Happy CNY !

Shortly after our surfing escapades (See below), I started work on a new project with TRUenergy, the fifth largest energy retailer in Australia. It's quite different from my earlier projects, primarily in that I wasn't calling the shots. In fact, it's almost like going back to school again, where I'm working almost in a collegiate (although sometimes competitive environment) with different consultants and stakeholders pooled together. Just within the first few days, I already had a pile of homework that needed attention.

View from my desk

The other big difference is working in the middle of the city. In Singapore, I'd always wondered if I missed out on the 'corporate life' by not having worked in the CBD. At present, my office is smack at the corner of bourke and elizabeth. For those unfamiliar with melbourne, Bourke St is kind of like Orchard road so I'm working at the equivalent of Takashimaya. Amazing variety of lunch places to eat, except I've mostly had only 30-minute working lunches.

Still thoroughly enjoying it so far. I can imagine getting burnt out if I keep up at this pace long term though but I guess it's better than being bored and unchallenged.

No gmail at the office (firewall blocks access) so I'm a lot slower at replying mails. And don't even think about MSN. I'm thinking of subscribing to a wireless hotspot so I can at least check my mails at the starbucks downstairs, but we'll see how we go.

Om and Shirz

Us

Sadly, Chinese New Year was a bit of a non-event here with us. It was stinking hot (38-39 degrees) so we spent most of our time hiding out in the shopping mall. Although we did mark the day with a nice dinner of Peking Duck with Om.

Speaking of eating out, when Esther said she had a severe backlog on her blog, she wasn't kidding ! After I've been back for over 2 months, she finally posts that dinner we had at the Tze Char place !

In the new-toy dept, we bought a HDD TV Recorder. Kinda like a TiVo but unfortunately the Australian Digital TV standards don't seem to have a great emphasis on the delivery of the programming. We can only see the next two shows in advance for each channel, which kinda reduces the ease of recording shows with just a few buttons. But still, the ease of zapping away TV ads is fantastic, and it also highlights how many commercials we're bombarded with all the time. I remember on one episode of the biggest loser, we were zapping away 8 ads each commercial break. At 30 seconds an ad that works out to be 4 minutes of advertising, every 8 or so minutes !?

Right, end of update. Mensa test this saturday. Not feeling very confident, partly also because my brain has been battered from work. I'm spending 4-6 hours of every day in a meeting of some sort. If it's not brainstorming, it's having to really pay attention to understand what's going on. Anyway, happy CNY to all !