Klog S3.5 - Signature & UAT

Thousands of TRUE. U'll see stuff like this when u run UATs. Normally FALSE means your formatting problem, sometimes it means the IT dept's problem.

Ugh. Am late again(for klog). 3rd day consecutively fell asleep while just wanted to rest on my bed. Anyway. It's WEEKEND! a long one somemore. Though working and schooling is both 5-day week, there is a difference where school you have fixed timetable, you know what to expect for each day. For work, it's everything about surprise! especially for interns we never know what's coming for each day. You wont be able to to differentiate tuesday and wednesday like you used to do in school.

Friday started with left-over work from the previous day. Did some formula, extract month and year, compare, round up and while doing that. Suddenly, "Wei Jian, can you sign over here?" Wahawahahaha. "Erm... Can you please leave it here first, i'll sign in when i'm free later.."

Haha. of course not la. How can an intern be so duapai. lol. Signed and was asked to scan it. It's the death claim calculation that i did yesterday. Argh. Scanner got problem so i didnt get to keep the doc in my temp file. Anyway, a new task later on.


Asian Kitchen - Last time came here to eat with kim ben yk kh, i think. exactly the same branch.


Lunch today: Pork chop fried rice. Quite nice eh. the meat very 够味.

It's Senior Z this time round. Speak supersonic-ly, Playing excel with 3.0 x 10^8 m/s. God-like.

*badababada*
Z: "You know what i'm doing here?"
*point to the screen*
Z: "So, how to solve this problem?"
WJ: "Erm.."
*cracking head to spin my brain*
*badabada*
Solved.
Eh Wait.I didnt catch that!

UAT. User Acceptance Test. for the company's Sales Illustration System(SIS). Apparently this is a typical intern's task. Haha. It may seem manual but u do get to learn alot thru the spreadsheet. the formula, the formatting, the small little technique to for e.g. delete empty alternate rows. Basically what i do is: Test the system developed by IT in different scenarios specified by Senior Z. Then for each scenario, premiums for every year during the coverage period is generated through the system and to be compared with the actuarial spreadsheet. and the "TRUE" you see up there means the figures are matching. Matching means OK and pass. Ran through 10 SIS cases and 8 negative cases.

It was with abit problem. Senior Z is hard to find, always busy walking around. and the spreadsheet was woah damn cheem. Waseh. Use up to the double-alphabet column leh. Finished the work at about 430 and "I will need to check your work and i think i dont have anything else for you to do today." Muahaha. Slack time!

Turn off my monitor. Walking here and there see see wad my internmates are doing. Flip some papers to look busy and tada. End of my first week of PA. Next monday is Vesak Hols! A public holiday which would have no effect on me if i'm not doing my PA now. Hehe. Till next time!

Klog S3.4 - Death Claim & My Name

My working desk. Till tomorrow. The rightful occupant is coming back next week T-T

Heyheyhey~ it's almost weekend already! Tmr is dress-down friday. No ironing tonight!

Let's see what happened today. Didnt really look forward to today's work. Coz didnt have any left-over work to do! and indeed, spent the whole morning reading product description - get to know more about insurance contact, terms, benefits, premium etc.. Then, while i was reading the chinese version of Professional Conduct of Life Insurance Company, Senior J came and gave me sth to do!

Something closely related to my year2sem1 subject, Math of Finance. I was given an old claim file, a death cert and a policy contract, supposed to calculate the amount payable to the insured's family. Holding a death cert is definitely not a very pleasing thing to do but hey i am doing my part here to help process the death claim faster for the deceased's family! It was abit like school tutorial in excel. Read contract terms, determine effective interest rate, determine expected claim, discount rate and the present value of the claims. Then used a formula to check the calculation, checked by senior J and printed it out with my name below the column "Done by" muahahaha :D A little proud coz having my name printed on company's document

After lunch, there was a continuation of my previous project [the reinsurance claim study]. Since the previous senior[Senior M] who guided me on this project is already on hols, was asked to explain some workings to another Senior W, before he pass the doc to my internmate haha. Then only i realised this project is quite important! Cross-team project leh!

