Can you believe it is LEMON? I can't but it is true. It is definitely shocker as my colleague showed me. My colleague was also astonished when he saw it in his backyard. This giant easily makes most lookers would rather believe it is a pumpkin than a lemon, right? I guess it is due to gene disorder or it might be from other planet.

What a free-gift Friday! Guess what? I received three surprising stuff today. When I arrived at the office and sit at the table in the morning, Bert handed over a cup of Gloria Jean’s coffee capuccino. It couldn’t be better to get it from a co-worker and really can’t refuse it although I don’t drink coffee……..before lunch time, Herman came over and passed on me a Post-it and he said he got it from some stationery supplier which just visited our company to recommend their products. The notepad isn’t worth too much, but it is fairly nice to show your colleague thinks about you and would like to share something with you…….after lunch, Iris and I went to CBA to deposit for the company, then we were stopped by a young mate who was giving away free Mountain Dew drink can in front of CBA building. How can we reject his favour? It was just in time to have it as we felt a bit thirsty after 10 minute walk in the muggy day……Getting to the office, I told my colleague that I looked forward to receiving red envelop if this kind of free gift could keep on coming to me in the afternoonJ 

 

Company is doing another business downturn action to push employees to reduce accrued annual leave less than 10 days, so we have to compulsorily take some days off until company is happy with each one’s accumulated annual leave no considering that we would like to do it or not. It has allegedly been executed in many big companies, This arvo, our team have to sit together to arrange what period you can be away and what time she'd better to have annual leave. Finally, it is my turn to take into account to have a week off first or second week in March. Jesus! I am not workaholic but I am a boring girl who would rather work than stay at home especially as I always don’t know how to kill a week. no money to have domestic trip, no money to go overseas, no fancy to do, no interesting arrangement to be made except watching DVDs.....Jason said it is not bad that we still have days off with pay while some companies already forced staff to take holiday without pay. Sounds that we are treated well, even better than being got redundancy, but I would say it is annual leave that is legal benefit for us.

 

Anything could happen as global finance crisis is on. I am certainly aware that you wake up every day and everything has changed, therefore I need to content with current situation. Needless to say, I should be happy that I am still working, still earning money, no reason to complain this company command. Why not try to think how to take advantage of five days, enjoy it?

紧急接到好友电话，讲她办公室的烦恼，没有想到在澳洲第一大银行也有这样的事情。其实无论在哪，都有好人、坏人（我不知用这两个词是否合适），办公室里人与人之间的勾心斗角， 各派系之间的明争暗斗很正常。人就是在这种环境中成长的，从而锻炼出‘成熟’的特质。我习惯用‘政治’这个词，因为我觉得很贴切。工作十几年，我觉得我的‘政治’敏感还是很低，经常会被小人算计，无论是在中国还是澳洲。记得第一份工作，可能澳洲的很多朋友都不知道，作为‘团委书记’， 我有着作为一个刚毕业的大学生不得不有的‘政治’思想，当时在党政之间我必须游刃有余，记得党委组织委员很差异我为什么能让两方领导喜欢，其实我没什么心眼，只是因为我小，没人和我计较而已。当然后来由于自己的任性，也没让后一任党委书记更加喜欢。由于自己还是不喜欢从政，于是跳出了这个圈子。第二个工作，在大公司，还算顺利地度过，但在最后一年，也被卷入了一场领导之间的斗争，好在那时已经申请留学，所以没太在意。但到今天为止，那时的很多战友都离开了。其实，在大公司有句话就是，不怕你不行，就怕你站错队。一样存在着一损俱损，一荣俱荣，领导受重视，你就有机会；领导倒台了，你就要准备离开。当然有些人继续生存下来，因为他们更加聪明，更知道如何见风使舵罢了。‘政治’，中国很普遍，澳洲也一样。只要你的公司够大，人够多，就会有这一现象，只是没有中国那么严重，因为中国更讲‘政治’，中国的人精更多。多遇到点‘政治’没什么，你会有更多免疫力。

Some friends asked me the frequency of updating blog has been not as much as before. Haha! First and foremost, in the past there were so many interesting things that drove me to write down every episode, but recently my life has been involved in common things such as working, watching TV and surfing the internet, no something special or new occurred yet, which couldn't motivate me to describe them somehow. Another reason is I have been a little bit busy and no time to be spaced-out at work. Basically I get anxious to be rest after work everyday, not like thinking too much, just like having relaxation as much as possible then. Since the first redundancy in our company, our work loads have been being more and more. Every morning, I have to manage to keep calm down as I saw thousands of emails unread, the situation will be getting worse as I receive lots of heads-up for this or that kind of thing that I need to do, which usually makes me have a big head at first response and sometimes think about to embark on sabbatical. You know, if you are very tired, generally you might not be interested in anything even though something you used to enjoy it very much. If your body and mood are in good status, little excitement can cause big happiness. On the other side, slight pressure or fatigue can create suffering if you are in blue. So not doing anything, not thinking anything would be best way to get a second wind from bloody wear-out. Actually, believe it or not, I brushed up some Chinese DVDs again in the past couples of weeks. I can’t remember how many times I did, but it is not a bad way for me to kill the time leisurely. The DVDs in the review list are <激情燃烧的岁月><流星花园><别了，温哥华>, Anyway, you would laugh at me because I still love watching <流星花园> which is supposed to be for teenagers. Frankly I inexplicit get to know why, just assuming I am essentially young. Currently I am watching a new series online, named <潜伏>, acted by Sun Hong Lei, one of my favourite male Chinese actors. I reckon it will take me much more time at the moment, however internet speed sucks and wish it would be better.

