October 31, 2003(Friday)

This is definitely an easy week; nothing much happened at work again. I worked on the wedding webpage for a while; Carmen gave me good suggestions. After grocery shopping, I went to next building's Shirley family's house for dinner. I studied MBA and read a medical book that I bought from Vancouver this July.

October 30, 2003(Thursday)

Today is another happy easy day. I welcome this by all means, just that I am not sure what to fill out in my time sheet. I worked on the wedding homepage for a while; Carmen gave me some suggestions about this page. I will try my best to make it look nice, but since I do not have the "romantic" taste and I am not a full time webpage designer, the effect may be limited.
I went home to cook dinner; I have not cooked for several days thanks to the food that church gave me and my skill is a bit rusty. The MB youth fellowship committee gave me a box of instant noodle as my birthday gift. Therefore, I am cooking it (of course, I would "pass cold river" for the noodle).

October 29, 2003(Wednesday)

For some unknown reason, today is another easy day. I finished the EMC eLearning; I found that so difficult and so boring if I cannot touch the machine or no instructor is teaching me. Basically I just let the material fly through myself and that's it. I also worked on the wedding website for a little while.
I went to have dinner at Ricky's house and then go to church for prayer meeting. It is boring and I did not get a lot. People always get side-tracked during the discussion. The only thing that interested me a little bit (still boring) is after the prayer meeting we discussed about the Evangelical meeting in Dec 1, 4 and also what we should do to settle the dispute with the Chinese Place because of the China Day's poor performance by the Lui and other people.

October 28, 2003(Tuesday)

This is a relax day for work. Therefore I spent about 5 hours studying the EMC certificate. A coworker, Wilmer, asked me to try out the MSN audio because he just got a headphone/mic. I have purchased the mic since August 2002 but I have never used it because Carmen's previous computer does not have voice card. I tried out with Wilmer and it works! Afterward, I tried to talk to Carmen. She can listen to my voice! This is the first time that I talk to her via voice. However she does not have a mic so I can't listen to her voice.
I went to have dinner with Baptist Church people because today is Che So's birthday. We had Hot Pot in my table; it does not taste as nice as any hot pot I tried in Vancouver though.

October 27, 2003(Monday)

As always, I am busy updating homepage and other administrative stuff on a Monday morning. I went home during lunch for afternoon nap; in the middle of it, people from office called. It turned out that nothing happened. It is one of those scary moments that have a happy ending.
I studied EMC for 4.5 hours today. I am mentally tired because I do not find that interesting and I do not absorb a lot. I did not bring my laptop home. I read the Chinese translation of the English famous book "Pride and Prejudice" for a while and started to read "Romeo and Juliet" (also the Chinese translation). I borrowed these books from Baptist Church. Usually when I want to relax, I read comic books. But I am running out of comic book so I turn to the children edition of the great novel instead.

October 26, 2003(Sunday)

It is the second or the third time that I did not attend Baptist Church when I am in Venezuela. I went to have hiking with the MB Youth. They wanted me to join them and I guess that if I do not go, they will cancel this first outdoor event. Since I "only" have to teach Sunday School in Baptist Church this week, I took a day off and asked Ricky to substitute me.
We went to hiking from 7:40 to 10. Afterward, we went to "drink tea" at "Lai King" restaurant. I went home to have a nap. I went to MB Church for Sunday worship. Afterward, I talked to the Youth Fellowship committee and also the deacon board about the Christmas program. Every year the Christmas program is "predictable" with drama and some sharing time. Therefore they want some new idea. I am acting like a sales and sell the "life game" idea. (I think that with my speaking technique, I should be a sale...) I hosted the program in Mar 22, 2002 in FCGC and Jan 28, 2003 in Baptist Church. We will play this program again in MB church Christmas again. I will be the program-coordinator for that day. Church work is pretty busy because there will be a big outreach in the China Place in the end of the year too. Plus leading singspiration every other week in the two churches and Sunday school in Baptist Church. The MB committee also counted on me for the input for the MB youth fellowship program too. Since I am working on my resume and I feel that my days are numbered here, I need to work really hard for the church and hope that they will have an idea of what is going on when I leave. I am glad that I have gift in co-coordinating church event and I am really using it now. I look forward to co-ordinate with Carmen in the future because she is the real professional as a program-coordinator. (She must be really proud when she is reading this)
Paco and I went to have dinner with Ricky and we talked about the plan of Sunday School. We also discuss about the pastor situation. Basically, Pastor Ricky Chan most likely will come back long term next year. And there will be another retired pastor, Pastor Mak from Toronto, will come here to help us for several months too. That means, we will have two pastors at the same time. Cool! We discussed some problems about the Lui's family; I am really tired and bored about this issue now.

