SuNfLoWeR.cOm's New Home

I'm reverting to blogger. My new URL is http://s-u-e.blogspot.com/. I've been having some problem publishing my blog entries here lately. Upon checking I discovered I have exceeded the disk space allocated which is 50MB. I have deleted some files to make space for this last entry. I hope it works. I would maintain this site for a while but for all new entries, see you at my new space :)

Y E S - Year End Story

This year, November and December has been a very busy months for me. Busy means I have training and that means I have income :) But so busy till I have no time to do Y.E.S. That's year end sale.

The end of this year also marks an important milestone in my life. I have been freelancing for a year now. There were times when I have more free time and there were times when I wish I have more free times. All in all it has been a very fruitful journey where I learned a lot, met some nice people and some with interesting characters. Income wise, averaged over 12 months period is about the same as my take-home pay when I was working full time. Not bad for 1st year working on my own.

With the new contacts made and new opportunities explored, I hope I'll have more projects next year. This year, my trainings averaged 4-5 days per month. I'd like to increase it to 10 days next year. Hubby and I has to be mentally prepared when I'm busy with outstation trainings. It could be an emotional roller coaster ride for us when we're apart for a long period. My dear hubby hates me when he misses me too much and I get annoyed with him when that happens. Sigh! I've tried to keep in touch as much as I can but sometimes things didn't work out as planned.

I've invested in a prepaid broadband modem to be used when I'm outstation and wifi is not available or ridiculously priced. I even brought a microphone recently so we can skype. My laptop mic is lousy. I even got a room to myself during my recent outstation training trip. No roommate. However, the phone coverage is very bad. Even making phone calls and SMS can be a challenge.

I prefer outstation training to local training due to one reason. I don't have to beat the traffic in the morning to get to the training location. The stress of facing unavoidable traffic situation can be overwhelming.

Well... I just have to make the best of every situation. There are some things that I can control and some that I can't. Working full time, I have control over income but not job commitments. I may be able to plan shorter outstation trips and plan training schedule but things can get hectic and I may end up not able to follow plan at all. Working on my own, I have no control over income and trainings conducted as it is based on demand. I'll agree to training request if I'm free because I'll never know if next time I have trainings to conduct. The consolation of working on my own is the personal satisfaction and the free time when there's no training.

That's life. We can't have our cake and eat it too. We work hard to make a living. I'm not sympathetic to those who sit around and hope for money to come down from the sky. That's another story. Anyway, I have one more training to do before end of the year. Then I can take a breather for a while.

My Hubby Said...

If you dig my old blog entries, I'm sure you'd find a few that mentioned on the benefits of staying single. To be fair, today I'd like to mention some benefits of being married :) In life, everything has its pros and cons. Neither is really better than the other. What makes it the best depends on the choices we made and the mindset we choose to hold.

Hubby has wondered whether I prefer my single or married life. I told him both are different. Being single, go dig my past entries. Being married, I have a best friend for life :) What do best friends do? They talked about anything and everything, they do everything together, they pleases one another, they share many things, they wanted the best for their best friend and they become a witness to their best friend's life. I have many good friends throughout the different period in my life. I still keep in touch with some of them but different geographical location and life commitments causes everyone's priority to change. I have never had a single best friend from my childhood till now. Now I do :) From the moment he said the akad, by Allah's will... till death do us part, I have a best friend for life.

Being married, your other half's opinion matters. It's good for check and balance like the moment I felt like splurging on a handbag. Not my regular splurging but real BIGggg splurging. I suddenly have a cravings for a really expensive handbag :) How expensive is expensive? Just something in the range of RM400 to RM1500. Yup... just something around that figure hehehe... No... hubby didn't say no. He just said he didn't really like the design. Good tactic hubby, good tactic... but it works. Hubby said he didn't mind really. Of course he doesn't cause if it is not my necessity, I pay for it. But I value his second opinion anyway.

Being married, you'd like to share your other half's opinion with others as well. When people say my hubby said this and that, you can also do the same. It's like staking a claim that you're part of an equation too. That shows you're committed to somebody and you matters to them. Even if whatever hubby said could be something that you can't do, you'd mention it with a certain level of fondness. For example, hubby said "jangan jeling-jeling orang lain" or "jangan balik malam-malam"... that shows he cares isn't it. Yup... being married is knowing someone cares for you.

When I keep mentioning hubby said this, hubby said that... it's a sign that I missed him too much :) Lately, I've been busy. Hubby said, "sayang bini, bini tinggal-tinggalkan" hehehe.... Hmmmm... we have to make the best of whatever time we can spend together when either one of us is busy. I'm going outstation again on Monday. It surely makes us appreciate the free time we can spend with each other. Absence make your heart grow fonder. I'm looking forward to not so busy time... but if I'm always not busy, I can't splurge on expensive handbags :) Balance... balance... we have to find the perfect balance in life.

