Are you on half-day today?

I called for a meeting the other day. It was about 5.30 pm. A number of my officers turned-up. One or two had to attend meetings outside. One of them went home early because times-up to go home at 4.30pm, as this person’s official working hours is from 7.30 am to 4.30pm. Well, in government office there is a flexi-system known as WP1, WP2 and WP3. Under WP1, you can clock in at 7.30am and go home at 4.30pm or WP2 you clock in at 8.00am and go home at 5.00pm or under WP3 you can come in at 8.30 am and go home at 5.30pm. So I told the officers who turned-up for the meeting a story that my friend from a private sector company told me. My friend said that one day he was about to go home at 6pm, a colleague of him passing by asked him “are you on half-day today”. It seems that in his company everybody normally leaves after 9pm. So anybody who goes home earlier than that they make sarcasm joke that he or she is on half-day leave. Similarly, I asked my officers whether the person who had gone home at 4.30 pm is on half-day leave. From then on, this becomes a sarcasm joke in my office too.

La isla Bonita……

Quite sometimes I didn’t write. Busy with office work. My policy, whatever I do, the priority goes to my office work. Kind of boring but what to do, the nation comes first. Last month went to Madrid, Spain. I really enjoyed the trip. I got a chance to visit the real Madrid stadium. It’s so huge and modern. Part of it is converted into museum like area, exhibiting the photos of players of Real Madrid club from the past to today. They also showcase the cups the team had won. I also visited the stadium where they have the bullfight (Spanish matador). The Spain they have long lunch breaks. At the conference I attended the lunch break is for three hours from 12.00 to 3pm. For dinner, restaurants start operation at 9.00 pm. We were so hungry and we make use of the Malaysian Embassy’s connection to ask the Turkish restaurant to open a bit early at 8.00 pm to serve us. Although the restaurant opened early and we took our seats, they still only started to serve us at 9.00 pm.