October 25, 2003(Saturday)

I did the final edition of my resume and cover letter today. After working on it for the last week, I can't think anything else. I need the professional editor to help me. I had my weekly run in Parque del Este and my shape is not as good as last week. Probably because I only do it once a week and that's the reason why.
I went to have dinner with Ricky and Ellen; we talked about the church stuff and finding job. They will recommend some contacts so that I can find the next job. He told me that international headhunter usually find people in the executive level (Annual salary more than 100kUS!). Therefore, I don't think that I am good enough to find headhunter yet.

October 24, 2003(Friday)

I left home at 7:45 because I need to be Fondo Comun in the morning. This is the request of my boss Omar (or client?). Anyway, I went to Fondo Comun and performed the traffic analysis. They have a 3Com switch and Desca only supported Cisco switch. I don't think that 3Com switch supports traffic monitoring. Therefore, during the middle of the morning, we asked for a hub from the main site and transported to this site office. The internet connection was slow and my computer crashed (It is not the "do or die" crash that I had three times in last 1.5 years. It is just the daily normal Microsoft Window crash).
I went home for lunch and took a nap. In the middle of the nap, Omar called saying that there is problem with the Fondo Comun PIX firewall and I need to go to their office. I hate this; most of the Desca people went to a course this week so I really want to go back to office and enjoy some free and quiet time. But both yesterday and today's afternoon, I was in the customer's office. It turned out that when I configured the PIX firewall several weeks ago, they did not give us all the IP address that needs to access to the internal network. Therefore, it only took me 10 mins and the problem is solved. However, I did not go back to Desca afterward because I do not want to waste 30 mins in the traffic. I worked in Fondo Comun instead. I studied the EMC eLearning for about 4 hours, which I had no opportunity to do since yesterday's afternoon. I left Fondo Comun at 8:20 and arrived home at 9pm. That was late in the street and the Fondo Comun area is not safe. However, I did not see any unusual thing happen during my trip home.

October 23, 2003(Thursday)

I studied the eLearning for EMC in the morning. Then I was told that there is problem with CanTV telephone network again. They reboot the server yesterday and then the "message light waiting" function is not working. I went there in the afternoon, co-ordinate with the Cisco TAC engineer and solved the problem. They tried to ask me to solve another problem at 6 but the Cisco engineer has to go home, plus I need to go home too. This is not the problem that I was told to solve; hence, I told them that they can solve it tomorrow (but I need to go to Fondo Comun tomorrow so I can't solve with them)
After grocery shopping, I went home to cook dinner. I edited my resume and cover letter again; after doing it for a week, I felt sick about any further editing. I also wrote some sharing and edited the photo for the wedding homepage.

October 22, 2003(Wednesday)

There is not much going on lately in work, so I spent some time enroll in the eLearning for EMC today. This would be a useful certificate to have if I plan to stay in the technical field.
I went to Ricky's house dinner and then to prayer meeting. After the prayer meeting, Ricky shared the conversation with the Lui family the previous Sunday. Chi Kong was unsatisfied and accused me. However, everyone knows that this family has problem and they are all in my side. Therefore, I have nothing to worry at all and treat this as a spiritual lesson (I am positive as usual).

October 21, 2003(Tuesday)

Today is my 13th spiritual birthday! I have been to church since I was born and I have accepted Christ for many times. However, I count today as my spiritual birthday because the basic questions are clarified today.
I discussed with co-worker Omar and Carlos about the Desca network. After being in Desca for about 1.5 years, I finally understand the internal network. I will write a report later as to how to improve the network. I started my wedding webpage today too.
I went to a wedding banquet dinner at night. A cousin of Che So married about a year ago and they hosted the wedding banquet tonight. There were about 9 tables and about 40% of those people are from church. I was the photographer using my digital camera. I had it fully charged but after taking 45 photos, the battery ran out. I should bring a charger next time no matter what! I had only met the female for several times and never saw the male. After some struggle, I did not give any "human feeling" (money gift /red pocket) because I really do not know these people, plus there was no receptionist and I easily slip by. (I guess that there are other people that did not give gift. I brought mine though, but did not give it out). They gave me Bs 10,000 (Cdn $6.5) for thanking me being the photographer of the night (which I did not do much).

