Finished First Quarter at work with Flying Colors

Didn't expect what happened at work today. Performers for first quarter were awarded, it was unannounced actually, it wasn't really a formal recognition, the people from management just showed up on the floor and gathered themselves to give out the certificates. To my surprise one of the awardees was me, I thought I misheard my name or something. I got the highest "Customer Experience or CE" with an average of 100% (CE is based from the survey results submitted by Dell Customers that we spoke with) for the month of April. And the surprise didn't end their, I heard my name once again when they announced the highest CE for the whole Quarter 1. I couldn't almost believe, I don't really qualify myself as the best, 'coz I know I still have a lot of things to learn and there are a lot of better folks at work that I sometimes get insecure with. But I guess I'm half lucky too at the same time. I believe in luck, to my definition it's synonymous with right moment, we may all deserve of something, but not all of us deserve to have it all at the same time.

Meanwhile the Team's performance (we are clustered per Team at work with one Supervisor) for Quarter 2 has been promising. Started with me who just took home the highest CE for the first week of Quarter Two (I enjoyed the cash prize by the way) and our Participation Rate for Sales has been consistent for four weeks now (so it means we got a total of Php 20,000.00 for our Team Building Fund). The Team is also ranking first in terms of CE and other metrics but over-all we are currently in Second spot, we came short in our attendance and one other metric. I don't really expect too much for our team, but I wanna keep my hopes up especially for the all the teams to pass most of the metrics this quarter.

It always feels good to be recognized for your effort, it lets you know that you're doing great with what you do because sometimes you are too busy to notice it at all.

Calamba, Laguna Summer Escapade

After a few weeks of planning for a summer escapade, me and my colleagues at work finally invaded Calamba, Laguna (the birth place of Jose Rizal, our National Hero) which is about two hour trip via public transportation bus from Metro Manila. We rented a private place with four rooms and a pool with a karaoke machine which was just good enough for 11 of us for just Php 3,500.00 which was really affordable for a place like that. We spent time swimming and karaoke all-day-and-night-long. Most of my colleagues had a couple of drinks, don't know if it was wine or rum, couldn't really tell, what I do know is that some of them got so wasted that couldn't almost drive their bikes to go home.

What I always appreciate whenever I go out with non-Muslim friends is that they always respect what we really believe (as Muslims). They are aware that I don't take any alcohol drinks or eat anything that has pork or any food contaminated with it (even for the spoon that was used to serve pork, I couldn't use it without washing it thoroughly). From the time we bought food for the trip, everyone wanted to buy Purefoods Hotdogs but had to switch it with Swift Hotdogs because it got Halal seal on it. I informed them however that they can buy anything they want as long as I'll prepare the hotdog myself which everyone agreed.

Everyone enjoyed, especially me, though I slept around 10 PM 'coz I woke up around 4 AM to resume the singing and I realized that I'd sung too much that I lost my voice for two days. I even had to inform my boss at work that I couldn't report because I had problem with it. Which means that I'll get some write-up when I report to work later. I'm so guilty that everyone was able to go to work but me.

It was my first time to be away from the Metro Manila again since last October when my friends invited me to join them for a Pampanga trip and my second summer outing since I moved here to Metro Manila (last year was the first when I joined my co-workers for Baguio and Pampanga escapade) and I can't wait for more to come. Great day everyone!

Additional photos below

4-ft private pool with four rooms on the second floor

On our way back to Manila