First week of training has been very fruitful. The first day was more of a refresher to me, as they were running through the organisation chart, which I have it already on my palms. I wasn't allowed to answer any questions. Haha... Like so sad :(

The remaining trainings were all very helpful, something which I have heard of in the past BUT no one has gone into details of these things. I merely know the surface. Thus, it was an eye opener for me. I already have one ring file filled with notes. Gotta read them before I head back to office, cos' once I am back in office, I am down to real work. It's time to prove my abilities again. Boss is coming back from BKK soon, thus, I hope to know the ropes soon, so when she's back, she sees me in action, instead of sitting in office, waiting to be allocated work again.

The new group of trainees together with me in these 2 weeks of training were very fun people. Well, joining the line of a salesperson, they are really eloquent and I love their sense of humour. I am the only one attending the training who's not a sales person to be. They too respected me to a large extent, considering I am slightly more senior with the Bank. They also ask me many questions, which I try to answer as much as possible. Well, they have been asking me what is my job scope. I have no idea till date but I told them, my job scope would be to manage you all, tabulate your results etc. They were like "WOW!". Actually, there's nothing to WOW about, it's a challenging job to me and I hope I am able to show results, being the competitive me.

Work aside... Staying at Darling's place for the past one week. We did not really talk since we felt each other's presence. Is this good or bad? Anyway, I slept quite early because training is really draining off my brain power. I need more sleep to replenish brain cells.

Saturday... Did not help out my mum. Noti Gal! Need a break la! Actually I did not really have a break too, I was running errands for her and myself the entire day. Woke up at 8+ in the morning, sent my mum to work as I wanted to use the car. Afterwhich, went for breakfast with Darling. Set off to meet our photographer for ROM. Such a happy thing that we need not pay any deposit. Haha. Then went to replenish some vitamins for my mum. And accompanied Darling to try his suit. After that, we went to meet the photographer for Actual Day. Love their photographs so much, but it's a pity they're already fully booked on our ROM day. Paid the deposit and off we went to take a walk in Bishan. Helped my mum to stick GMask onto her new phone. Dead beat by then. Ate dinner and slacked in Darling's house till about 10+ and I drove home.

Needless to say, today I was slogging at my mum's stall la. I need to work harder and earn money and stop spending money!!! Came home, settled all the monthly bills. By the way, I am the one who collates the entire month's spending for my family. Had to pay all their bills etc. Finally, I have some time for myself. Sitting here, blogging. Alright, nothing interesting to say le. Off to call my Darling who's waiting for me to call him. Good night all.

P.S: To all whom I have not smsed to say that I have changed my mobile no., please email me at reach.grace(at)gmail.com to get my new mobile number. Thank you:)

Everything's well between Darling and I. He has 'compensated' me for the time loss. Hee. I am just so soft la, just do a little bit more and I will be all fine and happy again. Love him too much for me to be angry with him for a long time.

Today's the first day of training. Super high concentration level the entire day, I could absorb a lot of information. That's great! My buddy says I shall train the next batch of newbies. Great! Something else to add on to my portfolio - training. Fantastic though a little apprehensive as well. But I wonder how much he says is true la. Scully say say only. Haha. Well, update u guys again if I get to train.

If you see from my tagboard, I told Xin that I feel aimless and needed the encouragement. This is because till date, it's been 2 weeks with my new division yet I don't know exactly what's my job scope. Really nothing to look forward to go to work everyday. Previously I had deadlines for every single report and I knew I had to get it done by hook or by crook. Here, still no specific timeline, no specific tasks for me to do. Let's hope everything will be going on smoothly after training and I have proper pieces of work and timelines to follow. I will ganbatte!

Told my sisters - JY, Qi and Pei to keep themselves free on my ROM date which has been fixed. So excited yet so stressed out of all the planning. I am glad they are very excited about helping me out as well. Well, hope to meet up with you gals soon once everything is ironed out. I Can't meet you all these 2 weeks as I am stationed in Tampines for training... :( Meanwhile, everyone jia you oh!

