After my previous report that accidentally send out many months ago, shy to reveal that coincidentally also received numerous positive responses or even subscription fee asking me to continue with this type of junk mail (Is the economy back there so badly hit? People really got nothing better to do!?). Hence, that’s the reason for the born of this ‘Diary for Dummies’ or ‘Chicken butt for the soup’®. By the way, if you expect to see Shakespeare’s literature here please uninstall your Microsoft Window now so you won’t see this document again, but if Ah Beng’s English not offended you at all, you may proceed to adjust your seat and fastened your chasty belt. Welcome to walk through my sketchy with your eyes wide shut and gives me your best pose baby.

Tips: Don’t read this during your busy working hours, else you may find your boss sitting beside you sharing the joy with you.

************************************************

Mar 15, 1999 After Sunset

Time flew man or because my watch is faulty?

Main event for today was a colleague of mine SengKee offer to cook us dinner. He cooked nasi lemak and curry chicken, to my surprise it was good or may be I missed Malaysian food too much. But I must admit that he is a good chef.

Now, I remembered one reader do requested me to mention more detail about the grocery price, i.e. price per lb. I think I will try my best to accommodate his need. Banana 2lb for $1, Green onion 4 for $1, Brocori $0.75/lb, lettuce $0.78/lb, large eggs $1.48/dozen …………..

Well, a small jokes was happening at the grocery store, when I was about making payment, the cashier requested to see my ID ‘cos one of my colleague buying cooler (FYI, in US liquor is not allowed to sell to the minor/underage/under 18 ), during that time I’m not aware of the drinks and asked why? He said bcos I’m buying liquor and I look like 13!! Oh gosh my jaw was hanging down, don’t know this should perceived as good or bad? Perhaps if I’m a girl may be this will make my day.

Mar 19, 1999

What make today a special day is, my old university mate came and visited me, drove all the way for 2 hours just to have dinner then drove back again, I’m touched.

When I reached home, my Malaysian colleagues here were having their ‘Bat Kut Teh’ dinner, smell good, at least they dare to eat pork here :-].

Mar 20

Our lunch today spend at our boss house to celebrate his son’s birthday.

Due to the fact that it is the first weekend after receiving paycheck, naturally it is shopping day, giving back what I earn to the community. Don’t you think they owe me some recognition here?

After our dinner at Vietnamese restaurant, we visited old town Sacramento at down town, this place look like a cowboy town, quite a number of carriage available for tourist to charter for a ride. (Side info: this place is also the actual scene for the movie ‘Gold Rush’ in 1940’s), we also went to the nearby Capitol Hill to waste some film. OK, now it is time for your geography lesson, Sacramento actually is the capital city of California, even though it was not as well known as LA or San Francisco in the state.

Mar 21

Mar 23-24

So with this sudden call a lot of last minutes reservation got to be made i.e. flight ticket, hotel and airport shuttle. Talking about the shuttle(here we called it Blue Van, actually a small van but carry not more than 4 passenger at a time), it will pick up 2 hours before your flight departure time. So basically that night I packed till 12:30am and then woke up at 3:30am. I’m particularly impressed with the punctuality and efficiency of the shuttle service, he came exactly 4:30am at my doorstep and you either pay by cash or credit card there and then.

The road system here is also quite good but not perfect, their highway is called freeway or interstate highway, all identified by the number, highway with even number run from east to west, odd number highway travel from north to south. One major different with their freeway compare with ours is that no demonstrator holding card at the toll plaza, ‘cos their freeway is really FREE. Of course they do have toll, but normally at those places that they build bridges, it is reasonable and not increase every year like those Dracula in Malaysia.

Mar 25

2^nd day here in this deserted small town, almost cut off from internet like cutting me off from oxygen, feeling very uneasy, now I aware that internet has actually integrated into my life. I’ll say the future trend most thing will go internet, for example, like myself here already start to do banking on internet, make hotel, airline reservation, find direction, shopping, reading news, checking information, checking cheapest price on hotel or flight, checking training schedule, phone call, listen to radio, email, ICQ all at my finger tips. Malaysia will follow suit, may be in 5 years time. By saying so, don’t stereo type all american are computer literate, for example company where I’m working, some of the people don’t even know how to use windows or mouse!! Surprise! But you are not on candid camera, this is true.

