What is Imm Doing?

A Place for my family and friends to know what I've been up to and what I'll be doing. 一个交待行踪和报平安的管道。。

Friday, December 30, 2005

Just no mood to work...

This week was quite bad.. Though there are lots to be done, I just can't summon enough attention to get things done quickly... Luckily no major issue happened during this week. With everyone in a festive holiday mood, things were done in a joyous and relax mode.

Except for the headache of manpower (the lack of it), everything is okay for me in my job. With the immediate termination of one of my guy and the pending resignation of another, add to that, the difficulty the placement company faced while looking for replacement, the monitoring team that I'm in-charge of is being stretched very tight. I can't afford to have anyone of them going on leave or even mc in the next 2 months.

Hopefully, things will get better next year.. Tomorrow will be better... but before tomorrow comes, I need to complete tonight's website implementation. Please let there be no complications to it...

Friday, December 23, 2005

It's my birthday!!

Didn't really celebrate much this birthday... Had only 1 birthday cake, from my colleagues.

Spend it alone this year. Went shopping in the morning, at Causeway Point in Woodlands. Never did like the town or Orchard area during Christmas, too crowded with people... Within 1.5 hours, I bought 5 T'shirts and 1 pants. All for work which can also be worn for non working purposes...

Then in the evening, I cooked the traditional mee sua with 2 eggs. Spend the whole afternoon and evening playing an Online Game called Silk Road. Very addictive.. :P

So that's how I spent my birthday.. Relaxing at home.. no need to entertain anyone.. just me, myself and Phaik Imm... :)

Thursday, December 22, 2005

Had a Good Year... 2005...

In less than 2 hours, it'll be my 31st Birthday...

Frankly, I can't believe it, that I'm already in my thirties!! Anyway, it was a good 30th year of my life, quite a fruitful one in fact. There are 2 major milestones achieved in 2005 that I am very proud of.

Firstly, I finally took the first step in becoming a translator. It has been on my mind for a couple of years but I never took any steps in realising it except talking about it. This year, I took the course and completed it. With my last exam result still pending, I can say that I did quite well in the course, 1A-4B-2C so far.

Secondly, I took part in the Standard Chartered Marathon running my first 10km race, and I finished within my own target of 1hour 30 mins. This run was on my mind too for quite some time, again, it was just thoughts that needed to be put into action. And this year I did!!

But with things that I have achieved that I am proud of this year, there are some things that I wished I had done better. First and foremost, keeping in touch with all my friends. I must admit, with the translation classes and work commitment, I didn't have much time to meet up with my friends or be there more often when they needed my support, and neglecting them in the process. Hopefully they will understand what I was going thru and I will try to make up to them next year. Next, I wished that I could put in more effort in my assignments so my results will be much better. I know I could do better, but I took it easy in several of the modules, putting in maybe 60-70% effort into them, instead of 100%.

Anyway, all these have passed and my 31st year will be ushered in soon.. Better start thinking of my birthday resolutions... instead of regreting things that I can't change.

Monday, December 19, 2005

Glad it's over...

It was a busy busy busy saturday...

Had to go back office to do some system application upgrades that involves 9 servers. I reached office around 11am. Instead of starting my upgrading tasks, I was asked to do testing by the Network Engineer to test the corporate systems, as they were doing some firewall rules maintianence. All these were not conveyed to me, and it seemed my manager happily agreed to their request without informing me. These testing took me 2 hours. By the time I start to do what I was supposed to do, it was almost 1pm.

Luckily the Project Manager of this upgrade was around to help troubleshooting. So with her help in doing verification testing and all, I spend a total of 9 hours doing 9 servers.

By the time we leave the office, it was already 10pm... But I am just glad that we managed to get it done.

Sunday was a rest day....

Friday, December 09, 2005

First Chapter closed..

Having the last exam of my translation course tomorrow.

Looking forward to this exam...

Feeling happy that I did take and complete this 1-year specialist diploma in translation. Lucky to have known and made friends/acquaintance with my classmates. Contend that I didn't do too badly in the exams so far (1A, 4Bs and 2 Cs). Pleased to know that I DO have the aptitude for translation and this might just be the first (small) step towards a possible new career.

However, this is just the first chapter in this new direction. Next year, the 9 of us (from this class) have decided to form a study group and meet up once a month for discussion on past IoL (Institute of Linguistic, UK) exam papers. The forming of this study group is to prep ourselves for the IoL exam in the year 2007. IoL is a world recognised certification for translators. It will definitely open more doors to the world of translation.

