Project 365: Day 39 The failed ban jian kuih

The last night my sister is in London before going back to Nottingham, she said she wants ban jian kuih, or apom balik I was told. It's a food which I'm not really fond of growing up but grown to appreaciate as I got older. My favourite was the thin and crispy ones sold at "hai tao ki" in Alor Star. Sweet, nutty and crunchy all in a small pack.

Anyway, it was a tiring day driving the sister up to Harlow in a honda civic hybrid. I must admit I quite like that car, the whole feel of driving it, and of course the morally superior feeling of driving a clean car. What a bunch of hypocrits, they are no cleaner than turning my heater off for one hour and leave it on for the rest of the day. In any case, it is a triumph of innovation once again.

Well you guys should get what I mean. I was tired from all the driving and now I have to attempt to make this kuih for the first time. It wasn't the most aesthetically appealing thing I make but it does the job of solving the cravings. Yes it's burnt and we had to eat the inner part without touching the burnt part but it was all nice. The next attempt will be much bettet, I've got a feeling.



Best regards,
Jing Qi Quah

Project 365: Day 38 I like window shopping

No longer able to afford shopping for things I like, I tend to wonder off in my own little world when I go out shopping with yours dearly. The department store is truly one of the biggest innovation of humans, I really mean it.



A day out window shopping can broaden your horizon much more than travelling in my humble opinion. Where else do you get to see 50 different types of pepper grinder each claiming to be the best. The most astonishing thing is that they all sell. You also get to see the latest innovation, like a so called best wine bottle opener in the world, a double pot you can use to heat stuffs using steam (making delicious butter sauce for steak), and the different types of teapots. Whoosh, it's a brave new world out there for innovators.



I said innovators because let's face it. This world needs more inventors but inventors are hard to come by these days. On the other hand, most entrepreneurs nowadays are genius innovators. They see a need in the market, no matter how small the need is, they will find a way to fill that gap. The market is no more saturated than stones in a bowl, you just need to be sands, or even water if you wanna be bruce lee.



Remember, no matter how small the gap, you just need to be smaller to fill it up.



A picture of deno and my sister looking tired after walking thru countless shops and buys NOTHING. Hahaha, it's the process that's enjoyable, think about it.







Best regards,

Jing Qi Quah

Time at home and coming back to UK

Project 365: Day 28 Sister Caught me sleeping, @#$%^&

I was happily getting my back massaged on the massage chair the day after the funeral when I accidentally fell asleep (It was very comfortable ok......). Not the nicest of my pic but oh well, the kids sneakily took a pic of me sleeping. And this isn't the only pic they took, my life is ruin, NOOOO!!!! Can't they just let me sleep in peace?

Project 365: Day 29 Back at home in KL, here's my garden

I got back to kl after the first 7 days ended. I know I left out taking lots of pics but my mind wasn't set on taking pics. Had the pleasure of stopping by Ipoh to taste the "big head prawns" at Mun Choong restaurant on my journey back. With every bite, I feel my artery getting clogged up more and more, why are nice foods always bad for you??????

Anyway this is a shot of my garden during the one day I get to spend at home. My room has been empty for almost 11 months of the year and it certainly gave me a spooky feeling everytime I sleep in there. Guess I need to load it up with stuffs but what's the point in doing that when I'm not home most of the time? Sigh......

Project 365: Day 30 Bought myself a new pair of shoes

Went to do some shopping a few hours before boarding my plane back to London and bought myself a new pair of shoes. I kinda like the design at the front of it, at RM130 I think it's a bargain for it was really comfortable as well. I also got yours dearly her face wash set and boy were they expensive...... sigh.

Project 365: Day 31 Back in UK, on train towards London Paddington

A shot onboard the Heathrow Connect train back to Paddington (Heathrow express too expensive la since I'm not constrained by time). I was a bit depressed leaving home again and coming back to the cold weather here, just to prove that it was just too comfortable at home.

Project 365: Day 1 What a Wonderful day

Beautiful weather in London can be such a beautiful thing. Since I've been sent home on paid leave, it has been a good time for reflecting on what I've achieved over the last year. 3 totally different jobs within 1 year and half year is surely something.