Didn't blog in office on Thursday. Morning: Had breakfast. Started writing down a checklist of my ROM. Nearer to lunch, my buddy, D, asked me to his desk and taught me some stuff and I went back to my desk and did what I was given. After lunch: Had a meeting from 2 - 6pm. Went back to office, read a few emails and off I went to meet Darling.

It was our 9 years 2 months anniversary. We had a date together. Was supposed to dine at Shokudou - Raffles City. However, read a few reviews online and realised that it was overated. Thus, told him to change location. He brought me to another place to have Hokkaido Sapporo Ramen. Their special Miso Ramen is really not too bad. The soup base is quite delicious. Had my all time favourite - Edamame! Yummy! After dinner, went to buy Donuts. There's a new donut outlet - J.Co and thus, Donut Factory had no queue. Previously I have never ever had donuts from Donut Factory. Always too long to queue. Finally, we had a chance to try on Thursday night. It was too good to be true! It's no wonder that the queue is always so long! Afterwhich, went to queue for J.Co Donuts. It's on par with Donut Factory, however J.Co had more variety and everything is automated. Kewl!

After which, went to Prints, my favourite shop to buy all the organiser, all the notebooks etc. Went there to find something suitable for a wedding guest book. Found one which we both quite like, and bought some pens to go along with it. Yes, the hotel does provide the guest book but it wasn't too much to our liking, so we decided to get one on our own. Home Sweet Home!

Good Friday: early in the morning, he went out to play mahjong all the way till 10pm. I slept till about 12 in the noon, had brunch, watched my drama and out I went to my mum's stall to work.

Tomorrow (Sat) supposed to spend the entire day with him. But sianz, he and his mahjong kakis for today have decided to meet for lunch. Totally sianz!!! Instead of meeting him, I decided to go and work. No point spending just that 4-5 hours, and then feel that it's not enough to do all the things we want. I cant go home late cos' I am working 6 in the morning on Sunday. So no off days for me this week. Working 7 days again. Totally sianz!!!! Sometimes when I have the time for him, he doesn't. I tried so hard to negotiate for one day off for him. But nevermind la, I got to respect his decision. Just got to learn to handle such things in a better way, so we won't strain our relationship. I just hope he knows I did make an effort to negotiate for day offs in order to spend some time with him. Either to chill, or to do stuff together, I did my best. If he decided to pack something into our already very little time, there's nothing much I could do. I really need to learn to handle such things in a better way. I need to learn!!!

Well, off to continue watching my drama. It's coming to an end, and it's getting more interesting. Good night all.

Weet! Just finished reading a 40-pages document. Got to give my eyes a well deserved short break for 15 mins as it is now 15 mins to lunch time.

Last night, Darling made me really, really happy. The news he brought to me through the phone made me exceptionally exhilerated that I was literally screaming in joy. Remembered previously I have mentioned in one of my posts that I was very frustrated with finding a venue for the banquet and the solemnization. I mentioned that when I found the venue, I had no date to commit. When I had the date to commit, the place which I like was fully booked for all the ballrooms. I was really feeling very down those few days.

After much discussion with my mum and Darling (of course!), we have come to a conclusion of not holding it on a weekend (i.e. Fri, Sat or Sun), we will hold the dinner on a weekday as we really have no other choice and way out if we want to settle it within the Rat year.

Finally, decided on the venues for both the solemnization and banquet. Got all the agreements on hand ready to go and place the deposit. For the solemnization venue, Darling went to speak to the coordinator on his own without me as we could not find a common time whereby the coordinator is free to meet up with us. So Darling went last night with my questions.

