We have school on Chinese New Year. I am currently in a group meeting with my Chinese Singaporean groupmate. I just learned a few things.
I asked about how much they give and to whom.
My groupmate (who will remain nameless) was telling me I actually don't have to give to anyone because I'm not Chinese. Score.
She was also telling me that you give $2, $4 or $6 or $8 to kids. I said, "what? You give $4? I thought that was a bad number in Chinese culture." She replied "INFLATION!" She said they used to give $2, but now kids are expecting more, and they care more about the money than the auspicious number.
She also said that she keeps a spreadsheet of the amounts that people give her kids so she can be sure to reciprocate.
Spreadsheets and inflation! That's Chinese New Year business school style.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Monday, January 26, 2009
Sleeping on the Plane
I have a problem where I always sleep with my mouth open on the plane or the bus. I can't control it. It's gravity.
It must be hilarious/disturbing for the people next to me. Out of respect, I tried to rather lean my head on my arm. But...oops, then I woke up, because I had drool running down my arm. I must be tired.
I must say that I liked Langkawi more today. If you want a place where you can ONLY sit on a GORGEOUS beach - it's it. It is absolutely beautiful (if you ignore the trash on the beach - which isn't SO bad for Asia...). While Matt and Tenley went to see the mangroves, I read on the beach for a few hours, and I was happy. Then Tenley and I talked on the beach while Matt read in the shade. I liked that too. Yay for vacations. Boo for school tomorrow - ON CHINESE NEW YEAR!!
It must be hilarious/disturbing for the people next to me. Out of respect, I tried to rather lean my head on my arm. But...oops, then I woke up, because I had drool running down my arm. I must be tired.
I must say that I liked Langkawi more today. If you want a place where you can ONLY sit on a GORGEOUS beach - it's it. It is absolutely beautiful (if you ignore the trash on the beach - which isn't SO bad for Asia...). While Matt and Tenley went to see the mangroves, I read on the beach for a few hours, and I was happy. Then Tenley and I talked on the beach while Matt read in the shade. I liked that too. Yay for vacations. Boo for school tomorrow - ON CHINESE NEW YEAR!!
Langkawi
I would rather blog than study, but I must study, so this must be quick...
Matt, Tenley and I are in Langkawi for the long weekend. We left on Friday night, and on Thursday when I looked up whether or not the hotel has wireless (it does - in the lobby), I came upon trip advisor and other sites that all had HORRIBLE things to say about this hotel. See for yourself - they're HORRIBLE. I saw that we had paid in full for it (I have to say that I took myself out of planning for this trip, because I was too busy, so I take no responsibility, but I also have no right to put blame - but WHY didn't someone look at the reviews? I'm not sure.). I looked at all of the terms of the booking, and indeed we could not cancel. Well, since my priorities for the weekend at the beach were doing work and sleeping, and the review said bed bugs, smelly rooms and other horrible things, I looked into canceling my ticket. It wasn't refundable or anything of the sort. So we came.
Okay - if you're used to staying in fancy resorts - yes this place is shit. If you need clean - yes - it's pretty not so clean. If you want fancy, fresh fruit - you're not in your element. BUT, if you're used to totally simple backpacker places, and all you need is a place to sleep that has pretty good location and is kind of clean - it's FINE!
My funny experiences, though, include the fact that it has "the biggest pool in Malaysia," and it has TONS of rooms, but it has only about 15 or 20 lounge chairs by the pool. This morning, when Tenley and Matt went on a tour, I wanted to sit and write, so I started looking for a chair that wasn't occupied. Every one had a towl on it or something, but NOT a person, and it was just after 9:00 am. Finally, I saw four in the shade, and while three had towels on them, the other had nothing.
I sat in one of the chairs. For 45 minutes I wrote in peace, and finally a woman came up to me and said, "You know, you're sitting in our chair." I said, "well, no one was sitting in it, it had nothing on it, and there was literally no other chair that didn't have something on it." "Well we reserved it last night, and just because we slept late doesn't mean it's not our chair." "Well, you're not sitting in it, so why don't I just sit in it and continue to do what I'm doing until you have four people that fill these four chairs." "Well, I think you can sit in OUR chair until we have two people that come, because we saved four chairs over here in the shade so we could have our privacy." "Fine. Bitch." (The bitch part was under my breath).
Then, I was here catching up on emails (50 related to INDEVOR!!! Oy), and all of the sudden there was no more internet. What? I went to the desk, and I said, can you please let me know why there is all of the sudden no internet? She said, "oh, we're charging our mobile phone." Oy. Maybe find an outlet that doesn't affect the internet for the whole place? Welcome to Malaysia.
