The end of 2008 - The start of 2009

Reading michaelooi.net in the morning as usual in my office.

He has the habit of writing a summary when it comes to year end. A post that summarise what had happen in the past and resolution for the coming year. I was thinking shall i write a summary of what i have done for the past 1 year?

Looking at his summary, I feel that at my stages of life, it is really too many unknowns. For people like him, everything seems to be so in order. He can make a list of what he plan to do; he can sum a list of what he had done too.

But for me...I can't have any resolution for the coming year since I am not sure how long I will be working at Norway. How long I will be in this company? How long I will start to buy my first house? How long for me to get into marriage?

I can't be like him...resolution is luxurious for me.

How to summarise what I have done for the past one year as well? What I have done? A new job? Travel a few countries? What does it has to do with adding value to my life?

Don't want to talk about my life, I only can summarise what I have write here for the past one year and what I want to write in the coming year. I has been writing in this blog for about one year.

The first time when Nicholas introduce me into this blog, he mentioned that I will have some Chinese post. Until today, I never write anything in Chinese. Throughout the year, I wrote down many article in Chinese, but never post it because I doubt how many people in this blog can understand. I feels that 90% reader from this blog are Nic's friend who don't read Chinese. Since majority of the reader don't understand Chinese, so I never have the motivation to blog in Chinese. Another reason I said that I might write in Chinese because of my poor English.

The more I write the more I am frustrating by the limitation of vocabulary and adjective. Especially adjective, it is still very troublesome for me whenever I want to describe what I see and how I feel. It is a good sign that I am aware of the it. But, I feel frust because I couldn't break through the barrier. I has been reading English book for some years, writing here for the past one year. I don't see any big improvement in my English.

At the same time, I can foreseen my Chinese is walking away from me. Honestly, I am always feel sad when my Chinese is deteriorate. One of my wish in the next year is I want to keep my Chinese level. I do not dare to say I want to improve it, at least, I want to maintain. Besides, I hope that I can learn more on the Chinese culture in year 2009. Something that I has been wanted for so long. Keep finger cross I will have the determination for it.

I talked to many people about the deteriorate of my Chinese. None of them feel it is a problem and they don't understand why I am so bother by it. All of them agreed that English is much more important today. I shall pay more effort to concern about my English rather than maintain my Chinese. More over, my Chinese foundation is consider very good. I admit that my definition of so called 'good in one language' is very strict. Be able to speak, write, read is not my definition of command the language. It has to be include to know well about the culture, literature and history too.

I has travel some place in the last year and I blog most of them. The reason I blog is to share some travel information on my personal feel instead of those typical information we can get from the net. Second reason is I want to recorded down some memory as well. From Nic and my notice, reader doesn't seems to be interest on my travel post. Reader are more interest on post regarding personal feeling. So, I might cut down those blog in the year 2009. Besides, I am a bit tired of travelling too. One conclusion I can make for my year 2008, I am not someone who like to travel. Travel is not be my hobby.

I do notice a lot of blog will normally post about their sad moment or story. Rarely will have anyone who write something happy. Because sadness is an emotion that will spread faster than happiness. However, I don't like to write some serious and heavy feeling post. Me is still me. In the coming year, I will still post happy moment instead of sad moment. haha...

That's it. After this, I will spent more time with family and friends. So, should be less post from now on.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everyone.

from the ss3 with love...

well, the title should read from west alliance/ miri/ ocean rover/ miri/ ss3 with love... with a little bit of labuan here and there... =P

the past one month has been crazy (in terms of travelling) for me...

05/11/08 - miri

06/11/08 - west alliance

13/11/08 - labuan

14/11/08 - miri

16/11/08 - kl (i'll talk bout this later...)

17/11/08 - miri

18/11/08 - labuan

19/11/08 - ocean rover

23/11/08 - miri

07/12/08 - labuan

10/12/08 - ss3

and hopefully back to kl before xmas... *fingers crossed*

how crazy was that? and really, all those travelling and changing of locations just took the whole month away from me in a blink of an eye... actually, thinking back, the whole year went by in a heart beat didn't it? the year started kinda slow, picked up pace by around may or june and now it's coming to an end at warp speed...

anyway, here i am, on ss3 once more for a datafrac job on barton 206. simple job in terms of the operation and execution but pretty much technical. it'll be interesting coz for the 10 weeks or so that i spent in oman, we've been performing datafrac before every prop frac job and i didn't have a clue on what's going on... i just knew that we were getting critical data out of the job, but that's about it... and now, after school and after catching up on all the technical aspects of the job, i'll actually be able to read the plots and know for sure (i hope) what it is exactly that i'm looking at...

but really, lately, i've been so absorbed in my work and trying to catch up on so many things that i've just lost touch on almost everything else... i barely called/ chatted with cl over the past one month... i've barely called my parents... i missed one of my best friends' wedding... and as you've probably noticed, i've abandoned this space of mine as well... at times, i was just too busy to do anything about it... but at times i've gotta admit, i was just purely tired and lazy... so while the ss3 is being anchored down, i'm just taking this opportunity to tell the world (if anyone is interested) that i'm still here!

