Konnichiwa

My Last 2.5 Months

The last 2.5 months has pretty much been nothing but work, work and more work. On largely just 1 deal. Which finally signed early June. Hard work is one thing but to be made to stay in the office every weekday night till about midnight or after, and to go in to the office every single weekend till midnight is another thing. I felt trapped, like I had lost my freedom, which essentially I did. I could not do simple things like get my hair cut! In the last one month, there we were 4 nights (not consecutive) where I stayed up the whole night working without any sleep at all - not sure how many more of nights like these I can do at my age! Tomo was great being the dad, the mum, the chef, the chauffeur, the entertainer, the housecleaner all whilst holding down his own job. One of the daycare mums whose son is in the same kindie class as Taiga stood in for me at one of the kindie events, Kai's English teacher kindly babysat for us on a weekend at the last minute ..... So that was how we managed, with the help of the community around us. Brought the English teacher to French Kitchen at Grand Hyatt last weekend as a 'thank you' and am glad he really liked the place. So what's next? A trip back to Singapore for 2 weeks. The boys and I are excited about it. Tomo will have his vacation at home without us! 2 quiet, blissful weeks for him. Tomo got me an Ipad so I am now ready to get on the flight, give my Ipad to the kids and get some sleep. Unless they start fighting over it. So here I am this morning sitting in Starbucks typing out this post on my Ipad. I am taking the morning and early afternoon off work to attend a lunch organised by the mums in Kai's kindie. This Is Kai's last year in kindie and I have never attended these kind of events before, so thought I should attend at least once before he leaves the kindie. I think there will be a round table self-introduction. I must say I am not fond of these things especially if it is to be in Japanese. Be positive, be positive, be positive! Does not help that I am feeling rather sluggish this morning. Was up until 3 am researching software for family trees last night. I intend to properly start my family tree project when I am in Spore this time.

Happy New Year

Rather belated, but happy new year!

Not sure who is reading this blog any more though - this blog has been stagnant for the longest time.  Many things happened last year which I will update the blog on some time later.  Kai started English class at Berlitz, Kai started kindergarten, Kai started golf, both Kai and Taiga started swimming class.

As I blogged earlier, last year was a crazy year.  There were months where I was very free at work, but had to behave myself in the office (i.e. no blogging) as redundancies were everywhere.  My colleagues have been asked to leave.  Of the 3 of us who started together and did our orientation together, I am the only one left.  The other 2 were asked to leave.  Because of the terminations, the maternity leaves and natural attrition, I was incredibly busy at work for about 6 months.  At the peak of of it, I seemed to be working non-stop, even on weekends, which kind of resulted in my losing all sense of what day of the week I was in.  For those 6 months, Tomo held fort at home and I did not cook a single meal.

To make things worse, my daycare forbade me to use the stroller to bring Taiga to the daycare.  They said he is old enough to walk.  He is, but he does not like walking in the mornings.  So for the last 5 months, I have been been carrying Taiga to daycare.  16 kg, 20 mins.  Up a steep hill.  And that is not to mention 2 bath towels, 2 daycare bags (with various towels, fork/spoon set etc.), my handbag and my document bag that I also have to carry.  And when we walk home, throw in another 2 bath towels (Kai's) and Kai's various daycare and kindergarten bags (at least, 4, depending on the day).  And am I expected to run after 2 active boys as we cross the various roads in our residential estate?  I am pissed with the principal.

So what are the plans for this year?  Now that Kai is 5 and Taiga 3, I think the pain of the last few years is easing.  For the last few years, we were just about living day to day.  With the kids easier to manage and Kai to start primary school next year, I think we can start scheduling our lives a little.  Some ideas/resolutions for this year:

1. put the kids into bed by 10.30pm - they used to sleep at midnight or after.  We tried this after coming back from Singapore and so far so good.  
2. stop going out so much, stay home more and do activities with the kids at home - when the kids were younger, they needed lots of entertainment and with our small house constantly messy, we used to get out of the house all the time previously.
3. cook more at home (preferably, with an organic slant) - we did get organic last year.  I think we can achieve this more this year with a supermarket opening on our side of the station.  It has made a huge difference already since it opened, so much more convenient for me to grab some stuff on the way home.  And this supermarket carries quite a range of organic veges, so that helps
4. make the kids room more functional - since we will be doing more activities at home and want to de-clutter our living room, this is a step to be taken.  We just bought them ergonomic desks/chairs from Germany which will be delivered in April.  We are thinking of buying double-decker beds for the kids because from experience in the last 5 years, no one bothers to fold up/put aside the futons - at all!  Hopefully, when this is all put together, we can finally get the kids to sleep on their own and I can get my bed all to myself again!! Oh, the luxury.
5. invite friends over more often - it will be nice to have company over. Esp since I now know quite a few people who stay in my area (from daycare).  Even the kids like it too the few times we had people over the last few years. They get so excited (and even did an impromptu "magic" show last Spring) and would not let the guests leave till they finished their never-ending show.  And it will force us to keep our house clean and de-cluttered.

