2012: Life in Aker Solutions

What possibly painted the most vibrant shades to the year are the multitude of outings with my colleagues. It certainly made my day job feel a lot more meaningful. The following are a few of those I embarked on this year.

Hiking Trips - Bukit Tabur and Bukit Saga. 

Musical Outings - Great Baritone Arias at Dewan Filharmonik Petronas; Jason Mraz concert at Stadium Merdeka (credits to Zamir Ramli).

Skytrex Shah Alam - where I somehow managed to overcome my life-long fear of heights for half-a-day.

Runs - 10K run at the Standard Chartered KL Marathon (credits to Clara Anne); Terry Fox Run with a host of colleagues (probably takes the prize for feel-good event of the year).

Jogs Around KLCC Park - Not as consistent a feature as most of us would have liked (hindered at times by rain, and work), but we still made a significant number of jogs whenever we could.

Meteor Showers - Failed attempt at catching the Perseids (we ended up playing Mafia instead which is fun in its own right), before we caught the spectacular show of the Geminids in December.

Karaoke Sessions - I frankly lost count of how many sessions we had this year, but I figure it'll be in the order of 10.

Blood Donation - I finally realised I was born to give blood being an O+. Special thanks to Zehan Edreena.

Weddings - We took time during the weekends to attend wedding ceremonies of colleagues - namely Akissha, Selvan Adhirai & Fikree Kamil.

Sports Tournaments - Volleyball, Futsal, Bowling - no great victories worth mentioning, yet so much fun!

Badminton Sessions - Something we organised on Fridays, taking advantage of Aker's introduction of the '4 and a half day' workweek. Much fun. Special thanks to Zarul Fahemy.

Ping Pong Sessions - This was one of the New Year resolutions that I achieved. Special thanks to Amy Lim.

IEM Mandatory Courses - 'Safety & Health at Work' followed by 'Code of Ethics.' Only 'Engineering Management Practice' remains, after which I'll properly embark on my journey to becoming a Professional Engineer.

Oil & Gas Exhibitions - World Gas Conference (WGC) and OGA.

Movie Outings - easily 30 movies watched this year. There was a movie outing on most Wednesdays of the year. Truly impressive stuff. Credits to Abdullah Yasin & Zarul Fahemy. There were also a couple of Movie Marathons organised by Humaira and Lenard at their respective residences.

Lunches & Dinners - TOO MANY to list!

Here's to another year of memorable outings together! :)

Of Movies & A Wedding (Plus A Sh**load of Work)

The last week or so has been pretty eventful. Last Saturday in particular was a long one. It began with me going to work to finish up on some outstanding work. From there, I followed a few colleagues as we took a drive to Subang to attend Farah's wedding (I missed the bride's ceremony in JB, hence I made it a point to attend this one although it's the grooms' side's ceremony).

I guess this is where I spare a few words for the new bride. She is certainly a very bubbly character, and life at work is never dull with people like her and Dason around. She makes a wonderful colleague and above that a great friend.. CONGRATULATIONS Raja Farah! :)

After the wedding I returned to the office where I spent another hour on a project that doesn't seem to be going anywhere; at least not yet. Working blues aside, the rest of the Saturday was basically a plan to relax and keep my mind away from the thoughts of work. With the company of Kwong Hann and Ziyu, I must say the plan worked to perfection! We started off burning more than an hour at a shoe store in Pavilion where Ziyu.. well I guess that's enough said. :p

After that we were on to the main event for the day - X-Men: First Class at Pavilion's GSC Theatres. Personally, I didn't find the movie all that great. It wasn't boring by any stretch of the imagination, but I guess I just had higher expectations for the movie. Next up was dinner, and once we were done with our usual deliberation (something I'd almost consider a ritual now.. lol) we ended up at Capricciosa on Ziyu's recommendation. The taste of Italian pasta only brought back memories of the times back in US when home-cooked pasta was pretty much staple for Kwong Hann and me. The food wasn't too shabby (I'd recommend the seafood pasta and salmon spaghetti) but I'd still have to say the food was overpriced - then again pretty much everything in Pavilion is over-priced.

Come Wednesday and I was out watching movies again - this time 2 movies after work hours with Alvin. First we caught Kungfu Panda 2, which I chose simply because I really enjoyed the first one. It turned out to be pretty funny as expected, but it paled in comparison to what I recall of its predecessor. We then had a good hour and a half to kill before the next movie and decided to have dinner at the Manhattan Fish Market. To put it simply, I will not recommend this restaurant to anyone nor will I be stepping foot into it again.

Our second movie for the night was Super 8, a Spielberg production that wasn't exactly a unique storyline, but still very enjoyable. The cast wasn't star-laden, but the acting was something one can appreciate. The ending though was very, very reminiscent of Spielberg's productions from way back (think ET..).

I guess I've been a tad indulgent over the last couple of weeks, the effects of which become immediately apparent when I take one look at my bank balance. Lol! So.. I guess it's back to the long hours at work with not too much to look forward to? Ah... think again. Next weekend I'll be participating in our company's Inter-Department Futsal Tournament. An then there's the plan to ascend South East Asia's highest peak.. More on that one another day! :)