January 2008 Archives

As requested by JS, here’s the farewell speech I made earlier this afternoon for my former boss, who is retiring after 30 plus years of public service.

I’m proud to be here today as someone who has worked under Richard Lim.

Richard is a boss who empowers and encourages his staff. As a newcomer to HPB nearly 4 years ago, I appreciated how he’d make the time and effort to explain things to me.

Throughout his work, you could tell that Richard had a passion for health promotion and serving the public. Everything he did, he did with the best interests of the organisation and the nation. He was unafraid to speak his mind.

Richard played a key role in developing the Internet Section, as we were then known, by encouraging us to explore new frontiers, such as podcasting and mobile technologies. HPB is now viewed by many in the public service and beyond as a pioneer in these areas.

Richard was a boss who let us play hard as well. As chairman of the HWC* Sports & Games subcommittee, Richard encouraged us to get active. We have to thank him for getting some of us started on golf!

In time, I also discovered that Richard had a sense of humour, which made even the most difficult challenges more bearable.

Richard, you have set a great example for many of us as a mentor and a boss.

I can only hope, one day, to be as great a boss as you have been. And as good a golfer as you already are!

Thank you, Richard!

Man, we’re going to miss him.

*HWC is our Healthy Workforce Committee.

I am preparing a speech to my ex-boss who is retiring from the organisation. He was asked to select a few staff members to say some words about him, and I was one of the people he chose. I am honoured.

He was always there to give us guidance at the start of a project, so that few things went wrong in the end. When things did go wrong, he would help out and support his staff, and not point the finger at them. I appreciate this as I've known bosses who give no guidance and then blame their team to avoid making themselves look bad (without realising that will backfire).

The word 'empowerment' is often thrown around as part of corporate-speak. I don't think my ex-boss used the word on us, but it was all in his actions. He'd let us run our own projects - he didn't need us to CC him on every little matter. Unlike the micromanager type, he wasn't insecure in having staff know more details about their own projects than he did, because he had the big picture in mind all the time. He let us manage our own meetings with internal clients, because he said he wanted us to grow.

Indeed, I grew a lot under his supervision. Very often, my morale was high and I was in a state of 'flow' - where I was so engaged with my work that I felt as one with it. It never felt like drudgery. I never woke up feeling that I didn't want to go to work, or that I was too bogged down by bureaucracy to be productive. 'Flow' is a feeling that is hard to come by for many of us, so I will remember it and hope to sustain it.

Without the empowerment given by my ex-boss, I wonder if I'd ever have dared to launch the very first podcast in the Government and start the Gahmen Bloggers group. If I was under a restrictive, tyrannical boss who wanted me to do nothing but stick to the Workplan, I might have thought twice about trying anything new. Having been under such a boss before, I can imagine the response would be: "Not enough work to do, issit?" And I would probably be asked to focus on simply meeting KPIs.

My ex-boss didn't agree that staff performance was all about KPIs, because quality counts, not just numbers. There's no point rushing out several mediocre microsites when all we need is a good one.

I also wonder if I'd ever have dared to ask to be sent to an overseas conference - something that nobody in my Department (service line, relatively low priority) had done until then. He supported me, and I went to SXSW in 2006. This gave me new insights which I applied to my projects and to future talks that I would be invited to give.

My ex-boss's passion for serving the nation is also moving. He often reminded us that our real clients were the public, not other departments whom we serviced. We should therefore produce materials and websites that appealed to the public and not simply because the internal client likes the colour green. He never pandered to anyone and had the courage to stand by his views.

In my previous 7 years of working experience, I have never had such a good boss before. Most of my other bosses have been pretty decent too, but this one hits the spot. He helped me to fly.

I really have to give him a good speech but if so, I hope I don't break down on stage this Wednesday. Many of us will miss him a lot and we can only wish him all the best.

I was driving out of the Sheraton Towers car park last evening and it took a while for the system to deduct the fee from my In-Vehicle Unit (IU). [To those not from Singapore, this is a device used in our Electronic Road Pricing which is installed in vehicles so that money can be deducted when entering town during busy periods.]

Finally, when the amount was deducted, the IU made a loud, high-pitched beeping sound and displayed the word 'Error'. There was an icon that looked like an empty battery.

Checking the One Motoring website, it appears that I have to send it to a service centre for repairs. Argh. My schedule is full this week, how to make time to go for servicing??

And I hope I can get into the office car park this morning, despite a wonky IU - I'm a season parker.