Next year I plan to take up Japanese language. I aim to take and pass the JLPT 4 and maybe JLPT 3, if possible, by end of next year. Also I plan to take the HSK Advance Level language test in Apr next year. Hopefully I can achieve all these within next year.. They are all part of my 2007 New Year Resolution. :P

Tuesday, December 06, 2005

Electronic chip timing....

From the Official Standard Chartered Singapore Marathon Website (http://www.runpix.biz/sin05/10/finord.php?LastName=15320&lan=),

Entrant: GOH PHIAK IMM
Event: 10 Km
Date: Sunday Dec 4, 2005
Division / Race Number: W_SIN / 15320
Chip Time / Gun Time: 1h:20m:43s / 1h:40m:52s


Further analysis of my run:
Average KM: 8min 4sec
Average Mile: 12min 59sec
Average 7.4km per hour or 4.6Miles per hour
Event Average Time: 1h:29m:01s


So I met my target of under 90 minutes!! :)

Next year, I shall run 10km under 1 hour!! Gambatte!!


A small hiccup: Yes, they spelt my name wrongly...

Dentist next?

Think I would need to make a trip to the dentist soon.. Food kept getting stuck among my upper right molars. So irritating... Might be that my wisdom tooth has finally decided to make an entrance after all these 30 years. Can't be sure until I visit the dentist, but I sure hope it is. Then I could take the customary 2 weeks mc for extracting the wisdom tooth.. :) Else I would feel utterly 'dumb' as the sign of my 'wisdom' has yet to emerge, even after 30 odd years!

Can barely feel.... the aches!!

Suprise! Suprise! Half expecting my body to ache (at least more than yesterday), but it didn't! Mmm.. all those jogging that I've done the past few months must be working.. Although I didn't jog quite as often as I would like to, still a body that has been exercising recovers faster than the one that didn't..

Maybe I can consider following my colleagues to the gym tomorrow... Or I shouldn't push it and wait till Thursday before I hit the gym...

Monday, December 05, 2005

Body still feeling alright.. for now..

Woke up this morning, half expecting body aches of monsterous magnitude, yet it didnt materialise (yet). There are some sore muscles here and there, but nothing major that could render me incapable of going to work. (damn!)

However, as the day goes by, parts of my body start to moan, time-delayed it seemed... Now most of my major muscle groups are quite sore, including my neck and shoulder muscles! Mmm.. when were they involved in the run?? Anyway, don't plan to start running these few days. Shall rest till maybe Wed or Thu before I (try/intend to) follow my colleagues to the gym during lunch time.

Will try to jog as often as possible. Think I shall jog twice a week, at least, if I were to run 10km under 1 hour. This last 10km run was a good motivational target. Hopefully, there will be more such runs next year that I can take part... think I'm going to be addicted to the adrenalin rush from such runs.. :)

Sunday, December 04, 2005

And I ran... 10km today...

I met my target of finishing the 10km run within 90 minutes. If I'm not wrong, the timing might be around 80+ minutes. Not bad... :)

Didn't really sleep that well last night. Woke up a couple of time worrying that I might overslept. Luckily I didn't.

Took a bus to the MRT and then MRT to City Hall. Was late in fact for the start-off. Reached the padang around 7.10am, searched for the VISA tent for 10min, then walked to the wrong starting line. When I eventually do start to run (from the starting line) it was (based on my watch) almost 7.30am!! Almost 30 min late!

Anyway, since there is a chip (black colored) that will record the start and end time, it makes no difference whether we start with the whole group or not. Slowly and gradually I made up the distance. Passed quite a number of runners. I kept running all the way to the 5km mark without stopping. It took me less than 40min to get there, which is suprisingly fast for me. Normally I will take more than 40min to reach the 5km mark. After that I stopped and walked for a while, before running again. I think I dont perform well under the sun, I ran better at cooler climate. Luckily, Singapore roads are shaded by the trees along the sides, so only occasionly do the runners need to run under the sun. I tried to push myself to run faster and not stop that often. Alas, during the final 2 km I had to stop and walk a couple of time. Maybe that's the sign of insufficient training...

Regardless, I am just happy that I finally ran my 1st 10km today and got a finisher medal to show for it. Will wait for the official cert to see my exact timing... Next year, I will definitely sign-up for the 10km run again before attempting farther distances. And of course, next year, I will aim to finish within an hour! :)

Saturday, December 03, 2005

Anticipation....

Tomorrow is the Standard Chartered Marathon! Will be running in the Quarter Marathon category (10KM).

Hopefully, my adrenalin can carry me till the end...
Hopefully, I can finish it in less than 90 minutes...
Hopefully, I wouldn't the last..

Hopefully, I won't oversleep tomorrow morning!! :P