Third one was given soon after that. Data mining using Foxpro, then update policy attributes. SQL and vlookup and validations. Left some unfinished for tmr hahaha.

and some trivia. In the company we use a centralised network system and for everyone, we have our own folder in the Temp drive. Mine is Wei Jian of course. i saw some previous batch interns folders as well! When seniors want to assign task to us, they will simply paste a copy of the doc in our temp folder. So refreshing the explorer and found something new there is kinda exciting haha. Hope this sort of enthu-ness wont fade too quickly haha.

Ciao. Gonna try staying OT to see what happens in the office after 6pm :P

Klog S3.3 -Transformation & Truth or Dare (updated)

Yesterday's work ended like this.

Instead of going 'forward',let's rewind back to the morning

when we had our free breakfast given out by the senior management at the lift lobby. wow not much opportunity for them to serve you, u know!


The blowstick with my futile effort to mosaic it. Haha. I dont know what's considered as confidential info so ...


And what are the chances of you seeing a full auditorium of professional working staff whacking each other with blowstick as if they were kindergarten kids? :P

Let’s recap what happened in the third day of work. Need to complete this entry before losing it in the memory.

Morning. Reached office a little bit earlier than the previous days. And top company personnel were at the lift lobby giving out breakfast! Hoho but I couldn’t recognize any of them. Grabbed the fried bee hoon, packaged drink, and apple then went straight to level 13. The interns had it together before I went off to work on the previous claim study project. Gotta finish it by lunch! 9am interns were called to collect the company red polo at level 12. 10am passed back the unfinished work back to Senior M. Felt a little bit sad coz couldn’t finish what I’m supposed to do. Somemore forgot to save before it hanged while running a rather long vlookup function. Anyway, Senior M took it back, finished it in 1 hour time and went for his presentation to the VP.

Then basically that day was kinda finished lo. Went around and realized nothing for me to do le. So my team leader gave me some product info to read. Some internal thing for the financial services consultants. Read a lot about the insurance products, terms, returns, contract etc. Ugh hate readings coz it gives me sleepy bugs. But do get to learn a lot from that.

Then after lunch, was waiting for time to pass before all were called down to go to Suntec. Yeah~ taking shuttle to Suntec. Interns were in the last bus to go, Bus no. 15. -..- the security guard bluffed to us said all bus were leaving together.

The event at Suntec was interesting one la. Hundreds of people in red guided by little red flaggers into the convention centre. Heard a familiar voice and the MC turned out to be Flying Mr. Holland. The event was delayed abit and Mr. FD led everyone to do some hitting blowstick and there you guys see the hitting-like-kindergarten photo. Hehe.

And there was a quiz kinda thing with Man U jersey as the prize! Lol. Shld have taken part in it then ebay the jersey haha. But intern was seated quite far at the back la. So seems like no matter what will still lose one loh.

Speeches were given and then there were some performance. First one was super fake Truth or Dare game performed by Company ultra top management: President, CEO, COO, VPs (Actuarial Dept VP was one of them! Haha our dept is rather important huh). It was so obvious that the whole thing was rehearsed including the ordering fried kwayteow, extra chili without cockles in Hokkien part. Was really hilarious to see this kinda propaganda thing during a company event, even after attending so many of the alikes back in sec sch, jc and uni.

“So Mr. XXX, do you want ‘Truth’ or ‘Dare’?”
“Hmm.. I’m always a true person. So, ‘Truth’.”
-___-“
“Ok. ‘Truth’. Tell everyone here what the TRUE reason is for YYYYYY to be one of the six company’s pillar for future growth and transformation.”
-_______-“

Second and third performance was musicals. Basically was to tell own employees how good we are, and at the same time how bad our competitors are. There were storyline about the future in year 2011. Company P and Company G. Insurance oscar. Super lame! (sorry had to use this JC term haha)

Event ended super on time at 1730 and then rushed back to Ant Tea You. Darn tired after harmoc.

