Majulah Douglas!

Majulah Singapura! Only a nation of 46 years old, but it is equally as civilize and advance as countries which as thousand years of history. Congratulations to the achievement in Singapore and good choice of separating from Malaysia 46 years ago.

Just a little update that i wanna put it down here. Work wise, I am getting more workload day by day and I am starting to fill that I am contributing. Yesterday, I was trying to understand the root cause of a project bug and i discover it might lead to something more serious in the design. Though it's still initial stage, but I'm glad that i made a slight contribution to that. This project I am working on is going to be closed soon and immediately after that I will be put on another project. I believe it wont be long before I will have the chance to do some real design work.

Put work aside, I have a little good news to share. During my thesis, I have heavily taken part in the design of a conceptual analog to digital converter chip plus the test board for the chip. My supervisor sent us an email on the initial measurement and both the chip is working and the board is working. My hard work and sacrifice to go to germany paid off and now I can put inside my CV for that! He haven't measure the performance yet and he told me the board needs to do some bug fixing, but hey, it is working that means the core architecture is functioning well. I can never believe I have designed a working chip! Good start and hopefully in my new career I am able to do so too. Hope one day I can write patents! Sadly I am no longer in Germany to celebrate with my team there.

Back to singapore. Tomorrow will be my first day of the 8 week fitness training offered by my company. It will involve some techniques that can be done at home to build up the body, which include push ups sit ups stuff, plus kick boxing etc. I am looking forward definitely. But one thing concerns me is my health as I am having soar throat plus a lil of dizzyness today. I am not sure if I am fit for tomorrow but I will bring my gear there. I hope to keep in good condition throughout this week too because Oliver's wedding is coming!!!

Now the emo part. Still pretty much sad almost wherever I go. Almost every part of Singapore gave me sweet memories and till now I still think that those trips were a great achievements for us. But I think I am just clapping with one hand. How can the peanut outings in Singapore compare to UK? For her, I believe nothing beats what she've seen in UK. Not even a single moment we spent. Well that shows the difference in our point of view in life. I have always mentioned, a great trip depends primarily on the person we go with, and location is just a fill up factor. Thats why in me, the best memories are still those time I spent with her regardless where. Could even be as close as around our home. It's sad huh to know that what appears to be the best for you isn't really quite the best on the other side. What's even worse is that what you believe to be the best moments is just shit to the other party. That's like the ultimate killer.

I don't know if I did post up the origami roses arranged into a heart shape birthday card I've made for her 2 years back. I get reminded of that because last week I was folding it in office while waiting for my simulations and my colleagues saw it. They were so impressed and all of them ask me to teach them. One even said, you're really multi talented and with this you should be able to kill lots of girl's heart. Deep inside me, I was laughing like laughing kor lol! Well, i forgot to mention he's already above 35 so probably during his days this kinda things work well with girls. Nowadays you see girls going out with guys who've no emotion at all, and always "abuse" their girlfriends but yet those dumb girls are so obsessed with them that they get so loyal. Girls love bad boys this is the fact. No point having all this romantic skills. No use at all. You just need a big dick and a bad attitude to get girl's heart. This is the fact. Sometimes really I do doubt whether those effort I've put in to make all this DIY gifts really worth it or not? 10 years down the stretch, I just can't recall how many of those I've did already. But in the end, it doesn't even matter.

Anyway, it is over. How many times I have to remind myself about that? I guess the answer is forever because I think it takes forever for me to recover. I am moving out of my comfort zone. I finally decided to move out of Jurong area where I am so comfortable with. There are a few factors which leads to this decision despite having to sacrifice approx 1/3 of my salary for my new room. First of all, I need a change. Call me kolot, but I think it's time to try a new environment. I might get lucky there who knows. Second to that, I don't want to cause more inconvenience to my uncle. It is just a matter of time I have to move and why not sooner in conjunction with a new change. Thirdly is of course I have no time for myself wasting all the time travelling to my office and back. Moving to a place much closer to my office is definitely a good choice. Some other minor factors are not worth mentioning here but made contribution to the decision as well.

That's all for now. Just a question to myself - Will I find a real lifetime partner in the future or nobody wants me that I will be alone forever?

Sigh...it's kinda depressing to ask question to oneself like that....life sux!