I will be reading in church this Sunday. I hope my cough clears up by then. I just received the passage and it's one I've often referred to when addressing those who expect miracles to land at their feet in order to believe that there is a God. Tactfully, of course ;-)

Matthew 12:38-42

Then some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law said to him, "Teacher, we want to see a miraculous sign from you."

He answered, "A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a miraculous sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.

For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now one greater than Jonah is here.

The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon's wisdom, and now one greater than Solomon is here.

It's that time of the year again, when I'm firming up my travel plans for SXSW. This time, I'm not leaving right after the Interactive conference is over - I'm staying a few more days to enjoy the music!

It's with a tinge of sadness that I've decided this will be my last SXSW in a while. My priorities are changing and I won't be able to afford the time to travel next year for leisure. Also, some veterans have felt that it's no longer the SXSW it used to be. It's become larger and more 'dumbed down' to suit beginners. However it's still different from most of the conferences we get in Singapore, where we talk more about IT (notice how that word's seldom used at SXSW) and corporatise a lot of things, endeavouring to meet our KPIs (key performance indicators).

Frankly put, if you want to learn more about technology or web standards there are better specialist conferences to attend, such as eTech, Future of Web Apps and An Event Apart. However if you want the big picture, I'd still say this would be a suitable place to start. At least folks like The Digital Movement is playing a big part in sowing the seeds for a more Web 2.0/entrepreneural mindset in Singapore. And hopefully we'll have another PodCamp and more BarCamps for geeks.

I am quite sure of the following this March, though:

There will be more Singaporeans at SXSW08. Me and Sarah, Jamie and Divya and Ming Yeow. I doubt we will only hang out in our group and hanker for local food. We will rock this place.

. In 2006 I took the company Fujitsu laptop, as none of us had portable computers at the time. In 2007 I brought the Dell laptop. This year, I will hopefully be wielding a new MacBook Pro, assuming that the rumours are true and there will be processor and touchpad upgrades in the next few weeks.

I will meet familiar faces and renew friendships. It will be exciting to see old SXSW mates like Ralph, Pat, Elaine, David, Aaron and others. I also hope to catch up with Jeremiah Owyang and Zeldman and will probably catch a glimpse of Robert Scoble, who's responsible for getting many of us hooked on Twitter last year. I will definitely catch the panel on Teens this year, cos Danah Boyd and company rock. I am happy to see Kathy Sierra blogging and giving talks again, after receiving death threats soon after SXSW07. Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg will be a keynote speaker this year. We'll see if he gets asked about Beacon, among other things.

Coming to think of it, I'm at SXSW not just for the knowledge but to renew the friendships I've made over the past couple of years and to meet more like-minded people.

Last but definitely not least, I am really looking forward to seeing little Alexander (since he eluded me last year by being born right after I left the US) and catch up with Mark and Kristen. Austin is a really lovely city, definitely one of the nicer places to live in. I hope my last trip here will be a memorable one.

Technorati tags: SXSW, SXSW08, Austin, geek

Update: This post was linked on Jeremiah's blog. Yay!

I've long heard of Michael Chiang's play but on Saturday I finally got to see it in musical form. I was quite proud to see homegrown productions take off. The music was good, the acting was humorous without being overdone, the costumes were flamboyant and the storyline was plausible. Some of us gave a standing ovation.

This is the cover of the programme.

After the show we chatted with Dick Lee's family and I asked Dick to autograph the Beauty World CD we had purchased. A large crowd had already gathered inside the Esplanade, queuing up to meet the cast. I followed Dick as he squeezed his way through the throng, with security guards keeping our path clear. He found a marker pen and a counter table and autographed my CD. Then we took this photo:

I first met Dick when his Mad Chinaman album (my favourite) took off and there was a party at his place. I had just begun writing songs and aspired to be like him. I've always wanted to have a photo with him but that eluded me until yesterday.

After that, we joined the queue to meet the rest of the cast, who were in high spirits. Wherever I could recall a good song performance, I'd praise the respective cast member - it's always good to encourage people. And they were appreciative and very friendly, no airs about them.

Me and my sister with comedienne actress Irene Ang, who was roaringly funny as the Cantonese maidservant.

The highlight was meeting the star of the show, Elena Wang. We realised she was from the same school as my sister, and she was delighted to hear about it. Her voice was crystal clear, she hit all the notes, her acting was convincing - truly a rising star.

All in all, it was a most memorable night. Singapore can be proud of this homegrown musical.

I recently helped produce this video as part of a health campaign. To date it remains exclusively on Youtube. It's a new approach we're trying out - using new media channels instead of paying a bomb for traditional media airtime. Let me know what you think.

