Just came back from Jaden’s 1^st birthday party, who is my past Filipino colleague Jennifer’s son. There are too many things I want to talk. 1. Old and new friends: The party was held in Burwood RSL Club and I got a chance to see some old friends over there, new mum Monett, my previous position’s replacement Karen….more surprisingly, I happened to meet a girl who is working in our company’s current contract freight forwarder, and so coincidence that she has kept sending invoice to our company every single day, guess what? The recipient is actually ME but she didn’t know my name as she only put our company’s name on the envelope. We can’t believe it that the world is so small. 2. Wonderful food: no wonder that I am a greedy girl who never misses any chance to try a variety of food and never feels shame to eat as much as I could in public particularly in front of free lunch today. It was buffet that had prawns, grilled lamb, beef, toasted chicken wings, vegies, Greek salad, pumpkin soups, desserts, and fruits, which made me dribbling and couldn’t stop taking plate by plate, of course not forgetting to have drinks such as coke and coffee. I was so full at last that I got to loose my belt. Frankly, those food was not first time I tasted, but it could doubly increase your appetite when you were in good mood because you saw your old friends and had a hilarious chick chat. 3. Well-arranged birthday party. Jen is definitely good at creation, you can see the point from the invitation card she sent to every invitees a couple of weeks ahead of party to the end of party. In the invitation card, you would be very moved when you read those beautiful words about how her son Jaden has gone through the past year, “I was born prematurely at only 32 weeks gestation. I was waiting to be laid down on my Mommy’s chest and feel the warmth of her skin but the doctors and nurses only allowed a quick glimpse then whisked me away to the waiting table with scissors, clips……I was glad that daddy was there. I felt secure…..Mom and Dad finally took me home. It was hard for them coping with my sleeping patterns and lots of crying but they cared for me and loved me tenderly anyway. They were also praying for me to be healthy, strong and bigger….” Although those impressive words out of Jaden’s mouth, you can see how much Jen and Denny love and care about their kid. Meanwhile in the party, you could see many details well prepared by Jen. Everyone was very welcomed and placed right and comfortable seat when they arrived in the party area and led to grab food if they like. In the middle of party, Jen arranged a program to have all of kids to have face painted. WOW! Those children couldn’t stop screaming and yelling after they were made up. Anyway, in the party, Jen never forgot to introduce guest each other, so we didn’t feel uncomfortable sitting with some strangers, even we became friends right now. The peak time was photo shooting, family photo, Filipino photo, IPC (where we used to work together) photo….Really have a lot of fun! When it was close to the end of party, Jen suddenly carried a basket wrapped with red paper and distributed a small gift to every guest. She was so nice to consider all that extremely surprised us.

Lately I haven't been able to access MSN messenger. One reason is that MSN messenger has been updated requiring the users to download the new version, but at our office, without IT approval, it is impossible to download any software irrelevant to the jobs, so I had to manage to find other way to log in MSN messenger. In the end smart Jing worked it out with other access way as she did get the same issue too. When I was happy with the problem dealt with, I have got a 'CAMERA ' who is my colleague and has always been close watching what I am doing, even warned me not to chat online for several times. Obviously it is not correct to talk online with friends during working, but I don't think it would be big deal if you have done the job well and it might be acceptable and reasonable to have a short break or fresh head by the way of chatting to someone online when your jobs wouldn’t be affected at all. As well known, it is not uncommon to sometimes browse internet for individual reason or have some personal call at the office. Generally, those are understandable, so is talk online for little time. But there is some person who does like telling other people what to do but blind and dumb on what she does herself. Sorry I am a little bit pissed off. Personally I think she kind of sticks her oar in although what she said is not wrong in principle but I somewhat hate some people who would like to snoop on. Okay, to avoid more trouble, so I have to say GOODBYE to MSN at the office.

