Taicang.

Went to Taicang this morning with the intention to do some serious sightseeing. I ended up only have time to see one place because I had to rush back to Shanghai to work on the Business Plan. Thank God the trip was not expensive:

Bus ride to Taicang – RMB 14
Taxi ride from Taicang to Liuhe Town for the Zheng He Memorial Hall – RMB 50
Taxi ride from Liuhe Town back to Taicang – RMB 5
Zheng He Memorial Hall entrance – RMB 10
Bus ride to Shanghai – RMB 13.50

All in all, the trip is still below RMB 100. So I was happy. Anyway the visit was always going to be a historial one because Taicang is a very historial place. The pictures for the trip are here.

The business plan is about done, just some finetuning left and I think it should be OK. Then all the work in the company is looking to be exciting too – with a bit of luck I should be making my 9th trip to Hangzhou pretty soon! Well I do hope that when I go there for the 10th time it should be for all the right reasons!

All these late nights are making me see stars. Well, Min Chuan has alrady seen a lot of stars for the past few days and I think it has been tough on him. He deserves a big pat on the back.

Business Plan.

Went to McDonald’s for breakfast with Sister before going to do some grocery shopping. Came back, played a bit of game to de-stress, and then went back to sleep.

Woke up at 3.30 in the afternoon after being woken up by Min Chuan who was so nice and not wake me up from my sleep. But ultimately I was still woken up to open the door for him. Oh well, I had enough of the sleep in the afternoon so that was OK – I dreamt that I was on a train to Russia! Must have been the thoughts of going Heilongjiang in December to ski that I was having last night!

Spent the remaining of the day working on the business plan. I would think whatever we have now should be at least readable.

October holidays – where to go?

Business Plan.

I know those of you who have just finished your stint in NOC are now rushing through your business plans (my heart is with you there, Jiahui. Haha), but that doesn’t mean that I’m having a great time here in Shanghai either because the business plan that I’m required to do for my New Venture Creation course has been branded unreadable by the lecturer and is in danger of failing. Now that is about as blunt a remark I can ever get for my work! I know whatever I’ve written for the business plans wasn’t exactly the greatest thing on Earth, but the remark by my lecturer (who happens to be my boss) was still quite a big blow. So I’ve decided to pull up my socks (and so did everyone in the group) and really start getting down to work on the business plan and hopefully we can come up with something that probably isn’t going to fail us. As such, I’ve spent the last 3 hours working on my part of the business plan, which talks about the product and service that our startup company is going to provide. Well, I guess the service that we are providing may not be the most exciting one in the market, but what Larissa said was true, if it’s our idea then we should believe in it, even though it may not sound the most exciting idea to the rest of the world. If we believe that the idea is going to work, then we’ll be more inspired to make it really work.

Let’s all work hard towards our goal! I was a bit demoralised just now after the negative remarks given by my lecturer, but after the discussion I suddenly have a lot of confidence that the business plan is going to pull off spectacularly, just like the way Liverpool came back against AC Milan in the Champions League final!

(OK so perhaps it wasn’t the most relevant and appropriate analogy, but you get what I mean.)

Se A Vida E

First day of work without Jun-Chih was weird. But I think we all need to get used to it. Out of all the NCS2 people, Jun-Chih is probably the one whom I’ll miss badly. Not just that he’s a great colleague to have, he’s also a great friend. Someone who keeps to his words, someone who gives us support when we need. It’s not often we get someone like him, and it’s been great with him around. Having a friend who’s true to you is something that’s difficult nowadays, and I really appreciated that.

I think besides Jun-Chih, I think the next one that I’ll miss would probably be Grace. I’m not sure if she’ll jump for joy to hear that, but I think her smile is something that has casted a very strong impression on me. And it seems like there’s never a dull moment when she’s around. It’s been nice to have such a friend too.

Of course people like Ming Chean, Weijun, Qingyuan are also high on my list of “people-to-miss”. Thank God it would be just a couple of months I get to see them again. So I guess just like what I said before I come to Shanghai, it’s not us saying goodbye, just saying hello from a different place!

Disneyland.

