What A Poor Pharmacist

Thursday, March 31, 2005

woke up at 9am today.

damn sleepy, and first thing to do was to search for any classified jobs... none. resolved to teach tuition, as compared:

tuition: $15-20 an hour teaching secondary school students, about $120-$160 per month?
5 students (5-day work week, 2h each): $800

kfc/ljs/mac: $5 an hour, about $40-60 (about 8-12 hours) per day, and hence about $800-1200 per month
(5-day work week, 8-12 h each)

the question: hard labour or intelligent aid?

Dispense-A-Dream '07
In a passing moment
11:07 pm

Wednesday, March 30, 2005

what a day...

woke up at 9am...

then accompanied wai seng and edwin to this "henderson building" job offer, at henderson road which is in alexandra area. Took 14there from clementi. on arrival, we had to walk in to some industriallooking area, with all those CCTVs around like some fortress... allwe could make of were many cars driving into their multi-storey carpark and the HARD LABOUR workers, ws and edwin made some jokesabout doing the same, yeah, "we want people with 4 A level distinctionsto do HARD LABOUR..."

we reached 04-09 without much difficulty, although the whole placedid seem like some fortress/prison. Like the Bastille in France?with cold clammy corridors and ... more CCTVs. in the office we weregiven personnel particular forms and we filled them in... me too and i was quite surprised that they actually wanted ME, some guy who hasn't ORDed yet. The lady at the counter was friendly and said,"dun worry, we can wait till your ORD to hire you." Well.
Relieved, i filled in the form. About 15 mins later some guy with a YELLOW TIE called us into the interview room, briefed us. Told us he would train us to "managerial positions" and "leadership", whateverthe shit is that, can't remember. Told us the company was "helpingsome other company train managers", or at least that's what i perceived.Me? a manager? ... interesting. Well we tried to find out what kindawork we'd get during the q&a, but he beat about the bush and stuck to his mantra of "managerial positions", "leadership", etc etc. Halfway through the q&a my eyes were falling asleep liao.

Anyway, we left thinking of the whole shit as a scam... in ws' wordsTraining? when we explicitly said we're gonna work for 3 months? and iwith epilepsy? haiz! anyway the company called us at 3pm when we were atsakae sushi celebrating ws' bdae and told us that ALL THREE were shortlistedthen i really smelt a rat, cos we're like playing the fool the period b4the "interview", the 3 of us. And no such company would hire people and train them, for 3 months, and one with epilepsy and haven't ORDed yet???

they must be dicks or they must think we're dicks.

Dispense-A-Dream '07
In a passing moment
8:44 pm

Monday, March 28, 2005

How time flies:

I was viewing friendster lately, checking out on friends (yeah at 2:30 am cos that's when the traffic is low), something crazy to do due to the long wait times. And i found out:

1) Ex-classmate Xiaoqi (in Secondary 2B) had been married!!! and she's only 20!!! I just glanced over at her "relationship status", thinking, yeah yeah it's one of those "in a relationship" and voila! And looking at her pics, she looks so much mature, man... exuding female charm!! Cant imagine her as one of those petite little girls about.... 8 years ago, getting teased around? It's like you go to someone's birthday party and, "Huh!??!??! you're married?!?!"

Anyway, the difference is: i still look like a high-school freak idiot (yeah i just started wearing 3/4 pants and frequenting the library) and horribly deficit in the relationships department. Positive sign: I think i still look 18 (maybe with the beard and shaved hair, yeah 19). Its hard to believe that we were actually born in the same year...
Negative sign: still no girlfriend. still get ang pow (hey that's good), still act and think like a child.

And xiaoqi, if you are reading this, no offence please, and all the best for your married life. and remember, i'll visit your house for chinese new year.

2) Andy, my "3rd brother" has a nice lady in a position with himself in a pic on Friendster that extremely boldly suggests he being in a more intimate relationship with the latter (no, NOT that kinda scene u find in pron). yeah both of them had wide smiles on. I couldn't find any other pics with this lady, and the most obvious hunch is that that's his girlfriend... steady... or target??? must ask him. Hey, in fact, haven't been in contact with the dude for very long, due to both our work commitments (aka army). Must get his ass out sometime, maybe k-box. Hope he's as crazy as i last saw him. Not...

Andy if you are reading this, please at least have the courtesy to introduce that girl of yours to me? Its like Hans (Hanyi) and yourself have some girl liao, leaving me to linger alone without anyone to guard my six. Some kinda brotherhood...