一直听说香格里拉酒店的buffet很好吃，今天终于去尝了。不过没有想象的好，主要是自己太挑剔，这个过敏，那个不吃，最后就剩吃几大盘oyster和甜品。如果你喜欢螃蟹、虾、印度食品等，不妨去试试。

原来在国内时，没少在五星级酒店吃饭，说实话，国内五星级酒店的饭比澳洲的好吃。唉，有的吃就不错了，别挑了。

It is the first time to have acupuncture today but it is not all that I understood. I had thought the doctor would put some needles on relevant points and then slightly tweak needle one by one. Not yet! In fact, I was treated by the insertion of the needles into the body at specific points, then connected with electricity to let impulse work on the points for a while. Why manual replaced by electric equipment? Has the traditional theories been changed? Or my previous understanding was radically wrong? Fresh up!

BTW, here I omit望闻问切---how the doctor looks at my face, asks my medical history and symptoms, feels the pulses, after that he comes up healing focus on some acupoints.

Have you done acupuncture treatment? Let me tell you what I feel, in brief it is that全身插满针，通电一小时 :-)

As Acer Arena sponsor, I guess our company must have got some free tickets for many events or concerts held over there, a handful of tickets never went into our eyes but perhaps swallowed by marketing team :-). So I never expected I could get a ticket as I heard Jay Chou(周杰伦演唱会) sole concert in Australia will be on Acer Arena 3rd July, until a few weeks ago, my manager told me I will be given a free ticket if I am interested in going. WHY NOT? It did sound amazing although I had yet been familiar with Jay's those extremely popular songs. Who can refuse a free ticket while some fans had to spend over $100 to get a VIP ticket? Frankly, if it is not free, I wouldn't like to pay for it even though it was sold $50 that originally $75 in our company. Firstly, I am not kind of people who madly follow up their stars. I don have loved singers, but can’t be supposed a truly loyal fan to attend their concerts. Secondly, I am not a real Jay's fan. In my mind, his fans are mostly younger generation. I believe my niece Andi in China would be probably jealous of me if she knows I can pop up in Jay's concert. Anyhow I had felt a bit excited since I got to know I can go to the concert, more or less it can enrich my entertainment life and would give me hilarious time.

In the concert, at the beginning, I was a little shy to present a crazy fan screaming loudly or dancing with his music, but soon a female colleague Grace and I couldn’t help participating in thousands of enthusiastic audiences showing how hot we were. Luckily, our seats were in sponsor box where is relatively separated area and we were located in the last low, so there was no worry to block other fans when we dancing and waving hands at the back. In the near 3 hours, my each cell was very active and I tried to release my high without holding back. To be honest, most of time I didn’t know what Jay was singing at all but relying on seeing subtitle on the big screen, but it affected nothing. I would say, Jay is definitely a talent after heard more and more his songs, and some melody are very traditional and beautiful, not very hip-hop style as I thought. Particularly interaction between Jay and fans made concert reach peak time as fans singing accompanied with Jay and together answering the question that Jay intended to animate…..It was no doubt a successful concert, I believe. There should be no regret for most audiences.

---Villain hitting
Today I have got big headache, being getting involved in heaps of traps made by some supposed villains. On the contrary, I have to admit I was not so careful that I was put into some traps that could be designed by some people intentionally or unintentionally. Who knows? It is pretty normal scenario for most of workers to face this situation. I tell myself not to see dark side, but more focus what I have learned somehow. Actually you would know how pain it is after you got stabbed. :-)

---Office Politics

Hebe has been telling me something happening at her office from last week. I have not been able to give more comments about it as I am not in that case and not smart and clear enough to provide my suggestion to her although I wanna try to have some constructive advice to her. In fact, I have to say, it is genuinely hard to absolutely escape from a battle of office even though you don’t know how it happened and there is no relation with you at all. Office politics would cause organisation restructure, position adjustment and etc., consequently you could suffer something you wouldn’t like to have, such as having new manager, changed responsibility, new co-workers….Sigh! It also occurs in our company too. A director is kicked out of the company by a new wave of cruel office politics. He will go through his last two weeks in our company. As a common employee even bottom level worker, I never need to think about how to survive in office politics because I am so worthless to be considered in the fight. The higher your position is, the more likely you could be affected. So it is true that the more you take duties, the more money you earn, meanwhile the more risk you take. Good luck to everyone!