Starting from a call centre, moving to the oldest insurance market in the world (Lloyd's) and going into an investment bank. Have to say that has been quite a journey. 1 thing stays the same though. I totally loved working with everybody in all my jobs, I wonder if it's something experienced by everybody as well?





Best regards,

Jing Qi Quah

Happy day for you?

It was a happy day for me. Why?

For Chelsea fans, congratulations on winning the FA cup.

For Man Utd fans, in YOUR FACE!!!! But you did win the Premier League title.
shorttalk: I actually went to the bar to watch this match. There were loads of Man Utd fans around us and it was obligatory for me and my friends to provoke them. Hahaha, I mean it's just football and they can really get very emotional when their team loses, it's the UK after all.

For those who don't know who I support in football (I actually got asked this question during one of my interview to make sure there's no conflict with the office atmosphere), the answer is none other than........



Yes, I do have to admit myself to being a Juventus fan and also a Del Piero fan. It was absolutely disastrous when they were involved in the Serie A scandal which resulted in them demoted to Serie B.

No matter, the past is the past and the current Juve is rejuvenated under Didier Deschamps.

After bombing Arezzo 5-1 with 3 games to spare, the Old Lady is back in Serie A. Oh YEA!!!!

One more season to go until we get to see some European action once again from Juve.

Now, all follow Del Piero and go "YEEEEAAAAAAARRRRRRRRR"

Job Update & Palm Oil Bitches

Firstly, my job update. I went for an assessment day 2 days ago with a human resource consulting firm(Mercer HR), I thought it went pretty well. The HR personnel contacted me yesterday to deliver to me the news that I got rejected, AGAIN. Nothing much to note here, other than the fact that she told me the reason I failed was because they think I was more suited towards working in the life/non-life insurance business rather than on pensions.

A note to you Malaysians who don't know about pensions. Pensions in Malaysia is managed by our lovely KWSP who is known for a lot of mismanagement of money but nonetheless is the BIGGEST investor in the Malaysian market. Things here in the UK is a bit different however as they were no central agency managing everybody's pensions.

Sure there is a state pension but most of people's pensions really depend on their employer. For instance, if you're an employee of Tesco, then Tesco would be responsible for your pension. It is however customary that they "sub-contract" these responsibilities out by taking up a trustee to do these work.

It is required by law that every trustee has to appoint an actuary to help them value their funds at least once every 3 years. This is where consultancies such as Mercer, Watson Wyatt and Towers Perrin come into play. Weirdly, many misconceptions about actuarial jobs being "boring", "mathematical" isn't always true. From the lots of interviewers I've had, most of them admitted that A-levels maths is probably the only requirement for them to do their job.

This however does not mean that an actuary doesn't have to know the sophisticated, complicated side of statistics and mathematics. They still have to sit for exams and most likely the exams are going to involve these high-level problems(hint hint). So basically, the hardest part of their job is to sit for exams????

Hmmmm............... anyway hope that gives you an insight on the things an actuary does in pensions. I however, am really starting to question what kind of career I want. I mean it's not possible that I know it now but is actuary a good choice for me?

---

On a lighter note, read tomorrow's The Star to see a very familiar article pop up.

Well...... not too familiar but on an issue I've already mentioned ---- Palm Oil.

Read my previous posts here and here.

If you're too lazy to read, then I'll give you an idea of what I was trying to say.

It is true that Malaysia needs and is surviving on Palm Oil. A lot of corporations are even making a hell of profit out of it, such as IOI corp and PBB(who incidentally is taking the firm private now). It is a blessing to Malaysia when somebody came up with the idea that palm oil can be used as a biofuel to replace petroleum. But yet another smart ass came up with the idea that palm oil is very inefficient in terms of the lots of waste it produces which offsets any merits we get from it.

A few examples of the problems we are facing because of palm oil are haze, deforestation and waste mis-disposal. Just take my words for it that it is a real upset to see the palm oil industry facing such attacks.

Today, though the attacks have suddenly got stronger. Apparently a group of western NGOs are planning to lobby against palm oil. If they succeed, we might see all palm oil products taken off the shelf in supermarkets across Europe, and that's a BIG threat.