I don't smoke myself - but many of us are passive smokers, inhaling smoke from other people and that is harmful too. When I was in China earlier this month, I had respiratory problems due to factory smoke outside and people smoking indoors. I can handle spit-covered pavements and smelly toilets, but my nasal lining was worn out from the pollution and I'm still coughing out phlegm up to today. It makes you appreciate the air quality in Singapore (provided the neighbours don't burn anything).

In 2008, I resolve to:

1. Seize the day. 'Carpe Diem' will be the overarching approach to everything I do this year and beyond. Too often I have regretted not doing things more than doing things and making mistakes. At least with mistakes, we gain experience and grow. When we don't even try out new things which we're probably capable of handling, we never know if we could've moved on to a higher plane and improved our lives. In 2008, I will kiss stagnation goodbye.
2. Improve my overall fitness. I did more brisk walking in 2007, but put off serious exercise too often. It was partly due to the fact that I fell ill often in 2007 and was not supposed to engage in vigorous activities too soon after recovering. Then I'd catch another bug and my exercise plans would be delayed again. In 2008, I intend to take better care of my health and break this vicious cycle. This will involve changing my lifestyle quite a bit - namely, improving my work-life balance so I can get off my butt, stop staring at the screen and spend more time at the gym and improving my golf. Maybe this year I'll finally get my handicap. I intend to sleep and wake up earlier so I'll have more time to exercise in the morning.
3. Spend more time with God again. This isn't the least important resolution but I put it at the end because it's a good way to wrap up my plans. In 2007, I turned down all offers to help out at church courses like Alpha and Christianity Explored, because I could not promise that I'd be able to tear myself away from work in the evenings. It would've been worse to say yes, then not show up most of the time. However, in the eternal scheme of things, that is not how it should be. I must set boundaries for myself and address any guilt triggers which make me feel obliged to overcompensate with time or effort.

These are more like 'big picture' resolutions. Of course, I have plans to do geeky things like restore my Mac, recover all the lost files in my 1TB external hard drive, get a MacBook Pro (not the costly Air), get an iPhone (if it doesn't break the law), upload an album and become an iTunes artiste, go to SXSW 2008, collaborate with entrepreneur-type friends, speak at more events and revamp this blog. Apart from that, other aspects of my life may be drastically changed this year. But that's all part of my plan to seize the day.

I'm sure everyone who reads this blog - being intelligent, educated, outward-looking types ;-) - would know that China is developing fast. It goes without saying, but seeing is truly believing.

I've been to China at least 3 times before this, not counting Hong Kong, and every time things have improved. Back in the mid-90s, when we visited Beijing in the middle of winter, there were fewer tourists although I was fortunate to see the Great Wall, Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square. I recall little else on that trip apart from the fact that there was a lot of vinegar in Beijing food (which I don't mind, as I am a true-blue SCGS mee pok-loving girl).

Another time, I recalled eating rice that had grains of sand in it. The roadside toilets had no doors, and local women used umbrellas to partially shield themselves while peeing.

In 2002 and 2005, I went to Shanghai, which was by that time quite happening. As China developed, however, the pollution worsened. My last visual recollection of Shanghai was sitting in a taxi from the hotel to the airport and seeing smoke billow from the chimney of a factory, not too far away from the city centre.

This trip to China took me and my relatives to more remote villages in the South, as well as the main cities of the Cantonese, Teochews and Hokkiens. We also visited a Hakka village. I am sure many of you Singaporean readers belong to one of these groups so stay tuned for photos of your ancestors' hometowns! I also took photos of almost everything we ate.

Again, as with my Tuscan trip a few months ago, I will attempt to blog each daily account with photos (and videos if applicable). I hope I won't run out of steam this time!

And yes, Yesterday.SG will get a piece of the action when I get to the heritage part of my trip.

5 Jan 2008 (backdated post)

We arrived at the lovely Guangzhou Baiyun Airport, which is comparable to our own Changi Airport in terms of efficiency and modern facilities. We cleared immigration quickly... and then spent over half an hour waiting for our tour guide, who was at the wrong block and couldn't find us.

We told him off, thinking he was just late and pretending to have gotten lost. However, he took our criticisms in his stride. He told us his surname was Jin but we could call him James. He guided us back to the other side of the airport, making us port our luggage down an elevator, through a concourse and then back up another elevator which took ages to arrive.

Finally, we got onto the bus and had lunch. I thought the food was decent, but my relatives had paid the Singapore tour agent extra to give us better food, so they weren't too happy at what we were getting.

Suckling pig. Lukewarm, fatty but crunchy.

