Sierra November India Papa Echo Romeo

I used to think that form 4 was the best year ever. It was a good year, i had a lot of fun, too much in fact, but what made it great was the people. Just the four of us (Daniel, Bev, Flo, and I) was reason enough to get up at 5.30 in the morning and rocket my rear to school. Granted, we didn't even bother studying, heck, we didn't really have any work to do, so it was all fun and games. We'd always go to the caffetaria in one group, we'd always do things together. I do miss those days. And sadly, i took it for granted. Only now (or actually since five months back) do i realize how good i had it back then, the laidbackness, the friendships, the jokes, the laughs, all the good times. It's like we went to school to meet up with buddies, chill out, relax. All this, of course, opposing to the intention of the school which is to study and shove inch thick books into our noggins.
But last semester, i met a whole group of new people and new characters. I can't say it was laidback though. The library discussion room was basically my second home. Whenever someone was looking for m, all they had to do was go to the library and i'd probably be there. Its not that i'm a bookworm, or that i enjoy reading two inch thick hardcover books, its just that the library is the quietest, most calming place in the whole college, as opposed to the next best hangout place - the caffetaria. Plus, it has air conditioning. During that sem, I was always with my friends, they were always nearby and with a deck of playing cards.
Today, i almost never see them. Haven't hung out with them in ages. It's kinda saddening, sehr Traurig! But you gotta do what you gotta do right? lets hope it gets better this semester. Either that or hope next sem will be a whole lot nicer.

Well, i've been doing my practicles for the past month, and altough it may be tiring, at least i'm learning something. Actually i'm learning a lot, especially in the kitchen. Its really sad that i can't eat what i've cooked. You really don't know what it tastes like until after service is over with. Even then, if there in't any left then, well, Schade!
I find working almost translike. You just start doing work, step after step, contingency after contingency, sometimes it feels almost clockwork, even if it's not exactly going as planned. But at the end of the day, when you're done, you think to yourself, "wow! i did all that!". It might not even be a lot of work or a perfect job, but there you go, its been done. I feel, to a point, at ease when i work, it just causes one to forget about all other woes and troubles whilst doing the work at hand. Also, at the end of the day, i have a sense of gratification, knowing i gave my job my all.
Still, i find it all a bit of a hassle. The responsibilities is the cloud to the silver lining. Its heavy, its a burden and its very real. The result of not fulfilling it - dissapointment, and that is something i can't live with. Thank god the RM's alternate every week.
Something Ali said just now struck me as what was giving me the slight case of the blues. Now that the class is split up into three groups, where we work in three different areas, we hardly ever meet up and do what we used to do last semester. Lunch is usually non-existant. And if it is, it's either in small groups or just two people.
Nothing is what it used to be, hopefully it will get better. If this is a forecast of what work is going to be like for me, then i say its going to be a very sad life. hell, that is IF we have a life.

Und bis bald - Nim

This sem is all about practicle work and how well we survive in it, and where survival is concerned, the fittest survive. It's a competitive world out there and we all try to do our best, some mere hope to do exceptioally well, some work toward it, and some are so sure of themselves that it is a given that they hit what they aim for. I'm like that, i take for granted that i will provide perfection, but not today, today it all changed.

Its Thursday and its my first practical for service, and i am restaurant manager or RM. I know i have to set a benchmark and that i have to give it my all. I am expected to give nothing short of my 110%. On Wednesday itself i ran my staff trough the procedures, i didn't wnat them to go into the field unprepared and panicking, their performance would, indirectly, affect my image as their leader, and i can't have that on my benchmark. Anyways, i didn't realize i overlooked a few things. I'm going to make sure that this never happens ever again.

Okay, so since its my first time being an RM and its the first practical and it IS a benchmark, i thought i'd invite some people whom i'd be honored to serve. I invited mr. Allen (whom still owes me a visit to the restaurant) and Dr. Tan, a friend of my mothers. This proved to be a bite too big for me. She did come, and so did her guests. Four guests from Mancheter Uni, some lecturersfrom business (i think), and student council (i think).

They came in small groups (there were 10 of them) and we were thought to serve them all at once, on the other hand i am expected to serve them instantaneousely, so here i have a conflict of protocol. This is, of course, not the only conflicts i had. A request that affects the whole group is made by the guest, but the thing is, we are instructed to move at the host's order, again another conflict. I wasn't expecting such complications to arise, but, it was sorted out eventually. The VIP's were happy, we fulfilled our required amount of sales, and my duties as an RM are over, for now.