October 20, 2003(Monday)

A usual Monday morning is a busy check-email and update-homepage morning. I also talked to Omar about work. He wants to organize the consultant and support department. I agree with it totally because I am also an organizing person. I suggested that we should have a Network diagram for the company network. I also promised to document everything about EMC certificate because I am the person to open the path.
I went home cooked dinner and then studied MBA. I called Carmen at night to share about my ever-changing working plan. I always modify my plan because I don't know what the future will be like. That causes Carmen some frustration. We are learning the lesson that "I don't know Tomorrow but I know who holds the future" and also trust.

October 19, 2003(Sunday)

I led music at Baptist Church today. The songs are: "Wonderful Hand" (ACM's "You are king"), "If", "High Sing to Cloud" (Author is "Uncle West"), "I come before you with prayer" and "Prince of Peace" (ACM's "Prince of Peace"). I tried to teach them more new song so there are not as many songs from ACM. I led combined (adult and youth) Sunday School to study Acts 7:1-29. I was quite scary at first because Mrs. Lui was here. She sat right in front of me and I don't know whether she will explode or not. But I am glad that nothing happened. Afterward, the Lui family wanted to talk to the Church Council (including me) about two weeks ago's argument. However, only Mr. Wong and Ricky Lam represented the council to talk to them. I guess that they must be quite upset that no one can hear their complaint.
I went to MB Church to lead singspiration. The songs are: "Wonderful Hand" (ACM's "You are king"), "Prince of Peace" (ACM's "Prince of Peace"), "Because of Lord's name" (author is "Uncle West"), "I come before you with prayer" and "Power of Your Love". During the Sunday School time, I walked around, played with kids and read some books. We had "big group sharing" for the fellowship night.

October 18, 2003(Saturday)

I went to Parque del Este to run. I also spent two hours to edit my resume and hoped to find a better job in the future. I went to Baptist Church to practice music and then to MB Church practice music. The MB people treated me good and gave me lots of food to bring home.

October 17, 2003(Friday)

I signed the legal contract with Desca finally, after working here for 17 months. I hope to have the visa soon.
In the middle of the morning, there were three military soldiers came to our office and looked at the folders of our co-worker. At first, I was told that we helped Global-vision (one of the anti-government TV station. In fact, only one TV station is pro-government) so the military needed to find something from us. However, I was told later that, the military would go to any office suddenly to make sure that they are legal and pay all the required expense and so on.
Omar asked me to do something again; he is quite demanding. He asked me to compare the Cisco PIX firewall with the other brand so that we can present it to the customer. Previously Mario would not ask me to do something like that. It is, in theory, a reasonable request. However I am not sure why he asked me to do this; is it because he saw me idle and gave me some random work?
I took the online MBA exam for Econ (C530). I thought that it is an extremely easy exam; I finished it in an hour even though we were given 2.5 hour. However, it turned out that for the multiple choice section, I only get 50/60. I am really upset. I am still waiting for the other 20 points for short question to be returned.

October 16, 2003(Thursday)

I went to CanTV at 9am and waited for my co-worker Frank to come. There was some problem in Desca so he came at 10. We tried to fix the conference telephone (7935) problem but the TAC engineer did not reply and there is still problem. I went to have a hair-cut during lunch. There was several mosquitoes there biting my feet. I wanted to scratch it but people were cutting my hair. Afterward, there were several big bites!
After I went back to Desca, it turned out that this particular CanTV problem is urgent; there will be some high level management using the conference telephone tomorrow so if we can not fix it today, they will think that we are incompetent. Therefore, my boss Omar asked me why I can't finish it today. I explained to him that I just know that this is urgent problem today. If I know it earlier, I will try to fix it. I know very little about this thing so my role is only to coordinating between the Cisco TAC engineer and Desca's co-worker Frank. He has to go to a course in the afternoon so we plan to fix it again tomorrow. I also explained that the culture of Desca is really last minutes. He said that it is this "flexibility" that causes Desca to survive until now. From the sales or customer's perspective, this is our (consultant engineer) problem that we can't fix it. However, from my perspective, we receive the info (e.g. urgency) in the last minute and got all the blame. Therefore, I explain all these to Omar; he understands this but still we need to fix the problem. He told me that Mario has gone to fix the problem and we should just be standby. I have shown a lot of initiative for helping to solve the problem, or at least try my part.
I standby until 8:30 and went home. I studied MBA C530 (Economic) for 1.5 hours.

