Saturday, September 02, 2006
The B@nk That Parties
I almost peng.
So I said, "No, my shirt's in the car."
That got the girls excited, including my manager. Some explicitly asked for a ride, even though the company had arranged bus transport. So I replied, "I'm not driving a bus, girls."
When we got back to the office, everyone were plainly dressed. Made me so sianz. My morning was ruined when someone called and screamed. But the brownie Gerrie bought for me from Famous Amos helped sweetened it. I continued to work till 2 and went to Tanjong Pagar to collect my jacket from the cleaners and drove back to work.
Surpise upon surprise.
I received my first stack of name cards.
Pretty neat. Except the job position.
They even laminated our names to identify the seating arrangements. I think it's really redundant for me. Everyone knows I'm the only guy in the department and Boss even introduced me to one of the new manager as 'a thorn among the roses'.
Which I replied 'Right'.
OOh, and Boss rewarded me with a star for posting all the queries to other department for verification. The system works in a way where st@ff are given these stickers for recognition. Sounds so primary school, I know. But it's one of the little ways to make the environment fun to work in. And don't look down on these stickers. You get paid up to $2k if you get the most. On top of that, you get to win shopping vouchers!
I stopped work at about 4:30 and began to chat with the girls. For those who had nothing on hand could leave at 4pm. I stayed on till 5:30 to wait for Gwen and went to change at PS. Together with Sherry and Jasmine S, we headed to the annual party.
It actually took us quite long to reach Expo. Missed the exit and had to make an u-turn at the budget terminal. And the Q at Expo hall 4-6 was horrible, with everyone rushing to the IT Fair. Geeks.
Anyway, when we finally saw the allocated hall, there were 2 men who opened the barricade for us. As we drove in further, someone stopped us to check our pass before allowing us to go in. They even had someone to show us to whatever available car lots.
There were long Qs forming already. The B@nk split all of us up. The idea is that we form a nation, separated into 5 states. There were immigration officers who 'chopped our passports' before letting us go in.
Not many people dressed up for the function. The common outfits were military uniforms, nurses and doctors garbs, policemen, and stewardesses. Some got lazy and wore polo tees to pass off as bowlers.
Machiam going to some exclusive party of the year
Gwen and I went to our table, where we had Zoey and Catherine. We were given this little drum on our seats. Samantha came over and we q to take this photo.
Lucky right! I mean the girls. This afternoon, I was tellin' Gwen men in our office are rare species and on top of that, I'm valued. And she says I'm thick-skinned for putting myself in the Tom Cruise's league. But at least we got one thing in common. We are short, in height. Not *ahem* in length. Well, at least for me lah. I don't and wouldn't want to know about Tom's. =)
The girls went "00h" when they saw me. Compliments poured, even from the VP. Gwen was like, "You got style". Ok, I sound very full of myself tonight.
This event really cost alot of ka-chings. Take the photo-taking session for example. Me, Gwen and Sam had the photos each. Multiply to the times of people and the number of people taking the photos.
They hired this 2 Spanish-looking men team and they really warmed things up. We were supposed to follow the rhythm and hit the drums. Minutes later, all the 'Heads' appeared. The new CE0 appeared for the first time. When he gave his opening speech, he had changed into this General-looking military uniform. Pretty cool. He then gave away awards to outstanding personnel. And when each personnel was introduced, a huge banner of that person would be dropped from the ceiling. Impressive.
D@niel 0ng, the DJ, took control of the party thereafter. He's so different from the way he hosted the Sing Id0ls. In that show, he seemed seconded to Gurmit. (Oh, btw, I'm so happy the monkey is out of SI. Next to go would be Paul, you 'little freaky-lookin' dog-haired guy.)
The food was excellent. But ever since the B@nk got involved in projects pertaining to saving the environment, they stopped serving shark's fin at dinners. What a damper.
Nevertheless, everything was good. Though I would like to complain about the lack of amount and variety of drinks. Wine ran out real quick. 7-Up too (AH had brought vodka along. Ended up mixing it with Orange and Coke.)
Then came the 'Best Dressed' segment. Apparently, people had voted candidates as 'Best Dressed'. KNS. So there I was, eating my greens when Dan Ong said into the mike, "From Fr1end1y B@4, we have... Felix Wang!"
Not that I was surprised or anything (fine, I'm shameless). And as I went on stage, Dan told me, "Hey, we dressed almost alike. Can start boyband!"
But I lost the segment to this girl, who came in a diver's suit. Just because she did a little provocative dance. All in all, I had pretty much fun. Glad Dan Ong didn't ask me to speak into the mike. I get stage fright.
Really disappointed with the Lucky Draw. Didn't manage to win anything! The prizes were really amazing. There were cheaper stuff, of course, like the iPod 2GB Nano, 30GB video, PSP, XBOX, Raoul, Tiffany & Co., Tangs vouchers, printers, 4-in-1 fax machines, digital cameras... The more attractive prizes are like a couple thousand bucks of Lee Hwa vouchers, DSLR cameras, a trip to anywhere in the world, Nakamichi surround system, Tag Heuer, Omega, LCD TV...
There are some people who received their L0ng S3rvic3 awards tonight. For dedicating 30 yrs to the B@nk. A Tissot, $2k cash and a month's bonus each. Lovely.
But end of the day, what matters most is the enjoyment derived working in one of the best Br1t1sh b@nks in the world.