So okay, we (emphasis on we) did a good job. I'm glad that whatever i ran them trough the previouse day stuck with them. Mistakes were made, but so what? we learn, and it was our first day on the job. I made mistakes myself, quite a few actually, and i couldn't have done it without my team.

Now that i reflect on it a bit (again) Brian (or was it Eric) told me that we'd do fine as RM, since we've worked before and we know what we're supposed to do. Well, actually, it doesn't matter if i'ved worked before or not, this thing we're doing is not the same. In work, we have already procedures put into place by our predecessors. But in this line, i AM the predecessor for the next RM (Nanthaya). I don't have guidelines to follow or refer to, all i have is my lecturer( thank god he is all a noob RM needs) and my gut instincts. I remember how it was like working as the staff, all i did was either make or take the drinks and serve them to the guests. It was simple back then, no steps to follow. Today, in addition to having the stress of serving VIP's, we have a bunch of notes and procedures we have to strictly follow stuffed into our noggins. This fresh knowledge and the need to acess that information at the snap of a finger could be very stressful. But no doubt, we managed. And quite well i might add.

Well, at least thats one responsibility over with, i should prabably get back to my marketing assignment. Redundant little rat!

Und Bis Bald! - Nim

Okay, so we all know that joke right? Why is 6 afraid of 7? because 7 ate 9...hahahahahaha!!! Right, so it just so happens that the club where the function i worked at for the past two days also goes by the name of 7 Ate nine. This reminds me of how wierd names and bars, pubs and clubs come together. Remember a certain joint i used to work at? Yeah, it's called Up2U cafe.


Thats besides the point. It was just something i was thinking about... I look back on those two nights (i love reflecting) and i start to think.

Right, so this is how it started. It was Tuesday and i had kitchen practicle all the way till 3pm. Whilst having our timeout from playing cookie, a friend managed to get me and another friend (An Ying/ Ingrid/ Anne/ Ah Ying) to go for a part time job. Well, i was asking for it a few months back, but this was sudden. I'd only have one and a half hours to get to the station after class ended (IF it ended on time, which it never does). Oh, almost forgot to mention, i've been sick for nearly a week when i got the job...

The club was at the Ascott hotel, right next to Mandarin Oriental and KLCC. Yeah, kinda far from where i live/study/would like to go... Anyways, we got there just in time and we reported in with the restaurant manager or RM. he was a nice guy and he showed us around... The club is owned by Irishmen (i think)...

So okay, i'm gonna fastforward to the "fun" part. The whole function was because of the clubs first year anniversary, and this meant that starting 8pm there'd be free flow booze all the way until 10pm...YAY!!?? not for us...

The place was packed by 8.30... not packed as in every table had customers...not packed as in every chair was taken up...but packed as in we couldn't so much walk trough the crowd... We had to either squeeze, pass along, climb on to podiums and down again, or just crawl trough the damn thing...

Of course it wasn't all bad. The customers were friendly (at least most of them), they were mainly white-eyes, indians and chinese. When you think about it though, why wouldn't they be friendly? you're giving them free booze. We momentarilly ran out of white wine (and later red) halfway trough the function. There was a cigar roller from Cuba, and where there is a roler, there are smokers. Every breath you took was like puffing on one, and this didn't help my sickness one bit.

By ten me and An Ying were dead tired...water never tasted so good, and sitting down felt like a luxury... Now this is where i made a decision that was glad i did. The function was for three days in a row and i just worked for the first one. It was so tiring i figured i'd jsut tell the RM that i couldn't come the next day, but then i though about my schedule and i found that i'd be free from 12 in the afternoon and i'd have all the time int he world to get to KLCC, so i told him ok, i'd come the next day. I might say for a first time, i did quite well...An Ying did great too, to which i must confess i did underestimate her a bit...

The next day was a little more relaxed, the journey there in any case. This time round when i got there, since i knew some of the staff already, i got some greetings, which felt nice. In a way it kinda reminded me of how working was like back home in KK...

The drill was the same, except for the minor change in drinks. Instead of the red and white wine, tiger, heineken and Rose Sangria we were serving yesterday, we had Johnnie Walker to replace the Sangria. This makes life easier. Shorter glasses means lower chances of spillage/droppage/breakage.

Okay, so there were a few interesting things that happened on the second night. A man sitting in the corner of the club waved me over. At first he asked me for some beer, and i asked back how many? he replied "as much as your tray can hold. I was a bit fazed by the request, so he asked for a few, i replied by asking if four would do and he said yes. So about twenty seconds later (after jumping over, crawling under and squeezing through customers) i set all four bottles on the table from my tray. I start to walk away and he motions for me to come back, and when i do, he stuffs ten bucks into my pocket. I looked at my watch and i relaized what he was doing. It was about another ten minutes before "free flow" time was over. i smiled to myself.