October 15, 2003(Wednesday)

I went to CanTV at 8am! It is very early but I can handle it. Basically I can act like a machine and wake up at anytime given there is an alarm. For example, when I went to fishing with friends in 1999, I have to wake up in 4:30. When I traveled between Venezuela and Vancouver, I woke up at 4:30 or sometimes even 3:30 without additional struggling. (I had the beep-every-5-mins alarm so I allow myself to struggle for 15 mins no matter how early or how late I wake up). The trade-of is that I need to have afternoon nap (no matter how early or how late I wake up).
I prepared and discussed briefly about the Network Security Proposal for Fondo Comun with Omar. I also notified Rhamer that I finished the EMC sales accreditation and ready to jump into the technical stuff. He told me that currently Desca needs EMC certification more than a triple CCIE. There is several training and I told Rhamer that I don't want to lose all the money to this training and he told me that it may be possible to use only one course for all the training. If this is the case, that sounds exciting. He told me that there is training net month in Miami. However, being in the Venezuelan culture, especially the Desca culture, for the last 1.5 years, I don't really want to prepare for it yet until the very last minute.
I ate dinner at Ricky's house and went to prayer meeting afterward. Ricky told me that he knows someone from "Cisco Asia" and I hope that I can get a job in Cisco too.

October 14, 2003(Tuesday)

In Sept 9, 03, I went to American Airline to refund of the air ticket that I purchased in July 28, 2003 in Vancouver. I have not received the money yet so I went to American Airline this afternoon. They told me that, because of the foreign currency control, I can only receive the money in Venezuela Bolivar and not US dollars. I am quite upset about this because when I purchased it in Vancouver, and when I went to refund last month, they told me that I can receive the refund in US. Moreover, my mood is a bit affected by the previous customer who was really angered about American Airline. Therefore, I escalated it to the manager. They will try to arrange so that I can get the US dollar back. Otherwise, I would lose about 40% because they only give me the local currency using the official rate is 1US = 1600Bs whereas I must purchased the US dollar from the black market which cost 2600Bs for 1 US. They will also investigate why no one process my order for over a month.
I no longer need to go to Dallas because someone else in Desca will go tomorrow instead. I felt kind of sad because instead of the boss notified me, that engineer asked me what hotel room I booked for the previous Dallas trip I had (which I did not go). I lost a chance to go to North America too. However, it is not the end of the world because I am going there to work anyway.
I talked to my boss Omar at night about the Fondo Comun report. In addition, I also asked him whether he is satisfied with my performance or not. He said that I am "fine" and "very responsible" so far. (I learnt from the TELUS Consultant workshop after I was laid off from TELUS that, it is beneficial to myself to ask how I am doing periodically. Once they express their satisfaction to me several times, it is hard to accuse me. This is a very handy technique that I often use now). I also discussed about the training plan with Omar. Since Desca wants to be the top, it is good to have a triple CCIE. I am already double CCIE and I told him that if I get the third one, then our company would look really good in front of the customer. However, I do not have a lot of motivation to go for the third one unless company shows their financial commitment or give me training. He will talk to Mario about this suggestion.
I cooked pork at night; the "wok" is very hot and when I put the pork onto the wok, there is fire that lasts for 0.5 second. It is the same kind of fire that some professional chefs induce when they cook. I felt so professional (but a bit scare).

October 13, 2003(Monday)

I went to customer Otepi for their PIX firewall configuration. They wanted to upgrade their licensing to include 3DES for IPSec. I have given them all the information in the morning so the afternoon visit is very easy. I talked to him about Cisco certification because he is interested in this.
I went home cooked dinner after grocery shopping. This is part of my life and I don't feel weird about this.

October 12, 2003(Sunday)

I taught Acts 6:1-15 in the combined (adult and youth) Chinese Sunday School. Afterward, I went home. Since I really have nothing to do, I went to Parque del Este second day in a row for jogging. I felt so good today because this is the best performance I have since I arrived to Venezuela. I used to run for 40 mins every other day when I was in Canada. However, since I came to Venezuela, I stopped this habit because I do not have time (I need to sleep in lunch time) and the place is not safe. Starting several months ago, I began my jogging habit again, but it was once a week. I have never been able to get back to the shape I had. Also, I need to struggle and felt lazy every time before I ran; this was never the case when I was in Canada. Without a frequent running habit, every time I need to force myself to run. I ran second day in a row today, which I only did this when I was in Canada; therefore, I felt that I am healthy and I am back to my Vancouver life.
When I went to jogging, I saw that there was an outdoor concert in the middle of a main road. Police blocked the road for the entire afternoon because of this concert. Traffic has to be rerouted. I have no idea why the Venezuelan organized a concert in the middle of the road (e.g. Kingsway in Vancouver) during Sunday afternoon and turned the music to be very loud.
I cooked for the fifth consecutive meals (Friday dinner, Saturday lunch, dinner, Sunday lunch, dinner). Compare to studying MBA or being alone at home, cooking (sadly) is now my highlight of the day. During my birthday dinner, people brought a lot of crab for us to eat and there were two microwave-size-boxes left. Therefore, I ate crab for the last four meals. I had crab-rice and crab-spegatti (plus my usual chicken, corn, orange). I need to go to grocery shopping tomorrow night because I finished most of the food in the last five meals.

