Once again, I've decided to redesign my website, and thus also the blog. In addition to that, I've moved the blog from the subdomain rene.modery.net to modery.net, as it is the major content provider for my website.

I made a few additions as well, e.g. it is now possible to "like" my postings here on facebook (Update: facebook's "like" feature is currently buggy, I deactivated it for the moment), and you can see my latest twitter update in the navigation bar. Lastly, I made it easier for readers to contact me, more information on the Connect with Rene page.

I will also take a new direction with my postings, and write a lot more about work related issues. Several articles about some SharePoint solutions I developed recently, the value of SharePoint as I see it, and some governance thoughts are currently in development.

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January
Holiday on Christmas Island

February
Went to China for work
Handed in my thesis, finished my degree

March
Went to Indonesia for work
Went to Philippines for work

April
Got an iPhone
Went diving
Went back to Germany for 9 days, return via Beijing
Started my aquarium

May
Singapore didn't want any tax from me (at first)

June
I think nothing happened in June....

July
Holiday in Haikou  (Also see http://rene.modery.net/1_living_working_travelling_in_singapore__asia/archive/405_recent_holidays.html)
Applied for PR

August
Holiday in Taiwan  (Also see http://rene.modery.net/1_living_working_travelling_in_singapore__asia/archive/405_recent_holidays.html)
Stopped being single :)

September
Holiday in Guangzhou (Also see http://rene.modery.net/1_living_working_travelling_in_singapore__asia/archive/405_recent_holidays.html)
PR application got rejected

October
My Birthday

November
Bought a very cheap fish-eye lens

December
Last month with Heidelberg Asia Pte Ltd
Went on Holiday to Krabi with girlfriend and sister

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After nearly 2 years and 4 months with my current company, I will start working for another one here in Singapore from mid-January onwards.

I definitely learned a lot during my employment here at my current company, and gained a lot of experience in different fields. It was a great work environment, with great colleagues and a very interesting job scope.

My new job will be very similar to my the old one, but with some more responsibilities. I'm already very excited about the opportunities this brings with it, and I'm looking forward to applying my knowledge and experience which I gained during the past nearly 2.5 years in a new environment.

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Last weekend, I bought a 0.38x converter lens for just $5 at the 'Thieves Market' (you could say it's a flea market). Naturally, it isn't worth much more than those $5....

Today, I bought a step-down ring to be able to add it onto my existing 14-45mm lens, and went towards the Boat Quay area to take some first pictures with it. The results:

This is how much I see with the 14-45mm lens at 14mm regularly:

Once I add the converter, I get this at 14mm:

Already a lot more to see! But clearly, I can also see the inside of the lens....

If I zoom in a bit until I don't see any black corners of the inside of the lens anymore, I get this angle (24mm):
Still a lot more than at the regular 14mm.

 

Of course, you get what you pay for, so the quality is not really good if I use this lens. But given the extremly cheap price, it's a nice toy!

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Looking at my life, I have to say that I can't be much more happy with it than right now, and I am really thankful for a lot of things and thankful to a lot of people.

I have a wonderful family who always supported me, and helped me get to where I am now. Despite some not-so-easy times in University, I made it through successfully, largely also due to their constant support.

I have a very interesting job role and great colleagues, my company has provided me with a great opportunity here. My work has allowed me to see many parts of Asia, something that I am really thankful for. Personally and professionally, I learned a lot during the past two years, and definitely grew in many ways.

I am truely blessed to be working in Singapore, I never imagined that I could identify myself this much with a place.

And last but not least, I have a very lovely girlfriend, who does a lot of things for me (which I appreciate a lot), dotes on me, and supports me in whichever way she can.

Life's good to me.

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In life, we have different goals. Some are short-term goals that we want to achieve soon, others are goals that we want to reach after a longer period of time. Our goals also have different priorities, some are more desirable than others.

As for me, I have 3 goals that are very important to me that I want to reach within the next 4 months. However, I cannot fully control the steps to reach these, for all three I also depend (to a varying degree) on other people.

Nevertheless, as these are probably the most important targets for me right now, I will do my best to get as close as possible to them. Once I reach one of these goals, I write again about it. It could happen next week, it could happen in November, we'll see.

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As it can be seen in the Tripit info-box on the left-hand side, I plan to travel quite a lot in the next few months, all possible thanks to budget airlines, and the financial crisis (which resulted in a drop in passenger numbers for most airlines, so that they offer some relatively cheap flights).

