Parodies at Work

How does one show the multi-cultural aspect of our country? How does one proudly present the racial harmony (read: racial tolerance >.<) that exist in our small island?

By having a courier company (which is owned and mostly run by Indians) celebrate Chinese New Year, by hiring a Lion Dance troop mostly consisting of Malays. 0.o

Or you could simply say: It is a warped world we live in. -.-

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It has been insane at work for the past two weeks or so. Daniel took leave last Thursday & Friday and this Monday as well. And when he came back on Tuesday, he was scheduled for his ISO course, as mentioned previously in here, on Thursday and Friday.

Which also meant that i had to cover his projects while he was away. -.-

Naturally, i had to settle my own projects as well. Talking about super-juggling. I suppose its like juggling balls with a colleague, passing them to-and-fro. There are enough balls to keep your hands busy and you think to yourself: I can manage this, as long as my colleague can keep up and not disappear.

Which suddenly, he does.

And someone had mysteriously greased all the balls which you are now stumbling over to juggle.

It is a strange analogy, but one that i can think of right now that describes how i felt then.

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The way we number our projects goes like this:

0329-1

First pair of numbers (ie. '03' in this example) represent the year in which the project was awarded to us (in this example, the year 2003).

The second pair of numbers (ie. '29' in this example) represents the running order in which the project is in (in this example, the twenty-ninth one).

If the client wishes to hire us again to do an A&A (Additions & Alterations) for a former project we have done before, then we put a '-1' behind. So in this example, this project is an A&A to the twenty-ninth project awarded to us in 2003.

Clear as mud? :D

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So i assume you understand what i mean, when i say i have been handed my first official 2007 project, 0713: The Proposed Development of ISH (Indoor Sports Hall) for six schools.

When I say 'official', i mean that it has a '07' in front. I have had one other project already in 2007, but it doesn't start with '07'.

So, which six schools am i doing it for?
1. Catholic High
2. CHIJ (Toa Payoh)
3. Fairfield Methodist
4. Zhonghua
5. Ai Tong
6. Raffles Girls Primary

One Indoor Sports Hall is okay. One might even call it easy. But for six?

And they are to be built on existing campuses.

And because its 95% sponsored by MOE, the ministry will be following it closely.

And the time frame is tight. Very tight. The first presentation is to be in the middle of April.

One month.

One month to visit all six sites, consider all alternatives, choose the best possible site, design it so that it matches the theme of the existing buildings, and then present it with fingers-crossed, hoping that it won't get shot down by the school or MOE. :p

Oh. And did i mention that we also have to try and incorporate each individual school's request? Knowing them, they will probably try and ride on this project, and ask for lots of things. Things which aren't even related to sports. Like an additional storey for CCA rooms. Or an additional building for classrooms. Or maybe even a whole damn-new campus. -.-

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With such a tight time frame, its little wonder why my boss and i are on the edge. I almost hate to think how the architect and C&S engineer feel.

We had visited three schools on Friday 11am, 2.30pm and 4pm. It sure was hectic day. My boss even forgo another meeting to go for the site visits. And we have another three to visit: 9am on Monday, 9am on Tuesday and 10am on Wednesday.
All nice, bright and early on three consecutive days.

Sighz...

Its gonna be a long week. -.-

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Right. Whinging time.

We have a few new additional draftsmen / designers, one of which is driving everyone nuts. She prints all the time. And i dun mean printing the normal A4 size paper. She prints the big A1 size which we use to print our services layout. I shudder to think of the money being wasted on paper and ink.

And she is completely fresh in Autocad. It took her one month to learn how to draw a straight line. And an additional week or so to learn how to copy and paste a file. Not 'copy and paste' in Autocad, but a simple 'copy and paste' of a computer file. -.-

And she doesn't seem to comprehend that being told once or twice is enough. We all have explain to her numerous times, but she still asks the same questions over and over and over again.

And her failure to understand questions doesn't stop there. She also fails to understand our directions to correct her mistakes. We write the corrections on the printed-often, error-filled A1 size paper, but she still doesn't do all the corrections. She doesn't check on the computer if she has done all the corrections, and just prints when she thinks she has completed the job.

And she brings all the paper home. Why? I have absolutely no clue.

As a result, my temper has soured and gone downhill. I simply do not have the patience to keep explaining to her the mistakes, keep directing her to do the same corrections, keep finding out that she has screwed something up.

I'm not faulting her attitude, for she constantly asks if she can help. But her behavior really irks not just me, but all of us.

Argh.