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*for ang*

congratulations on your wedding... i'm so sorry that i had to miss your wedding and trust me, if i've had any other options i would have been there... the first among us to tie the knot and i missed it! darn... anyway, wish you all the happiness with spl and may we soon see little angs running around... =P

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btw, although i've always dreamt of celebrating a white xmas - christmas has always been associated with snow so i guess that holds true for every kid who's never seen snow... but i'm in danger of celebrating a very blue xmas this year... surrounded by the wide, blue south china sea... =(

right now it still looks very likely that i'm still gonna be able to make it home before xmas... but there is a slight possibility that i won't and i'm praying hard that i'll be home for xmas...

well, i've gotta go now... it's getting really late and this post is getting really long... i'll end this post with all the pictures to make up the past one month that i've left this blog alone...

flaring on the west alliance - thanks to this very successful well, we once again went to the west alliance, rigged up and rigged down without executing our job...

this is me letting out all my frustrations at having to go through the same experience... twice!

just being a proud malaysian on the west alliance...

been on a few rigs now, but i've never seen them jacked down before... here's 2 of them that came in for maintenance at the labuan jetty...

here is the ocean rover... and a successful job for murphy oil...

remember the west setia and the kikeh spar?

they never cease to amaze me... we're in deep waters here - water depth at 1300m... some ppl feel sick even on the rig and these fishermen stay on those boats for days - come rain or shine...

after 4 visits to miri, i finally had the chance to see the grand old lady on canada hill - the first ever land rig in sarawak... thanks to amie...

sadly this is just a replica of the original... not only the structure but also the location... i think it would have been so cool if they could have maintained the original... maybe they can still do that with the last land rig in sarawak?

the view of miri from canada hill... see that tall building in the middle? i stayed there on my last trip to miri for 2 weeks - that's the mega hotel... and the building on the right is the imperial hotel which i stayed in my first 2 visits to miri...

tusan beach... also in miri - courtesy of amie amir again... says this is a good place for her geological field work of some sort... =)

we arrived just in time to catch the sunset...

need more work with my photography skills...

Santa Claus is coming to town...

Norwegian have some Christmas traditions and I want to share with everyone here. First, it is the Jule Calendar or Christmas Calendar. A calendar which has 24 days on it. It is a count down calendar to Christmas from 1 of December until 25 December. Every day, the small kid at home will open a box which means one day nearer to Chirstmas. They also will receive one small present everytime they open the day. It means 25 presents for one Christmas!!! Sounds cool,right!! 25 Christmas presents leh.

However, my Norwegian teacher told me that those present usually are small presents for kids. For example some eraser, pencil, ruler or most common is chocolate. Some major chocolate manufacturer will have the Christmas calendar which contain 24 different types of chocolate. Everyday, the kid can open and take one chocolate from the calendar until Christmas.

This is a Christmas Calendar from Kinder Chocolate. But, this calendar doesn't belong to any kids. Somehow, many process engineers in our company bought the calendar too. =)

As you all can see, the calendar already has 5 empty spaces which means 5 days gone and it is getting nearer to Christmas! However, instead of taking one chocolate per day, those engineer sometimes took 2 chocolates a day! I took the picture on 2 or 3 of December. They are not following the rules!

This is a photo taken from my office's reception which is a simple candle stand. Some are really nice.

Another tradition is the 4 candle for 4 Sunday on December. On the first Sunday of December, the family will light one candle after breakfast. They will only light one candle each Sunday. The second Sunday, they will light the 2nd candle. And it goes until the 4th Sunday which is the end of Christmas month. So those candles are different height with one is shorter than the other one.

When they are lighting the candle, they will read a tradition poem together. The meaning of the poem is something like the first candle will bring happiness and the last candle will bring peace to everyone who shine under the candle light. I couldn't remember the meaning of second and third candles. I have the poem but it is in the car and I am lazy to take it since it is cold outside. =P

Besides, Norwegian eat pork, pork sausage, some red cabbage and fish during Christmas dinner. Usually they will not eat beef on the festival. And, they also have their own version of Santa Claus - Fjøsnisse. They believe in a small version of Santa Claus who will take care of their animal. He is the secret keeper in the barn. So most of the family will leave one bowl of porridge with a spoon for him on Christmas Eve night. If he eat the porridge and the bowl is empty on the next morning, it means those sheep, goat and cow in the barn will be save for the following year. If not, it might have some sickness to the animals. I don't have the picture of the little Santa Claus. But, it looks exactly same like Santa Claus except it is much smaller in size. All kids are looking forward for white Christmas, they will not be happy if the snow is too little during the Christmas. As I heard from all the Norwegian, the snow at Norway is getting less year by year due to the global warming.

Wish the snow will always cover this peaceful land - Norway on each Christmas. And wish everyone to have a great Christmas.