So the thrust of it all is that this will be the year where we try to get some normality back to our lives.  

(I will blog abt Singapore as soon as I can.  The photos will take some time.)

Finally Left!

Well, leaving has its benefits.  As a farewell gift, I received 2 Christofle photo frames (very coincidentally, I love their products although the givers did not know) and 1 iPod Touch - 16 GB, no less!  Ah, I now have only wonderful memories of my old workplace!  :-)

In Japan, on the last day, at the end of the business day, a "farewell ceremony" is organised.  The company will appoint a person to say a few words of thanks followed by a presentation of a huge bouquet of flowers.  Then the leaving person has to say a few words in return.   I am very happy to say that I managed to go through that whole ceremony without crying, even when I was giving my little speech.  For the past few years, K, as the administration partner, will be that representative.  In my case, they got another admin partner to do that speech.  And then K gave a speech.  He gave a very nice speech and said, amongst others, that he hope I will regard this firm as my Japanese home (I am moving on to a non-Japanese firm) and that I am welcome to come back to visit them anytime etc.  He also said I am welcome to go back and join them anytime and  that is good to know for me as although this place may have its cons, it also has its pros. 

In private, many of the partners have also said that to me, so it is very comforting to me to know that this door is not shut and it is not only K who takes that position.  And indeed, a few of the current partners have in their earlier days left to explore other places only to return later.  Which I think at the end of the day, does benefit the firm as it gains from the experiences of those who have left.  What really surprised me when I said my personal good-byes to some of the partners, their eyes started watering too!!! I think it is not so much that they will miss me, but they all heard my reasons for leaving at the partners meeting and I think many of them had guilty pangs (and hence why some partners were apologising to me, as per my earlier post).

There is no one single reason why I am leaving.  It is just an accumulation of many things.  Many of the push factors were already there when I first joined.  I did not act on it earlier as I was busy producing 2 kids which did not make it a good time to move.   Also, there is no perfect workplace.  Some days, I am happy to tolerate those push factors.  Other days, they roil me.  So for the past few years, depending on which week you ask me, I am either ready to stay on or prepared to leave.

Many of you who read this blog know how difficult it is for foreigners to penetrate Japanese society.  From the media, when crime rate is talked about,  foreigners  are also mentioned.  When it is being discussed in Japan whether the country should let in more foreigners, the number one issue is how the crime rate will go up.  Although statistics have shown that this correlation is not true, that is how we are perceived.  And it does not stop there.  There is a lot of discrimination against foreigners.  The first apartment which Tomo and I applied to rent when we first came to Tokyo, we were rejected because I am not Japanese even though Tomo is.   Even though my FIL was to be our guarantor  and showed  his healthy finances and that his main  clients were big, publicly listed Japanese companies.  On a more personal level, it is difficult to be friends (as in truly friends) with the Japanese people, and not for lack of language as I know many foreigners who speak Japanese like a native and are still not integrated into Japanese society.  In short, I am living half a life here, outside of the work place.   That is difficult on its own already.  It is made more difficult  when  I am treated like an outsider too by the people I work with on a daily basis.  Take lunch for example.  My Japanese colleagues will come into my room to invite my Japanese roommates out for lunch, but seldom extend the invitation to me.  (It it not just me, it happens to all of us foreigners, so it is not personal.)   Likewise  after-office hours socialising.   When our firm started growing exponentially in the last few years, the firm started this new lunch programme last year whereby Japanese lawyers from one corner will lunch with Japanese lawyers at another corner (at the firm's expense) with the objective being for lawyers to get to to each other better.  Foreign lawyers were left out of that programme.  I can't understand why we were left out.  Especially if getting to know each other better is supposed to translate to working together better.  So socially,  there was no or little integration.