What Did I Do?

What did I do? ...stress on 'I'

Life is full of ups and downs. Smiles and laughter, tears and sadness... they are all spices of life. Everyone knows that and somehow can accept that as facts of life. But we certainly did not appreciate the time and moment when we feel sad or when someone makes us cry... especially when we're not at fault. Who does isn't it? The question now is what do you DO under the circumstances? What CAN you do?

You can explain... you can cry... you can apologize... you can ignore... you can live with it... you can do nothing! What would YOU do?

What would I do? Normally I'd put up a brave exterior but internally, I'd want to run and hide, go as far away as I can from all the injustice. "La tahzan!" Don't be sad... do'a orang yang teraniaya Allah makbulkan. That's my consolation because it certainly makes me feel 'teraniaya' when I have to deal with all the negativity that does not originates from me. Some people can't separate between issues and people or emotional and rational. Thus, we have to face the brunt of their emotions. Sigh! I know that's life... but it's not that easy to deal with isn't it?

Services That Didn't Make Sense

I was invited to attend a briefing by a private hospital about a health program. Those who attended will be given a complimentary blood test voucher. I've always heard hospitals conducted talks or programs to inculcate awareness to the public about certain health issues. So I thought why not spend half a day for something that might be useful to me. The complimentary blood test voucher was not the carrot for me to attend. I can't even remember where I put it. Maybe the offer has expired by now.

They started with a 1-to-1 consultation session. I had a nice chat with my consultant. He tried to make a strong point about being aware of our health at all times so we can take the necessary measures if something goes wrong. I couldn't disagree with that. Until he introduces a confusing plan to achieve that awareness. It was a full medical check-up plan that you have to pay RM600++ per year for. I thought that was very reasonable don't you think so? In fact, very very affordable. Once he got me interested, I was introduced to the financial manager who will elaborate more about the plan.

That's when I discovered I have wasted half a day of my life listening to something that didn't make sense. Anyway, I could write about it one of these days. I'm blogging about it now just so I'll remember the event and the ridiculousness of the idea. This event took place few weeks back. It has always been at the back of my mind... I just didn't have the time to put it down in writing.

You see... I'm not a fan of paying for services not yet rendered. That would include long-term commitment to fitness centres, spas and salons, anything... By long term, I mean 1 year or more. This plan concocted by the private hospital is for 18 years or more. The plan A includes spouses which costs up to RM44,000. On top of the RM600++ paid yearly. There's a discount for the RM44,000 if we sign immediately. Only when I told them I'm not interested, they revealed plan B which is for individual and transferable which costs RM20,000++. I've forgotten the exact amount. There's a discount as well if we sign immediately.

To finance the amount, you can either use your credit card to pay in installments or take up a personal loan. They even have some panel financial institutions that would approve your application.

I know sales people. I've done sales training for sales people. They can't play up my emotions by bringing to my attention how those who knew about the cost of full medical check-up wouldn't hesitate to sign up immediately, about how non-Malays would not pass up such good opportunity. Hellooo... I'm thinking about practicality here. That old school tactic only pushed me away further. If you know non-Malays would not pass up such opportunity then why call us the cekai Melayu to attend your talk? Enlightened me if I'm wrong... but unless you're a phobic of something, I don't think that many healthy people will be so obsessed about doing a full medical check up every year. Every 2-3 years maybe. Other than that, maybe just pap smear or any special check up that you want to do every year.

Let's say you took the 18 years full medical check-up plan. What happened if you discovered you have cancer after 5 years? You'd go for treatment of course. What's the use of the balance 13 years of medical check-up. If you're undergoing medical treatment, I'm sure your health will be monitored. Full medical check will be redundant. The plan is transferable... well, why don't just sell plan B? Spouses and family members can use it together. Whatever it is, I still prefer to pay AFTER a service has been rendered. I'd rather pay RM3,000 whenever I feel like going for a medical check-up rather than get a loan to pay RM44,000 for services not yet rendered. Medical insurance... make sense. This medical check-up plan just didn't.

I've paid in advance for my spa visits. Only the 3x plan that has to be used within 1 month. I've paid 3 months in advance for my yoga classes which I ended up not using all of it but I'm OK with short term commitments like that.

I wanted to see the list of check-up done to compare it with the general full medical check-up given by any other clinic and hospital. They refuse to give it to me. They claimed to give more thorough check-up and has more in the list than offered elsewhere. I certainly like to compare them. Who knows checking our pulses is considered as one. We can only get the list once we signed up. OK if there's a cooling period for us so we can do our homework and cancel if we don't like what we found but there's none. Insurance plan clearly has better offer than this.