Mar 26-28

We checked out from the hotel and move in to stay in a new apartment in Ogden, Utah. 30 minutes drive from the work place, with 15 minutes stretch drive at 75mph and 15 minutes distance drive at average speed 40mph. (Quiz: How far is the apartment from working place?) Ogden is a bigger town, more animals, more restaurants and more civilized compare to Brigham city.

Even though it is weekend but we still went back to work after lunch. One reason is because there is only little thing that we can spend our time with, another reason is due to the heavy work load and the best reason is because we can use the phone line there to access internet. Our apartment not yet have phone line, got to wait for 2 weeks. In addition they don’t have a local ISP, so we have to dial a long distance call and the response is slow. In conclusion, it is very MKF.

I felt that American style of living really very wasteful, either with food or appliances alike. Spending like no tomorrow and saving rate is low, that’s why a lot of them are living on credit.

Mar 31

Another day, unlike normal day, this is the first time I meet with snows since coming here, coincident with my 1^st full month stay at this soil of freedom. Some people like snow some people hate it, I’m not a big fan of snow, no doubt that it looks beautiful, but the look doesn’t compensate well with the inconvenient and trouble that it brings along.

April 1-3

Somehow feel happy that I can go ‘home’ to Sacramento this weekend, even though only for 2 days. I’ll try to go back every 2 weeks, at least I’ll have something to look forward to. Another piece of good news received was the project will be postpone for additional month, the live date is pushed to early June, that means more room to breath for us now, can take away the oxygen mask for a while and cancel the order of life support machine. The decision was made after the audit session from SAP America, telling that …. "…. it is too aggressive to implement the project in such a short time (3.5 months with MM, SD, FI/CO and HR modules), nobody have done it before, and it will run everybody down both users and consultants, …… the consultants cannot do any better than what they had done now with the resources available,…. prepare to clean up some mess if the live date persist…". Actually it was the initiative from the customer to delay the project, seeing his staff and the consultants working abnormally hard. First time for me to see the customer actually worry for the consultants, may be this is why everybody said suburb people are more humane than those in the concrete jungle.

April 4-9

I have lost count what date I was in, days in days out routinely doing the same thing. It was snowing again, beautiful but inconvenience.

April 21

There is a wild shooting at high school at Colorado, causing 15 death, guns are so easily access to anybody in US, just need a people to be out of their mind then there’ll be innocent victim. Even one month of Kosovo war does not cause that much casualties. Too many violence scene on TV nowadays, kid can easily being influenced. Not a good place to raise your kid. The price you pay for freedom.

April 23

Today we only work half day, reason being there is a black out at the plant we were working due to a very strong wind blowing this area about 110mph! Very strong gust, and caused a lot of damage, just imagine can overturn a big truck on the highway.. the weather here is really hash, can get very cold, raining, strong wind, sunny, snowing. Due to early departure from the office, we went to a nearby mall and watching movie, this time we watched ‘Matrix’, impressive special effect and of course unrealistic, more of a guy movie.

April 24-25

April 27

The project team went for our biweekly project dinner at a restaurant called ‘Timbermine’, the restaurant is interestingly decorated like old time cowboy mining era, the steak is very nice and juicy plus pricey. Btw, I think the gravity force here is getting stronger, because last time I stood on the scale I was 5kg heavier. That is the reward you get from eating fattening food and no exercise. Guy also will look pregnant.

April 29

Today is a special day in the sense that we do something different than normal, for the first time we left office on time and went to watch NBA game at Salt Lake City Delta Centre, Utah Jazz vs Golden Gate Warrior, the experience was good but the game was not ‘cos it was one sided blow out. We got the second highest seat in the house which was second row from the back.

May 1

Flying back to Sacramento again, now I really believe I can fly, I believe I can reach the sky, in mere 2 months I already traveled more than 5000+ miles in US. Today we tour Nappa Valley, popular tourist spot, Mecca for vine lover. Beautiful weather, and a nice green view.

