a powerful hatred for someone unless at some level you first love him or her. When love is wounded and frustrated, the tears it provokes can be warm and cleansing, but they can also be bitter and cold. Cold grief. Hatred with its children, jealousy, bitterness, murderous feelings. That�s part of the anatomy of love and that�s why love can so quickly turn into hatred and why most murders are domestic. When love breaks down what follows is rarely indifference (a parting in good friendship). What follows is often hatred, bitterness, coldness. Affairs mostly grow sour, not indifferent, and the same is, sadly, true of love in almost all its aspects.What�s to be learned from this?That hatred needs to be understood, whether it�s at a personal level or at the level of whole civilizations hating each other. Hatred is not the opposite of love. It is a perverse form of love, cold grief, bitter disaffection, that needs not to be met in kind, with a reciprocal form of coldness, but with warmth and forgiveness, tough as these are in the face of their opposite. One of the great moral struggles of our lives lies precisely in this. When people hate us what spontaneous feeling rise within us? Feelings of coldness and anger, along with the wish, secret and not-so-secret, that their lives will go badly and that, in the ensuing misery, they will be forced to see their error and have to swallow against their will the fact that they are wrong, particularly about us. Hatred wants the other to choke on his or her own error.But none of that will be productive for those who hate us, or for ourselves. Only if good things begin to happen in the lives of those who hate us, only if they feel the warmth of love and blessing, can their hearts let go of the bitterness, jealousy, and hatred that�s there. Hearts don�t thaw out inside of bitterness and jealousy. They break. It�s not when people are bitter that they admit the error of their ways and the unfairness of their hatred. Hearts begin to see how wrong their hatred is only when the very object of their jealousy and hatred is itself strong enough to not give back in kind, but instead to absorb the hatred for what it is, wounded love, love gone cold when it would want to be warm.Leo Tolstoy once said: "There is only one way to put an end to evil, and that is to do good for evil."
There is a popular theme within Christian apologetics that goes something like this: Christianity is the most hated of all religions and that is a certain proof of its truth. The logic works this way: If we are so unfairly hated, we must be doing something right. Truth and innocence draw hatred. Jesus was hated, and so are we!We need to be careful with that because, among other things, today, thanks to certain radical fundamentalists claiming to be Muslim, Islam is probably the most hated of all religions, and hated not because of what is true and best inside of it. Not only innocence and truth draw hatred. Being hated is not always a good sign or an indication that you (alone among the unfaithful) are holding to the real truth. It may be that you have made a vow of alienation rather than of love. Both eventually make you hated.Being hated is only a criterion of carrying the truth if you have made a vow of love. Jesus wasn�t trying to be divisive and unpopular, he was trying to speak his truth in ways that precisely didn�t alienate and didn�t provoke hatred. But that isn�t always possible. He was trying to love others, purely and in the truth, but it eventually made him an object of hatred.That isn�t surprising.There is a certain proclivity within human nature to hate innocence and goodness. We see this illustrated in many books and movies. Notice how in so many stories that depict the struggle between good and evil, invariably, the bad will eventually train its sights on and fixate on what is its opposite, innocence and goodness. In most every dramatic epic, eventually the guns of the bad guys will end up trained upon the most innocent and loving person in town. It�s the saint who invariably bears the brunt of wound and hurt inside of a community. It is the saint who eventually is the scapegoat. It happened to Jesus. It happens to all goodness; by its stripes we are healed.Why?Because such is the anatomy of hatred. Hatred is a perverse form of love, love�s grief. It�s what love becomes when, because of wound and circumstance, it cannot be warm and reciprocal. Rollo May once famously stated that hatred is not the opposite of love. Indifference is. Hatred might instead be described as cold, wounded, frustrated, and grieving love, love gone sour. You can�t conjure-up a powerful hatred for someone unless