Meet my Zen Center

I’ll let my pictures do that a-picture-is-worth-a-thousand-words thang.

I’m off to watch a movie!

Our desks

Inside our tank

Aha, the portal!

New desk!!

A new friend in a new place

A touch of Me

Saying goodbye (sort of)

Sometime earlier this week, I returned to the HQ to clean out my desk. There was a lot of junk, of course, even for a person obsessed about keeping one’s desk neat and organized. Yet, amidst the scraps of paper I found a few gems which churned out the bittersweet feeling of leaving some place familiar to embark on new adventures somewhere new. I decided to keep these and bring them along to my new branch as a reminder of the friends I’ve “left behind” with whom I’ve shared some pretty darn good times at the workplace.

Now you know what I eat for lunch

An outing, yes?

Mr. Bunny and Mr. Cow make their appearance

Small yet sweet

Scraps of memories

Even the rain prompts doodles!

A Christmas greeting

Stickmen at large!

I hate cluttered desks

One of the exciting things about settling in at a new place of work is getting (and then personalizing) your own desk. Your desk at work is important. It’s your center. Depending on you and how you personalize it, it has a great influence on how you perform at work. It creates productivity no matter what your abilities are. Yet, one of the most annoying things about getting your new desk is cleaning the previous’ tenant’s mess. When it’s a cluttered mess, well, it just sucks.

I spent most of my free time today cleaning out the junk left in the drawers and on the table itself off my new desk at my new workplace. For two weeks I sat there as my temporary base of operations, the mess bothered me slightly but not enough to encourage me to tidy up as I knew I wouldn’t be there long. Now that things have changed, on the very top of my list on my first day of official permanent residency was to clear out the damned mess!

There were piles of scrap paper all over the desk! Scribbled pieces, unused and obviously abandoned forms, ripped out pieces of paper from exercise books and the most annoying sort were the itty bitty ones which you have no choice but to pick it up piece by piece.

Then I found several empty tissue boxes chucked underneath the desk. God knows why the previous employee didn’t throw those out!

Being an education center, I naturally found tons of used and supposed to be used exercise book littered all over the place. In drawers, above the drawers, on the table, slotted in the file holders on the table…sigh.

It took awhile to clean it all out and by the end of the spring clean, my wee dustbin had to be emptied three times. But it paid off, because now I have a nice large desk (larger than the one I have in HQ) just waiting for more personalization. I miss my bobble-head Stitch! Tomorrow when I return to HQ, I’ll be cleaning out my desk and transferring my stuff to make me feel more at “home” at my new desk. Hmm, maybe “home” isn’t such an appropriate term to use for anything concerning work. Ha!

Will post a picture of my new desk as soon as its all set up!

I like making happy discoveries

It was many months ago that I had set out to try the famous Krispy Kreme doughnut after hearing (and being suckered into) all the hype surrounding its long awaited arrival here in Malaysia. Naturally, this happened to me in my pursuit.

I stumbled across another outlet of theirs today while out shopping for birthday gifts. Oh, I love making happy discoveries! Without an ounce of hesitation and ignoring all cerebral cries of despair (nooo your waistline doesn’t need a doughnut!!) I said “two please, thank you” with a big happy smile on my face.

Tummy Yummies

I like my doughnuts simple (none of those fancy ones tyvm) and went for the famous original glazed. The verdict? Better than Dunkin’ Donuts and all the other fancy schmancy outlets out there! This was soft and very tasty–all 200 calories, 12 fat grams of it. Every bite coats your tongue in sugar and you’d have 10 seconds of pure unadulterated bliss as you chew. Mmm mmm! It’s simply a mystery how I waited months and months before trying this mouthwatering pastry. I’m not one to go for doughnuts and if I had a top five list, this would be no.2. The reigning champion is still one of those sugar sprinkled local doughnuts. Yum!

It’s a good thing these yummy treats are located rather far away from where I live. Or else, I’m dead. :O

Work, work, work.

Ah yes. I like, so many others, blame work on the lack of activity here this past week. There has been several developments in my work and at the end of the day, the thought of blogging is only secondary to the need of sleep. So, my apologies, dear readers. I promise to try harder.

While we’re on the subject of developments at work, let me just shoot off by saying that I’ve been with my company for almost a year and a half. I teach children and I enjoy what I do. Still, I suppose like most employees, I started to feel discontent with my workplace (specifically the management) sometime earlier this year and have been rather unsatisfied with my overall perception of the company.

I felt nearly all the time that I was merely enduring this for the pay. Yes, my job pays me well and to leave abruptly like so many of my other colleagues is not an option because at the present time saving money is a big priority. Still, my dissatisfaction prompted me to start looking for other jobs but I’ll tell you right now that I am still with my current workplace. At times when I look back on my failed interviews, I may have sabotaged myself–trying too hard to impress the potential employer. And I knew this stemmed from my great impatience and eagerness to leave my present company. Oh well, better luck and more sense next time. I make a lot of mistakes, I just hope I eventually learn from them.

For the past two weeks, I was asked to help out at another branch (I’m based at the HQ) which I gladly went. This required me to work more hours and to top that, instead of having to drive only 10 minutes to work as I always did, it was now a 30 minute safari amongst semi-heavy traffic. Coming home, naturally took longer than that. There was a lot of travelling involved, dear readers, and that is what drained me.

Now, the developments. My bosses have offered me a permanent position at said branch with a RM500 hike in my salary. Among the new terms of engagement is a revert back to my less hectic schedule (although still a lot of travelling involved) and there will be no need for supervision of my classes anymore. Does this sound like a pretty good deal to you? Apart from the longer travelling to and from work ordeal, I’m being paid extra to do the same thing!

I have until Monday to give my definite answer but I am leaning towards a yes. As for the aforementioned dissatisfaction with my workplace, I think this change will do me good. Having experienced being in this branch twice now (once last year) the environment was less prone to stress and overall, just…more cheerful. Most importantly, I like the way the lady boss runs this branch. She integrates herself with us subordinates (wink) which I think proves to be more conducive to a better working environment than the stuffy ones I have in the HQ.

So dear readers, in a very long winded way, I will be posting more in the coming week. Thank you so much for checking back even when the spiders start to build their webs.