May 6

May 8

Today whole day mainly spend my time watching NBA playoff games on TV. At night we watched movie ‘The Mummy’, initial starting part of the movie is grand, but after that the story went downhill, with some reluctant narrative story lines. Especially feeling so when started feeling cram at the neck ‘cos we were sitting at the second row from the screen. Want a Big Screen TV? Here you go, get a front seat.

May 9

Today we visited Utah State University at Logan, this is a simple or small university, but the natural surrounding view of the school is wonderful, it was situated near a mountain and you can see the valley, canyon and lake located nearby, very peaceful. We also drove to a nearby tourist spot called Bear lake, a small city of about 255 residents, but the view of the blue lake is awesome, this place is also famous for his Rasberry Shake and it tasted good. Due to the high attitude of this place, we can still see snow along road shoulder.

May 15, 1999

After many days of working till midnight, finally I was given a chance to take a short break. The night before I took off, actually managed to talked to James, Roslyn and Piau online thru ICQ and Mediaring, this exercise last till 4;30am before I went to bed.

Early morning today I took a flight to Boston to attend ASAP training. The journey took 4.5 hours. Many people told me the city is nice and now I got a chance to witness it myself. Indeed it is very beautiful, we are staying at a suites in DoubleTree hotel near SAP training center in a city call Waltham. We drove around the area and I started to like the area, very greenery surrounding and, like driving into a forest, houses, plants are all very well kept and very peaceful as well. I found my definition of dream home.

May 16, 1999

Sunday, this is the only day that we will have a chance to visit the city of Boston, so we just do it.

In the morning, we drove to Salem, a witch city, in 1692 this place went into witch hysteria then they started executing anybody who were accused of practicing witchcraft. We went for a show reflecting history of that time, and visiting witch house.

In the afternoon, we drove to Boston downtown, first stop was the chinatown, it is not as big as New york and San Francisco, but one exciting thing is we found a Malaysian restaurant called Penang Restaurant, so we have our dinner there, and order the food that we missed for so long: Rojak, ABC, Char Kuey Teow and Hokkien mee, came out with a full and satisfied stomach. Before that we visited Boston Tea Party, Hard Rock cafe, Cheers, Harvard University and MIT. Quite tired walking around the city. This experience taught me, if you want to have a relax trip then don’t have your holiday at a city, instead going to a beach or island where you don’t need to walk around so much and gain total relaxation.

May 30, Saturday

Today after working, on the way back to home, we decided to watch the much discussed movie ‘Star Wars: Episode 1’, the next available time is 12:15am, so what the heck, just do it. When we entered the cinema, we ended up one person sitting one row, ‘cos only total of 25 audiences. The movie was a disappointment, felt that it was overdo, too many characters and too many creatures, my little brain just couldn’t take it.

June 4

Our project going live this week, one of the end user invited us to her house for a BBQ dinner, her house is of old Victorian type, old but nice, total area about 0.5 acre, big garden, not luxurious but tastefully furnished. No wonder first thing American do after work is to rush back home. I’m thinking: a normal clerk also can afford such a cozy house, this is what I referred to as quality of life. Myself was particularly touched with the hospitality of this small town people, they appreciated us more than the company do.

June 5

Today early morning around 5am we depart to Bryce Canyon National Park. It is about 350miles drive. We took 4.5 hours to reach the destination, Bryce Canyon is not as well known as Grand Canyon, but in my opinion it is more beautiful, basically what we saw was rock, beautiful stones, with different and stunning shape. The scene was beyond my capability of explanation especially when yellow sunlight

 June 6, 1999

After staying one night at Bryce Canyon, we proceed to Zion National Park, about an hour drive. This park is quite different, here we look at those gorgeous red mountains, the red color is due to the ion dioxide, as a result of ion mix with air. Some of the mountains are

June 12

Came back to Sacramento this weekend. We decided to go to Lake Tahoe. It is about 1.5 hours drive. Lake Tahoe actually located right at the border of California and Nevada, there is a street in town called State Line actually divided the town into two. Once you step across the Nevada, there is where you can start seeing casino here and there. In the winter this place is a favorite skiing area for Californian. When we were there the weather is cool, along the way you can see abandon of pine tree. Surprisingly, the view is better than expected.