Outside of our hotel (which is where we have spent most of our time), we have spent a day diving with very poor visibility, but it was nice none the less. We played settlers on the beach at a nice place (I won all three games - yup). Yesterday we rented a dude with his car, and we went all around the island. To be honest, it's nothing special, and definitely nothing we haven't seen before in SE Asia. I don't think I would come back unless there was something special going on, but it's definitely pretty. We were a bit bored, so we went to the Westin, on the recommendation of Jeff (Tenley's husband who has stayed there before), and it was awesome. We sat in their beautiful bar/restaurant with an amazing view for four hours - I studied, Matt slept, Tenley read. We even got the complimentary cocktail at 6pm. Pretty sure it wasn't meant for us, but oh well. Only US$300 per night to stay there. In my dreams...
Last night we went to another nice place on the beach, had great food, Tenley won settlers (way to go!!!), and I'm heading back to Singapore later today. Matt and Tenley come back tomorrow.
One more weird thing - we saw monkey roadkill. I have never seen that before. Kind of felt bad.
Matt, Tenley and I are in Langkawi for the long weekend. We left on Friday night, and on Thursday when I looked up whether or not the hotel has wireless (it does - in the lobby), I came upon trip advisor and other sites that all had HORRIBLE things to say about this hotel. See for yourself - they're HORRIBLE. I saw that we had paid in full for it (I have to say that I took myself out of planning for this trip, because I was too busy, so I take no responsibility, but I also have no right to put blame - but WHY didn't someone look at the reviews? I'm not sure.). I looked at all of the terms of the booking, and indeed we could not cancel. Well, since my priorities for the weekend at the beach were doing work and sleeping, and the review said bed bugs, smelly rooms and other horrible things, I looked into canceling my ticket. It wasn't refundable or anything of the sort. So we came.
Okay - if you're used to staying in fancy resorts - yes this place is shit. If you need clean - yes - it's pretty not so clean. If you want fancy, fresh fruit - you're not in your element. BUT, if you're used to totally simple backpacker places, and all you need is a place to sleep that has pretty good location and is kind of clean - it's FINE!
My funny experiences, though, include the fact that it has "the biggest pool in Malaysia," and it has TONS of rooms, but it has only about 15 or 20 lounge chairs by the pool. This morning, when Tenley and Matt went on a tour, I wanted to sit and write, so I started looking for a chair that wasn't occupied. Every one had a towl on it or something, but NOT a person, and it was just after 9:00 am. Finally, I saw four in the shade, and while three had towels on them, the other had nothing.
I sat in one of the chairs. For 45 minutes I wrote in peace, and finally a woman came up to me and said, "You know, you're sitting in our chair." I said, "well, no one was sitting in it, it had nothing on it, and there was literally no other chair that didn't have something on it." "Well we reserved it last night, and just because we slept late doesn't mean it's not our chair." "Well, you're not sitting in it, so why don't I just sit in it and continue to do what I'm doing until you have four people that fill these four chairs." "Well, I think you can sit in OUR chair until we have two people that come, because we saved four chairs over here in the shade so we could have our privacy." "Fine. Bitch." (The bitch part was under my breath).
Then, I was here catching up on emails (50 related to INDEVOR!!! Oy), and all of the sudden there was no more internet. What? I went to the desk, and I said, can you please let me know why there is all of the sudden no internet? She said, "oh, we're charging our mobile phone." Oy. Maybe find an outlet that doesn't affect the internet for the whole place? Welcome to Malaysia.
Outside of our hotel (which is where we have spent most of our time), we have spent a day diving with very poor visibility, but it was nice none the less. We played settlers on the beach at a nice place (I won all three games - yup). Yesterday we rented a dude with his car, and we went all around the island. To be honest, it's nothing special, and definitely nothing we haven't seen before in SE Asia. I don't think I would come back unless there was something special going on, but it's definitely pretty. We were a bit bored, so we went to the Westin, on the recommendation of Jeff (Tenley's husband who has stayed there before), and it was awesome. We sat in their beautiful bar/restaurant with an amazing view for four hours - I studied, Matt slept, Tenley read. We even got the complimentary cocktail at 6pm. Pretty sure it wasn't meant for us, but oh well. Only US$300 per night to stay there. In my dreams...
Last night we went to another nice place on the beach, had great food, Tenley won settlers (way to go!!!), and I'm heading back to Singapore later today. Matt and Tenley come back tomorrow.