at some level you first love him or her. When love is wounded and frustrated, the tears it provokes can be warm and cleansing, but they can also be bitter and cold. Cold grief. Hatred with its children, jealousy, bitterness, murderous feelings. That�s part of the anatomy of love and that�s why love can so quickly turn into hatred and why most murders are domestic. When love breaks down what follows is rarely indifference (a parting in good friendship). What follows is often hatred, bitterness, coldness. Affairs mostly grow sour, not indifferent, and the same is, sadly, true of love in almost all its aspects.What�s to be learned from this?That hatred needs to be understood, whether it�s at a personal level or at the level of whole civilizations hating each other. Hatred is not the opposite of love. It is a perverse form of love, cold grief, bitter disaffection, that needs not to be met in kind, with a reciprocal form of coldness, but with warmth and forgiveness, tough as these are in the face of their opposite. One of the great moral struggles of our lives lies precisely in this. When people hate us what spontaneous feeling rise within us? Feelings of coldness and anger, along with the wish, secret and not-so-secret, that their lives will go badly and that, in the ensuing misery, they will be forced to see their error and have to swallow against their will the fact that they are wrong, particularly about us. Hatred wants the other to choke on his or her own error.But none of that will be productive for those who hate us, or for ourselves. Only if good things begin to happen in the lives of those who hate us, only if they feel the warmth of love and blessing, can their hearts let go of the bitterness, jealousy, and hatred that�s there. Hearts don�t thaw out inside of bitterness and jealousy. They break. It�s not when people are bitter that they admit the error of their ways and the unfairness of their hatred. Hearts begin to see how wrong their hatred is only when the very object of their jealousy and hatred is itself strong enough to not give back in kind, but instead to absorb the hatred for what it is, wounded love, love gone cold when it would want to be warm.Leo Tolstoy once said: "There is only one way to put an end to evil, and that is to do good for evil."
Sunday, May 04, 2008
Labour Day Long Wknd Getaway in Taichong & Sun Moon Lake
A few 1sts this weekend.
- finally rode the high speed rail! It is FAST!
- made it out beyond Hualien into Taichong
- visted the much talked about Sun Moon Lake
- scootering
Was pretty fun except Sun Moon Lake was er.. hohum boring. I suppose the heavy rain affected our experience, but I honestly didn't think it was all that it was made out to be. Anyways, the high point of Sun Moon Lake for us were the foot massage - I like all massage :) and scootering which scared me sh__.
I got lazy with picture taking this trip... The hotel rooms were pretty decent, esp the Sun Moon Lake accomodate - it was nice. I would recommend it to visitors. Here're my few pix -
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8062670@N07/sets/72157604879391371/ Kuansie took loads more pix - I'll try to add a link to her website if she parks them up.
Ran in this morning's Supau Cup - no championship tags and it was super crowded. Was warm too (which I suppose is way better than the 14degrees I did in January's Nike Run). Clocked a slow time - 1.01 same as Nike Run. I will work on this - my gym membership starts in June after my US trip.
- finally rode the high speed rail! It is FAST!
- made it out beyond Hualien into Taichong
- visted the much talked about Sun Moon Lake
- scootering
Was pretty fun except Sun Moon Lake was er.. hohum boring. I suppose the heavy rain affected our experience, but I honestly didn't think it was all that it was made out to be. Anyways, the high point of Sun Moon Lake for us were the foot massage - I like all massage :) and scootering which scared me sh__.
I got lazy with picture taking this trip... The hotel rooms were pretty decent, esp the Sun Moon Lake accomodate - it was nice. I would recommend it to visitors. Here're my few pix -
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8062670@N07/sets/72157604879391371/ Kuansie took loads more pix - I'll try to add a link to her website if she parks them up.
Ran in this morning's Supau Cup - no championship tags and it was super crowded. Was warm too (which I suppose is way better than the 14degrees I did in January's Nike Run). Clocked a slow time - 1.01 same as Nike Run. I will work on this - my gym membership starts in June after my US trip.
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