October 11, 2003(Saturday)

The switch of the water pump at house was broken. I *tried* to fix it. Being a graduate of Master of Engineering, I should be expert in fixing house appliance. After all, I studied Engineering because I saw my dad fixing water tap and changing light bulb when I was 5 and he encouraged me to pursue Engineering at that time. It turned out that I succeeded in studying Engineering but my interest in fixing house appliance, which was my original force, was missing. Anyway, it turned out that the water pump switch's button is broken and there is nothing I can do.
I went for my weekly jogging at Parque del Este. My performance improved greatly compare to last week. I stayed at house for the rest of the day and enjoy my solitary (boring) time. I spent lots of time to study my MBA material.

October 10, 2003(Friday)

I took the online MBA exam today for class C520 (Quantitative Analysis). This course teaches us how to use Excel's advanced statistic function. The allowed time is 6 hours and I took from 9:20 - 1:45. Work was free at that time so I can concentrate on the exam. I hope that I can get 80%.
I went to customer PUIG afterward; I have been there in May 2003. There is connectivity problem with their VPN3005; Desca's support engineer can't solve it and wants me to go. It turns out that the problem is obvious and I solved it within 30 mins. I am proud of myself. I went back to Desca and completed the last two EMC sales accreditation exams. This is an easy certificate because I can take it for free for as many time as possible; hence I cut-and-paste all the questions to notepad. I had meeting with co-worker about the network security for Fondo Comun. They want the meeting in Spanish; Omar stayed behind and explained what we discussed in the meeting, and assigned me this proposal-writing job.
I went home at 7 and enjoyed my Friday night alone.

October 9, 2003(Thursday)

I ICQ Carmen for about 1.3 hours this morning. She gave me some cute photo about birthday story line; I really appreciate her creativity. I also studied and took the online EMC certificate tests. They are quite easy and the pool of questions is not large so I took total of six different exams today. (9 exams are required for the certificate) I Went to Fondo Comun because they are installing a new PIX firewall. The customer did not like to have Cisco PIX firewall but his boss wants Cisco PIX firewall; therefore he is not too cooperative. We need to make it work to proof to the customer about Cisco PIX firewall's superiority. It works fine and I had nothing to do at Fondo Comun.
The MBA C520 (Quantitative Analysis) mid term exam is this weekend. Originally I planned to take this tonight for my birthday celebration. However, Che So invited me to her house for dinner. I declined the invitation originally but she told me today is my birthday and she has already invited some people. Therefore, I went to her house for dinner and birthday cake. I thought that I will have a lonely birthday taking mid term exam. However I thank God that brother and sister treated me well here. (Turned out that this is Carmen's sweet surprise to me again, second year in a row)
The water supply at my house is not functioning. Last year the water pressure is small so we installed some pump and tank this January. However, starting a few weeks ago the contact point of the electric switch of the pump is not functioning. Therefore, the pump would stop in the middle of the shower. Today, it just stopped functioning. I am really annoyed by this; once again I need to be as low as possible when taking the shower, yet the water pressure is smaller than anyone pee. I don't know what I should do when I take the shower tomorrow.

October 8, 2003(Wednesday)