Klog S3.2 - Expresso & Red Top

Morning was spent on doing the left-over job from Day1. The claim study on two reinsurance companies, analyse premiums, claims and the ratio. Managed to finish it before lunch as told. Create tables, copy values, sum, formulas, colouring. It was quite challenging for me coz the senior seems to be quite stressed over this piece of work and starting everything from scratch does give me some sort of satisfaction hehe. Went for lunch at laupasat and almost drown in the people mountain people sea -..-

Oh and before lunch, the whole department was told to go down one level to the lift lobby and dance! My tian, there was this lady who led the dance moves (clapping, walking, turning and singing "we are the champions"). imagine the boss doing it! After lunch, realised that we do have an executive pantry besides the water dispenser next to the washroom haha. We went to play make some coffee. got myself a single shot expresso due to the very not user friendly machine haha. but it smells really nice~

After lunch, slack for about 20minutes coz had to wait for info from another team to continue my work. As interns are baokaliao worker, was told to do some data entry for 200+ records. Tried to finish it off asap so that i can get to do something requires more braincells and was rather pleased with my speed haha. Hope didnt make any errors.

After data entry, got the info for claims and continued with my claim study. Rearrange tables, combine sheets, calculate figures then actually hentam solved a formula problem. Shiok. Hmm ended my day with abit more to touch up tmr before the senior go for his holidays. will have to rush in the morning liao.

speaking of tmr. it's gonna be a half day! Coz will have some company event of the lauching of new vision(?) coz the new CEO just set a new direction for the company for a transformation. (they actually use TRANSFORMER image in their briefing slides). Bad news is have to wear a red top for the event~ Man U and also company's colour. Just collected ChiSoc maincomm tee, it's the closest-to-red-and-yet-still-can-pass-the-company-dress-code polo that i have liao.

Crap this klog is getting sien. just too tired to think of any quirky writing style le. Kinda worn out after two days but still looking forward to tmr!

Klog S3.1 - Yan's Palace & $1000

Was almost late for work on the first day, blaming the traffic from ntu to boonlay which should have been predicted haha. Luckily i wasnt the latest XD Anyway the briefing in the morning was sure long. So much of the company history that the HR guy shared with us. morning session was complete with a short mcq quiz somemore! a transition from sch to work first eh?

Then we reported to our respective department assigned. Mine is on the 13th floor with the others in the actuarial department. lol. sounds cool sia. whole department [except the sec] are acs ppl. 5 of us were assigned to different team in the department, i was in the product team [as far as i can rmb XD]

After being introduced to my team leader and teammates[or rather, my seniors], i was assigned to my first task immediately. woohoo. kinda excited haha. excel stuff. and database. great to see SQL again! [hey i learnt that not too long ago!] Then while i was still checking the figures, boss[ie my supervisor] said "C'mon let's go for lunch!"

Welcome lunch so that we will work harder! Haha. So the newbies just followed the boss + the team leaders took the lift, walk walk walk from raffles to chinatown. for about 20minutes. and guess what? lunch was at the legendary Yan's Palace[YP]! My tian. It's ok if u dont know what YP is, not sure if it's so famous but if you were/are a HCIBS-ian, u probably cannot not recognising it! The salted-egg-plus-lap-cheong food caterer from my previous hostel who opens a damn nice restaurant at chiatown. This is it!

We had dimsum, basically abit of everything. Ju Cheong Fun (HK style!), Siew Mai, Har Gao, Char Siew Bao, Pei Dan Zuk, abalone porridge and some other fried stuff like yam with lychee(this is REALLY good!), banana spring roll, pumkin with cereal etc. XDDD ah and not forgeting 杨枝干露[sagu+mango+pomelo+ice] for dessert. Man. it was damn fulllamak! Was super full and food was great~

Then it was a walk back to the tower and work work. Somehow was more efficient after the lunch hehe. Completed first task then given another. from one company to two then from one year to 2.5 years of data. Yaa, pretty much still doing excel and data stuff but i still kinda enjoy doing excel XP

Got to apply stuff that i learnt into practice[though only more on the manual stuff], the assumptions, the calculations, the excel shortcuts and everything. hmm felt kinda shuang haha.

