let's talk about work

masaya ako ngayon

i received a congratulation email from my big boss this afternoon for a job well done on my missions to the philippines these past months. we finally reached the target after a long struggle of process tuning! our markets accepted our product and the big bosses gave their go signal to officially launch the production. i can see the volumes going up now...ouaiiiis!

ps: the big boss of my big boss was on copy in the email. in the office, informing our heirarchy of such email translates to financial incentives, ehem.

why am i so gaga on this project

it's my baby and i actually saw it growing. i did my OJT in the same company a year ago and my mission was to do the technico-economique study of this project. during this time, aside from working with an excel file trying to figure out what will be our production cost if we consider such and such scenario, i also worked hand in hand with their R&D team to develop the product and even participated in its industrial pilot. after i got my diploma, this same company called me up offering a permanent job. wow, i havent even started looking for a job! my first project was of course, this same project. we were on the industrialization phase when i finally joined the company - the challenge was there and i felt like somebody who just came out of the university with the diploma on hand ready to conquer the real world!

getting motivated

for sure, other inclinations of this project will be started very shortly. i can see them coming now. being the only one who have an expertise on this project, im quite busy responding for queries on this subject. i love the feeling of being a consultant, ehem.

we are working in the same company

what do you expect? 80% of the conversation are work-related. we just cant help it. ok, ok, it's been always like that since we knew each other...hehe, we knew each other at work..

i forwarded to him the congratulation email, and as usual, he's proud of me. he told me that it's very seldom that we send such kind of email, normally we just receive a group email to all the person who worked in the same project. i received both.

im still on my clouds..

meet my heir...la france!

french people, to be frank, are the spoiled brats of their government. they receive financial support which makes them naturally indebted, just like the filipinos towards their parents. yes, im talking about the utang na loob thing.

in fact, the government takes charge of its populace remarkably. from conception to, i will say, death. ties within the family are not that strong compared in the philippines as french parents don't undergo the same sacrifice as filipino parents do. i should add in this list the panganays (the eldest in the family) of course. la preuve: education doesnt cost here. and almost everything is reimbursable (i say almost as not everything could be reimbursed at 100%). would you believe that if they get a nanny for their kids, the government will even pay up to 30% of the charge! hallucinant!! and they're still complaining.

but hey, dont be misled..the government gives...but they have to take back in return (aba, kung di ba naman, p@#&!! ang mga walang utang na loob!!!) ! that's universal law!

VAT: one of the highest in europe that habitants near the frontier do their shopping ober da bakod! (to neighboring countries).
... and taxes everywhere!
... and charges wherever the government could tax!

i was just confronted with one of these.

we had an appointment with the notary two days ago in line with our house acquisition because we had to do our testament. it sounds normal to me that we declare our patrimoine in prorata of our respective contributions. and so there we went with the explainations and all. blah blah blah. i was dozing off (hikab). and then the notaire suddenly said, if ever something happens to monsieur, madame will have to pay such amount so i could actually call the house my own (still in prorata of monsieur's contribution). WHAT? and of course i will pay a significant amount as i own just a meagre part of it. eh merde! in fact, aside from the parents, the government is also our héritier (heir). houses, unlike cars, are considered national patrimony!! the funny thing is that, you could disinherit your parents in case you have a child of your own...but not la france!

vocabulary check

PIPE, pronounced as 'pip' in french could mean either the apparatus used for smoking (clay pipe) or oral sex (BJ) when it is used as slang.

here is a conversation with a colleague just this morning, using PIPE in the sentence.

scene 1: MR and I with another girl colleague were talking about a project and visibly, MR was a bit nervous and stressed out with the result and so i proposed him...

ME: hé, vas fumer, ça va te detente. (hey, go out and smoke, that will calm you down.)

MR: oui, une bonne petite pipe de temps en temps, ça fait du bien. (yeah, smoking (or...) from time to time makes us feel better.)

scene 2: me and my eyes wide open trying not to laugh. my colleague who cannot contain it anymore burst out. well, well, malicious minds :). and MR suddenly realized what he just said - he was all red.

on 35h and delocalisation..france laments!

globalization has always been an interesting topic / polémique and each point of view varies depending on which sector we belong. it brought an irreversible impact on the market that demands competitivity - a cut-throat competition at that.

many industries delocalize their production mainly because of exorbitant manpower cost. how could they compete with asia, for example, where manpower cost is divided into 15 for most countries. add to the fact that taxes are far lower in these countries. we haven't even talked about productivity and overall production cost which is way advantageous compared to here.