What's the point of me writing about this? I might be able to use them as an example in one of my training about service and the value of service, perceived or real. And also about how desperate some companies are to come up with unreasonable products and/or services on the pretense of valuing their customer. No you certainly don't value your customer. I don't feel it either in perception or reality. You only care about your bottomline... your profit. No doubt every where you go companies would give a lip service about caring for their customer but customers are not stupid.

Just like if you declare your love to someone, you better show it. That someone better feel it or else there'll be no relationship. So this company's plan A and plan B showed their love for the customer's money and not the customer themselves. So... bad strategy there.

Busy Is Good... No?

I have just completed a 10-days training marathon. Phewwww.... There were 2 training sessions. The first session was for 3 days, the 2nd session was for 7 days 6 nights. I felt so claustrophobic staying in one hotel for the whole week. It was only in Shah Alam but we finished very late and start too early in the morning for us to return home. Some participants wrote in the feedback form, "the training should take longer because there were too many things to learn". I was like... oh nooo... I don't think I can handle it. The rainy days didn't help either. Despite having to walk out from the hotel lobby to go to our training room, it just didn't feel like a real open space.

I told hubby the moment the training ends and I was driving back, I felt so free like the birds flying on the sky. I feel like I need to commune with nature. Go jungle trekking somewhere. I certainly need a good massage. I felt like going shopping too. I probably need a new handbag and a few good books. Sigh! Too many things to do before my next training in 3 days time. And the laundry that needs to be done... arrrggghhhh...

Hubby's birthday was on the 3rd. I haven't got the time to plan anything. I managed to make some arrangements with an associate trainer to cover for me the night before hubby's birthday. I was from Shah Alam, hubby's from Gombak. I managed to reached home few minutes before hubby arrived. On the spur of a moment, I decided to stop at a florist and bought hubby some flower. The moment I reached home, opened the grill and door, quickly hid it in one of the rooms. Hubby arrived before I managed to lock the grill so he must've thought I just arrived. Hehehe... my secret was safe.


Fitting flower from me to hubby isn't it :)

We went to have a nice dinner. I wanted to wait till after midnight before I gave hubby the flower but I was so tired I might konked out the moment my head touches the pillow so he got his flower earlier :) Happy Birthday Dearest Hubby.

It's difficult for us when I was busy. I can handle things and situation if hubby's busy... but not when I'm busy. Maybe because when we're not so busy, I can spend time to pamper hubby and be pampered... even if hubby's busy, I can follow him on his outstation trip or his meetings, so I felt a sense of loss when I'm busy. Once when I was having dinner alone at the hotel, the singer sang one romantic songs after another which makes me missed hubby so much. I called hubby just to hear his voice and tell him I missed him. That turned out to be NOT such a good idea. I cried but has to control the quiver in my voice so I wouldn't worry hubby. I just hope people around didn't notice my tears or thought something got into my eyes. Sigh!

Next time I have to be more careful with my training arrangements. In my line of work, that's not really a luxury but we have a choice. We have to live with the choices we made. Money or family, leisure or work, health or wealth... So whatever it is... be it!

The Sun vs. The Heart

The sun is shining very brightly today. Even before 7 a.m., the heat can be felt already. Normally my mood followed the weather but I don't feel as bright as the sunshine today. For one, hubby is not around. He has other commitments and obligations to attend to. Then, there is this headache. It is not throbbing very badly but enough to make me feel uncomfortable. I have endured worst headaches than this because I'm allergic to panadol and pain killers. Normally it happens because I didn't take my meals on time. It will magically disappear after I've eaten something. Of course there are other causes as well which sometimes will go away if I sleep it off. This time, I started feeling it since yesterday. I think I have enough food and it is still very early for me to sleep it off again.

I also can't seem to stop thinking about something that has happened. I'm at a loss as to whether I'm being reasonable or not. What's the underlying reason if any. Because sometimes we do certain things as a reaction to some event or situation. I make a decision based on other surrounding factors that seemed to support my decision. When the surrounding factor crashed and crumbled, what was once a right decision can become a wrong one. I've asked myself what do I really want. There is some answer but I thought that 'want' could be very unreasonable depending on the circumstances. And if the surrounding factor crash and crumble again, I might not be able to handle it emotionally.

I'm normally a reasonable person but a human being nevertheless with feelings and emotions which can sometimes be difficult to manage. Should I just stay away and avoid anything that might cause emotional upheaval or do I be reasonable and schooled my heart to behave? I don't have the answer....

I have some tasks to do that I better handle now. At the same time, I hope I get the answer I'm looking for.

From Hubby...

Aamiin...