The Ultimate Kryptonite

just feel like updating here. It's been like 2 months since i came back from Europe and about 5 weeks since I start working. Work, still about the same. Starting to get a lil more workload but still it's kinda "peanut" work whr an intern can do the job. On the bright side, I am taking their salary for the minimum effort I'm giving. On the down side, I am not contributing and not really learning much. At this point I can't tell whether I am really happy with the work or not but for now I am happy that I just got my first month salary. Yes all I care about is money now. Seriously, I think this is not a long term thing. I want to do some real Design Engineer's work, eventhough I'm not a very confident person that I can handle that.

I have nothing much to comment bout work atm. I am feeling emotional now. Well, it's about the same thing actually. I believe everyone have one/several Kryptonite that always make the person weak at some point. My worse case is love/relationship. I loudly admit, I am not quite moving on as how I was and no improvement at all. Especially last week when the convocation spark up lots of hype. I thought distance and time will also help in my healing process but one phone call changes alot. It started with the mother calling me. Details of the conversation will not be disclose here.

U know what is the most hurting part when you exit a relationship? Its not the break up really. It's when you know all these while when you felt you're the most important your love one would die for, isn't that important after all. Many people did ask me before, I've been with the same girl on and off several times. Why is tht so? If I love, why did I break? Honestly I don't know. I really don't. Maybe I just can't let go of her. It's too useless to talk about the past but i wanna mention the recent one.

In 2009 when I finish my bachelor degree, and slowly we get closer to each other again and finally got back together. It was after so long we've been separated, and judging by the age perhaps we've reached a maturity level and know who we really wanna spent our life with. All these while my relationship with her wasn't quite accepted by my family. But that time we got back together, I was so sure this is the girl i wanna marry and live forever. My confidence level even shoot sky high because she came back to me, proving there's something she's attracted to me and it is not money/looks/fame because i don't have any. She knew I was going overseas for some time again and will not have any income. She knew my face is as ugly as whatever ugly things u can imagine, but still stick to me. Something inside me that attracted her. So that's it, decision made. I dun care what outsider criticize about me getting back with her for the 4 time. I fought with my mom and finally got her approval. She finally had lunch/dinner with my parents for the first time in 10 years we've been on and off. Everything seems so wonderful right?

This is the problem when your confidence is built upon such fragile factor. My confidence was borken into tiny pieces even smaller than the world's smallest particle now. She changed job, had chance to go UK and things were just upside down since then. The so much enjoyable UK trip that I felt, wasn't what it was in reality. So, happy right both of us finally can tour around a European country together? No. It was as disastrous as hell. I'll fastforward here. So finally we broke up again. So much for the lifetime plan with her. Gone baby gone. Even then, story hasn't ended. When I'm back in Sg, when i tot her love wasn't with me anymore which i had never expected that to happen, happened! But tru phone conversations, she showed as if, she regretted leaving me. She show she wanna patch things. She showed she "can't live without me". Wooahhhh imagine my confidence shoot up again. But I denied her because I don't want it to be just because I am finally away from distance and sort of found a good settlement here in SG plus now she's not with any companions. I dun wan to have another fragile relationship. I want as solid as hard diamond.

So what is the conclusion? It doesn't take a genius to figure out the real fact. The love is long gone, there's no regret in it, no will to come back, importance have much faded. The fact. Since she changed job, and went UK, she felt in love with that country, more than anything. Enough said. Well, nobody's fault. In summary, it's just our way of life that doesn't match. I used to wonder why despite me staying in different countries and been expose to so many things, yet I am still loyal in love/relationship and how come she just can't? Well simple thing I understood now. She's not me.

So again, I have to find ways to forget bout all these crap, move on and hopefully will find a true lifetime partner that is also willing to build a solid hard rock diamond relationship with me till eternity.

Emtpy life v1.1

After 1 week of work, finally able to update a bit here. I don't really know who's still reading this but again i repeat tht I'll just put on my feelings here like a diary. I believe no one will read it now. Well, I leave home around 6.45am every morning and come home around 8pm every evening. After bath, and surfing internet plus lucky enough watching 1 episode of TVB drama, I'll go to bed. Around 11pm max. This is how my first week of working life is.