 

Friday, we, 3 girls, happened to meet pink Vivacity ice cream van when we were having post-lunch walk in Olympic Park. Woooow! Its free!!!! We stopped and had tacit eye contacts, afterwards couldn’t help speeding up and rushed to that van. Sorry, please understand we were greedy girls and didn’t wanna miss any free stuff by any way. The hot girl in pink respectively gave us a cup of raspberry ice cream, then we left with huge satisfaction and found a good place to be under a tree with shady and cool to enjoy our FREE GIFT. Yum! It is uncommon phenomenon to have such big free gift in China, but you could be lucky to get free finger sausage, or other finger meaty food, or some snack as seller has promotions. Maybe Australian are more generous or they know there would be hard to see a long queue to wait if they hold promotion activity or public benefit event by the way of dispensing in an underpopulated country. Actually it was the second time that I came across this kind of event. Last time I was given a bag of slice bread at Martin Place. I reckon that bag of slice bread would be sold more than $4 in supermarket. Wish I could have more and more this sort of experience. J

 

原来国内的公司终于如网上所说，行动了，而且裁的都是中高层。原来的领导，昔日的战友相继离开.....电脑业的另一个冬天终于又来了。哎，自己目前不也在经历吗？选择了这个行当，无怨无悔吧。

It is the last day of 12-day pleasant holiday, which more or less brings me some disappointment when I think to resume working tomorrow. Looking back these days I went through, there was nothing left except endless delight and relaxed body with bonus of a-few-kg weight gainJ. How did I do to have it?

 

Initially, I didn’t miss out to be a hospitable hostess to meet my self-expression desire as a new house owner. I didn’t think I would have that busy days to welcome so many visitors as I didn’t literally plan all friends I had invited to come over within a few days, happily it gave me some chances to show off our new home and made us hear million of positive appraise and win desiring eyes. Simultaneously accomplishment of a hearty table of dishes for serving 6 persons made me again experienced what self content was. I really love that feeling! Don’t forget that I am a kind of person who is in narcissi all the time.

 

In addition, retail therapy worked out fatigue and improved mood and disposition on a large scale. To reward a year hard working in 2008, I happened to purchase a Longines watch and a Swarovski necklace actually they were not in the shopping list and budget. Women are women, who always buy something out of plan during shopping as they couldn’t resist that beautiful temptation at all no matter that they truly need it or not. Somehow new stuff is certain to turn out extremely pleasant sensation in women’s bodies, which is likely to make women more beautiful and younger. In that case, lady, you don’t feel guilty to buy something to take advantage of Xmas and New Year sales as long as you are happy. It sounds that I am trying to look for an excuse for myself, huh?

 

Incidentally, plenty sleep and complete rest state were good for body relief from work tension. I underwent the last 10 crazy working days before the holiday. Short staff and busy year-end jobs got me frigging busy and I pretty much looked forward to holiday at that time. There was sun-rise hope to support myself to keep working as I thought about holiday coming. At last holiday kicked off, I knew it was happy when I could fall sleep without worrying about time of get-up and my body had thorough relaxation then. Now I feel refreshed up, so there is no doubt that physical break is definitely indispensable to renew strength and store up energy.

 

On all accounts, through holiday rest, brain and body obtain resetting, hopefully it is ready for having a new start from a new year.

元旦，2009年的第一天，我在新家组织了个小小的house-warming party，自己动手做了一桌饭，这是我的第二次‘处女秀’啊:-)。准备了8个菜，除了继承上一次的老三样：粉蒸肉、栗子鸡和炒虾外，还有豆豉鲮鱼油麦菜、香菇牛腩（老人国内带的汤锅，附带赠送一本菜谱，从中学习的）、土豆片、芹菜腐竹和花生米黄瓜胡萝卜（这两凉菜是上次和Emily学的）。另外，还参考了足迹网中的一些窍门，这也是Emily告诉我的，呵呵。照片已放在我的photo album New Year Day in 2009.

 

通过这次实践，发现自己在厨感上稍有提高，做饭水平小有提升，但做饭积极性未有改变，哈哈。

 

感谢Jack夫妇的鲜花，这是本人平生第一次收到的花啊！