A Job. A Real Job.

Yesterday I got an offer to be a permanent employee of Standard Chartered Bank - where I have been working since November. I was hired on a three month contract, and assuming all worked out, I was to expect an offer for a permanent position. Even though I felt that things were working, I really like my team, my boss, and my job, you still never know, so I was so excited to get the offer yesterday.

So far my work has been about making maternity leave easier for everyone involved - the women, their managers, HR, etc.; work-life balance, and trying to figure out what we need to do as a bank to help our employees find it better; lots and lots of writing and communications...and I have really interesting things on the horizon. I'm really excited about the job.

Good - I really am excited about where this could take me professionally.
Bad - We will not move back to the States anytime soon.

In other news, we had a great week with a million things going on. Matt worked "in New York and London" from Singapore. Meaning he worked from 8 until 5 or so...8pm until 5am. He got sick, super tired, and struggled a bit - but he's a superstar, never complains and really liked the calls with the clients. I didn't like that when he came to bed around 5:30 or 6 I couldn't fall back asleep. Of course I complain about the few minutes of sleep that I miss out on, and he's super fine with missing out on complete nights of sleep. He's awesome.

In addition, our Kitty finally started using the scratching post I got for her...over a month ago. She uses it for scratching and stretching...and storing her toys on top of it. (Ok, we store her toys up there, but she plays with them).

I have been doing yoga everyday for the last few weeks, and I love it. I will write more about yoga in a more boring week when I have nothing else to write about.

I had a very funny book club experience - we read a (really quite horrible) murder mystery in Malaysia. The author is a friend of one of the book club members. The book was really simple writing...anway, it was fun to read, but...So the author came to our book club meeting, which I was initially skeptical about, but it turned out that she was hilarious, smart, entertaining, and I loved it. It's not everyday that you get to talk to an author of a book you read...even if you didn't really like the book.

Sarah and Ben finished their trip in Thailand and made it back to Singapore. We went out for a funny Japanese food experience and an Asian mall experience. They were totally into the stuff at the mall. They got out of here alright and made it home. It was really fun to have them in Asia for a few weeks.

I met up with Rusty's (see earlier posting) wife, and she was super cool. I really liked her a lot. I can't wait for Rusty to get back to Singapore so I can see him. I don't think I have seen him since 1996. That's a long time.

My team from work went mini-golfing yesterday for a team bonding activity. It was ridiculous. First of all I sucked, and no one likes to do things that they are bad at, so that's just being honest. The course was in one big room, 18 holes, smashed into a room that's probably about 5,000 square feet. All of the holes were spots in Singapore with super silly obstacles. I had no interest. I didn't even think it was funny/dumb. Though, I will admit that mini-golfing really isn't fun when you're sucking, because when you stop caring it just makes it worse, because then you REALLY don't get the ball in the hole and it just keeps on going....luckily we skipped about 6 or 7 holes. Phew.

I wish I was at Limmud NY right now. My mom is there, and I'm sure I have a million friends there...hope it goes well!!