The first trip will be 4 days to Haikou (海口) in the Hainan province in Southern China, I'll travel alone. Flight is operated by Tiger Airways.

One month later, in August, I'll go to Taiwan for 10 days, flight in and out will be to/from Taipei (台北) with Singapore Airlines. This time, I'll most likely travel with a few people, definite number not confirmed yet. The current plan is to travel around more or less the whole of Taiwan via car.

The last trip in September is to Guangzhou (广州) in the Guangdong province. Yes, that's the Guangzhou I've already been to in January 2008. The one where I saw my first real panda(s) and hugged the white tiger!
I'll go there with my company's intern. Initially we planned to go for 2 days only, but after we booked the flights with Tiger Airways, they changed the return flight shortly after, so that we will now come back to Singapore on Monday instead of Sunday.

 

One other trip might still come up, however not for holiday, but for work. That will be to Bangkok, Thailand, but the date isn't confirmed yet.

 

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Currently still in preparation. Going to buy more plants today

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I wrote before how I am tempted to buy new camera equipment.

As for option one, I nearly bought the 14-54mm lens, but the seller was pushing a bit too hard for me to get it very soon (I wanted to have a look at it on a Friday, he wanted to meet me urgently on a Wednesday, as he had someone else interested in it). As I don't really need the lens immediately (just an upgrade of an already existing lens, the 14-45, which is quite good already), I told him that he can sell it to that other person.

Option two was the additional lens, that I might get one day, but I know that my main photography areas are elsewhere.

Option four, the flash, would be a wonderful addition, but still I'd use it not on a regular basis.

So, in the end, I went with option three and bought a new camera body   And I'm absolutely happy about that decision, I really love the 5fps and the big buffer (compared to my E-500). I went to the Bird Park on Sunday morning, and was testing the camera a lot. Awesome camera!

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Earthquake Details
Magnitude 5.0
Date-Time Wednesday, October 08, 2008 at 06:07:48 UTC   /   Wednesday, October 08, 2008 at 03:07:48 PM at epicenter 
 
Location 35.521°N, 140.073°E
Depth 35.7 km (22.2 miles)
Region NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
Distances 35 km (20 miles) ESE of TOKYO, Japan
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsww/Quakes/us2008xxaz.php

And my last posting made it to the top 3 results at google's blogsearch for earthquake japan:

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So here I'm sitting in the office in Tokyo, when suddenly the building starts to shake. An earthquake! But only a small one, after a few seconds it was over.

Guess I was the most confused looking in our meeting here....

 

PS: Yes, it just happened a few minutes ago, I guess at around 3.08pm local time

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I'm currently thinking of upgrading my camera equipment soon. The options I am thinking of:

1. Upgrading my Zuiko 14-45 f3.5-5.6 lens to the Zuiko 14-54 f2.8-3.5 lens. The 14-54 can be bought second-hand for around 550-600 SGD. Not sure how much I could sell the 14-45 for, maybe 100SGD.
   
2. Getting the Sigma 30mm f1.4 lens. Would be a wonderful addition to my Zuiko 50mm f2.0 macro lens, for low light situations. Second-hand would probably be around 500 SGD, however this lens is not being sold very often.
   
3. Upgrading my E-500 body to the E-3. Second-hand around 1700 SGD, if I buy a new one (comes with the battery grip), I could try to get a 1,990 SGD promotion.
   
4. Getting a flash. Probably the FL-50R, sold for 400-500 SGD, I think.

Options 1 & 3 are the most likely, sometimes there are second-hand bundles that sell both. The question is, however, if I want to spend that much money at the moment.

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A friend made a funny statement about 'older men' who like young girls:

Something along the lines of "Xiao mei mei, ni yao chi tang ma? Uncle gei ni."

Roughly translated: "Greetings and salutations little lady, would you care for some caramelized sweets of various selections? I, the older gentleman, could verily supply and satisfy that craving."

Of course one only understands the joke when you understand the original Chinese, which is more like "Little girl, you want candy? Uncle give you".

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Our company is updating the corporate desktops and laptops regularly with new software updates. As we are using Vista, there is currently an update including Service Pack 1 available:

The installation will log you off and will take 2 – 5 hours with 11 automatic reboots

But at least they also give the recommendation to start the update after work ;)

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I just love it when I see a short Chinese sentence and can actually read it! Although for this one (actually, a song title), I didn't understand it and had to rely on a translation and short explanation.

明明白白我的心

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