I feel freaking tired everyday actually but not because there are lots of work. In fact I don't have much work for the first week. But I guess just like old times, I need time to get used to the timing. Sitting in the MRT for 1 hour to office 1 way isn't that stressful but kinda boring. I usually get a place to sit because in the morning trains are more frequent and I'm always quite fast in securing a place to sit. When I get my first month salary, I'll get an ipad 2. Ok yes I'm still not a big apple fan but the reason I get ipad 2 is because my uncle and my brother have one. Easier for me to synchronize with them. Later, I also plan to get smartphone, but I might go for Samsung or HTC. Samsung is my first choice because they offer much better hardware specs for the same price u pay for an iphone. Only concern is, android is still pretty much in development stage and I am quite impatient to see them stabilize. I know they will reach one day where they can compare one to one with iOS, the question is when that's all. At this age I'm still quite keen on gadgetings, but the next life transition I might have different hobby I wanna invest on, such as automobile or other mean toys.

Ok, back to work. Not much girls around my office as expected. Microelectronics are never popular subjects for female anyway. Colleagues are relatively good, not close though. Perhaps I'm still new to them. Last friday i even tear my face and force my boss and his gang to accept me for their dinner outing which from their expression not quite willing to. I can see why. Not that they don't like me, but with me along they have to be very careful with their conversation. Like in the car they did talk about foreign talent, and can see that they're filtering alot of stuff. They try to cover it with Hokkien sometimes, but I can roughly guess what they're saying though not knowing Hokkien. They also wanted to go for full body massage and stuff like that, which I suppose they don't want me to join and also they know I'm new guy so shouldn't take such a long lunch break. I also learnt my lesson, I'll not go with them so often unless I'm called to. Other than relationship with colleagues, the technical part is kinda challenging for me. Even the internship guy is much more active than me and much more pro than me. The upcoming new project our principal engineer gave him most of the task, which left me like a noob. I'm still in 3 months probation period and I wonder if they'll find me too useless and will kick me out within this period. Sigh......

Other thing such as I'm kinda missing someone. But well, u can't get happyness by force. Two different person with different priorities in life eventually will end up fighting and struggling. How did we get together in the first place? Simple. It was feelings. I still love her, but love isn't everything if we've tried to live together and failed. All those sweet memories, they can be so sweet because our relationship wasn't put into test. Once it is, it is proven that the relationship has been quite fragile all this while. It's just like a Ferrari. Sweet, but once it get crashed up, the damage is far worse than other cars. Pity and sad, but that's life I guess. After officially breaking up for 4 months, I am still in the state of recovering, and in fact my recovery status is just like 4 months ago - felt like I'm just starting to recover. I'm kinda concern too if I would ever get another partner in the future knowing my lousy qualities and my low self esteemness. I guess only she appreciate my lousy qualities and convince me I'm somebody even I can't convince myself. But I should stressed out that it is all now in the past. Past tense. I am always confident that she'll be able to get a guy much better than me in a short time. I hope she does. But, being selfish, I don't wanna know. I don't know if I am mature enough to take that news or not. So if anyone related to her knows about this news, please don't busybody go and tell me.

Looks like this two weeks, there's nothing much I can look forward to. It will be the same old 9-6 working thingy, weekend same old badminton and that's about it. I am looking forward for my graduation, but not the ceremony. I'm just looking forward for my parents and my brother to come over to visit me that's all.

I felt empty at this point again. Empty life. Sigh.....zzzz

Nooby day

First day at work! Well, as expected I felt so noob. Today there's a group meeting and division meeting. In both meeting it's like everyone is so actively participating in the conversation and I'm just like nooooob. I hope in 1 week time I'm able to pick all those up! Tomoro will be another nothing-to-do day.

Well, I hope this job is really what I want. Now I'm looking forward for 2 things. One is to get familiar with the technical environment and the other one is my first payday haha. Sigh, long long way to go.

As for personal stuff, It has been kinda turmoil. I did enjoy my week last week where my bro Kel came over to Singapore for business and pleasure trip. We had a few meals of hawker which was so enjoying. He treat me quite number of times coz I'm freaking broke. Then we had BBQ on Friday night at my place. We bought too much food and in the end it was all wasted. Then on Saturday we went East Coast Park for cycling. There were about 9 of us and I really enjoyed it so much because it has been a long long while since I ride on a bicycle. Next target is roller blade. Also, I finally met up with Wenni. On Sunday we went casino and of course I didn't gamble just to go in and see. Then we walk around Marina and Clementi mall. Manage to get my working clothes, but have to borrow money from Kelsen first sigh sigh. Then we took off to the airport and we had a nice japanese meal before he took off. Overall was great!