June 13

Today we do something different, after dinner we went to drive-in theatre. We were watching ‘Notting Hill’. How’s this thing work? Actually you sit in the car and use your radio to tune into certain frequency to get the sound … (no idea how the car without radio going to watch the movie??), overall quality is not as good as watching in the real theatre, not a good choice for serious movie goer.. but the experience that’s count here, one trial is enough.

June 19

This weekend we take one day off from replacement leave for Memorial day. We drove to Yellowstone national park in Wyoming. It is about 6 hours drive. We left from office about 6pm and stay overnight at a small town in Idaho called Driggs.

June 20 Good Morning America

OK, Today we will start a new chapter in National Geography 101. What else can I said I love nature. Early morning we drove toward Jackson Hole another tourist spot famous for skiing. On the way to Yellowstone we stopped by Grand Teton National park. At about 2pm we arrived at Yellowstone. Let’s talk about the history of Yellowstone, it is the world oldest national park, established in 1872. It is indeed a huge park, 64 miles from north to south and 53 miles from east to west. What we can see here is geysers, hot spring, water falls, trees and wildlife like elks, bison, bear, pelican, deer and etc. Unlike others national park this park is green. All the habitats are also very well preserved and protected.

First we want to talk about the famous Old Faithful geysers, it was estimated to explode approximately every 40 minutes, last for 5 minutes and reach the height of about 100 feet. Beside, we can also really peek into the inner structure of the earth.

My favorite spot is the view of the water fall from Artist Point, it is really magnificent, I never dream about such a nice picture and you do not expect me to describe this masterpiece of god in laymen’s term, would you? Let my camera do the trick. Next stop, we can actually walked till the edge of the Lower Falls and have a real close look of the falls, the experience was breathless not just due to the scenario alone but also partly because of the trail that we need to take to reach there.

June 21

Today we continue our tour inside the park. Fire forest actually occurred here in summer 1988, and the evidence of this still vividly displayed, a lot of dry and burned branches. Pessimist will said the fire destroyed the beauty of the park, but optimist will view it as part of the ecology system and it will getting green again in years to come. The fire was sparked by the lightning simultaneously stroke in the park at 50+ places and ignited the dry glasses and tree branches, in addition, that summer is the driest in 50 years. If you may recalled the lightning is caused by the negative charges of the cloud and positive charges of the earth. Scientist used to think that nature is always in it equilibrium, but in fact it is actually in dynamic changes which actually diversify the communities of the nature.

The river in the park is also very beautiful and well preserved. It is not that in Malaysia we cannot see a river but it is always come with undesired bonus views of the squatter houses or Indonesian workers washing their dishes, clothes or performing their daily routine.

June 23

Today, I got involved in a minor accident after lunch, a Mitsubishi Eclipse drove by a lady make an improper lane change causing me to knock on her side, failing to avoid even after stepping my heart out on the brake. Accident does happen.

June 29

Today mark the day that I sign off from the Utah project. I flew direct to Seattle to attend 2 days SAP/Microsoft forum. Will I be sleepless in Seattle this time?

On the forum first day evening event, the organizer brought us to museum of flight where we have a chance to look at the old plane, jet fighter, and board America’s first presidential jet - the original Air Force one as well. Basically the forum looks more like a Microsoft marketing event, try to sell Windows NT in SAP corporate world. Quite admire the choice of word of those marketing people, for example some word that is not so nice like ‘Hard Code’ they can turn it nicer to become ‘Logically Static’. Cannot swim also they will say it can float man.

July 4

This is a long weekend due to Fourth of July independence day. We made a sudden decision to drive to bay area. Initial plan is to visit an ex-colleague at San Jose and eating some good oriental food. For those who are not familiar with San Jose, it is a place where people normally refer to as Silicon Valley. But the trip turn out to be going to Sunnyvale, and later went to Pacific Ocean look at the seaside, eating Malaysian food and at night we were at San Francisco watching firework, it was a beautiful and fruitful weekend.

July 8, 1999

Today basically kind of like day off, because office is moving and we are working from home. Our new office is much bigger and now looks more like an office. I’m not stingy to compliment if it’s due, it’s a nice office. It is so near to where I stay and offering me more time for my dream.