The report from The Star says that Malaysia will be sending representatives there to talk with these people. I quote:

Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Datuk Peter Chin Fah Kui
said he would explain the truth to British MPs in London and members of the
European Parliament in Brussels about ”our efforts to conserve the environment
and biodiversity while we develop our palm oil industry.” [Source: The Star]

Well, given Malaysia politicians' track record of being bad at negotiations (crooked bridge), I'm not expecting to see this go too well. Take a look at Mahathir's video on youtube here to get what I mean.

Watch the stock market, as this is a make or break situation for Malaysia.

p.s. sorry for the pictureless post, I'm in the IT center(library) so I don't have the luxury of cutting n pasting pics :D

References:

1. Delegation heads for Europe to counter anti-palm oil lobby, The Star, 19 May 2007.

Update on Job Hunt

smalltalk: Hello Transport Tycoon, Goodbye life. Life after dissertation that is.

Weee, I've got an assessment day with Mercer HR next week, so hopefully it will go well and they offer me a job...... any tips guys?


It's gonna be 2 interviews, a written exercise, a group exercise and a presentation to make the day complete. So tough to get a job......... sigh.

Anyway that's it, haven't heard from the other companies yet.

I did however went to London last Friday for an interview with a reinsurance company. Not too sure if they liked me, but I certainly like the interviewer, she's such a nice person. Plus she tried to hook me on to this other actuarial recruitment company, sweeeeeet.......

So for now, consider myself trying to work hard for the interview next week.

Absence

Will be absent from the blogging scene for a few more days, at least until Friday, my absolute deadline for my dissertation.

In the meantime, will have to put down some to do list when I come back including....

• tag from KY a.k.a. Freethinker(I hate tags)
• Update on the most recent RM10.50 offer from Microsoft to third world governments and its impact on MORSEHack.
• Update on my job hunting.
  

Erm..... that's about it, see ya all in a few days. Sorry arr I promise to be back with more goodies goodies.

p.s. paiseh KY, have to do your tag a little later k?

Ijok and Bag

The week of exam is over. It's going to be a race to the finish line for my dissertation now, so cross my fingers. :D

So the news of the day today which everybody knows is that BN won the Ijok by-election. I don't think this is a disappointment, BN NOT winning is a disappointment if that happens. Thanks to phantoms?(maybe not since it's sort of a landslide victory)

Let's look at this objectively. Compare both candidates for the by-election, Parthiban and Khalid.

We know Khalid led PNB and Guthrie Bhd in the past, he's a corporate man and he makes no mistake in letting people know that he is going to run politics like he runs business(although his performance in the past is subject to debate).

Parthiban to me looks like a better candidate overall, although he's running for a rotten party. He's a family man who raised his sisters, respect. He's a much cleaner candidate(at least in the public eye) than Khalid, respect. Most importantly, he's a teacher!!!!

2 reasons why I respect teachers:

1. My dad was a teacher.
2. Education is sacred.

To me, BN winning that is no big deal. They are going to have to compete for the seats again for the GE and let us hope that the opposition really presents us a REALISTIC case of how to run a country, rather than go on saying how bad and corrupted the current government is.

So, Uncle Lim, Dato Seri Anwar and Dato Nik Aziz, the onus is on you guys to show us the light if you think that you have a better way of running the country.

On a side note, as I said earlier, words on the street has it that the General Election which was supposed to be held just after Hari Raya is going to be postponed. Of cose, when the exact date is, only Pak Lah will know it.

End of the political talk today. I'm damn depressed I couldn't be at home to go witness Ijok the day before polling day. I heard got a lot of drama, and I like watching drama. Sigh........ sadness.

---

Enough of politics, I went out shopping(dragged by someone) and guess what I got.

A BAG!!!

A freaking BAG!!! That's like the first bag I've ever bought for myself in 5-6 years, no joke. I have to admit though that most of the bags i have are gifts from friends and I got one as well from my uncle.

Too lazy to take photo of it and show u guys now so I'll just find the pic of it online and post it here.

Woo hoo, it's a Ted Baker biffo!!! Welcome to Boss Lepton's family.

I have to say it's the nicest bag I've seen so far, non-leather of course. And it has lots of space inside which can fit a laptop plus a book and some notes nicely. Not to mention it looks great.

Ah..... vanity!!! Ok, enough indulgence, have to go back to normal life and dissertation.