But also I did receive some unexpected sms and email. Again, it almost ended in a bad manner but I guess now everything's much clearer. Now that it's really over, I did felt a lil empty in the part of life. But well, I guess it's a choice I have to make and live with it. I will definitely remember all the sweet memories. It is still one of the best moments of my life. I wonder, with my appearance and my quality, will anyone be attracted to me? Perhaps I'm gonna be single my whole life.

Freaking tired, that's the end of my day.

I'm a Designer!

It is exactly one month since I came back from Europe. Well, probably coming back is not a good word to use since Singapore is not my country. But I set a goal to build my life here. So, I guess I can say coming back after all.

I came back with a vision, and full of hopes and targets to fulfill. First off, I need a job, a related job of course. Other things are such as building a social life here and start contributing to my family. When I reached singapore, I realized that most of my colleagues already started working. Honestly, I felt the peer pressure. My first meeting with them is in one of the weddings. Everyone seems to be exchanging name cards and I'm the only one without one. I have to keep my heads high so I was joking to everyone saying why not I copy my student card and give it to them. After that, I felt like it's time to step up my job hunting and I am seriously looking down on myself because I'm spending parent's money still.

The first turning point came when I met up with my Professor. He is helpful enough to distribute my Resume to all his connection, which in his case a huge network of managers or hiring managers. I have confidence he would help me of course, but I never thought my Resume would be firm enough to be short listed for interview. But it came really quick. In summary, I screwed up like 7 interviews. When I mean screwed up, I mean those technical questions. So i really start to doubt myself whether I do have the ability or not to work in Singapore.

I can only say luck is with me. On last thursday I was called up for 2nd interview with STMicroelectronics, the first company that I was called up for interview and the same company that i screw them up last time for my internship. At first I didn't I know it was a second interview. I thought it was more like another interview for another position since I knew I did really badly for my first interview. Also, the person who called me up for the 2nd interview is a different person, and his Chinese-accent English wasn't really clear. I asked him if it's a different interview from the previous one, he said yes. So I prepared damn freaking hard for the interview, reading up the technical stuff again and again especially those part where I'm weak at. When the interview started, the interviewer pop questions about my previous experiences in Bosch, focusing more on the interpersonal issues such as communication with ridiculous colleagues. About 40 mins of interview without a single technical question. After that part, she said she was done and I was stunned, thinking perhaps my chances are over. But then she told me to stay in the room as the HR needs to interview me. Then came the lady who called me for the first interview, Jane. Jane was nice and she put up a very friendly smile, by far the most friendliest smile in all the interview. Of course, I was told to smile as well, so I return a big smile. Our interview session was more like chatting, where she get to know me better asking questions based on what I've scribbled in my resume. Then she ask me if I have any questions, but i told her not really. Then she start telling me about the basic salary and benefits if i were to be employed. Suddenly I was so excited. Just when I thought she would present me with a contract, she said she will notify me the next day.

I was excited the whole day I couldn't sleep. Ok maybe i should speed up things here. Yes I am offered a job. The job according to the manager sounds very interesting, plus I think the salary + benefits is very attractive. I don't know what is the market value, but at least it is higher than my expectation.

Whatever it is, at least I have secured a job!

But way before I received my first pay, I am already starting to think about the things I want/need to buy. Gosh!

I don't belong to the Elites

I just came back from an interview where I made myself look like a fool again. It's my 8th interview so there's no excuse, i should have performed no matter what. I have never felt such an idiot before in my life, really!

I recall during the time i was searching for internship. I applied to many companies, only 3 companies called me up for interview. The first one was an internet conference interview. He asked me some technical questions, which I am able to answer few of them. They rejected me though because I wasn't confident enough. The second one didn't even ask me any technical questions, just asked me to explain about my previous projects and experience. There were 4 of us interviewing for the same position, so basically the interview is just for show. They have already picked their candidate before hand. The 3rd one was from the same company as the second, but different division. Yes, i totally screwed up the interview but yet I was hired because it was just an internship position and they only need to pay less than half a normal employee's salary but the workload is the same. So that doesn't proof anything. The fourth one was the one I nailed. It was a telephone interview, and trust me it's much easier to cheat in the phone interview than face to face for technical questions. I am very good in bullshitting, so i can talk all i want. Furthermore, my supervisor who hired me is a very very nice guy.