Dispense-A-Dream '07
In a passing moment
2:29 am

Oh yeah, guys, i found this on the Net:

ITE graduate in Electronics (Computer Technology) Tan Yong Qiang recently graduated from Singapore Polytechnic with top honours, chalking up 20 distinctions and 8As out of 32 modules of his Electronics, Computer & Communication Engineering course. This result was ‘quite unexpected’ for Yong Qiang, whom - 10 years ago - had barely made it to secondary school.
Yong Qiang was from the pioneer batch of Normal (Technical) [N(T)] students who first entered ITE in 1998. “When I was in primary school, I wasn’t the ‘studying type’. My studies weren’t important then; I just wanted to play,” he recalled.
It was only when he was in Secondary 2 at Yuying Secondary School that he began to give his future serious thought. He visited the ITE Open House and returned home with a stack of ITE course brochures, which he pored over. Electronics became his dream course because of his fascination with electronic devices and computers. “For the first time in my life, I started to work very hard in my studies because I had a goal - to get good results and enter the ITE course of my choice,” he said.
His hard work was rewarded when Yong Qiang was offered the course he wanted, National ITE Certificate (Nitec) in Electronics (Computer Technology) at ITE West (Balestier) in 1998. For the next two years, he was delighted to have found his niche as he realised he has a natural aptitude for the practical, hands-on nature of his course.
While Yong Qiang studied hard, he also led an enriching campus life. He joined the Youth Volunteer Club and spent much time helping the elderly. He also tinkered with projects with the Electronics Club.
He did well in his ITE studies and was awarded the Certificate of Merit in 2000, thus enabling him to enter a relevant polytechnic diploma course direct. At Singapore Polytechnic, Yong Qiang breezed through his studies, thanks to his technical foundation. He said: “About 90% of what I’ve learnt have been introduced in ITE so I don’t need to start from scratch.” He did encounter some difficulty with Engineering Mathematics, but put in a lot of effort into the subject, which earned him an A grade at the end of his course.
At the end of his polytechnic studies, Yong Qiang was awarded the prestigious Tay Eng Soon Gold Medal, a medal given to an outstanding ITE graduate in each of the polytechnics. His parents - dad is a welder and mum a housewife - were very proud of him.

The original site at:http://www.ite.edu.sg/about_ite/TQW_Archived_Issues/Tqw_72/72_p08.html

Hmm, so much for same names....

Dispense-A-Dream '07
In a passing moment
2:26 am

Wednesday, March 16, 2005

The average pay of an NSF clerk

Total money collected = $350 x 12 + $390 x 6 + $420 x 10
= $10740

Hours worked for a clerk:
There are 365.25 days in a year,
in a month there is 365.25 / 12 = 30.4375 days
We work for 28 months, that is 30.4375 x 28 = 852.25 days
We work from 8am to 6pm, that is 10 hours per day
Therefore we work a total of 8522.5 hours

Therefore the per hour salary for an NSF corporal clerk who got 2 months off is:

$10740.00 / 8522.5 hours = $1.26

that's for free food and medical attention...

Dispense-A-Dream '07
In a passing moment
8:57 pm

Monday, March 14, 2005

sien...

today woke up at 11:00 am. Promised myself would exercise at 8:00 am but no... slept at like 2-3 am yesterday. its becoming like a bad habit nowadays, and my weight is still at 80kg... PIG!!! afternoon tried to pack up my old stuff... from sec sch and JC. found a lot of dust instead.

abandoned the project halfway and decided to visit Leonard instead to get MP3s!! i just bought an iRiver mp3 player G320. check out the product details:

http://www.iriveramerica.com/prod/hd/h320.aspx

my own review: comes in only black colour, but nice interface. also can view pictures and text files... microphone... fm radio... etc etc. all this for $549.. not a bad deal. next time can sleep in lectures liao, hehe. not to worry of having no music to hear either. yay!!! oh yeah, waiseng also got one iriver, but was the h10, more stylish with 4 colours.

along the way, i saw this gal inside the mrt... she was like

at leo's house, got hell lot of mp3s and some cds from him... not a bad haul after all. also found out that Ang Mo Kio's not that bad to navigate after all, just a lot of markets under construction... leo next time when give directions, say that the market is U/C ok... anyway no pun there... and thanks... probably one more gig of music to add to my collection...

Dispense-A-Dream '07
In a passing moment
11:45 pm

Tuesday, March 01, 2005

yay!

love the mail today. 2 things:

1. moe has sent me some letter telling me to get a medical doctor to certify that i'm fit to teach relief teaching... ok at least the application went through somewhere. i'm afraid it will get stuck, like xin's. pretty SOP for someone with epilepsy who's applying for decent jobs.

2. nus sent me one big package with the following:
- enrolment in the course reserved in ay 2005-2006 for national serviceman
- oam form A (form for the submision of photograph for matriculation card)
- oam form B (form for confirmation of course reserved for NSF)
- 02 x medical examination or national servicemen who were reserved places and enrolling in nus in ay 2005-2006

also, senior medic has approved of my off/leave forecast... can CO/CL at the second week (11/03/05 onwards). However, march must come back once a day (haven't really decided when, tentatively wed), there are TWO clerk duties (shoot). for april i'm trying to ask for a fixed duty date (4th april), so i can CL the rest of april.

matriculation's in, enlistment's out.... song bo!

Dispense-A-Dream '07
In a passing moment
2:32 am