Why do I have to wait so long?

Waiting to catch an earlier flight out of Singapore. Mine's booked for 9:15pm. I arrived at 6:15 and there are 75 people on standby for the 7pm and 8pm flights on both MAS and Singapore Airlines. The ground crew is giving me the runaround with inaccurate information - some say line up here, some say take a ticket, yadda yadda.

Should I start screaming?

Rubik's Cube

Here's an "insight" from the Customer Analytics & Consumer Insights conference that I am attending in Singapore this week.

Rubik's Cube is back in fashion again. It was invented in 1974. I last played with one in my teens, many (many) years ago.

When Toys"R"Us started marketing the cube at its stores, they realised that consumers walked in, and loved playing with the product. But they weren't buying it.

Upon conducting a study, they realised that people were more likely to buy the Rubik's Cube if they knew how to complete it. Toys"R"Us then came up with a 7-step guide to completing the cube. Sales spiked in no time. Neat, huh?

So, when was the last time you solved the Rubik's Cube?

Leaving on a jet plane

Off to Singapore for a few days. Attending a conference. Will you be on the island too? Let me know, we should hook up.

What's your "in addition"?

IN ADDITION.

That's my overly repetitive phrase. I tend to use it all the time. My paragraphs never seem complete without it. In addition (tadaa!), I just like how it adds that sophisticated feel to my words, without sounding bombastic (yuck!)

Mel likes to use "nevertheless". She says her colleague, Z, likes to use "considering".

It even applies to the Malay language. In school, I used to love repeating "justeru itu" (which means: "as such") in my essays. I could just feel an "A" coming my way everytime I put one down.

What's your overly repetitive word / phrase?

Life's a Pitch!

We're having a team building event today in Kajang. 9 teams, 90 people. We're all selling products on the street today.

Sir, would you like a prepaid pack with that?

Bad day, yesterday

Murphy's Law states that anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.

I had some rotten luck yesterday. A mad thunderstorm, which left me totally drenched. A car that wouldn't start, because the battery died. A disappointed girlfriend, because I couldn't fetch her.

Thankfully, today has been good, thus far. I missed a mobile blogging moment with AAM earlier this morning, but that's minor compared to the roller coaster ride yesterday.

Here are some things that I re-learned over the last 24 hours:

• March & April are rainy months in Kuala Lumpur. If you park outdoors, always carry an umbrella, even if it makes you look geeky.
• The price of an AAM maintenance-free battery has skyrocketed from RM175 (July 2006) to RM238 (April 2008). That's a 36% jump. I was told that this price point applies to other brands too.
• The average life span of a car battery is 1.5 years. Mine just passed that mark (1 year & 9 months).
• How to tell when your battery is about to go kaput: with the cheap Malaysian / Japanese cars, it supposedly gives some "soft" signs at least 1-week prior. e.g. it stutters, or just feels different. Your best bet is to drive it to your local mechanic and have it changed immediately.

Samsung BlogMob(ber)

So here's the deal. I'm one of 16 bloggers in the BlogMob programme organised by Samsung and Mobile World (the magazine).

They gave me the Samsung SGH-i450, after I drew a black 7 of spades. Had it been a red card, I would have gotten the SGH-i550 which has GPS, WiFi and a 3.2MP camera. I wanted the latter, but luck is quite a rotten thing.



What do I have to do? I've been asked to use the phone and blog about it, although I am not obliged to (mmm hmm). I think this will be a tough task. For me, the mobile phone = Nokia (remember subsets in Math class?)

This is a form of peer-to-peer marketing. It's great to see brands such as Samsung experiment with these type of initiatives. It takes a little bit of guts, as the average human being (blogger) will always have something negative to say. Multiply that by 1,000 readers, and you might end up with a Marketing Massacre.

For more about the BlogMob, and the other 15 bloggers, check out:
http://blogmob.mobileworld.com.my/

Watercooler gossip

Overheard in the WIP toilet, last Saturday:

Empat belas haribulan, dia orang semua mau gerak. You dengan UMNO atau Keadilan?

Is something BIG brewing in Malaysia this week? One thing is for sure: Anwar Ibrahim is free to contest in a by-election after April 15.

Samsung BlogMob

At the Samsung / Mobile World BlogMob event. They've selected a group of bloggers to blog about their new phones for the next 4 weeks. I'm one of them. Drop me a comment and I'll include you as one of my ambassadors :)

More updates soon. Stay tuned.

Something everyone should have

A funny tee.

My colleague is loving his Friday. A bunch of them are wearing funny tees today.

What's the funniest tee in your wardrobe?

Mice on Sale?

Sale Mice? Or Salem Ice?

I don't think they picked the right design for this one.

Would you do this for 100k?

If this appeals to you (tummy or wallet), drop by 1U between April 11-13. 100k cold hard cash if you eat the snake. Alive.(Gimmick? Perhaps. I'm not sure either!)

On my wishlist for 2008

I'd like flexi-working hours. Travelling during rush hour is such a waste of life.

What would you do to make this happen within the next year?

Remember Central Market?

We're at the Central Market in KL today. The place has changed so much. There's the Annexe which is home to the arts and cultural stuff. Walking in now. Mel wants to take painting lessons. Cool!

Can you break dance like these guys?

Ever wanted to learn how to do the break dance? No better way than learning from my buddies. They've been working on their routine for a while now. I can't wait to hit the dance floor with them!



What do you think?

Dinner with the boss

Dinner with CEO tonight at Aliyaa in Damansara Heights. Nice place. Sri Lankan. Up market.

Make a comments widget in 10 minutes

I've updated the Recent Comments widget on the sidebar. Given the limitations of my Blogger template, I made use of the Blogger comments RSS feed + Yahoo! Pipes + Google Reader's clip. It now displays the author's name, followed by an excerpt of the comment (still dont' know how to extract X number of words from a feed element in Pipes - anyone know how?)



Is this widget better than the previous version?

How fast have you driven your car?

On the way back from lunch. 6 of us in a Honda Civic. Last stretch near the office. Bosses wanna see if we can reach 200kmph, and we've reached 118 so far (we have different KPIs outside the office)

We're reaching the bend. Hope to make it out alive.

Obviously they don't have a clock

My HP laptop is not working again. All this despite having it's mother board changed last week.

I'm back at the Service Centre today. Waiting for it to open. I may have to start knocking on the glass window soon.