At that time I was so proud of myself actually that I got that position. After completed my internship and my overall masters, I am so confident because I had good grades, plus good internship experience. True enough, I was called up for interviews based on my CV and my grades. But after so many interviews which non of them I answer with confidence, I really start to feel like I am shit. Everytime they pass me a paper and ask me to derive equations, I just struggle. Today's interview was one of the worse because I really didn't manage to answer much. Most of the time he was trying to help me on the interview. Until some point he gets frustrated as well. Sigh.

I have a master degree from top Universities of their region. I have 5 years of international exposure, plus a recent experience in my related field in Robert Bosch. I graduated with a very good grades. So what am I? Nothing! I can't even secure a job. What's the use of all these records anyway?!!!!

I guess it's time to realize, I am not the smart one. I am just normal.

Dream inside a dream (2 layers now)

I guess the fight is over. Actually it is already kinda awkward that we're still fighting after the break up. But I guess it is necessary at least both side is much clearer what is destined for us and what actually happened in the past. Well, it isn't really a mutual break up but at this point, I guess its fair to say it is unavoidable. Just one phrase summary, we just have our own way of handling htings and unable to tolerate with each other.

Ok, since this is over, there's no point talking about it anymore. The sweet memories will always be with me and will always pop up from time to time. But it's time for more serious stuff. I am already consider old and at the moment quite a useless person on earth.

I am talking bad about myself, but it is partially true. I am really low in confidence now. From the previous Friday until now, I have already being interviewed by 7 companies. 2 of them are called up because I was short listed. The other 5 was more like a career fair and I just did a walk in Interview. Everyone is very envious about my situation. But I can tell you honestly, non of those interview that I am confident to nail the job. Yes it's still early to tell, but it's like exams. You know exactly how you perform, and if you perform badly or so so, you can only hope that either the other candidates aren't performing well too, or basically no other candidates. Well, being a pessimistic person, and knowing my own performance during interview, it is likely I will nail any job. But of course I am still hoping I will receive phone calls from them for job offers.

I don't know what type of response or how they conduct interview for other professions. But at least I know for my field, in particular chip design, they don't usually ask you trick questions nor will they ask you questions that will proof your intelligence. In this field especially for a fresh graduates, the only thing they really want is a strong fundamentals in the theory. Most of the questions they ask are questions that have only a right or wrong solution. What I mean is for example they won't go and ask "give me 3 reasons why I should not hire you?" stuff like that. I classify these questions as abstract questions, where there are no right or wrong answer, but every answer you give reflects your intelligence or in general your character. Of course, one of the interview he asked me what is my greatest strength and weakness. That's about it.

Really, I am starting to doubt if I am suitable for this field despite obtaining a masters with a good grade. It's like I am not even strong with my fundamentals. I have been reading up for each interview, but when it comes to the real situation I just couldn't explain things well. Yes I did a good job in Bosch, and perhaps my working ability is good. But what's the point if I can't even get through the interview stage? Sigh.

These days I have been dreaming about the next morning waking up with a phone call about job offers. I am so desperate for job now. I need money to flow. On the lowest level, I need the money because I am staying in my uncle's place for free and I don't feel good about it. It's time for a payback. Also, at the age of 26, I should be doing something useful. On the luxurious side, I am already eyeing on some gadgets and goods I want to purchase and services I need to sign up for.

About gadgets, the first thing I want to get is a tablet. No, I am not going for Ipad. I am eyeing on the Asus EEE Pad Transformer(or Slider) with 3G. It is definitely much cheaper and it's android based. I have good faith with android because since it is own by google, it will be much easier for compatibility in the future because almost everything from the internet is own by google. The other advantage over ipad is the programmability, or customization. Ok, android tablet, the next target is android smartphone. HTC is my choice, and i think i'll go for incredible S series. And hopefully by end of the year, I am able to get some telezoom lens for my 550D.

Service is my physical appearance. First I need to get rid of my pimples. So it's time to see skin specialist which obviously gonna cost me alot. Then, orthodontist to beautify and to healthify my teeth. Yes yes, perhaps it's kinda late to wear braces but well, it's for my future anywayz. Then, I wanna sign up for German courses, continue to brush up my German. I believe my English level is good enough, so as my Chinese. I think it's advantageous to have a strong German background so I can deal with German customers in the future. Finally, I wanna take up Guitar courses as well.

Hmmm, ambitious me.