For work too, there was little integration.  K totally integrated me in his projects, so I really like working with him.  But with others, especially the associates, I felt that they did not consider us foreign lawyers as a part of the team.  An example would be a due diligence report I was working on in early 2007.  It was a large due diligence, about 20 lawyers or more involved.   We were very close to the deadline and were working almost round the clock.  The night before the deadline, I worked on the draft at night and overnight.  Slept very little and got back in to the office at 8.30am expecting the Japanese lawyers to have left their revised drafts in my inbox.  I was surprised there was nothing.  Waited till about 11am and still nothing.  Started chasing people up and that was when I found out that the night before, clients called off the project, the whole  team except me was informed.  Why was I not informed?  I guess they just never saw me as a part of the team.  I (and my foreign colleagues for that matter) are just there for their use and disposal.   Likewise, another major due diligence I was working on at the end of 2007.  When it ended and  an e-mail was sent out to the whole firm to announce that our firm had  assisted the client on this matter and the client has successfully acquired a business, that e-mail listed out the names of all the lawyers who had worked on the matter.  As is usual.  It listed out the names of all 28 Japanese lawyers.  It did not include my name.   It included the names of  10 new graduates on that matter who joined our firm only 2 months before and certainly did much less than me on that matter.  The irony of this is that this e-mail was sent in December, after I had given the reason of not being made to feel as part of the team as why I am leaving and the various partners were speaking with me to get me to stay.  This e-mail certainly helped me in deciding it was the right decision to leave.  As an add-on to that, the partner in charge of that project decided to host a thank-you party to all the team members and asked the associate-in-charge to organise it.  I received my invitation separately from the group invitation.  I was curious and quietly asked around.  Yup, they had forgotten that I exist and contributed too until another associate (an ex-roommate of mine and a good friend - who also happens to be in the midst of interviews and will leave too) on that matter voiced that I should be invited too.

Another incident that majorly pissed me off involved a Tom Cruise movie.  This was some time back.  The entertainment partner asked me to help out and said he thinks he will get tickets to the Tokyo premiere of Mission Impossible 3 which he will give me.  I would help out anyway and the promise of the tickets did not influence that at all.  In fact, I never thought much about it after that and just assumed that I was not given any tickets because he was not given any in the end.  No big deal.  Well, a year later, we were at a little party to welcome the new lawyers when I overheard a new lawyer asking him what the perks of his job were.  And he mentioned that he received premiere tickets to Mission Impossible 3.  I was only 2 seats away and he immediately realised, from my expression I guess, that he should not have said that.  He started making excuses for why I did not get the tickets.  I asked him who went.  He did, so did the senior associate who worked on that matter.  The remaining 4 tickets went to secretaries and paralegals.  I was furious as I am pretty sure there was little use of the secretaries and definitely no use of any paralegals for that matter.  Total disregard for the contribution of foreign lawyers again.  To score with the secretaries and paralegals?  If he had given those 4 tickets to his mum, dad and siblings, I would have had absolutely no problem with that and in fact, would applaud such a move.

In addition to the lack of integration socially and work-wise, many of the young associates often give the foreign lawyers work at 5 or 6pm, for work that has to be sent out that day.  It could be a 5 page memorandum.  They will tell us, it takes only 20 minutes for you to review.  It really pisses me off as (i) it never only takes only 20 minutes and (ii) do they think that what we do is so simple that it only takes 20 minutes?   What an insult  and lack of respect for what I do.  And because of that, the foreign lawyers are usually sitting around with little or no work until 5 or 6 pm each day.  If we take on and work on that memo till 9 pm, we can bill only 3 to 4 hours which is not reflective at all of the late nights we are putting in.  And for me as a mum, that is totally not satisfactory at all.  Why should I be working late just because some young punk is so disorganised with his working  time and has no respect for me and my time?

So the above is in short, the main reasons why I am moving on.  On the flip-side, one pro for staying on in this place is that I have lots of time to surf the internet until 5 or 6pm!

Oh, I should also mention that unlike Japanese lawyers who automatically get a pay increase every year, we foreign lawyers have a fixed salary.  So my salary was fixed for the last 5 years.   When I asked for a pay review at the end of 2006, I was told by my "immediate boss" that it is very difficult as if they increase my salary, they will have to increase my hourly billing rates and if they do that, no partners will want to include me in their projects as I will then be very expensive to use.  Although when I finally plucked up enough courage in summer 2007 and asked K (in his capacity as admin partner) for a pay increase and was  given a fairly substantial one, the words of the "immediate boss" continue to ring in me.  I can see to a certain extent why he said that.  Although they agreed to a pay increase, I could be fixed at this new rate for the next couple of years and I really don't like the idea of asking for a pay increase every few years,  And the firm is such that if I don't ask, nobody will see to it that I get one.  (Only because no one really thinks of the foreign lawyers.)