I got my laptop finally! After about two or three weeks using other people's computer, I finally got mine back! The motherboard is new, probably because the laptop has been violently hit before. It is because some of the key stroke does not work and the IT administrator of Desca Frank helped me to fix it by banging the laptop's keyboard. I was quite surprise at that time but it worked. When Omar asked me to take care of this laptop, I told him that I never dropped or hit the laptop except Frank banged my laptop. I am not stupid enough to do anything harm to the laptop because I have a lot of painful experience without laptop!
I have a lot of application in my laptops. ICQ, MSN, AOL, Office 2002, WinZip, Sniffer Pro, Cisco Tftp server, Java Console, Internet Explorer, Cisco IP TV Viewer, Visio, SecureCRT, Terminal Service, Xerox (for printer), Adobe and Cisco Wireless LAN card. This computer runs Window XP. All my three previous crashed are Window XP, so let me see how long before this computer crashes again!
Desca needs me to take the certification for EMC. In order to get started, Desca wants me to take the sales accreditation. There are totally nine tests; all the material and the exam are available online for free. Therefore, I did something that I have never done when I take the test. Rather than spending endless time studying, I only study for 1.5 hours and then take the test. I need 70% to pass. I got 68% the first time. (The test is open book or open notes). I thought that I will pass soon. Then I got 58%, 55%, 55%, 58%, 68% and finally got 77% on my seventh trial. I am sure that I have seen all the test questions. In fact, for the previous trial, I did screen-shot and cut-and-paste all the questions to notepad. They only notify which question is incorrect without giving the answer. Therefore, sometimes I need to try all the possible choices. It is the hardest when they ask me to choose 2 correct answers out of 4 possible answers because there are 10 possible combinations. When I took the test the first time, I really search through the notes; however starting the third time, I am too tired of that and just go with my instinct or look at previous answer. I hope to finish the other 8 exam by a week.
The prayer meeting is canceled and we went to the airport to pick up Jackie Ngai. She is a Chinese missionary from Toronto that has been here before. She will go to Barquismento to serve for three years. She was about 44 yrs old and has not yet married. I have been to the airport many times; this is the only time that I pick up someone. The other time was I farewell Carmen in June 1, 2002.

October 7, 2003(Tuesday)

I checked about the EMC study material today. Desca will be an EMC partner and they need some technical people. I will be one of those people that need the technical certificate. Unlike Cisco, there is no book or other material available. The only method to pass the test is to take the training courses (or buying the past exam/brain dumps). The subscription for all courses is US $9995. It will make this certification harder; but that also makes this to be a more valuable certificate. I worry that if I take the courses, that will decrease the training money that I receive from employer. I will try to negotiate with boss when the time comes.
I went to Che So's house for dinner; she (actually, it is her maid) helped me to wash the dirty clothes too. We talked a lot about the church incident in Oct 5 and the idea about the evangelistic program in Dec 31. I went home; called parents and studied the EMC certificate too.

October 6, 2003(Monday)

I went to work and there is not much happening. I edited the Fondo Comun traffic report. Also, boss Omar and co-worker Frank had problem with the Fondo Comun PIX firewall configuration. They asked me how to do it and I gave them the solution in 40 mins. Since I am the Security CCIE, this should be the expectation on me. However, since most of the time I only do co-ordination (open Cisco TAC case) or traffic report, no one (not even me) knows whether I am good or bad technical-wise (I should be good because I have my certificate) and I have no confident in my technical skill. Therefore, this is a good experience.
I went home and cooked dinner. Afterward, I studied the practice midterm for my online MBA courses for about two hours.

October 5, 2003(Sunday)

