What an increase… what a statement…

Ya’ know, when I have my daily dosage of comics a.k.a. mainstream newspaper, I will usually laugh, albeit a cynical one. Do you laugh when you read those “comics”? But today, when I was doing my daily reading, I was totally depressed.

Up to 35% increase in salary and double in living allowance! That is on top of well known perks such as boleh-pergi-minum-sesuka-hati, boleh-pergi-kursus-tiap-tiap-hari, boleh-kerja-sambil-jalan-sana-sini and boleh-tutup-kaunter-walaupun-orang-sudah-mari, just to name a few. After all, we don’t shout Malaysia Boleh for nothing.

The last time I worked like a dog till I never got to see sunlight and got double-promoted, I only managed a mere 31% increment. And that includes having to endure the world most misleading document, an absolute opposite compared to those boleh-perks. Aren’t you depressed?

But the most depressing (and scary) part is when I read… “Abdullah said the pay rise could be given because of the economic growth of 5.6%, the effect of fuel prices, positive trends of Bursa Malaysia and improved tax collection.” Quoted from here.

“Effect of fuel prices”… “improved tax collection”… sound very scary…

But towards the end of the day, the comics brought back some cheer… just a bit. That’s when I read the caption below:
Woooooaaaaaaaahhhhh… I wonder what happened. To me, such incident is truly… An act of God…

But then again… will there be any result?... sam jiu ler…

Of selling and barking

There are many divisions and departments in a typical company such as marketing, sales, planning, finance, human resource, etc. But no matter what they call it, they can be segregated into 2 distinct parties… the profit centre and the cost centre.

Profit centre (“PS”) simply means those fellas that actually make money for the company. They are the salesmen, the marketing guys, product development geeks, just to name a few. And yeah, in any company, someone somewhere will have to make a sale all the time. If not, how’s the company gonna survive?

Oh, if you’re thinking there’re no salesmen in those glamorous professional firms… you’re damn wrong. Those promoted to managers are expected to do sales and marketing. You’ll be surprise how many times their ass-es get screwed by the partners for not bringing in enough sales. So if you’re one of those who are dreaming of the stage where you will do nothing but just sign on the dotted lines… please wake up.

As its name speaks for itself, cost centre (“CS”) refers to those fellas whose existence only lower down the company’s profit. These are the financial controllers, the internal legal advisors, the risk managers, quality control, basically people who make life difficult for PS in the name of compliance and reporting. They are there to ensure that the company complies with all the rules and regulations.

One thing for sure, CS people are very proud of themselves and they tend to look down on PS. I mean, it’s natural right? You graduated with a business, finance or law degree… you spent 5 years or so in a glamorous firm and now that you’re in a big corporation with title such as manager this and controller that… you certainly feel you’re a damn big shot. In their eyes, those salesmen are nothing but people who didn’t make it in college and uni.

With such pride and a huge sense of self-worth, CS people think they run the company, which of course, is partly true. A CS fella once said to me that they are the people looking after the interest of the shareholders (i.e. the owner of the company) and that they are the “watchdog” of the big bosses. Oh believe me… when that fella said that to me… I can feel the sense of pride and power. You can practically hear I-AM-IN-CONTROL hidden within the words uttered.

Of course, that is very true. CS is the “watchdog”… because they all work like dogs and only know how to bark. Also, they fail to know that their barking often means nothing. Don’t believe me? Picture this scenario…

A sales fella brings in 1million worth of revenue… the legal dogs bark about whether there is a proper contract, the finance dogs will bark about whether it has been properly recorded, the risk dogs will bark about whether the sales will pose any kinda threat to the company, the regulatory dogs will bark about whether the gomen will allow such sales, etc.

A meeting will then be held to facilitate the barking. Oh trust me, such meetings can be really interesting. To those dogs, everything is a problem. This cannot, that cannot, this must follow that, that must follow this. But somehow, a conclusion will be reached. Why? Cos those dogs are smart people… they are employed to solve problems, not knowing that they are the problems most of the time.