The very day after my previous post, I found out that at the partners' meeting (which was on a Wednesday night) where I was dicusssed, me and my reasons were discussed for more than 1 hour.  In a meeting that lasted for no more than 2 hours in total.  I was also told (inside sources) that this meeting was very different from other in that my issues struck a chord and it truly engaged the partners and a lively discussion ensued as to how to improve things.  What struck the chord was my "complaint" that foreign lawyers are left out socially.  Most of the Japanese lawyers have spent 2 years outside of Japan, including 1 year in a law firm outside of Japan.  For many of them, they were also treated as "outsiders" and they were quite upset about it and at that time, they realised that that was how they have been treating the foreign lawyers back in Japan.  Although once back in Japan, they did not do anything to change our lot.  So, there was quite a lot of guilty conscience (and hence the reason for all those apologies to me).  Close as we are, even K is guilty of this.  I have seen their action list of what they intend to do from now to include foreign lawyers and it is impressive for now.  (Yes, foreign lawyers will now be included in those lunches on the firm's expense.)  As mentioned before, partners are usually very good about including foreign associates fully involved.  The problem arises when matters are delegated to senior associates who don't fully involve us and this actually affects the quality of work to our international clients.  The partners were very concerned with that and came up with another action list as to how to rectify this problem which affects quality standards.  (Although for this, as Jen pointed out in her comments, I am not sure exactly how much will change as we all know Japanese are slow to changes which is the reason why I am not sticking around to see if the changes will happen and blowing away my chance with a new firm.)  Lastly, the partners agreed that some foreign lawyers should be better paid and they will identify who they want to stay on long-term with them and offer them a better salary.      

So, if those changes actually take place, will that be my legacy at the firm???

Anyway, as I said, that partners' meeting was on a Wednesday night.  On Thursday night, it was our firm's x'mas party and since it was at the newly-opened Ritz Carlton (as opposed to the dull Hotel Okura where we have it every year), the whole firm including the partners turned up in full force.  I just could not face any of the partners after learning how extensively I was discussed at the meeting.  I spent most of the night avoiding eye contact with them.  I could feel, as could my fellow foreign lawyers that I was hanging out with, that many of the partners were trying to make eye contact to start a conversation with me.

And to top it off, I won a prize at the xmas raffle!  I got a huge humidifier in the shape of a  frog.  One of the younger partners whom I did speak to said this  to me, "In Japanese, frogs are called "kaeru".  "Kaeru" also means "come back/return home".

Leaving is so Hard!

I have been really quiet over the last few months because there has been just too much happening.  I had to mentally focus on whether I wanted to change jobs and why.

A friend e-mailed one day and said her place is looking for someone fairly senior.  Whilst the place I work at is supposed to be one of the best in Japan, where she works at is supposed to be pretty established around the world (although it is American in roots).   I put my name in for the opening, thinking that they will probably not be interested in pursuing this.  As it turns out, they were interested.  I went through 4 interviews!  All through that, I was focused on finding out more about that place as well as doing an internal examination as to why I want to leave my present work place.  Because if I was not serious about leaving my workplace, I should stop the interviews.  It would be terrible if they offered me a job and I say, whoops sorry, I did not really mean to leave my present work place. 

Then the job offer came through.  And it was the beginning of the end of my work at the present workplace. 

When I formally tendered my resignation to the Japanese partner I work with most - K- who also happens to be the administration partner,  he promptly rejected it.  He wanted me to reconsider.  Said how well we worked as a team (which is very true and that is the reason why I have stayed as long as I have in my present workplace despite all the structural failures for foreign staff like me), how our foreign clients  are repeat clients because they appreciate our work, how our clients have always told him after a project that they appreciated my work etc.   And how  there was so much trust in our team work.  And that was when I started blubbering in front of him.  This was at the end of November.  Ever since then, for the past 2 to 3 weeks, I have been crying on a daily basis in some other partner's room.   K got the other partners to speak with me and try to get me to change my mind.  It has been very traumatic and I have been so emotionally volatile these past few weeks.  Anything can set me off into crying fits! 