Just wish that i can take photos in the office haha. It didnt say we cant what!
First day of work was tiring i guess. Haha understand how comforting a hot bath is. Aaahhhh~ Maybe getting old already. -..- Though tired like anything, i would say that i have enjoyed my first day there!
[just dont think about the $$, learning experience.. exposure.. haha]

Oh and the S$1000 note, haha i think it was on everyone's table lah. The senior who assigned task to me asked me to use that to copy down the computer password haha. so i assume it's actually rough paper, took it back and snapped a picture with my company tag.

Kk. that's all for the first day i think. Will try to update everyday[as i need to write log book -..-] haha and for your viewing pleasure, of course ;)

Klog Season 3 - Preload & some other stuff

Woohoo. am going to start my first day of PA in 2 hours time.
Man. though expected a lil bit sien-sation after talking to senior who went under the same program last year. still kinda looking forward to it.
Ironing sux. Ugh.
Will try to post a klog everyday, just like wad i used to do last time.

Program Code: 1539
Product Development: - Testing of benefit illustration systems. - Testing of system handling of new products prior to launch.
Actuarial Assumptions: - Assist in claim studies.
Financial Reporting: - Month end valuation and checking.
Reinsurance: - Reinsurance admin.

Hmm doesnt sound very interesting eh. :P
1539. Go buy 4D!

**
Ant Tea You harmoc intensive prac phase 1 has ended. Attendance was very encouraging! Hope it will maintain/get better as we get closer to the concert.

Went back to nj and played harmoc with j3,j4 and j5s! Almost lost my way there haha. Still. Feels good to see harmoc ppl once again. 天冷就回来~

<分享> 意志力 Willpower

戏里这个人的意志力是恐怖的

**
被烤时在董主播那里看到的有趣转贴文章
重点是说 人的意志力 就和体力没什么差别
都有所谓的极限 就像钱一样需要支配需要有budget
都需要锻炼才可以提高它的上限 酱紫才会接近所谓的"成功"

这里摘录文章的10个重点
1. The brain has a limited capacity for self-regulation, so exerting willpower in one area often leads to backsliding in others.

2. The brain’s store of willpower is depleted when people control their thoughts, feelings or impulses, or when they modify their behavior in pursuit of goals.

3. Other activities that deplete willpower include resisting food or drink, suppressing emotional responses, restraining aggressive or sexual impulses, taking exams and trying to impress someone.

4. What limits willpower? Some have suggested that it is blood sugar, which brain cells use as their main energy source and cannot do without for even a few minutes. Exerting self-control lowers blood sugar, which reduces the capacity for further self-control.

5. Foods that persistently elevate blood sugar, like those containing protein or complex carbohydrates, might enhance willpower for longer periods.

6. In the short term, you should spend your limited willpower budget wisely.

7. On the other hand, if you need to study for a big exam, it might be smart to let the housecleaning slide to conserve your willpower for the more important job.

8. Similarly, it can be counterproductive to work toward multiple goals at the same time if your willpower cannot cover all the efforts that are required.

9. The good news, however, is that practice increases willpower capacity. Like a muscle, willpower seems to become stronger with use.

10. In psychological studies, even something as simple as using your nondominant hand to brush your teeth for two weeks can increase willpower capacity.

这解释了为什么考试期间，我们都会看多几部戏、吃多几包零食、打多几回合的game 哈哈
所以大家一起训练意志力吧！明天开始换手刷牙！我试过一次，好像刷不干净的感觉 lol

PS: 主播的观点就是不一样(虽然现在讲的这篇不是她本人写的)，她的blog值得一看(再看).

Let's go online, shall we?

To share the music with people who search for keywords like harmonica, harmoc or songs they like, we've gone online. Hopefully, there are people like it as much as i do.