This morning is a "violence" and "exciting" morning. I went to church at 8:30 to practice music. Chi Kong arrived at 9:05. Since I am the singspiration leader and I need to play guitar, I must be on one side of the stage. Therefore, he, as a pianist, must be in another corner. This is the floor plan every time when I lead music. Then this morning when he came here, his mom accused us (i.e. me, because I am the singspiration leader) of not respecting the pianist and required him to stay in the corner. I was very unsatisfied at that time because this is coming out from no-where, plus the thing that happened last night. I told her that "who is the singspiration leader today" and I said firmly that he will stay over there. Chi Kong said that "I have been to church for over 10 years and no one ever respect me". Of course this is not true. Also, we agreed earlier that we will end the practice at 9:15. By the time he set up the piano, I announced that "time's up". I am glad that my brain does not function as fast as I normally do at that time or else I will be a lot more "inch". However, I need the clear conscious in order to serve and so I went to Chi Kong and apologize to him even though I don't think that I did anything wrong. When I talked to him he walked away from me and did not want to talk to me at all. I have done my part and that is all I care.
I led "Praise you Hallelujah" (from ACM's "You are king") with a lot of actions, "Because God's name", "I use pray to come before you", "Prince of Peace" (from ACM's "Prince of Peace") and "Please send me" (from ACM's "Prince of Peace"). After the worship, I went up to Mrs. Lui and apologized to her, even though I don't really think that I did anything wrong. Once again, she said that it is no use to apologize and this is her problem to accuse this morning. She did not accept my apology at all and not happy about that. Then she talked to Mimia and Che So saying that "All of you use the selfish desire to run the church. I will wait for the church's top leader to come back and talk to all of you". What the? The Church leader is Jesus; is she waiting for Christ's return? Pastor Loh is not here and the Church Council's chairman Mr. Wong is right there. Probably she is waiting for Ricky Lam's return; he was in Toronto until Oct 12. We separated the Sunday school back to adult and youth. I led the youth and we talked and clarified all these thing with them. And then I tried to share the gospel briefly with Mrs. Gao (Paco's wife).
We had urgent Church Council meeting afterward to talk about all these thing. Obviously Che So and Mimia were extremely angered by all these. I heard from others saying that Ah San will "sing bad" our name and caused Semson to resign from the position of Pastor. They told me that I am "2 5 son"; Semson and I planned to force these people to talk to the China Place people. Semson used his influence to cause everyone from supporting them. What the??? Of course all these are false. We were trying to find a way to minimize the damage in front of the non-Christian, yet draw a line from them. They made a mess this time! If I have another pianist here, Chi Kong will be in the "never use" list.
I went to MB Church to lead music. I led "Praise you Hallelujah" (from ACM's "You are king") with a lot of actions, "Inside Jesus" (ACM), "Because God's name", "Days of Elijah" (Spanish version) and "Come worship God" (from ACM's "come revive me"). I had a rest in the Sunday School time and I dreamt what happened this morning! There is not many people join the fellowship because Semson will go to HK tonight for two weeks; most of the drivers will go to airport so there are not enough cars. So people cannot stay late. We had group sharing and discussed about salvation and the influence of Jesus.
I was really disturbed by this morning's incident; I am glad that I shared these with Carmen so that I can sleep in peace.

October 4, 2003(Saturday)

I went to grocery shopping then went to Parque del Este for my weekly run. I was seriously "out of air". This is the worst physical condition shape I have ever had. I need more exercises. (I do sit up, push up and jump every day for total of 8 mins) I went to Baptist Church to practice music from 5 to 7. Then I went to MB church to practice music (again)
Semson told me that the Chinese Place was really unsatisfied with the performance that the MB Church did on Sept 28 and they need to think twice about whether letting us to have another chance in doing any performance in the Chinese Place. I am quite shock because we know that neither Baptist Church nor MB Church performed for that Chinese Day. Ah San and Lui and other people use their personal name to do it. However, we found out that they mentioned the name "Church choir" during the performance and every expect this is a church group. Also, since the program started late and people were leaving before the performance started, the committee asked the "church group" to decrease their songs. These people refused and sang all 7 songs. It ended up that they had half of the performance time and several groups after them need to be canceling because of lack of time. Of course, their quality is not good either. We planned to have an outreach at the Chinese Place in Dec 31 and now we may have a problem to obtain the approval.
Leo and Kitty know that I will get marry next September and I need to rent a better place at that time. Therefore they brought me to their second house and offered to rent to me at that time. That was a nice place and I am sure that the rent will be reasonable (about US$200). I told them that Carmen will come to Venezuela in December and we can visit this place again at that time.

October 3, 2003(Friday)