Anyway, the partners heard my reasons as to why I want to leave and agree that the foreign staff have been marginalized and neglected over the years.  And they have all been sincerely apologising which sets me off into another crying fit!

It was very hard.   I now know I am valued here - do I want to risk all that for a place that may not like me?  It was also hard because I do like the partners who have all treated me very nicely over the years and with some respect, it is the associates that I have a problem with (I have blogged about some of the associates and their attitudes), so it was very hard for me to have the partners apologize to me and I had to keep telling them to please stop.  And through all that time, I had to juggle keeping the dialogue open with both my present workplace and my new workplace.

Last Friday, I managed to remain firm that I am not changing my mind and am not reconsidering anymore.

Tonight, there was a partner's meeting where my impending departure was formally announced to all partners.  Apparently, there was great shock and dismay.   And I was  told that a few partners said that my leaving is a "disaster" for the firm!!!  Those partners were named to me and my gosh, they are  often listed year after year as  the "who's who" in my industry.  What an honour.  But then again, I think they have it all wrong.  I am just a little girl who often sneaks in late to work and does as little as I can to avoid getting into trouble.

Now that they have all held me in such high esteem, I feel like I cannot leave.  After all, if I do leave, they may wonder 6 months later  - what was all that fuss about?  The firm is doing just fine, if not better, without Heidi.

 

How Small is Tokyo Exactly?

When I first arrived in Tokyo in 1999, it felt really big.  I was this anonymous person in a sea of people.  I could do what I want, and it did not matter.  I could walk around sloppily dressed and with no makeup, and it did not matter.  (OK, it did, sort of.  When I walked around without makeup, I started getting pimples and I had till then fairly pimple-free skin.  The people at the makeup counters told me it is because I did not wear any makeup, there was no protective barrier for my skin and with all that pollution in Tokyo ....).

I realised that some of my anonymity was lost when I was at a rooftop playground at the shopping centre near my house when a young boy near me and Kai started pointing at Kai and saying "Kai, Kai".  His parents immediately came up to me and introduced themselves.  Our sons attended the same daycare.  A couple more similar "meetings" have since taken place.  Esp in Japan where "sloppy" for women is failure to have 3 different shadings for the cheek and wearing only a fitting Gap T-shirt, fitting jeans and pump shoes, that spelt the end of my days walking around in sandals, baggy T-shirts and frayed shorts (yes, I owned that pair of shorts since 1993 which I bought in Boston and have been wearing it every weekend in Singapore and Japan (when it is not winter) since its purchase until last month when I finally had to dump it.  I had no choice but to dump it, the holes were getting large enough for me to be arrested for indecent exposure.)

I remember once when Tomo and I were late for the ballet but needed to grab a small bite first.  We went into this unexciting restaurant in an unexciting building.  It was a huge place despite the non-fanciness of everything.  This was in Shibuya, where there are so many other restaurants and all definitely more appealing.  We chose this place as there was no Q.  We were shown a table.  Soon after sitting down, I noticed that the girl sitting on the next table - she was my new secretary.  So new (less than a week) that I was not initially sure whether it was really her.  But it was her.

And it is not just Tokyo.  When Kai was a tiny baby, Tomo wanted to bring him to see fishes.  We drove out more than 3 hours to some desolated place with an aquarium.  It is so desolated that I can't even recall the name of the place!  The aquarium was, erm, nothing exciting.   And I am not sure how much 3-month old Kai enjoyed it.   As if that was not enough, he insisted that there was a beach nearby with restaurants.   I think we hiked through a jungle before finally reaching the small stretch of sand he called a beach.  He decided to go to the restaurant at the end  (although, if I recall correctly, that was probably the only restaurant and the other 2 or 3 places were surf shops).  We sat down.  As I looked around, I thought the guy at the next table had a weird smile on.  On closer look, he turned out to be a colleague of mine!

And then 2 years ago, when I was pregnant with Taiga but had not yet told the office that was I due to leave on maternity again, Tomo decided that we would go explore Karuizawa (a couple of hours drive out from Tokyo) over the long weekend.  As it was a long weekend, the place was packed.  It was difficult to walk down the main "village street".  And in the crowd, I literally came face-to-face with yet another colleague who sits only 2 room away from me in the office.  Who saw me in my maternity clothes.  And without any make-up!  (Although if he can recognise me without any make-up on, maybe that is a good thing?)