Crunchy long beans with pork. The usual hearty tourist fare...

Live seafood outside the restaurant

We visited the ancestral home where some of my mum's cousins were born. I'd think it would be a run-down place but it wasn't too bad. I can imagine it being quite grand in its heyday.

Inside the family compound, looking back at the main door

The main building, which we climbed up

A very old, large tree. Imagine playing Chinese chess in front of it, or sipping tea with friends!

On our way out, some officials entered the compound and started making some surveys on the land. Apparently they were contracted to restore the house. They mentioned our surname and we confirmed that this was our ancestral home. It was a generally friendly conversation.

Nearby was a grand-looking restaurant. I was told that the ruling officials had taken some of our ancestral home's wood and glass and used it to build this restaurant, specifically the staircase shown in this photo. Oh well.
http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=2192363825&size=m&context=set-72157603711182090

We then went to the Guangdong Folk Arts Museum, which was pretty interesting.

This is the front entrance.

Beyond that, is another section.

There were all sorts of folk art.

From sculptures...

Eating lychees

to embroidery...

(taken through glass)

to fans...

to opera masks...

Even the building itself was crafted in an artistic way.

I love taking perspective shots.

Outside, we had freshly-roasted chestnuts.

I will be in Southern China (Guangzhou and Xiamen) from 5-14 Jan. The first leg of the visit is with my mum and her relatives, as we tour Guangzhou where her ancestors came from.

My dad and sis will join us for the second leg of the visit to Xiamen where we will visit our ancestral village. We will be guided by one of Dick Lee's brothers who is a trained Chinese historian. It turns out our families are related, having shared a common ancestor 16 generations ago. How exciting!

I'm finishing up my packing even as I type this post. Man, I wish things could automatically sort themselves into my bag so I can get some sleep!

As with my Tuscan trip, I am not sure if I will get regular Internet access to update this blog, so keep an eye on my Twitter posts instead.

I am not an American citizen, but today I played my first role in helping to set the record straight on one of the leading candidates.

After listening to Barack Obama's speech in 2004 in support of John Kerry, I was hooked on this guy. He was different. He was young, brilliant and rousing. I read his book, Dreams From My Father, and was inspired by it. I was therefore delighted to hear that he had entered the race for the Democratic nomination this time.

I joined the Barack Obama Facebook group to support him. After hearing how he had won the Iowa Caucus on 3 Jan 2008, I logged in to read his latest message. However, someone had to add a nasty comment alleging he was an undercover Muslim extremist.

Some quick research showed that these allegations were untrue. See the facts laid out and the false rumours categorically proven wrong. Often, the truth is out there, waiting to be found. But some people choose to perpetuate false rumours.

I gave this reply:

To be fair, if I heard false rumours about other candidates, I'd also refute them. Everybody deserves the right to defend themselves against false allegations and be voted on their own merits. Right now it just seems that, being black and having studied in a Muslim country, Obama is seen as the 'Other' in a country that has been ruled by whites who have trouble pronouncing the names of foreign countries and leaders. Everywhere in the world there's always been prejudice - just that it now seems to be rearing its ugly head on websites and chain mails.

In my country, Singapore, some moderate Muslims attend Christian schools. In the junior college I attended, which was Methodist, the Muslim students were excused during worship sessions and there was nothing to be awkward about. As a student I never saw anyone trying to convert each other, or make digs at each other's religions. Everyone gets an equal chance to succeed. Our nation was proud of the top primary school student last year, who was a Muslim female. So after seeing the kind of ignorant comments Obama is getting, I appreciate the racial and religious harmony in my own country even more.

Perhaps in America, the majority of citizens are less exposed to people from minority religions including Islam. The few instances where they have witnessed an incident involving Islam, such as 9/11, have admittedly been painful for them. With human nature, there's a tendency to assume the worst of those who are different, and to stereotype them together even if there are liberals, moderates and extremists in most groups. That's how racism and xenophobia come about, and it is not something we should encourage. A couple decades ago, the dirty word in America was 'Communist' and the enemy state was the Soviet Union. Now it's 'Muslim' and various Middle East countries. Why does America need bogeymen all the time? Taking on Obama's approach, let's have dialogue, not war.

I heard an account of how a doctor based in America came to Singapore to find a job after 9/11. That's because his name had 'Osama' in it. It is most unfortunate, especially if you're not related to the terrorist, that you cannot work in a country that preaches freedom and democracy. So maybe it isn't so surprising that some people are playing up Obama's middle name, which goes with Saddam. It shows that some Americans are not ready to accept someone who has merits but is different from them.

