Autumn Trip (Part 4): Working Experiences in Suzhou
After lunch, we had an exercise with everyone - Mind Map.
K would frequently conduct exercise to improve everyone's English. So... apparently they're not familiar with Mind Map concept so... we're here to share with them!
Everyone contributed some idea and this was the outcome...
They're quite imaginative actually!
I was told by the staff that every time K or Mr Leong drop by, there will be a staff dinner to get together and have interaction & staff amp; bonding.
So after work, all of us waited for cab. And while waiting for cab, I snapped a pic of the main street...
Our office building is behind these apartments....
We came by to this restaurant with Mao Zedong/cultural revolution theme concept to have our staff dinner.
This is supposed to be healthy to the human body....
But er, sorry, I dunno how to appreciate it... =P
These food are considered 大鱼大肉 to me since I don't eat them on a daily basis. But to China businessmen, these seemed like the norm for them. Let's just say that I haven't really know how to appreciate these Suzhou food yet because currently they have yet to appeal to me.
While chatting I also got to know their age. Maybe I have or have not brought this up but we have 4 staffs in the Suzhou office.
- Mayun 28/f - Admin, married, got a 2 year-old daughter
- Lisa 27/f - Language dept
- Lili 25/f - IT/Software/Hardware dept
- Amy 23/f - Design dept
Apparently, they were told to have English names to 'blend into the global environment' but I had a feeling they weren't really willing to have one and would be preferred to be called/addressed by their Chinese names.
So far, my job scope isn't really well defined, so I kept wondering what's my ACTUAL title and what I have to do in Suzhou. But I was told by K & Mr Leong to get them to research, work on articles to post on the website. But seriously... none of them seems suitable to do this as they have different background & interests.
Hmm.. ok never mind. Will think over it the next time.
Had an extremely filling dinner and got back to the apartment and fell asleep at only 9pm+.
By the time I got up again, it was 140am, washed up and changed and went back to sleep.
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Tuesday, bathed and prepared for work.
Went to work and had dumpling soup for lunch.
After lunch, K was out with Mayun and I continued with the categorisation of the website and the area of topics we can cover. Discussed with K when he came back.
Had Jap ramen for dinner!
This restaurant is nearby the office.. but it doesn't have a lot of crowd cos... the price is kinda steep. RMB25-35 is like SGD7-9 which is same pricing as in Spore. Mostly the meals in Suzhou can be settled within RMB15.
Salad's huge!!
Very huge portion and very filling!!!
Went back and nuaaahhh.....stomach exploded liao!!
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Wednesday, was told by K we're meeting Mr Leong's PA, V in the food business tonight for dinner and I decided to doll up pretty tonight...
On the way to work, I took a lot of zi lian pics on the cab.
A "sweet + act cute" smile with head a bit tilted still cos you CANNOT reveal double chin!! LOL!!
Hmm... hope you're not sick of seeing my act cute face yet.... WAHAHA
Had lunch with Mayun & Lili... come to observed that both of them are pretty close cos they're the only child and no siblings so they sort of decide to become each others' sister. Hmm....
Nice steamboat place which Mayun brought us to...
This is Mayun
This is Lili.
Here's me looking super enthu!
Taste really good I tell you!
We got back to office after lunch and I was supposed to give a speech, but it was so nerve wrecking that I felt my face grew hot.
So anyway, after work, K brought me to meet up with V for dinner at Guanqian St.
I already had steamboat in the afternoon and now we were steamboat for dinner again! But the difference is that instead of one big pot shared by all, we have individual small pots to our own and have the freedom to cook whatever we like!
The different ingredient! I can't even remember what meat are those?
Pic's kinda dark but see the little pot on the right of the picture.
We were waiting for it to boil!
We were waiting for it to boil!
V kept snapping pics of me...
V is a very nice girl! Had a great time talking & chatting with her. She speaks really good English for a Suzhou girl who has never gone out of the country. She mainly speaks English to Mr Leong over these few years. Can tell she's really somebody who's very 好学勤奋.
We chatted during dinner and went to look at phones at this Guan Zhilin place? At first I was quite surprised by the name cos it shared the same name as a HK actress haha!