Ciaoz


p.s. Kelwin, I'll get the promised post about scam up tomorrow ok? I have a good 1 :D

Nuffnang

Notice something familiar? It's nuffnang, yes I've finally added 2 nuffnang ads in my blog. Why?

Well because of this


I would like to donate to my alma mater and I can't think of anyway to do so other than getting some ads in and donate the proceedings. Aiks...... I have to say, thank you ya boss.

In the meantime, if you're an ex-keathwa student, please consider donating some money.
If you have nothing to do with this but you're feeling generous then please donate some money here too. Seriously they should start a paypal account for this.

Otherwise, you could contribute by telling me which schools you think might need the free computers from Project MORSEHack.

In the meantime, I shall leave you with the word of the day - alma mater if you don't already know the meaning to it.

Here is wikipedia's entry on Alma mater:

Alma mater is Latin for "nourishing mother".

In many modern languages it is usually and principally heard as a term of academia; thus, in the English language, it is often used in place of the name of the university or college a person has attended. In American English, it is also heard in reference to a high school or elementary school.

SMK Keat Hwa is my alma mater, so is the University of Warwick and SMJK(C) Keat Hwa (H).

What's yours?

An apple a day keeps the doctor away......

....... and it keeps your parents happy too.

I tried peeling an apple like so today -------->

I have to admit that using a knife to peel apple is indeed harder and slower than using a peeler. That was when I thought of how my mum, grandma or aunt peeled apple for me when I was younger. In fact, now even when I'm back at home they would do the same thing if there aren't any maid around.

Since I'm a lot older now, I think it's my turn to peel apples for them. Too bad I'm all the way in the UK now.

But YOU (yes you who are reading this) should get your bottom off the chair and walk to the fridge now to get some apples, wash them clean and start peeling them. Then, slice and remove its seeds before giving it to your parents(and grandparents). Trust me, it's not that hard and it will barely take 5 minutes of your time.

When was the last time you did this? I hope it's an answer other than "never". So start moving now and I'll assure you, they will be happy.






p.s. to reward yourself, get an extra apple and eat it yourself, keeps you healthy and helps lose weight you know?

Wish me luck

Fu yoh, need all the luck and caffeine for an action-packed week.



Action-packed indeed.

Wish me luck and all the best to all of you for the upcoming week.

:D

Human Capital is key

When I was in Form 5 preparing for my SPM examinations, I couldn't distinguish between a degree and a diploma. I'll be frank, I had no idea what I was going to do after secondary school and it came as a shock to me that I am about to step into an unknown world. Forgive me, I am from a little "city" called Alor Star(a city that is not a city) and I was not alone in realising the existence of an unknown world.

Don't get me wrong, the school did a lot to tell us about the options we had at that time. There were many educational fairs organised, whether by the school or some private organisations. I remember that I was at this careers talk when the speaker pop the question to me(I was sitting in the front) asking what do I aspire to become. My answer at that time was

CEO of a multinational corporation

I swear that he looked half shocked half amused. What an answer by a student, and to be honest I wasn't even thinking straight. I had just learnt the word CEO less than a day before the fair and there I was talking like I already have big ambitions. I want to be a successful businessman like my dad and my uncles, talk about influence on my youth, sheesh.



If you ask me the same question now, my answer would be no different that that time. The only difference is that I have a clear mindset of what I want to do. Why CEO? Power of course, who doesn't love power, and me being a control freak. Why multinational? Secretly I told myself that my ambition is to take a small local company and transform it into a multinational corporation, that is a show of success. Too much of a fairytale? It is possible and I adhere to this believe.

To realise this ambition, I have to equip myself with all the relevant knowledge. A degree is a key, a qualification as an actuary is a tool, a determined mindset and an acute business sense are requirements. Throughout the years, I've met a lot of different people and I certainly would love to meet more, much much more. I love to listen to what these people have to say, how they go about analysing a particular situation, how they handle the challenges and how they view life. Along with all these, I've also accumulated a few views that I think that I would adhere to one day as a businessman.

One of this views is on human capital.