In fact, I'm thinking the tables can be turned. It would actually be good to have a US President with some experience living abroad. The US President isn't just the head of his own country - he is viewed as the leader of the only superpower in the world (so far). Barack Obama may in fact have a better chance of reuniting America with the rest of the world, because of his international exposure. In today's increasingly globalised world, there is no point fighting with China or India. (On this point I disagree with the Democrats who tend to be protectionistic. Tough love is painful but it will help in the long run)

I've laid my thoughts out and still think Barack Obama is a candidate who can draw votes from both parties, unite the nation and restore ties with the rest of the world. God knows we need a stronger world leader especially in these turbulent times. Go, Obama!

This is the update on my 1TB Maxtor external hard drive. I sent it to a local data recovery company for a free evaluation and this was the prognosis:

Our data recovery specialist had done an evaluation of your hard disk. The harddisk has files structure damage and multiple read write errors. The read/write head electrically damaged, causing file read write access errors. Scratches can also be found on the platter due to misaligned head scratching its surface. We will need to procure another identical Maxtor One Touch III drive to perform parts change to recover the data and also perform a firmware reloading. Platter needs to be refurbished in a clean room environment. After which, a laborious and tedious bit by bit cloning procedure will be performed, which is very time consuming but a necessary and important step to attempt the recovery of your data.

Due to the complexity of your data recovery job, we would require around 15 working days to complete it.

The bill will come to S$2,700 if they successfully recover the data. It’s 7 years worth of photos, videos and music. I’m going for it.

My other IT expert friends have told me that data recovery is expensive because it truly is tedious. I can’t do it myself and even if I didn’t use the whole of the 1TB space, there were still a lot of files in there. Still, it is a good learning experience, albeit painful, and I will ensure that there’s enough space on my computer’s hard drive in future to store all my files. The backup system will remain as a backup.

29 years I've had this name and only now have I realised that the devil's in it. This file was a photo of my (now dead) Maxtor hard drive.

I'm a little shaken, amused and depressed. My Chinese name means US dollar, which is depreciating, and my English name has 'satan' in it.

New Year's Eve: I went to work for half a day but ended up staying till 2+pm as there were still a lot of things to do. I went home to freshen up, then headed down to Suntec City to deliver my clicking external hard drive to Datasavers. I didn't want to procrastinate anymore on things - that's one of my resolutions for 2008.

Since I was in the area, I decided to walk through Citilink to Funan Digitalife Mall and exercise my options as a new member of computer superstore Challenger. I decided to be naughty and bought computer games: Command and Conquer - the First Decade, because it brought back good memories; SimCity, because I like strategy games and want to start running/managing things in 2008; and Football Manager, because I love football and am probably a closet Jose Mourinho / Arsene Wenger / Alex Ferguson.

I also spotted the HP Touchsmart PC, a lovely modern-looking computer cum TV system with a 19" touch screen. Yup, you heard that right. I was ogling it for a while and despite the S$2999 price tag I was seriously contemplating getting it for my room so I could do stuff and watch shows on it.

We had a huge family dinner (huge in terms of number of family members attending, as well as the amount of food served!). I sent one of my cousins back to the office as she still had work to do, poor gal. I drove my sis and two other cousins around the Esplanade area and we saw crowds gathering to watch fireworks.

At home, we had numerous blackouts due to a power trip. Turned out it was the air-conditioning - so we would spend our New Year's Eve night sweating away! Nevertheless, I started playing Command and Conquer. To my horror I realised I was still highly addicted to it, even though I was a bit rusty at first. I was so immersed in it that I didn't realise 2008 had arrived until several minutes later. What a way to begin the new year! Anyway we all wished each other at home and I replied to some SMSes from friends.

New Year's Day: I was much more productive. I woke up late as I slept at 3+am playing aforementioned computer game. I swore to myself that I did not need to be addicted again. I helped mum prepare lunch and dinner. We went shopping for clams at Tekka Market to go into our seafood soup which we were cooking for dinner with our grandparents. After that, Mum helped me re-arrange the work space in my room. Now there's more space and it looks neater. I am so pleased. However we realised we needed some new stuff for the home, so we went to Ikea. I bought myself a new swivel chair for my re-arranged desk.

Mum bought baguettes to go with the soup, but we were concerned about carb overload. I remembered how I once learnt how to make finely-sliced bread by putting it in the freezer first. It worked - we had fine slices of baguettes smeared with butter or olive oil and herbs and spices like thyme, nutmeg and pepper. It was a great meal.

The whole family is now watching the next Arsenal match... so this is Van, signing off for New Year's Day!