One more weird thing - we saw monkey roadkill. I have never seen that before. Kind of felt bad.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Bali
Since I'm seriously back blogged, and I have ten minutes, I'm going for the Bali part.
I went to Bali with two friends this weekend - Julie and Julia. They sometimes introduce themselves as Melissa and Susan. That's only when they don't really want to be meeting people.
Essentially we left Friday night, dove all day Saturday at Tulamben, hung out Saturday night, relaxed Sunday morning, went to Ubud, relaxed, went to Legian to the beach on Sunday afternoon, and relaxed. Then we came back to Singapore. Basically, we relaxed, and we had a really great time.
A couple of highlights...
On our third dive at Tulamben, we swam with bumphead parrotfish. They're my favorite. I will post a picture
or two of them, but it was amazing. They're huge. They're the Dr. Seuss ones that I have mentioned in the past.We walked to our dives along a stony "beach." I thought it was hard to get to the place where we get in the water. Well...the locals put our BCDs and tanks on their heads (two at a time!), and carried them for us. They get less than $1 per tank per carry.
I had a defining moment on Sunday. We tried to work out transportation on Sunday to get from Sanur to Ubud, then get to Legian, then get to the airport. The airport is right by Legian, but our stuff was in Sanur. After exploring options (having a driver for the day, taking a bus to Ubud, hiring taxis, hiring private cars, etc.), we decided we would figure out a way through taxi or private car to get to Ubud, find a way to get to Legian, and then the guys from our hotel were going to meet us, with our bags, in Legian to take us to the airport. I am NOT a trusting person. In fact, sometimes I think the world is out to get me. Well...I relaxed, and I did it. I left all of our stuff with some random guys and hoped that they
met up with us to take us to the airport (with all of my scuba equipment!). I explored their incentives for each choice, and it seemed okay, but I did get nervous throughout the day. It worked! The guy was there, and all was well. I am slowly getting back hope for humanity.One weird thing was the beach at Legian (and Kuta and Seminyak). When I went there in August, it was the most beautiful beach I had ever been to. Perfect clean sand, going on forever, super fun waves, and facing a wonderful sunset. There must have been a shift in the tides or something. There was trash ALL over the beach. It was filled with plastic bags - even some trees had washed up on shore. It was totally disgusting. When I went into the water, I had to get out, because there were plastic bags swimming around my ankles, and it made me gag. Yuck.
We met an unsuccessful suicidal gekko at Cafe Wayan in Ubud. He was hanging by his hands, upside down from a beam on the ceiling, and we were watching him. All was fine and good until we heard a smack. He jumped off the beam and then walked away. Poor guy. Must have hurt.
One last note on Bali - it was fun to travel with girls. I love going places with Matt, but I had a whole new perspective with these girls, and it was kind of fun to be checked out! (I don't get that when I walk around with Matt). Even if they guys were looking at Julie and Julia...it was still nice.
Pictures include Tulamben diving area, Julie and Julia underwater, a bumphead. Videos are the bumphead, a Julie Fish, a Julia Fish, a Ranta Fish, and a Melanie Fish at the end. The second one is oriental sweetlips. Click here to see more photos from our trip.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Backblogged Again
I don't have five minutes to write about:
P2 Grades
Bali
Watching the inauguration with SO many Americans in Singapore until 2 in the morning (mistake? maybe). I am so happy Bush is done.
P2 Grades
Bali
Watching the inauguration with SO many Americans in Singapore until 2 in the morning (mistake? maybe). I am so happy Bush is done.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Matt's a Superstar
Matt gave a presentation to 1,300 Malaysian insurance conference-goers today. At the end of the presentation, a woman came up to him and asked for his autograph on the conference program, and she also got a picture with him. He took one too. He's famous. (I blocked out her eyes to protect her identity).
Monday, January 12, 2009
There is such a thing as a free lunch!!
I had Macro from 8:30 -10. International Political Analysis from 10:15-11:45. Executing Strategy from 12-1:30. A negotiation for my Negotiation class from 1:45-2:15. Then I had to watch the negotiation until about 3. I finally got to the hawker center across from school at 3:05. I was so hungry. I walked almost past my vegetarian food auntie, straight to the fishball noodles, since they're the only one who usually has food this late. But...she called me over, and she gave me her special brown rice with a whole lot of tofu and veggies, and I had not negotiate HARD to get her to take $1 from me. She said it's her policy to give free lunch when they're packing up. I'm too stubborn though, so from the $2 I was ready to pay, I compromised with $1. I had just come from a negotiation, you know...
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