I went to RCTV worked on the report. Relatively speaking, today is the quietest day. Therefore, I get to enjoy it.
I went back to Desca at 6:30 because I needed to talk to my boss Omar about the Fondo Comun traffic report. Also, I was told that the trip to Dallas is confirmed. The company gave me another laptop because my laptop was still in the HP service center. For the last several days I was using the laptop that the Desca help desk is using. This is a small and "useless" Toshiba laptop. The mouse is a little button in the middle of keyboard and is very hard to control. I used the PC that supposed to perform traffic capturing in Fondo Comun and RCTV most of the time. Since I need to go to Dallas, the company gave me another HP laptop that another person is using. This is not a bad one but the power needed to be connected all the time. Usually for any laptop, it can function for up to two hours even without power. However the battery of this one is not good so I need to connect to the power supply all the time. Not only that, the power contact point is not good so if I move the computer accidentally, it will turn off. Therefore I need to save often. After laptop crashed on me several times in the past year, I learnt this lesson. In addition, the screen is quite dark. I hope that the HP service center will fix my laptop soon so that I can have mine back.
I need to get the air ticket for Dallas trip from Omar too. He gave me the air ticket and US$1100 and Bs50,000 (about US$20) for this one week trip. This covers the cost of the hotel, transportation and food. I can use as much as I like as long as I have receipt. For some other company, they will give a lump sum of money and I can do whatever I want (i.e. I can save it). However, not for this company. When I am about to go home at 9pm, I received the email saying that the Dallas trip is postponed again. They have changed the plan for over 10 times! Keep on postponing. But this time it is the closest because I even have the air ticket and money on hand. I gave all these back to Omar. Even he is pissed off with this project. He said that this is a piece of sh*t and he is disgusted. He asked me for input and I told him that I had a hard time scheduling anything on the weekend. North America company would have a two-month notices (I guess); for myself, a one-week notice is necessary; all these changing and modification really cross my bottom line. Omar will reflect these to Mario and hope that Mario will talk to the customer about this. I said that this is not the fault of anyone in Desca but the customer's problem. I told Omar to double check that I really don't need to go to Dallas on Sunday; I don't want to receive a phone call on Saturday saying that I need to go on Sunday! I went home at 10 and called the Baptist Church and MB Church saying that I will be here this Sunday and I can be the singspiration leader for both churches. I felt bad for them because of mine uncertainty in work.
Since Omar became my boss several weeks ago, thing changed. He tried to re-organize the consultant department. He is not as busy as Mario (my previous boss, now he is Omar's boss) he would have more time monitoring and assigning job to us. That's why I am busier in the last few weeks. Also, his English is a lot better than Mario so I can communicate with him easier. (He studied M.Eng in Germany and wrote the thesis in English last year!) He can be a channel to communicate with the upper management and he is willing to fight for our concern. (At least this looks like to me in this Dallas thing) He is also picky and detail in terms of the work. Previously people are ok with the traffic report but he has lots of comments about my report. (That's means more work)

October 2, 2003(Thursday)

I went to RCTV today working on the traffic analysis report; I also emailed the previous Fondo Comun traffic report to Omar. Previously people said that I do a good job on my traffic report; they seldom have any comments. However, Omar has some suggestions about the report. He said that the content is good but there is problem with the format. I tried to convince him that no one previously cares about the report format. However, he seems to mind about this. Oh well, he is the boss, I have no choice but to abide to his suggestion. He said that he will give me the comments by 230pm but he kept on delaying pass 5pm.
I saw people take shot in RCTV today. I saw one or two actresses posing in front of the camera. I guess that they are taking shot for the advertisement rather than movie. However, I do not know who is who.
I am still waiting for the information about my Dallas trip. One of my co-workers already went to Mexico for the same project; however, he said that the client did not give him any information so he was wasting time doing nothing. This project seems to be extremely unorganized. This is the problem of the customer's fault. They (Telmex) hired Alcatel and Alcatel was extremely disorganized. Alcatel hired us for some part of the project.
I am glad that there is no last minute thing come up today so I can go home early. I cooked rice and put chicken in it. I have not "wash rice" for a long time. It tastes pretty good. I spent some time studying MBA too.

October 1, 2003(Wednesday)

I went to RCTV today continuing on the traffic analysis. I was quite busy with that because I need to work on both the Fondo Comun traffic report and the RCTV traffic report. In the middle of it, my boss Omar called saying that we need to make some change to the PIX firewall for Fondo Comun. This is very important (as he always says) because we are going to renew the contract with Fondo Comun soon. I am glad that I always have buffer zone in my life. My co-worker thought that it takes three or four days to complete traffic report, where it actually takes me two days. Therefore when my boss told me that I need to work on some other project, I have the spare time to do so.
I went to Fondo Comun and found that it is really frustrating because my co-workers that were outsourced there know very little about the network. Moreover, we have communication problem because of language problem. I am glad that we are not going to do the implementation today. Another Desca employee Frank will work on that tomorrow so all I need to do is to have a "preliminary" configuration. That is easy.
I went to church for prayer meeting at night. Ricky gave me the training kit for "Purpose Driven Life". We will teach it in Sunday School. Originally he will teach the combined adult and youth Chinese. However, the class is too large and this will bored the Chinese youth to death. Even Paco told me (privately) that he prefers the two classes be separated. Therefore, I will teach the class. There is a lot of material that I need to read. It adds up because I have work, EMC certification, MBA plus other church thing. However, being positive as I always am, this is a good opportunity for myself to revive and renew my spiritual life. Since the discipleship training in 1994, there is no breakthrough in my spiritual life. It has been growing steadily but sometimes I feel like I am in the dead-end. Therefore, I hope that I can regain the momentum again. This is a 40 days campaign and I look forward for my life to be changed in this 40 days. I called Carmen and invited her to join me to have this experience too.