Random updates
Long time since I blogged...
Work has been busy as usual and Changes at the work place have been real sucky.
1st Sat of Jan was spent at Boss's place for dinner and new year countdown.; 2nd weekend (Sat + Sun) at Suntec City for roadshow; last weekend (Sat + Sun) at Ironman event all the way at ulu NTU. This Sat.. roadshow at Woodlands. In short, no life.
But the Ironman event last weekend really deserves some mention. The whole Ironman concept derives itself from the Ironman triathlon. While the normal triathlon consists of a 750-metre swim, cycling 20km and a 5-km run, the Ironman triathlon is the ultimate with a 3.8-km swim, 180-km cycling and a 42.2-km run.
Not that we did the full event in those two days. We did do a scaled-down version: a 50-m swim, 3-km cycling on the stationary bike, and a 400-m sprint, done by 3 different individuals.
This Ironman event was meant to be used as an analogy, as an example of how we could apply this to our work performance. Yes, stuff about productivity, tracking our individual performance, keeping track of our variance and coming up with corrective action plans to, well, correct the unsightly variances. Perfect example of micro-management. :-(
The message behind this Ironman event is useful, teaching everyone of us to learn to exceed our limits and break our boundaries.
One video they showed was especially meaningful. I still had goosebumps even though this is my third time seeing the video.
It is about Henry Wanyoike, a blind athlete. Henry was born with perfect eyesight. But at the age of 21, he woke up one morning and found himself totally blind in both eyes.
The video shows a scene at the Sydney Olympics in 2000, showing 2 runners tied together with a string. The two of them are nearing the end of their run and one runner (we will call him A) is smiling and looking very ecstatic while B (the other athlete) continues his run.
After a while, we see A is slowing down and seems to be lagging behind A. As both of them reaches the finishing line, A stumbles and falls while B frees himself from the string and smiles and waves happily at the crowd.
The video ended with, "Who was Henry?"
So who was Henry? A or B?
Runner B.
Yes, the one who gave A a hard time by pushing beyond his limits and outpacing himself as he passed the finishing line.
I am quite certain that if anyone had seen the video the first time, they would have thought Henry was Runner A. Really. I did. Because Henry really did not look like he was blind with all his actions.
His quote was especially memorable. "I still feel proudly the scars [incurred from his many falls and scratches while running] on my hands."
And the management threw the question back to us. Were you Henry?
On a totally irrelevant note, we are going to get cable vision!! Yay! Finally! I can watch all the soccer matches I want on ESPN and Star Sports! And with the World Cup in Germany this year, things can't get any better!
I did say this post is really about random updates.
Work has been busy as usual and Changes at the work place have been real sucky.
1st Sat of Jan was spent at Boss's place for dinner and new year countdown.; 2nd weekend (Sat + Sun) at Suntec City for roadshow; last weekend (Sat + Sun) at Ironman event all the way at ulu NTU. This Sat.. roadshow at Woodlands. In short, no life.
But the Ironman event last weekend really deserves some mention. The whole Ironman concept derives itself from the Ironman triathlon. While the normal triathlon consists of a 750-metre swim, cycling 20km and a 5-km run, the Ironman triathlon is the ultimate with a 3.8-km swim, 180-km cycling and a 42.2-km run.
Not that we did the full event in those two days. We did do a scaled-down version: a 50-m swim, 3-km cycling on the stationary bike, and a 400-m sprint, done by 3 different individuals.
This Ironman event was meant to be used as an analogy, as an example of how we could apply this to our work performance. Yes, stuff about productivity, tracking our individual performance, keeping track of our variance and coming up with corrective action plans to, well, correct the unsightly variances. Perfect example of micro-management. :-(
The message behind this Ironman event is useful, teaching everyone of us to learn to exceed our limits and break our boundaries.
One video they showed was especially meaningful. I still had goosebumps even though this is my third time seeing the video.
It is about Henry Wanyoike, a blind athlete. Henry was born with perfect eyesight. But at the age of 21, he woke up one morning and found himself totally blind in both eyes.
The video shows a scene at the Sydney Olympics in 2000, showing 2 runners tied together with a string. The two of them are nearing the end of their run and one runner (we will call him A) is smiling and looking very ecstatic while B (the other athlete) continues his run.
After a while, we see A is slowing down and seems to be lagging behind A. As both of them reaches the finishing line, A stumbles and falls while B frees himself from the string and smiles and waves happily at the crowd.
The video ended with, "Who was Henry?"
So who was Henry? A or B?
Runner B.
Yes, the one who gave A a hard time by pushing beyond his limits and outpacing himself as he passed the finishing line.
I am quite certain that if anyone had seen the video the first time, they would have thought Henry was Runner A. Really. I did. Because Henry really did not look like he was blind with all his actions.
His quote was especially memorable. "I still feel proudly the scars [incurred from his many falls and scratches while running] on my hands."
And the management threw the question back to us. Were you Henry?
On a totally irrelevant note, we are going to get cable vision!! Yay! Finally! I can watch all the soccer matches I want on ESPN and Star Sports! And with the World Cup in Germany this year, things can't get any better!
I did say this post is really about random updates.
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