Basically, I had a whole list of questions to ask and also a whole list of items to bargain for. Darling got all the items I wanted to bargain for, all at NO additional cost! Yay!!! Best of all, he brought me the news that they are able to hold our banquet as well although we do not have the capacity to fill their minumum no. of tables. However, I am holding back because I feel apologetic for the previous coordinator of another hotel. She has been very nice to us, booking dates tentatively for us etc. Feels quite bad if I do not give her the deal. Well, it's a competitive industry. Darling says it's perfectly fine for us to reject her.

Anyway, tonight I will be meeting up with the coordinator to see what she has to offer us. Another big round of bargaining, asking for FOC items etc. Let's see if she's able to give me everything I want again. I really hope she'll do wonders for me. Such a happy problem - having to decide between hotel A and hotel B.

Meanwhile, I have been trying to do up a blog for Darling and me, so we can post up the process of our wedding planning etc. However, I have been having problems with the blog skin I want. Let's see if Darling is able to solve the problem or is it that the blog skin has problems on its own in the first place? Once up, you all can see how wonderful and sweet it is to plan your own wedding. Sometimes, I even feel like changing my occupation to be a wedding planner.

-=The amount of sweetness you fill me with is unmeasurable. I love you Darling!=-

It's Day 2 and I am still blogging in office. Given 2 easy tasks to do for the day and I can finish it in less than half an hour.

Still no email access. Argh... Otherwise I can write to my ex-colleagues and chit chat and pass time. Eekss... I hope tomorrow they will finally let me login into my email. Else, I think I will continue blogging. =)

Next week's a killer. For consecutive two weeks, I will be in Tampines everyday. OMG! I will definitely dread going to work. But I am going for training, thus, absolutely no choice. I think I have got to move to Darling's place for 2 weeks. Otherwise I will end up going out at 630am in order for me to have some time for breakfast. Darling, will you please rent me a place on your bed???

It's been a long long time since I ever blogged in office.

17th March 2008 (Monday) marks my first day in my new division. To be exact, I am only half a day old here today. This is because in the morning, they had a seminar with customers and the entire division is not around, thus, they told me to come in only after lunch. Being the honest me, I told my boss about this and came in early in the morning to report to my old division, continued to clear some stuff, and off for lunch I went. Reached my new place at 1+ and started to unpack everything from a few boxes onto my table. I cleaned the table so many times till it smelt exactly like the wet tissue. Fragrant! I also brushed my keyboard, like nobody's business, cos' it was extremely dusty! Finally got settled down at about 2pm and waited and waited for my buddy to be back from lunch. He came back at about 220pm and I asked him what I should do. He told me to wait. He's gotta settle down and think of what to let me do.

This is so unlike my previous division. The first day you come in, they give you one entire stack of SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures) to read. I remembered I read them for 2 weeks before I had any form of training. Life then was miserable. Imagine reading something over and over again from 9 to 630 each day for exactly 10 working days! Hell! I was briefly introduced to everyone, realised that the division is very huge, could hardly remember any names except for people whom I already knew. They did not even give me any form of stationery, so unlike before. I had no calculator, no pens, no anything and I have not bothered to ask from them because I have no use for them at the moment. When I need to use, I will ask from them.

And so I waited for my buddy to tell me what to do. The clock reads 6.02pm now and I have done nothing as yet. He asked me if I am ok with my Excel skills. He will be surprised as to what I know how to do man! I am well trained in Excel after all the reporting I have done previously. He said he has 13,000 accounts for me to do some classification tomorrow. And readily I agreed. I wanted to tell him what is 13,000 since I have consolidate about a few hundreds thousands together before.

I dislike sitting here, nothing to do. Feels so left out, so lonely, exactly like the first day at work in an entire new place. I surfed and surfed the web till I am getting quite bored and also quite paisei to not be working. A colleague whom I previously knew asked if I was acting busy. I asked her how did she know. She said she could tell from my eyes. Really?! I was really acting busy lo. Nothing for me to do ma.

Remembered my buddy told me we have a division meeting on Thursday. He says he will introduce me to all 100+ staff. I am so apprehensive. I hope I don't have to stand in front of everyone and say "Hi, I am Grace, your new colleague. Nice to meet you." I will stutter!