A contract will then be needed by tomorrow. It’s always tomorrow or the day after. Why? Because the client says so. So the sales fella will say… “Ok, you dogs lawyers, accountants, risk managers, etc, please get the contract ready for tomorrow. I am going home, ciao”. And this is where stop-barking-and-work-like-a-real-dog begins.

The next day, the contract will be presented to the client a.k.a. “waterfish” and he will then say he is not happy because too many conditions inside the contract. So he won't sign and the sales fella will panic! “Fuck, I’m gonna lose 1million worth of sales!” Thus he pleads to the dogs to relax some rules. But of course, all dogs will be united in one word and say… CANNOT… must follow law!
The sales fella will be thinking…”KNNCCB a.k.a. fucking hell, I bring in money to pay all your fucking salary and you fucking make things so damn difficult. Ok, I will go and talk to the big boss!”

As the sales fella talks to the bis boss, those dogs will continue their barking… this cannot, that cannot, high risk, woo woo wuu wuu. Then the boss will think…”Oh yeah, very risky, bad for the company”. Then the sales fella will say…”But boss… 1million worth of sales”.

$$$$ kaching kaching $$$$$

The dogs will continue to bark but this is the part where the big boss will screw all their dogs doggie style for making life difficult for the sales fella. And thus begin stop-barking-and-work-like-a-real-dogs part 2 begins. Why? Because the contract needs to be amended, and amended quick a.k.a. don’t-need-to-go-home-until-work-is-done.
Yup, that’s a typical scenario is any given company. Those who are in the corporate world long enough will know what I am trying to say.

In a nutshell, PS are the people who do the selling, who brings in the money. They are the people who are often looked down at by society, particular by the affluent bunch. But they are the reason why a company grows.

The CS fellas are those who only know how to bark of their ability, their knowledge. They think that because they are smart, they are in control. But most of the time, that’s not the case. Power lies in the hands of those who bring in the dough.

The best part? At the end of the year, the bonus payment for those salesmen will be much much much higher compared to those who are smart. And I mean, much much much higher. And of course, those smart ones will continue to bark boast about their knowledge while those salesmen are just… lowly salesmen.

A little on 4 fronts

Personal front:

Weekend has been a mixture of emotions. First, was quite elated about looking for bridal photos with Jules. Made a visit to this place called covershots and had a fun time choosing wedding gowns… Jules la, not me. But… the day ended with blardy Chelski lifting the FA Cup. While it’s difficult to say which team deserves it more, it is still heart-break to see Man U lost. Sigh…

Well-being front:

Had a nasty collision with Kenninaz during football today and my knee is busted. As I type, I can't quite bend my right knee already, which brings much fear about how it will cope tomorrow. Should I take MC? Hehe… But then again, I hope I can recover in time for hip-hop class this Thursday.

Sam Jiu front:

I had quite high hope when the Datuk Shahrizat was asked to handle the issue. Ya’ know, she has always been the one to scream and shout about women’s right and everything. So when she was asked to handle the issue, I thought she will really do something… I was wrong. She handled the issue by…… accepting the apology on behalf of all women in Malaysia. I shouldn’t have given myself hope… should have adopted the ‘sam jiu’ ideology.

Modern slavery front:

Boss asked to have lunch today (Monday). I think she has noticed that I have not been quite myself at work lately. She will probably be doing all the motivational talk. I think it’s time for me to be honest with myself and how I feel about being a modern slave. Nonetheless, must be very careful with my words. Wish me luck ok!

Oh, my “A professional mistake” entry… if you guys have time, you all should go through all the comments. Seriously, some are more meaningful that my entry itself.

Do you know why?

Jane’s grandmother just passed away. It was a tragic death. During the funeral, a handsome young man came to pay his last respect to Jane’s grandmother. Jane doesn’t know who man. She has never seen him before but was instantly attracted to him; she just couldn’t take her eyes off this man.