And perhaps my most horrifying encounter was about a month ago.  I had just interviewed at this American company.  A week later, as I was on the train, the partner who interviewed me got on board and was standing only 2 persons away from me.  And he had seen me.  Aren't partners supposed to stay at fancy schmancy addresses like Azabu or Hiroo, and not in the area where I stay that is so "local"?  Oh gosh, what do I say?  The American company had not at that time made up their mind about me yet, so whatever I say can be held against me.  It was just like having another interview, but even worse as I was totally unprepared and the setting was not the office - it threw me off!  And I was sloppily dressed, with a Coleman backpack, Uniqlo (Japan's Gap) sweater and Nike sneakers.  A far cry from my designer interview suit, Ferragamo heels and Fendi leather bag a week earlier!

My Roommate Got Booted!

The roommate that I mentioned previously, he got thrown out of his apartment last week.

OK, it was not as dramatic as that.  He was not thrown out of his apartment.  Only his bedroom.  The wife slammed the bedroom door and locked him out.  But in Tokyo, especially in prime real-estate in an area like Azabu which is expatriate-land, if you stay there but are not on an expatriate package, once outside your bedroom, all you have left is some tiny space that triples up as kitchen/living/dining with a tiny bathroom to the side.   To give those of you who don't live in Tokyo some idea, the entire apartment, with the vast bedroom and all, comes to a grand total of 30 square meters.

So what did the roommate do?  Mustering all his manly pride, he came back to the office (a mere 10 minute walk) and spent the night in the office.  The office.  The underlying cause of his marital problems.  The new wife (they got married in late-September this year) does not like his working hours.  She called him at 8am the next morning with a "Where are you?" to which he replied "What do you care?".  She then slammed the phone down.  Ah, the passion of a newly-wedded couple.

So they were not speaking for the next few days and my whole corner of the office got to hear about his story.  Just as well that the office's administration partner is right next door to me and he can see how real it is - the crazy office hours and its effect on personal lives.   My roommate's wife, she is a high-flyer like him; they are both from the University of Tokyo (Japan's Harvard/Cambridge).  She has a job and earns her own keep.  Even after her marriage to him.  And I think that is why she had the balls to kick him out.  All my other married male colleagues, they keep similar long hours if not longer and their wives seem not to mind it too much - I have not heard of anyone getting kicked out or complaints from the wives (perhaps just a little for those with young kids).  My guess is the difference is that their wives are of the type (which is common in Tokyo - and I think I must have blogged about it before) that quit their jobs the moment the marriage proposal from their high-earning husbands came through - never mind that there is no bun in the over yet nor is there any plan for any kids for the next couple of years. 

And therein lies a contributing factor to the long hours that Japanese men keep in the office.  Japanese wives.  Their wives don't expect them to be home for dinner and after a couple of years marriage, their wives don't want the men to be home for dinner as they have already established their own routine in the evenings.  [I think there is a Japanese saying that "a good husband is one that is healthy and always at work". [Will double-check and edit this later.]] With no rush to go home, unlike working men (and women) in other countries, the work gets stretched through the day and the night.  This encourages inefficiency in the office.  This also means that since everyone is still hanging around the office at 9pm, the Japanese men don't think twice about calling an internal meeting to start at 9pm.  Which meeting is usually to discuss something unimportant and outside of Japan, could have been discussed during working hours the next day.

So I actually wish that more Japanese women are like my roommate's wife.  Demanding that their men go home earlier to spend time with them.  Starting with the boss's  wife.

The Famed Japanese Work Ethic?

My roomate (in the office, that is!) has been busy but so have I.  We are working on the same project.  In this project, the Japanese team is to draft a report in English and I am to review it and re-write it so that it is more easily readable in English (not an easy task, my friends!).  And it was all supposed to be due last Friday (we missed the deadline though ....).

He approached me late on Friday afternoon and asked me to draft his portion of the report for him.  I was busy enough with my own portion and said  point-blank to him "Is that not your job?".  He was taken aback by my directness, went red and was at a loss for words.

After a couple of seconds waiting for his reply, during which time my softer side came through (only because he is a newly-wed and  know his wife has been complaining about his work hours), I finally agreed to do it for him.

And then, that evening, he went out for a 90 minute dinner!!!  What did I have for dinner? Potato chips at my desk as I was too inundated with work to leave my computer.

Ugh!  He did a couple of apologetic bows before he left for dinner and again when he came back from dinner, but am I that easily appeased?