I am just waiting for 630pm and off I am to Marriott Hotel for a sumptuous International Buffet Dinner on J's tab. She's promoted and she's treating us to dinner. Yummy!! Can't wait for the clock to strike 630pm. And if I still have nothing to do tomorrow, I shall continue blogging. :)

I was on MC for 2 days last week. Darling was amazed at how I managed to get 2 days MC, afterall, I was not really feeling that unwell. Anyway, I managed to get a 2-days MC, stayed in Darling's house practically doing nothing. Keke...

The first day: Darling was on MC together with me. I just dread going to work. Darling dreaded it too because he had to cover a bitch's work as she is on leave. We had breakfast, took a nap, went for facial, followed by wedding bands hunting and dinner. Wedding bands hunting was great. Went to several famous jewellery stores, fell in love with 2 out of a few which we saw. Had a rough idea of how much it would cost and time to plan the budget and spendings again. Opps, speaking of which, I have not updated our spendings yet. Hehe, must put some effort into it.

The second day: Darling went to work while I ate, slept and watched TV. Hee... went back home that day.

The third day (Sat): Went to do some shopping in IKEA. Afterwhich, met up with Adam (Darling's friend) at the PC show. Walked around, squeezy like mad. Then went for coffee. Explored Adam's iPhone. Totally fell in love with it!!! Can't wait to get one. =P It's on the way now! Haha... It's gonna be in my hands very very soon!

Monday: First time no Monday blues because bonus was announced today. Not too bad, at least money is coming in, whethe it's a lot or not, it does not really matter. Lalala... at least can subsidise a little of my wedding?! *Smiles*

3 more days to my last day in this division. Next Monday, I will begin a new career path in a new division. Look forward to it as well as feel apprehensive about it. Afterall, I have got to adapt myself to a new environment, make new colleagues and new friends hopefully and I need to change my mode to a very steep learning curve so that I can prove to my boss and counterparts that I am capable. I want a fat bonus, a major increment next March, thus, I need to start paving my way towards it. Wish me luck everyone!

Just want to keep something into this 'diary' for memory keep sake thus, a slightly outdated post below:

25th Feb 2008

Went for gown selection on this day. Really happy and thanks to my dear friend, JY, who took leave to accompany me as well as help me make decisions. Tried several wedding gowns and evening gowns. Had to pick 2 each. Darling and JY really helped me make a decision. Thank you dears.

JY said I look really pretty. Well, who doesn't look pretty in wedding gowns? However, I Am still not very satisfied with the second evening gown I have selected, I will try to choose another one when I go for fitting the next time round. Photo shoot will be very soon. Really high time to go on a major diet and weight losing program. =(

Some photos (Darling did some editing as no photography was allowed):

Personally loves the train for this one. Thumbs up!

See the long train? Turned one round, still haven't follow me. OMG!
This organza one is really light, fluffy and pretty!

Well, just these few for now. Will try to take more during fitting again. Happy girl...

Do all Rats born in the year of 1984 feel this way since the Chinese New Year?

1) Everything just does not seem to go smoothly.
2) The simplest thing that you thought would never go wrong, just went wrong. Best of all, found out by your boss.
3) Restless at work everyday. Just can't seem to get your ass off the chair and head home.
4) Feels unlucky all the time, no luck at all.
5) Boss and colleagues just seem to give you a hard time.

I have such feelings ever since the Chinese New Year...

Work

Was supposed to be transferred to another division on 1st March (Sat), that means to say my first day in the new division would be 3rd March (Mon). Current boss wanted to hold me for another 1 month because she thinks the division would not be able to cope without me and another experience colleague who is on marriage leave. She wrote to my new boss and my new boss asked for a compromise i.e. 16th March.