The most gratifying part about the job is making a customer happier than they would expect. And of course recieving compliments (or a ten buck tip) for your hard work (cause i really worked like crazy)... one would imagine the amount of hot gurls at the funtion...but one would also ahve to imagine how busy it was that i couldn't pay much attention to the flocking chicks. T.T /Cry....

Allright, at the end of the night i thought i'd get 7bucks per hour. We worked five hours a day, so times two its a total of ten hours. You'd think the RM would gimme 70 bucks huh? I made some calculations and i factored in transportation costs. If i got seventy bucks, i'd earn about 40 or 50 and so i figured, what the hell, at least i get to put this down as experience right. Yeah well... The RM pulls out a stack of fiftys and just slips us each two notes...30 more than what he promised, and well, An Ying was really happy...so was i...after cutting away the transpo costs, nett profit for me was 70 bucks, toss in that ten buck tip and i get 80...it was really great that i managed to do this...for the experiene and the cash...! HOOAH!! Next time something like this comes up, i'm jumping at it!...

Ok, so its time for another reflection of yours truely. It must have been ages since i oficially did this, and this would be the first one on this blog.

It's been pretty much 5 months since i moved to KL(technically Selangor) and started this hospitality course. Hell, this is the second sem already, this first one was pretty short, about three and a half months. We pretty much finished in three months what other students finish in six. I aint gonna say who's better, so you do the math huh?

I still remembered being pretty lucky to enter the DIP-1 class. A good mix of foreigners, most of which are my close friends now, a good place to stay where the tenenters were not the care-less types, a roomate with whom i didn't like at first, but managed to work things out eventually, and now, moving into my brand new apartment, and of course utilizing the bus to its full potential (going to college, ivo's place, one utama, KL central, etc...

Of course between the time i started the course and the present, a lot of things happened. Things that change me, things that make me think from a very different angle, things that might be good, or maybe even bad. I went trough group assignments as a group leader, and it was frustrating work. Dealing with the language barrier, and dealing with the incompetencies of those who didn't have language problems. Even with the simplest of tasks, they fail(the incompetent ones i mean) and of course, this causes severe frustration and stress. Another thing that changed about me was my temper. I have now what i never had as much of a problem, something that i used to pride myself in was that i would be able to keep my cool in high tension situations. But now, I go nuclear ever now and then. This is not good. As most would say, i have anger management problems. I try to controll myself, but the sheer idiocy of those who provoke me and push me over the edge cause me to form a mushroom cloud. And they never learn... most would know to which two i'm refering to.

Of course there was another cluster of problems and issues that i had not much control over. This problem is classified at the moment and require Tier-4 clearence. This problem brough out the worst in me. I saw a monster everytime i looked into the mirror(and also now, everytime i see Ed or Brian). It took someone to tell me about this evil for me to realize it. I then noticed what this problem could do to people, and how much it could ruin someone. Of course, now that i've realized and rationalized this problem, i've come out a bit wiser than i was previousely. I wish i never have to face the same evil again. Just a short description of this evil. It causes severe depression, overthinking, irrational behaviour, mood swings, uncharted temper,and of course, a high possibility of loosing those most important to you.

And now, here i am, writing this blog, right after i just passed even more classified information to a friend who has Tier-7 clearence (which is basically what this info rquires). I hope this doesnt turn out to be another "brining the worst out of you" experiences. It's truely aweful to see the worst in a person when you've known them as another better person for years. Overall, i've seen that this journey(altough just moving from phase one to phase two) has caused me to replace carefreeness with perfectionism and conformism, replace immature with (with no intention of self praise) slightly mature ( i have a long way to go), replace stupid jokes and brainless conersations with seriousness and meaningful conversations, replace being overloud and overt with maybe a bit of silence and well, i'm still overt, to big to miss (at least thats what Hasan and Ivo tell me). I'm glad for these changes, i rather have meaning in what i do, say, and think, rather than something pointless.

Well, okay, a reflection always has to end, at least until the next time a reflection is required.

Okay, so its like this, I've just moved into Pelangi Utama, its a condo about 30 mins walk from One Utama new wing. Our unit is on the 5th floor, pool facing, with an unhidered view. My room is the one with the BEST pool view and, as Eric would call it, a very nice emo corner.
As most of you would know, i'm starting this blog up bcoz friendster blog is dead boring...zzz... und es ist schade...Auf Wiedersehen...