Just as Jane was going to say ‘hi’ to this handsome young man, her sister, Joanne went up to the man and they embraced. Alas, he is her sister’s friend. They seemed close as Joanne cried on his shoulder while he, in turn, gave her all the comfort she needs.

Jane walked away… in rejection.

2 weeks later, Joanne died. She didn’t die of a natural death. Someone murdered her. Based on preliminary investigation, the murderer seems to be someone within the family.

You must be thinking it’s Jane right? Yeah... it’s Jane who did it. But the question is… why? Why did Jane murder her sister?

Some of you might have read this before but for those who haven’t… do you know why? I was told this question was used by the CIA to test the mind of killers during homicide cases.

Have another nice thinking weekend!

P/S: Has anyone beat my record yet?

A professional mistake

Your alarm rings, signalling another brand new day. You get up, looking forward for another new day of challenge, another new day to learn. After washing up, you put on your office outfit, giving you that professional look, one that you believe many out there envy. Breakfast follows (perhaps), and you head off to your office. You’re one of the earliest to arrive, ahead of all your superior and when they come in later, they greet you and you feel all charged up for another productive day. Plenty to do and learn and hence, you are prepared to stay back late to do all that is necessary.

If you’re currently doing a degree in finance, accounting or law, the above is probably what you’ve been waiting for all these years. You work your ass off (well… most of you) in university because it’s your dream to join one of those big glamorous firms out there in the market. Lawyers and accountants are the usual suspects for this curse. Once graduated, all of them will run like headless chicken towards those big firms. If you’re an accounting student… you want to be an auditor in one of the Big-4 right?

Well, if you do make it, it’s like a dream come true. In such firms, you get a personal computer, maybe a notebook (wow!). All your stationeries are free, and it’s also the first time you step into a ‘pantry’, where you can make your own coffee, just like those nice offices in TVB series. Next, you get an exclusive e-mail, the domain after your name is not the ordinary @gmail.com or @hotmail.com or @yahoo.com… No, it’s not, it’s your-name@a-big-and-glamorous-firm.com. You can’t wait to tell that to your friend.

Then comes the feeling of giving a business card with your name on it, and it’s not any other business card, it’s one with your name on it, it’s one that signifies you’re an employee with a-big-and-glamorous-firm. And… the word below your name is not a lowly “accounts executive”… the word below your name is exclusive… the word below your name is… “Associate”. And when your friend gives you the “Wow, you’re an associate with this firm?”… you get into instant orgasm.

3 or 6 months into your job, you will then be experiencing the euphoria of saying… I-am-very-busy… I-have-a-lot-work… I-worked-till-very-late-last-night… I-can't-make-it-for-the-gathering-cos-I-have-to-work-this-weekend. Yeah, it’s an euphoria because to you, it’s a privilege to be busy, it’s very cool to work late, you’re very proud to work in during weekends. When you utter such words, a sense of arrogance and pride radiates from you. You feel great because working so hard means you learnt a lot of things, those not in the professional industry somehow looks lowly to you. You feel big, you feel you’re a level smarter than them .Reality will tend to sink in within 2 years or so, though the duration seems to be getting shorter and shorter now with the younger generation.

First, you will probably ask yourself, how come a graduate like you must do all sorts of donkey jobs such as photocopying, checking invoices, going through pile and pile of documents and filing. You will also be wondering how come your superior whom you once looked up to have to suck up to clients. Oh yeah… most all clients are unreasonable.

If you’re an accountant, you will probably realise that there is no such thing called a ‘balance’ sheet. It’s balanced because you did the balancing act so that your big boss can sign on it and certify it as ‘true and fair’. Yeah… signing on accounts, the job that you once dreamed of… isn’t exactly all a bed of roses. You then realise that you will probably never reach that “just-need-to-sign-only stage” but hey… it’s ok, you probably hate that job by now. When you tell your client something, chances are you are just as blur and confuse as them. But you have to act as though you’re an expert because you’re the con-sul-tant. This is just a glimpse of it.

