Friday, December 3, 2010

You're young and have so much to learn...

I've heard this phrase MANY times in my life especially from my mother, but I never expected to hear it from my supervisor. Let me tell you the story...

I've never really enjoyed my job. I started to appreciate my job more when my Nana sent me an email telling me that people have jobs to test butt thermometers. So I've been happy at times and there have been great moments. However, overall I'm getting a bit restless teaching arrogant students who think they can have communication skills like the best of them, which clearly..Obama wouldn't pronounce 'the' as 'da'....anyway, that's a whole other issue. Back to my story..

My office is great, everything outside of my office is chaos. I'm the type of person who likes a plan and I like to stick to my schedule. My superiors like to throw things on us at the last minute and expect us to rearrange our schedule accordingly. I could not be more annoyed by this. It's frustrating and I feel as though I'm letting my students down. Well, this happened on Wednesday and I couldn't rearrange my schedule to their liking and so I couldn't make it to this "training" session thing. To make a long story short...our 'Executive Office', Gladys, wasn't too happy about this and barged into my office, picked up my phone and called my boss. Then preceded to yell IN CANTONESE about me to my boss. She didn't even bother to speak to me about the situation first.

Then my boss calls me and tells me to go to the training thing for an hour or so before my first appointment and just to tell them I had to leave early. So I tell them, and Gladys snaps at me "AN HOUR IS NOT GOING TO CUT IT, I WILL BE CALLING DAN AND YOU CAN JUST LEAVE!!!!!!" oh. no. she. didn't.

So I smiled and said "Okay, thank you, Gladys. See you all later." (Kill 'em with kindness, right?) Anywho..the situation only escalated and I eventually got an email blaming me for the whole situation and that I have much to learn. Okay, granted, I might have been able to communicate more effectively.........GIVEN I HAD MORE TIME. However, no matter what I did, I didn't deserve to be belittled and embarrassed by a colleague like that. But apparently, "there's nothing they can do about that." I slept on it and was fine as I came to work today. Forgiven..over it.

THEN, another email from my supervisor going on and on about how I'm the one to blame.I know I probably sound like a spoilt brat, but I honestly don't understand the situation and I think it was just all a big misunderstanding. I'm just going to let it be and not fight back..even though my aggressive personality is compelling me!!!

April couldn't get here fast enough....luckily I'm taking my vacation in 3 weeks. These people are going to make me go mad.

Thursday, December 2, 2010

It's beginning to look a lot like...

CHRISTMAS!! Even though it's December and I'm still wearing shorts, it's that season!! It will also be my first Christmas season away from Texas! I've learned to embrace this harsh reality and have made the most of my situation. Back in August I begged Ellison to go buy this second hand Crate and Barrel Christmas tree that this lady was selling and I'm certainly glad I did. We saved so much money, because those things are NOT cheap! Little by little I'm decorating the house and more and more I'm annoying El with my Christmas music.

Although I'll be away from most of my family..we have the most awesome opportunity to bring my mom and brother to Hong Kong for Christmas!!! It's going to be such a special time, because in the 2 years I've lived here, I've never had family visit! They arrive on the 22nd and will be staying until the 3rd of January. Only 20 more days!!

On top of celebrating Christmas we will be celebrating our FIRST ANNIVERSARY on the 19th of December (or 2nd of January, depends on which wedding, ha!) !!! Ellison will also be turning the big 26 on December 23rd! More importantly, on Christmas Day we will be having a baptizing service where Ellison will be baptizing 7 of his youth! Really awesome. We have so much to be thankful for and it will be an exciting, chaotic time for celebrating!!

Here's a few of our Christmas decorations! The most awesome thing about our decorations is they were all free. :) I love getting things for free (or really cheap) and making the most out of them!!