So infuriating ......

I am Exhausted!

It has been toil, toil, toil since February.   Only maybe the odd week or 2 that I had some let-down, but other than that, it has been long hours and hard work at the office.

It all came crashing when I had the cold 3 weeks back.  It was a particularly nasty one.  Not only did I have a fever for 3 days straight (out of which only 1 day I stayed home, away from the office), I completely lost my voice (and it seems that today is the 1st day I am getting it back) and have been feeling terribly drowsy.  But there is this matter that I am working on which is due to close in early August and the past few weeks have been especially crucial to put everything in place for the closing.  So I could not  really be away from the office .  Problem is, this matter had telephone conferences starting from 8.30  almost every day!  Which is awful when you consider that I have been in the office till midnight or past midnight (sometimes even till 2 or 3 am) and have to be up by 6 am again.   And because  I have to be in the office by 8.30, I have to jostle for space in the trains together with the other commuters, this being Japan and all - famous for the sardine-conditions during morning peak hours.  Ugh, definitely not a pleasant start to the day.

Since the beginning of this week, I can feel the cold getting better, and I don't get that drowsiness.  But I am feeling even worse now as I am so worn-out.  Flat-out exhausted.  I have been making stupid mistakes in the documents I draft.  And I am just going through the motions this week, totally zombified.

Thank god it's Friday!!!!  Alas, I can't sleep in tomorrow as Tomo's company has a family-day event that starts very early in the morning, but I can Sunday.  Can't wait.

To Move or Not to Move?

Moving professionally, that is.

A recruiter called me recently (no, I am not particularly desirable, they call everyone on my firm's website!) and suggested meeting up for coffee in a nearby hotel.  How could I refuse free coffee?  In a hotel, no less!

Whether I should change jobs is something that has been weighing on my mind for years.  Where I am at present pays decently, and I am left to my own devices as to how I control my time as long as I can produce my work within the deadlines.   With familial obligations, that works out quite nicely for me.  But at the same time, I feel like I am being under-utilised (and underpaid), that I can do more than how they are using me. 

So I met the recruiter yesterday.  The market is hot in the area that I "specialise" in, now is a good time to move.  He reckons it will be easy for me to move, and the pay will increase by at least 20 to 25%.

No new information there.  Just pretty much confirmation of what I have known.  But, no one pays you more for nothing, right?  With the higher pay would come a decrease in flexibility of time, longer working hours and possibly work on weekends.  I could deal with all that - if I have no kids!

Where do I draw the line?  More pay could mean I can afford baby-sitters every night on weekdays.  No need for MIL to look after the kids!  Is that good or bad?  I don't mind working late on weeknights so much, I already do a lot of that, but  work-free weekends is something  that I treasure.  Esp with kids around.

That's the dilemma of working mothers, isn't it?

Coincidentally, as I am catching up on a month's worth of Financial Times now, there are quite a few articles on this topic but focusing on companies in Europe.  Flexitime is one of the solutions.  Really?  To what extent?  In these days of internet and e-mails, deals move so fast.  Clients get annoyed when they have to wait.  Replying to an e-mail 24 hours later can be sufficiently tardy.  I don't see how that can work for those of us in the service industry where things move along at break-neck speed.  No one is going to say, "Oh?  She won't be in this afternoon due to Flexitime?  That's OK.  We will wait till tomorrow."  Clients will be saying " Can you please put someone not on Flexitime in this deal?"  Also, taking conference calls from home is not the same when you have kids yelling in the background.

Decisions, decisions.

Losing My Mind

So I posted last week about what a crazy week it has been.  Lily commented that I managed to remain coherent nonetheless.  Maybe.  But these are a few of my insanities by Friday night:

• when I left my office, I was wondering why it took such a long time for the lift to come.  Only to realise that I had not pushed the button and was stupidly standing at the lift lobby waiting.
• I continued to work from home that Friday night/Saturday morning.  At about 3.30am, I heard a baby crying in the distance.  My first thought was "hmmmm... I did not know there were other babies in this area".  The baby continued crying.  My second thought was "geez, poor baby, it is still crying".  I continued on the derivatives memo I was drafting.  Half-a minute later, it suddenly struck me that maybe, just maybe, that baby is Taiga.  And so it was!
• a few other incidents that happened which I thought at that time I should blog about, but have since totally forgotten it.  And I am usually known for having a good memory.