Now, all the late nights and irregular meals will probably caused you to age 8 years in 2 years. Those I-am-very-busy… I-have-a-lot-work… I-worked-till-very-late-last-night… I-can't-make-it-for-the-gathering-cos-I-have-to-work-this-weekend will take its toll on your body and it will show. You will probably look very skinny… or very far… you will certainly look old and worn out. Working late and spending weekends in the office is no longer a cool thing but absolute stupidity. But hey… you will still have to do it, because there’s still much work to be done.

By now, all your friends who ended up as salesmen or doing other thing except being a professional, those whom you felt superior to are driving anything but a proton. But for you, it’s time to think whether you should buy a proton cause your perodua is beginning to give you problem. Of course, if your father is well-connected fella, things can be different. But if you’re not, tough luck. You’ll be wondering how come you’re generally under-paid. Those exposure and learning curve that you once craved are no longer relevant. You want to make more money. But unless you’re a partner of the glamorous firm, money can be a lil tough to come by.

At this point of time, probably after 3, 4 or 5 years, you finally realised that document you signed when you first joined the glamorous firm was nothing but lies. Then, you decide to ply your trade in the commercial world, you leave those glamorous firm. You think joining a commercial firm will bring about a good change, not knowing that such move means you switched from being a ‘profit centre’ to a ‘cost centre’. One of the main effect of the switch is that you will be working doubly hard compared to the profit centre, which probably includes a lot of late nights too… but your salary and bonus is much lower compared to profit centre. What does this mean… a story for another time.

One thing for sure… your morning will now be something like…

Your alarm rings, signalling another day… another weekday. You get up, after snoozing the alarm a million and one times. You hope today is Friday, but it’s not, and you feel like shit. You think of a million and one reasons to take MC, but you realised you have to go to office because you failed to finish the report due today though you stayed till 10pm last night. You tell yourself you need to change job, just like how you have been telling yourself in the last 1 year. Once in office, you’re in a dilemma cause you want time to go slower so that you can finish your work but yet, you want time to go faster so that you can leave the office and go for lunch.

During lunch, you will bitch with your colleagues about work and probably the bosses. You will all talk about so many people who seem to be doing so well except for you. You realised you should have done something else while in university. You realised you may have made a mistake in life… a mistake in being a professional… you have made… a professional mistake.

P/S: I've added a "Zewt top 10" at the sidebar. Any entries that you think which should be or should not be there?

"Sam Jiu"

About 3 months ago, I was somewhat considered a new social-political blogger by a school of bloggers. While I don’t consider myself a political blogger, I do blog about social issues. A fellow blogger mentioned that lately, the direction of my blog has changed, particularly since the passing of my mom. I have to admit, that’s true.

There are a few reasons to it. My interest in exploring and writing about life is one of them. And I realised that there are many people out there who share the same notion. Secondly , I realised I have quite a number of international readers (;P), so blogging about Malaysian stuff ain’t gonna make sense to them.

Another reason is that I realised no matter how hard we scream or shout here in blogs regarding “Malaysian” social issues, it will always fall on deaf ears. I am not discouraging all the social-political bloggers out there, certainly not. In fact, you’re all my heroes and heroines. Your energy and never-say-die attitude deserves much admiration.

But one of the main reason lies in an ancient Chinese saying….

“sam jiu”
(directly translated: heart shine)

It refers to things that we already know by heart, that we already know the answer without having to talk about it. In other words... it means "Isn't the answer obvious?"

Take a look at the photo below (courtesy of TVsmith), how many of us have seen this before? How long has such things been in existence?

But how come the authorities were surprise about the existence of “kereta potong” last week? C’mon… “sam jiu” la…

The authorities also screamed and so promisingly proclaimed that they will clamp down mat rempit activities. Remember those countless statements in the press aka as the only source of news that we can trust. But are those Urukhais still roaming our streets? And why? C’mon…"sam jiu” la…

How come some datuks can so openly insult women in the parliament and we are all supposed to take it as a joke but when a “joke” is uttered from the mouth of certain people, it is considered “samseng” and “kurang ajar”? C’mon… “sam jiu” la…

How come if you and I mention about certain things, they are considered sensitive but if mentioned by not you and I, it’s perfectly fine? C’mon… “sam jiu” la…

How come after putting up this entry, I might land myself in trouble? Am I spreading lies? C’mon… “sam jiu” la…

Anymore "sam jiu" situation that you can think of?