July 13, 1999

JFK junior was killed this weekend, nonstop broadcasting of the incident on TV, even the deaf also heard about the news, not to show disrespect to the victims but to show how influential the media in US is. By chance today I watched Shaniah Twains winter break concert on cable TV, this is a good concert, started to like her songs. I still puzzle why is she being categorized as country singer?

July 21

I was assigned to a stupid project that is to give demo and training to a customer at Nevada. Again, fall to a victim of salesman commitment, as usual, this is a last minute call up and we got to learn the unstable application and at the same time teaching people how to use them – why I said this is a stupid project, ‘cos in my opinion I feel that the application tool is only good if user want to make their conversion task more difficult!? This dummies product is full of bugs, and no documentation, I felt embarrass to present to customer myself, good experience for me to improve the thickness of my face skin. But somehow salesman still can sell it, I should admire them for this.

July 22

OK, that’s why here I’m at a small town called Minden at Nevada - Sin State of US, not a good place to raise a kid, too many temptation or enticement, unless you interested to be father of god of gambler. One thing that is unique in the state of Nevada is you can see slot machines almost everywhere, even at unusual place like in Grocery store, Hard Rock Café dining table and airport. I won’t be surprise if one day while sitting on toilet bowl here a slot machine will also sit in front of you as well.

July 23-27

So we were here to entertain a company called Bently Nevada. Our demo result turn out better than expected, what a relief, at least the customer is kind enough to accept a flaw product, we frankly told them what went wrong with the product, honesty does pay off. So far my experience dealing with American is that if you are truthful then they are willing to give you a chance.

Aug 7

Today is our company Communication Meeting, kind of like a big event, they flew employees from everywhere to attend the meeting, they were talking about their vision, initiatives, stock option and bla bla bra bra Bra! One of the few opportunities that we can met most of the staff under one roof. In the afternoon is company outing at Sunsplash, something like a mini Sunway lagoon. At night, a few colleagues and I initially plan to watch ‘American Pie’ but it was sold out, so we watched ‘Runaway Bride’ instead, starring Julia Robert and Richard Gere, don’t expect a rerun of pretty woman here, ‘cos we went in with high expectation but came out disappointed, the story is slow, bizzare, felt sleepy and I only like the final 10 minutes.

Aug 11

Finally, I went to watch ‘American Pie’ after work today. It’s gross but it’s funny and entertaining. The story is about high school students, you better get your parent permission to watch this. I don’t know whether this movie will be banned in Malaysia but you must watch the uncensored one.

"… *&%#@! …. one tongue up, better than Star Wars" – Chicago Tribune.

"Looks like we make it … "

Thank you on reaching the end of my excrement. If you didn’t skip any word in here, that shows you care, it is my honor if you allow me to call you friend. You’ve got a friend.

One impression you may have after reading this, is that seems like we enjoyed ourselves here but it would be misleading to imply that everyday was sunshine and roses. There is no place here for me to show my grudge, anyway what’s that matter to life to have a flaw. I’m learning to be more thankful for what I have today and to not dwell on what is behind me or what lies ahead, we aren’t always dealt the perfect hand, so we have to make the best of what we have now. Let’s continue to live the life the way we choose and make the world a better place for others.

Remember: Seven days without laughter makes one weak.

Should you find it hard to get to sleep tonight;

Just remember the homeless family who has no bed to lie in.

Should you find yourself stuck in traffic; don't despair.

There are people in this world for whom driving is an unheard of privilege.

Should you have a bad day at work;

Think of the man who has been out of work for the last three months.

Should you despair over a relationship gone bad;

Think of the person who has never known what it's like to love and be loved in return.

Should you grieve the passing of another weekend;

Think of the woman in dire straits, working twelve hours a day, seven days a week, for $15.00 to feed her family.

Should your car break down, leaving you miles away from assistance;

Think of the paraplegic who would love the opportunity to take that walk.

Should you notice a new gray hair in the mirror;

Think of the cancer patient in chemo who wishes she had hair to examine.

Should you find yourself at a loss and pondering; what is life all about, what is my purpose?

Be thankful, there are those who didn't live long enough to get the opportunity.

Should you decide to send this to a friend;

You might brighten someone's day!

To whom who has extra stamps to spend, I can be reached at:

1130 Iron Point Road, Suite 288

Folsom, CA 95630

USA

EARTH