I came across this article on Bernama. I quote Tan Sri Nor Mohamed Yakcop as saying:

has called on the private sector to give attention to the development of its human capital, describing it as a critical component in the country's development. [Source: Bernama]

I do in fact agree with him that human capital is vital to thedevelopment of the country. This is even more so for industries where human capital is the asset of the company such as consultancies, banks, creative industries, advertising etc compared to say manufacturing. Everybody knows this and so this is not a vital issue that we have to note.

An addendum to the above is a very crucial point I would like to stress --- human capital management. A business's success depends on how well the leader managers his employees, whether he can extract the full potential of his employees and how much loyalty he can garner from those who had shown full potential. It is also important that the employees get rewarded appropriately and given enough benefits. This is a move that doesn't only increase productivity, it also helps in bridging the poverty gap said to be widening in our country.

Another form of rewarding employee is to send them for re-education. Of course there are worries that these employees might be poached by competitors, I see this as failure of the company to build loyalty and less of the employees' fault. Why? Figure that out yourself.

Another important thing missing out from the business sector in Malaysia is the providence of pensions to the employees. I know in Malaysia, pensions provision is secured by the existence of EPF, but have you actually thought of whether an employee in your company could secure a good enough pension to lead a comfortable life after retirement? Probably an additional private scheme where feasible would satisfy your employees right? I think that this is even more true if your company is a multinational one.

Lastly, I would like to stress the appropriateness of pyin your employees right. And by paying I mean their monthly salary. There should be more studies on the appropriate pay employees should be gettind instead of just offering the market level. After all,

If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys

If you're still reading here, I would love to hear your comments on this.

Please please leave a comment ok?




References:

1. Critical for Malaysia to invest in human capital, Bernama, 13 April 2007.
   

Golf Properties Ahhhhh........

First, this caught my eyes when I was looking through FT.com.


A Villa in Sabah around one of Asia's best 18-hole golf courses. Sounds tempting no?

Went ahead to look at the sales detail at the website:

It says "Prices from c. £105,000" on their website, I think that's for the apartment. Anyone wanna guess how much it would cost for the villa?

Moreover, it's designed by Wimberley Allison Tong & Goo. Don't know who they are? They're the designer of:


Sun City Resort in South Africa



Venetian Resort Hotel in Las Vegas. (Can you believe they have gondolas in the middle of the desert? With money, anything is possible.)


The Atlantis in the Bahamas.



Fuyoh, head over to their website. Award-winning 5 star hotel eh? I want I want!!! In my dreams :P

Job Hunt

Updates on my job hunt, to whoever who wants to offer me a job.

Watson Wyatt - Rejected
Towers Perrin - Rejected
PwC - Rejected
Legal & General - Rejected
MercerHR - Phone interview Thursday Done, Waiting results
Groupama - Yet to submit(Pending email reply from HR)

Oh why oh why so hard to get a job 1? Nevermind, try try again.

Anybody got any connections into the actuarial field?

Shutdown Day

It's 24th of March and it's the International Shutdown Day. It means that I'll be signing off tonight and will not be touching my computer for day. It'll be good for the eyes too.

See you day after tomorrow.

It's official, the FINE

Yes, as from previous posts, you should know that I nearly started a fire in my flat. I've just received a letter from the warden stating that they are going to fine me. How much you ask?

£50!!!!!!! ====== RM350!!!!!!!!


You know much is that worth? That's worth a month of my tesco shopping, meaning enough food to last me for 1 whole month. Sigh........... That's like............ an extra hefty speeding ticket, all because of negligence. I do have the right to appeal in mitigation, but it is not likely that they are going ot reduce this fine.

Here are the exact words in the letter:

Since this is an incident relating ot firesafety within halls and your actions were contrary to residential regulation 20 (a) (ii) - I hereby fine you £50. The fine should be paid immediately.........

And residential regulation 20 (a) (ii) says

Non-compliance with any of the University Accomodation Regulations (as set out above), or with any rule in the handbook for the relevant Hall of Residence.

Set out above here refers to regulation 20 (a) (i) saying

Anti-social behaviour such as drunkenness; disorderly conduct; unnecessary noise; selfish use of noise emitting equipment including radios, music centres, CD players, televisions, computers, musical instruments; playing games in close proximity to residences; disregard of such hours of silence and visiting hours as may be laid down in the handbook for the relevant Hall of Residence, and any behaviour causing a nuisance, inconvenience, or annoyance to other residents.