Boss wanted very much to ask for one more week as the new guy will come in on the 18th. So when he comes in, I have a few days to teach him. However, after much discussion with small boss, she decides that 16th March will do.

I feel that all these are shit! She told me things like "I could have held you for 2 years." Is she trying to ask me to thank her? Thinking back, when 2 very experienced colleagues resigned one after another in a short 1 month period, and 1 experience colleague going on 1 month leave, the division still coped as it is. To think without me (relatively newbie), and 1 very experienced colleague, the division can't cope? We can even cope when 3 were not around. Totally bullshit!

Finally got to count down, then extended so back to square one. Starts to countdown again. 8 more working days to go...Finally got to hand over all of my reports except one... The most important one. She still wants me to check the report this month. I am ok with it, but I will not be able to do a complete job because it will be halfway and it's time for me to leave. I still have to attend meetings with her because the newbie who's taking over is not as familiar as me with another report. I have given her way enough notice of 3 months and she thinks it's insufficient.

Everyday, when I go to work, I really dread it because it's either I am clearing people's shit i.e. backlogs, or I am helping my boss type some emails to smooth out the procedures or I am just typing standard operating procedures. You see... All these that I am doing will enable people in the future to benefit wholly. Quoting one of my colleagues: I plant the tree, take good care, ensures it grows into a big tree and people after me get to enjoy the shade provided by the tree, whereas I don't get to enjoy the shade. Totally true! However, darling wants me to think in the sense that at least I know how to plant and grow the tree, the rest of them don't. In life, many things are just how you look at it. "Is the glass half filled or half empty?"

I can only say I look forward to my last working day with them because I really dislike their operations and management. To think they reward efficiency with more work just makes me pissed off. And more to come, because a very very experienced colleague is pregnant. She will be going on maternity soon. My boss's pet. Boss will feel handicapped. I am fortunate I am no longer with them because I know if I am, they will throw every single thing onto me again because they know I have a steep learning curve indeed. Throw my anything and I could almost survive. That is because I bother to open my mouth and ask and clarify. Some people simply just say I don't know or I don't have the time. Again, it's how you look at it. I am just one who wants to learn more and learns a lot more every day in order for me to climb higher in the social ladder.

Wish me luck in my new division!!!

Family

Been having weird things happening in my family. Things falling off from the wall all of the sudden when it's nailed to the wall. Seen Fengshui and my main door's position is in a very bad position this year.

I pray for everything to go smoothly for all my family members and also all will be healthy and get through this year safely.

Wedding Dinner & ROM

Been having slight arguments and small quarrels with darling today, especially. We are both very vexed about the wedding date. We had the Fengshui master calculate an auspicious date for us, but the hotel which we want to book is fully booked by others. When I have the venue, I did not have the date. Now when I have the date, I no longer have the venue. What rotten luck!

Now, I am very disappointed, troubled and frustrated. As much as I want my wedding to be a grand affair, I am stuck with limited funds, no dream hotel, much less to say a dream wedding. Not to worry, everything is going fine between Darling and me and we will definitely make it to the red carpet. Darling, thanks for tolerating my nonsense these few days and I look forward to walking down the aisle with you. =)

On a lighter note, thanks Xin for accompanying me for gown fitting the other day. Really appreciate your time taken off from work to give me comments and helping me make a decision. Also, let me thank you first for all the time you will need to take off due to my wedding. :) Loves ya very muchie *muacks*

Everything is still very unsettled except for the bridal and the photoshoot. OMG! Time's running out! I gotta hurry! It's putting a lot of pressure and stress on me. I hope we can settle this very soon, especially before I move on to a new division, else I think I will be too busy to care for most things. I feel so dis-organised for the first time in my life.

That's basically all my grumblings. For those who have finished reading, thank you very much cos' I know you love me and care about me. Take care, all... and please keep me in your prayers for better luck with everything, work, family, relationship, friendship, health, wealth, just everything la :) I just hope I don't have to grumble so much. Thanks a lot folks.