After that we parted and took cab with K and she saw us off. She's really a professional person. You know, the kind of 秘书助理 we watched on TV dramas? That was exactly how she was like, very professional even after working hours.
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Thursday, there was another impromptu staff dinner and KTV.
To be honest, I think the rest were expecting the expenditure to be on K? I'm not sure if K is able to claim from company? It seems like getting together with colleague is kind of common in China? Someone please enlighten me?
Dinner at this inn nearby the office. We got V to drop by as well...
Cos we're in a inn, so V made that hand gesture! lol...
SUPER NICE RICE BALLS!!!!!!!!
SUPER YUMMY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I WANNA EAT THAT AGAIN!!!
The rest of the food weren't appetizing at all. I think only the rice ball can make it, the others really cannot make it....
Later, we moved on to the KTV next to where we had dinner.
I am really a big giant next to these petite and small size girls...
Attempting to zi pai!
Yay! I GOT IT!
The pictures below are photoshopped.
Haha... Make a guess what I did?
Haha... Make a guess what I did?
I always look terribly pale when I take flash photos.
With Lisa. Same thing, I added blusher & lipstick.
But I also made my eyes bigger and my face smaller.
With Amy. I did this photoshop on another different day.
I forgot and was unable to follow the same colour of the previous blush =(
With Lili. Very subtle photoshop here! Haha...
If K isn't attached....
I'd think him and V make a cute couple leh... A very rare picture of K smiling.
He always bin chao chao one, will only smile when he's with his gf.
He always bin chao chao one, will only smile when he's with his gf.
We parted ways after the fun KTV! Can kinda tell they're not really the type to KTV often so they're really quiet and uncomfortable... Hopefully they'd lighten up the next time ba.
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Friday, it was our last day in Suzhou office before we leave for Shanghai tonight.
Usual zi lian pic along the way to work....
One of my random KFC breakfast in front of my working station in my cubicle at the office.
After work, we went back to the apartment and packed up and made our way to Shanghai.
Sigh, I have to go through all the hassle and crowdedness at the train station again and the carrying of my super heavy luggage.
SZ apartment to SZ train station > purchased tics and waited for train > spent 1hr to SH station > took cab back to SH apartment. Whole journey probably took close to 3 hours.
THE WEEKEND PLAN!!!
- Sat would be spent in Hangzhou with K and K's sister and K's sister's friend.
- Sun would be spent in Shanghai with K's sister again and evening with my ex-colleague from Syno, Evelyn. Can't wait!!!!
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Saturday, early in the morning got up and head toward SH train station going toward HZ. It was a last minute decision so we bought the tic last minute, no seat. Gotta stand for 1 hour.
No mp3 with me and K was nice to lend me his Nano.
His choice of music mostly instrumental, sounds like from Jap anime/drama kind.
From the HZ train station, K & I took a cab to this hotel where his sis and the sis' friend were checking in. I was quite unsure of the situation. He only said we were meeting his sister for a tour around West Lake. So my idea is his sis and the friend came to Singapore for holiday huh?
The friend had some issued with her passport so we were just sitting around at the hotel lobby.
We accompanied the ladies to check into their rooms and this hotel is actually pretty cute!
Lots of reflective surface to zi lian!!!
The hotel is actually called....
Street vendors who look like they might be from 边疆？回疆？
Later on we got settled down at this restaurant that serve REALLY GOOD FOOD!!!!!!
After chatting, I got to know K's sister is Yvonne and Y's friend is Joevinzel. Y works in Shanghai permanently. Y & J used to be colleagues but J is now with Unilever as Marcomm I think. I had a hard time guessing about her... they kept playing me around! She said she's 1986! That means she was younger than me but I don't believe! Haha!
Later on she finally revealed she's 1977. At first she bluff me say she's a lawyer but I refuse to believe as well... I may not be well exposed but you know, such things got vibe one ma. Lawyers where got so siao ding dong sampat one?
It was fun hanging out with her, we had lots to talk about actually! Haha! After lunch, we split the bill and went on to visit West Lake....
To be continued...
: Working Experiences in Suzhou){kind=link}
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