I was glad to have the opportunity to work in Melbourne for 6 months but even happier to finally end my assignment there victorious, marking a good episode in my career story. Below were some of my fond memories while working there, and particularly grateful to be able to meet with some old friends while I was there.
Mark brought me to Australia Football on my last weekend in Melbourne
Suelyn joining me during my last week in Melbourne
Dinner with Suman and family in Sydney.
Dinner with Mark and Neil at the highest point in Sydney, a revolving restuarant.
A walk to the Parramatta river from Ermington GSK site.
The short walk to Parramatta river
One of my favourite dish in Melbourne, Sharkfin! :P
This is my favourite Japanese restaurant in Melbourne, the boss even knows me!
Kevin, a old friend whom i knew from work back in Singapore, now living in Melbourne.
My farewell dinner with the GSK colleagues.
The beautiful garden in Boronia GSK site where there are so many types of birds.
The IT team when we went live with the new SAP system.
A sea of cloud on my way to Melbourne
The impressive state library in Melbourne.
One of the most stressful moment to resolve a IT critical issue in Boronia.
Dinner with Stef and Family
A nice rainbow welcoming me to Melbourne on my first assignment trip.
Farewell lunch for Felicia.
Caught up with Jamie, a great old friend and mentor I knew back in Singapore.
Having to spend almost half of my time working here in Melbourne alone since last Nov was not fun at all.
I got Qiqi accompanying me here in January and during this March holidays, I had arranged for Shin Yang to come over this time. I rented a car and fetch her from the airport on a Friday evening. Frankly, I was so much happier to see her here and got her company. Coincidentally, there was also a public holiday that Monday which granted us a long weekend to go around Melbourne. That weekend, we drove to Great Ocean Road, Yarra Valley and also visited Stephanie at her place for dinner. I had never enjoyed the place this much since working here for almost 5 months. Of course having someone important beside you definitely made the difference. I also took my camera and tripod along this time and we are able to capture quite a few beautiful shots for both of us.
This year is slightly special when it comes to receiving the education awards from the government.
For the very first time (probably the last chance for Qi), En'en and Qiqi receive their first ever EduSave Award for their 2016 performance. Xuan also had a 'consolation' prize and receives the Education Merit Award. What a remarkable moment that all 3 got an award in the same year!
This was the car which I had driven the longest! Nearly 10 years, almost end of it's life span as determined under the Singapore regulations. The car served us so well, and it was able to carry 7 of us comfortably. I had driven it on my regular long distance to Tuas and also to Malaysia several times. It had never given me big issue, except for a little problem on the air-con. As a family, we had enjoyed watching multiple movies and dramas in it, and many times refused to leave the car until the show ended appropriately. It's name was even more fantastic, it was called a WISH, something which everyone would inspire to have at least one in their life. We were so grateful that this car had served us so well these 10 years and we could hardly part with it.
As a result.... we gotten ourselves his brother, another blue WISH! :-) Thank you so much my grey WISH, you had completed your great mission.
Despite not having much differences to our past Chinese New Year routine, I was particularly grateful to be back with the family for the entire 15 CNY days this year, without having to travel back to Melbourne for work.
As usual, we had great moments catching up with relatives and friends, taking photos whenever opportunities arose. Such get-together should not be taken for granted and we treasure the chance to catch up with those we had not seen often.
As i started my new year 2017 with lots of business traveling to Melbourne, i decided to reward Qiqi to come along with me during my first 2017 biz trip as she had worked hard for her 'A' level exams and having her holidays too. Personally it was good for myself to have Qiqi around too as it was damn bored to work alone in a foreign country and definitely not fun to dine alone nor enjoy the places of interest. While I spent most of my time at work, Qiqi was comfortably moving around Melbourne and enjoying her holidays. We did plan for a weekend trip together to the Great Ocean Road, visited the Victoria Market several times and also watch a football match at the stadium. It was a good experience to spend time bonding with my eldest daughter alone, our first overseas trip.
Four of the top Man in the family have birthdays just 2 days apart... :P
Last year Dot and Hong started the tradition to celebrate our birthday together and this year, without fail despite just returning from Harbin that day, they organised another celebration at the SiChuan DuoHua restaurant. It was really a fantastic way to end the year with such high note celebration!
It has always been our good fortune to be able to travel for holidays as a family and this year end holiday we have chosen to return to Taiwan for a good 12 days trip.
Personally in 2016, it had been a very busy year for myself at work, with additional responsibilities threw to my shoulders and required me to travel quite a fair bit during the second half of the year. It was also not easy for Qiqi as well as she battled with her 'A' level exams until early December. The rest in the family also strived to work hard to achieve a good conclusion for 2016. As such, many of us looked forward to this holiday to take a good break from our routine lifestyle and bond together.
We were lucky to have 2 friendly and passionate drivers cum tour guide to bring us round Taiwan to experience the local delicacies and places of interest. With the car chartered, it was also great fun for me to take lots of photography without having to carry the heavy gears around. During the trip, some of our stomach did not cooperate well, but we did manage to recover and continue to enjoy the journey.
With the kids growing up and our parents getting older, I am unsure how many more such trips we can have but will definitely like to continue such tradition as much as we could, these holidays are simply priceless!
This was probably the only trip which quite a few of us got sick during the trip, particularly in the stomach. We later thought it might be the oranges which we ate on the first day which probably contained lots of pesticide fresh from the farm. Nevertheless, we were still grateful to be able to have a round tour in Taiwan and a fantastic family bonding time.
It was Qiqi's Prom night and a big celebration night for her and her friends, particularly after a stressful year in preparing and taking the 'A' level exams. The prom night will informally conclude their junior college life with a night of dinner and dance. Qiqi had excitedly booked me in advance to photoshoot her and her friends, with my studio lights at home. We did setup the lights on that day, but as they spent most of their time in making and dressing up, we did not really have a lot of time left for photo-taking. Nevertheless, a few good shots were still taken for good memory sake.