Did quite a bit of work on the website for my company, and I’m glad to say that I’ve got the framework out, so now it’s just the content. I think I can get it fully churned out in a few days’ time. In addition, there are a few major projects for me to do, so if everything is according to plan I think I’ll really have a great remaining few months ahead.

Class today was nice, had a nice discussion, and now it’s on with the project!

Surfed around today and was basically looking through the website for Hong Kong Disneyland and while I was gutted that the ticket is going to cost HKD 295, I think the experience alone is going to be brilliant, so I’m still going to go. And if I can only bring one person with me to Disneyland, that person will be you.

But then again why would I only be allowed to bring one person to Disneyland?

Oh ya, Disneyland seems like a nice place to work in. That will be my possible employer in the future. The only drawback could probably be the distance – Lantau is very far from Lam Tin, and the transport cost is going to be quite a significant amount. But then again, not everyone gets to work in Disneyland.

ChinaJoy (again).

Yesterday’s visit to ChinaJoy was great – MC, Edwin, Renhao and I were treated to some delicious eye candies! While I was just happy with seeing the games, I think MC’s mind must have had a field day with all the pretty girls at ChinaJoy. Let’s just say the whoever on his mind is not reading this. Haha.

Did I mention that I rode the bike from wherever I live to People’s Square and back in the evening? It was a hell of a ride, but more interestingly, I found out that actually there are a lot of roads in Shanghai that are closed to cyclists.

Today has been a very lazy day for me. Woke up at 10.30, did some work (and played some game) until about 4, before cycled out for breakfast/lunch/dinner at Daniang Dumplings. Came back to do more work and played more games. Not too productive, but then again, it was a nice way to spend a weekend. Whoever says weekends must be spent out of the house?

Though it has been a nice weekend, but the irritation in life is still not going away. Oh well, chances are I’m stuck with such irritations at least until I return to Singapore, so it’s either to confront it, ignore it or live with it. Well since I’ve mellowed a lot since coming to China (but I still shout at people who irritate me on the metro train, the bus and basically everywhere on the streets), so I don’t really confront these irritants nowadays. Between ignoring it or living with it, both aren’t exactly good options. But then again, what to do? Life is never a bed of roses anyway (actually it could be, because there are thorns in roses anyway so if it’s a bed of roses it’s going to be painful anyway).

There are big things coming my way in work. I think I’m going to enjoy it very much.

Bicycle.

The ChinaJoy exhibition was very nice. Managed to get what I need to do done, so I left the exhibition a happy man.

Bought my bicycle for RMB 270, and promptly met with my first accident on the bike. Thank God I wasn’t hurt, but the brake handle was broken, so I guess that should let the potential thiefs know that my bike is not a new one so they should look elsewhere.

Off to sleep. Would be going to ChinaJoy again tomorrow morning.

Attitudes.

The business meeting this afternoon was interesting – it opened my eyes to a lot of new things and I think it was very enriching.

Class today was good too. So was the supper.

Quite a bit of things on my mind now, but I’m going to put them aside and do some reading first. It’s been quite a while since I last did any serious reading.

Clubbing.

The highlight of the day has to be the clubbing again. Wasn’t exactly looking forward to it because I was kinda tired after the SHEN meeting, but seeing that Sister was so enthusiastic (and so was MC), I chased away all the lingering thoughts of staying at home for the night. The clubbing didn’t disappoint as I get to meet some very interesting (and cute!) people, which made the sacrifice in sleep more than worth it.

Would be having an interesting couple of days ahead, and it would be safe to say that if these couple of days are going to be smooth, that should pave for a good but busy few months ahead for me. Now all I can do is keep my fingers crossed.

Tuesday.

Did quite a bit of work today, also pondered a bit about my modules when I eventually do go back to Singapore. I kinda miss student life.

I think I’m still harbouring the thoughts of keeping my minor in Business, so I think I’ll have a very tough time trying to accomodate al of that, but I think I can still do it. Imagine graduating with two minors!

Class today was interesting – it’s always nice to have my boss as the lecturer. I wish some of the NUS lecturers can deliver classes that way.

Nothing much to talk about today, so perhaps I’ll go sleep a bit earlier as well. Getting woken up in the middle of my sleep last night was no fun.

I think something out there is irritating me a lot. Why wouldn’t it go away? Aargh.