A day at the government office - 12/12/2007

So I'm going to break the surprises on this article. If you have to go to the government office for any issue, make it early. Preferably arrive at 8 o'clock - sharp.

This is what going to happen if you arrive at noon for renewing your mom-in-law's passport at the Damansara branch immigration office.

I and my mom-in-law arrived at the branch office around 12:30 PM (I took leave on that day). We went to the first counter to take our number after the staff checked our application with the appropriate document. Looking at the piece of paper, we have to wait for 80 people before we were able to submit our form. Keep in mind that there are round 20 counters and we thought this is going to be fast. Nope, it wasn't. There are less than half of the counters were open and one staff processing one application took like 15 minutes. My guess was that some of the staff were on lunch and the application is kinda complicated to process.

Suddenly, one of the staff show the system down sign on his counter and there were a announcement about it. That's too bad as there were 17 more before us and I was thinking of going home. My mom-in-law insisted of waiting since we came a long way. At that time, it was around 2:30 PM and we went to the nearby McDonald for lunch, as we don't know how long the system would back up again. After the 30 minutes lunch, we quickly went back to the office and luckily the system was back up again.

Then suddenly the whole office changed. People are rushing around and the number display jumping so fast as it was like stock market in bullish shape. In 15 mins, our number is called. (If you do the math before the system down, our number should be called around one hour. So what happened previously?) We went to the counter to submit our form, it took less than 5 mins. Yes, you read it right, 5 minutes! (So, what happened couple of hours ago? Should I called the X files team to investigate whether there are any extraordinary unidentified brainwave that caused staffs suddenly get so ultra productive. I really have no idea.)

By the time our number is called again to pay for the fee and collect the new passport, we was told to come back tomorrow because we submitted our application late. (!@#$%)

Although the government web site stated they open from 8 am - 4:30 pm, since you're not going to get your things done on the afternoon shift, considered they open from 8am - 11:00am.

ps: I thought of Damansara branch because it has the auto machine to processing the application, which is faster. I was wrong. We should have went to the Subang branch office as the processing is still took 2 hours to complete. :P

Open House Gathering

My friend bought a new condo in Shah Alam and she invited us to her for a lunch. A free and easy style of lunch, which is the steamboat way. It was nice to see her house renovated and beautifully done. Although she stated that the furniture most of them are given by her relative, but for me, I think it still comfortable and seems new to me.

What I really like is the view from the balcony. Looking down from there is the condo's swimming where there are sound from small fountains splashing around the pool really gives one a relax feeling(except the occasional children playing the pool causing some noise). Plus the breeze coming from the balcony straight into the living room gives me a fresh feeling. Throughout the whole visit, I spend most of my time with others just at the balcony entrance where I believe it the best place to be or perhaps it was the Feng Shui there. I wanted to took some photo, but I was distracted by the view, the relax feeling and the chit-chat with friends.

I reached there about noon and some came late because the location was tricky for them. The food was nice because it was Tom Yam based, which is my favorite flavor for steamboat. Not to mention the hospitality of my friend who brought us room to room tour and explained her house buying and renovation experience.

Finally, I just want to say thank you for you, Zin Lu, for the lunch and great hospitality.

Fire Drill

At this moment, most of my colleague has been waiting at the building's lobby. Why? They suspected a fire drill will be coming soon. Instead of taking the stairs, where they should be in this practice, they took the easy route by using the lift and wait for the drill to happen. From here, I would say the building manager has failed miserably organizing this practice.

As expected, the alarm rang finally and we was told to gather at the receptionist area. Our group was small and my senior was not happy about it. The fire warden, who is the support staff, started the head count and wait for further instruction from the building's speaker. After we got the message that our floor is ready to clear, we started our walking from 27th floor and join into the crowd from upper floor. It was not a comfortable process but I heard that the crowd was much lesser than the previous drill.

Finally, we reached to the open ground and the fire warden directed us to the LRT station, with prepared bottled drinks and sign post with floor numbers. I found my floor number and met up with the rest there. We took an early lunch since it was almost noon. Around 12:30 PM, we came back from lunch and the whole drill has ended.

Hopefully there will not be a second one as this drill, in my opinion, considered unsuccessfully. :P

Where's my locks?

Wife: "Dear, do you know where is my lock for my lugguage?"
Me: "Where did you put them last time when you back from your trip?"
Wife: "I don't remember"
Me: "And you're asking me about it?"
Wife: "I was hoping you saw them"
Me: "!@#$%"

Charity event

My wife dragged me to a charity event at Bukit Jalil that was happened last Sunday. Honestly, I not a type of guy who really like to donate much unless I really know what is the Fund raising organization is doing. Anyway, my wife bought a 10 dollar coupon for that event so we headed there to see what was happening there.

It turned out a lot of stuff and people was there. First, stalls selling different kind of stuff from food, stationary till flower and bonsai. Then, there are handcrafted souvenirs, brochures, poster, games and stage for people to play the gong after a small amount of donation is paid.




We we spent the 10 dollar for our lunch there and stay for an hour. We left with nothing but our stomach fulled.