I have always been told that debates in the parliament can be quite… err… “passionate”. Having viewed a few parliamentary clips, I couldn’t agree more. But what I really don’t understand, is how can some people can appear so well-mannered when they were a candidate eyeing for a parliamentary seat, looking all so intellectual while giving speeches, but when they are finally doing what they were elected to do, they can be of the total opposite? And I am not only referring to the gomen component parties members, I am also referring to opposition members.

Below the infamous caption of the recent “bocor” fiasco and observe that both gomen and opposition members were both actually attacking each other when they were supposed to deal with the issue at hand.




P/S: Word verification is temporarily up to avoid spam and any comments deemed inappropriate will be zewtily deleted. Why? “sam jiu” la…

With or without a reason?

I was once asked by a then-close-friend… “what do you like in that person that you are going after?” He was referring to my ex. I was taken by surprise and I could not answer him. He paused for a moment and told me that my inability to answer was the best answer one could give. I was puzzled, I bet you are too, right? He then delivered to me his motto… that when you like someone without a reason, that’s true love. At that time, I trusted him and I adopted that motto. That was 11 years ago.

As time goes by, I figured he was probably right.

Perhaps I have been exposed to quite a heavy dosage of western movies where couples break up or divorce because they no longer find their lover understanding, humorous, pretty, handsome, etc. That’s notwithstanding Hollywood celebrities, because I think they separate when they are bored of fuc*ing with each other.

Anyway, what I am trying to say is that I believe if you love someone because of a particular attribute… and when that someone no longer possess such attribute (it could happen), are you still going to love that someone? Not so much of physical attribute but character.

For example…… you meet up with a girl… she is sweet, demure and ladylike… and you love her for all that…you get married… you two have children and those lil ones drive her mad and she turned into a witch!... no longer sweet, demure and ladylike… are you going to stop loving her? Maybe… maybe not. Due to this, I believe there should not be a reason in loving someone, so as to not give you a reason to stop loving someone.

For 7 years I loved a girl and I chose not to find a reason for it. We were happy (most of the time), spent a lot of time together gathering a host of memories (both sweet and bitter) and life was indeed a bed of roses. But we are all humans, the fact that we are who we are today, is because of our species managed to evolve over time. So over 7 years, I supposed we changed… we morphed… we evolved.

God created the world in 6 days and on the 7th, He rested. On the 7th year of my precious relationship, disaster struck. For the first time in my life, I was put into a situation whereby I need to think and choose and shit!... I needed find at least a reason why I have loved this girl for 7 years. You may be thinking right now, that I have been playing a fool for the those 7 years. Hell no!!! I treated my ex better than my family, and I am not going to start by telling you the sacrifices I have made for her.

After 7 years together, when it matters most, I couldn’t find a reason to love her. I loved her for no reason and as such, there was no reason why I should stop loving her. Like the final sand falling down from the top of the hourglass, 7 years came to an end, like a flash.

No, I am not here to tell you why it ended or how it ended. The notion here is, are we supposed to love someone with a reason? And if that reason disappears over time, will we have to stop loving that someone?

After the break-up, I discussed this with another friend, and she told me is it crucial to have a reason to love someone. This is because when there is a need for it, when it matters most, when we need to reassess our position, we know why we love our partner, we know why we put up to all our partner’s shit and most importantly, we know we have something to fall back on. We know, despite everything, we love our partner for something.

So are you going to love someone without a reason? Just in case if that someone ceases to give you that reason, you will still love your him/her?

Or are you going to find an ultimate reason to love someone? So that whatever happens, you know why you love him/her.

Such a predicament… isn’t it?