i have seen french industries closing to migrate in east europe or asia. this really hurts! some companies try to dissimulate it by staying in france, but then, they dont expand their production here anymore, they create jobs elsewhere. unemployment rate never stopped to soar, i've heard insecurities everywhere! to control it, the government implemented the famous 35h/week from 39h/week to promote job creation. to no avail! they just lowered down productivity and tagged french people as fainéants (lazy). it didn't really solve the unemployment problem.

now, they talk about reviewing the 35 heures and not everybody is willing to give it up. i guess france has a problem with the word change. they are always reluctant and afraid of change - even if they see right infront of their eyes what's happening. and who will say yes? here, we have an average of 0.83 day/month of RTT (réduction de temps du travail = effect of 35h), that adds up to our already-long vacations.

the government will surely do something to at least keep the industries which are still in France by lowering patronal charges, increase the budget for research and development to create jobs, help entrepreneurs to start their business, etc. delocalisation will nevertheless continue. that's the price we pay. we have to be competitive. we have to think global.

we're being questioned!

hay naku, we're buying a house and we're getting indebted! piles of papers to be signed everywhere, medical examinations to be done, preparations, etc.

we've been constant visitors to our bank representative but hélas, laurent and i have been together to sign a paper there just once. the rest of the appointments, we've done them separately. either i was out, or he was out. and since we're binded by PACS, we're being questioned if we're really together. of course, the bank representative was only joking...but then, reality bites! i have been out quite a lot these past months (25% of my time since i started working) and it's not yet finished. hay naku ulit, mahirap kumita ng pera...

trying to stay awake!

just came back this midday from a long trip from home back to home! one colleague who stays in the philippines as an expat asked me one time which country i consider home now. what a question! i didnt even think about it before, nor did i consider the idea. philippines will always be my home, i have my family and friends there. part of me will always be attached to my native land. but my life now is here - where i construct my new 'home'.

so what's up with my boring life?

i finally found a way to sleep on the plane!
the secret? just let myself doze off without doing anything to catalyze it. haha! if i only knew!!! actually, it has always been a dilemma for me, so i try to read, watch a movie or just anything supposed to be boring so i could sleep. on the contrario, those stuffs just make me awake because i end up interested on them. i even tried taking a sleeping pill, and read a book while waiting for it to take effect. it worked! but i slept only for 3 hours as i was so taken by the story of my book. hopeless!

i didnt work last nov 15.
yeah, it was the end of ramadan in the philippines. in case you dont know yet, they started celebrating it since 2 years now. good or bad? no comment. all i know is that, there was a 2-day weekend and i was able to go home to zambales, and was almost left by my plane because the north expressway is not totally finished yet - got it right, traffic jam!!!

i spent my 1st week in a monastery.
i was exhausted! i had 4 out of 5 dinners in my room during my 1st week of stay there. i was on bed at 9pm. i didnt give any phonecalls for the 1st 3 days - not even to my families. good thing they phoned me up! i didnt read my book during those times. i was dead tired!

the complexity of my job.
3 times on-site support in 5 months, total of 9 weeks spent on site, not counting that of my boss! if time translates how complicated this particular process implementation is, then, this is extremely complicated! it's a new technology for us, we're just building experience curves and it seems that we're not finished yet. all problems not encountered on the feasibility and development phases, we have them all right now. when i left, we succeeded to reduce the problem from 100% to 0.34%, a fairly significant improvement. but everybody knows that the process is not as robust as the traditional processes we have. the technical support manager's farewell remark was: 'see you next month.' merde!

laurent's thoughtfulness.
he's out to germany for work but he left a note on the table. well, actually, it was the menu for the day. he prepared lunch and dinner for me and left them in the fridge with the welcome note and all. what makes it special is that, all were my favorites!

i fell inloved with spiderman.
i saw it twice on the plane. oh man, he's adorable! nakakatuwa.

no filipino newspapers?
would you believe that lufthansa doesnt distribute filipino newspapers for their franckfurt - manila flights? quite odd, i've used different airlines (KLM, Emirates, Cathay..) and on economy class at that, but i always had newspapers on board.

the guy seated next to me..
i swear to god, he kept on farting! sayang, gwapo pa naman sana...kainis, he never stopped polluting my air!

trying to fight the jetlag..
im off now. jetlag has finally won over me...ciao amigos!