I mean I do think I'm guilty of nearly causing a fire, but it was an accident. Surely that is not anti-social behaviour right? Someone enlighten me on this please.

Anyway, I'm just gonna pay the stupid fine and get on with it. If there's anything I'm happy about, it's that this case is finally resolved and I can concentrate on my studies.

Relevant posts:

1. Fire Fire
2. Update on Fire Alarm Incident

Turning my back on Microsoft Windows

As most of my close friends know, my hard drive crashed on me a few months back, completely destroying the data and more importantly the windows program on my computer. You see, I'm using an IBM thinkpad t40 for the past 4 years now, and as IBM users will know, there's a pretty neat function called "Restore to Factory Settings" which would wipe everything out of your com and restore it to just Windows.

Well, so much for Windows now. I've decided at that time I should try something new, something exciting, something revolutionary. That's when I saw the come of one of my lecturers, he uses Linux. I remembered that I read an article about Linux sometime back in secondary school but heard nothing else since then. I thought they were just gonna succumb to Window's domination of the Operating System(OS) market.

I was SO wrong. Not only did they survive, they even evolved. Just for starters, there are so many distributions of Linux out there. And a lot of them provides very nice frontends and desktop environment.

For those who don't understand what desktop environment is, take a look at your Windows. That's a desktop environment.

Here's a screenshot of my desktop.
Now why do you think Windows has triumph over all the other Operating systems? Because they have such a nice and easy to use interface, and that's what the desktop environment is about.

Linux's strength isn't in this though. It's in the kernel, the supposedly powerful kernel that is customisable to do anything to your liking. While I'm not at the pro-level yet, I could already feel the power of the kernel.

Just think about this. You can run any program, any function, integrate any type of programming language into this thing. This little baby is a monster I tell ya. MONSTER!!!

An example of me running R(a statistical program) in it.
Basically there are two major types of desktop environment you can choose if you want to run Linux: GNOME and KDE. Both have their advantages and disadvantages. I chose GNOME because its name appeals to me more(:D)

Also there are so many distributions of Linux out there and the best thing is that they are all free.

The bad thing about it is they are updated so often, and you can choose to use the latest available version (what we call the bleeding-edge version). I personally use SUSE Linux 10.1 but if you're a beginner, there's a distribution called Ubuntu, which is very user-friendly.

So why am I writing this article now you ask?

Well, I've been browsing around looking at new things and I came across this other FREE but not open source OS called Solaris 10. Solaris is developed by Sun Microsystems, the same company that brought java to us and changed our lives forever. Apparently Solaris 10 uses a java-based desktop environment, which could be interesting. A screenshot for all of you, introducing Solaris 10, using a GNOME environment too I see, well bits of it.
Anyway, if you're interested in testing this out, go over to their website here. Place an order and they'll deliver the DVD-image to you FREE!!! ANYWHERE in the world. Oh did I mention Ubuntu is doing this as well?

For more info why they deliver it for free, read this article by Jonathan Schwartz, our tai ko in blogging.


p.s. Jonathan Schwartz is also the CEO of Sun Microsystems. Yea baby, Sun Microsystems you have my support :D

p.p.s. WINDOWS I'M NOT GOING BACK TO YOU, NOT IN THE NEAR FUTURE.

麻坡的華語 Muar Chinese

A video by my fellow Malaysian. I tell you this is one good song, and a damn good video. Top class production dude, well done.

When you're at it, feel free to watch his documentary on Muar as well.



and

Update on Fire Alarm Incident

An update on my Fire incident on 6 March:

The sub-warden came over to see me to get a detailed statement from me which I gladly gave. The update is that he is going to discuss with the Warden on whether any action should be taken against me.

Bad thing is that it is very likely that action is going to be taken, i.e. a fine most probably. The not so bad thing is that it is going to be a maximum of £50 fine according to the sub-warden.

He said that the payment was a token to the fire department for their action. It is estimated that everytime a fire engine is called out for a false alarm(I thought my case was pretty genuine) it would cost £2000, no way do I have the money for that eh? Sigh......

Still pretty upset, but yea hope this would resolve soon.

PRAY FOR ME please....