Though a little bias here, below is my personal favourite. Haha. Enjoy.

医龍

又嗑掉一部日剧了

医龍，一开始听到朋友谈论这部剧时，还以为是古装港剧、述说着古代神医的呢。不像吗？古代神医的称号。故事主要讲述一个拥有神之手的外科医生朝田龍太郎怎样在被邀请下，为了加藤　晶的论文进行BATISTA手术，寻找梦幻队伍- team medical dragon[日文也有hukum DM?] 和手术过程。枝干就是每个队员背后的故事，还有一些从中作梗的怪老头。说是神之手也不为过，他做的手术绝对[最常出现的日剧对白之一]是成功的，而且往往比别人用少很多的时间，薪水应该是天文数字吧。每个小故事虽然有些太过戏剧性和巧合的成分，但也蛮牵动人心。本来就是戏剧嘛。觉得戴上口罩在手术台的戏最难演，只能靠眼神来表达，他们的眼睛也太厉害了吧。楼上官网照依人头大小代表戏份和初次要，而脸最没有打光站在后面的就是作梗的怪老头了。

喜欢日剧的精短，只有11集却把故事交代清楚，而且每一集都有一个中心点，不像我从小看到大然后越来越烂的第8波道 -..-

学习/观察到的东东
1. 日剧看多了, 有注意到吗?日文里的是没有"ti"的发音的。 平仮名、片仮名上面的 "ち、チ" 摆在 "て、テte" 和 "と、トto"的中间却偏偏念"chi"。剧里一直提到的医龍team dragon[チーム ドラゴン]听起来变成cheem dragon就很别扭。注意咯，"医"在日文的kanji里是简体字哦。

2. 日剧的道具组都很用心：这次还模拟手术台上的血肉模糊、心脏、血管、喷血。稍微一想象你就可以感受患者虽然有麻醉但是肉被割开时有多痛。哇赛这就是我不可能读医科的关系。然后还有剧里出现三次但很抢眼的黑白茶杯实在太酷了！金龙鱼看起来也不便宜，那个鳞片是美到~

3. 学到了手术室里的运作。执刀医 内科医 麻醉医 第一助手 第二助手 看护士 临床医学技士。每个人在团队里都有自己的角色，合作起来实在是厉害！还有一大堆的医学名词、用具。可是用手去掏心脏去按摩心脏时还是有小小过头...

4. 漫画。Wow 又有漫画看啦！拍摄成剧集的漫画可以有一种不同观点来看~

5. 日本的医生漢字kanji要很厉害，几乎所有病症、医学用语都是100%纯汉字！而kanji又是学日文里最难的，辛苦塞，sensei.

Time to reopen my organizer

My ntu organizer has been left on my table, coated with dust since the week before exam, after i crossed out the reminder for my last presentation for AB214 on the calendar. No more meetings, project whatsoever until, at least, end of exam (which is today!)

I don't know since when things that i used to be doing with passion now seem to be burden on my shoulders. Maybe it was right to say that never mix your interest with commitment. As in, once you are doing stuff that you like not because you want to, but rather, you need to, it will be quite nasty. Gah. Let's not talk about these stuff now.

With the end of today's killer paper (so to speak, the hardest one of ACS course),it marked the end of my year 2 in NBS, the end of my year 1 in ACS and the start of the so-called break before final year of uni. Time flies! Voila and it feels like i am being pushed out of my baby cradle. Now having the urge to grow up and learn, exponentially.

Was reading my old-old blogposts and realising how much i have changed. and how much stuff around me changed. The only constant thing in life is change. Wow. How scary. I do wish that there is something that stay constant, at least there is something familiar to hang on to. Giving me the "Hey you are still here" kinda feeling. When everything changes and the change of state is memoryless in nature. It scares me. (walao. this is how i apply Markov property 0.o)

Sometimes i don't like my "ability" to see stuff that others dont, to see stuff that (in my opinion) it should be done instead. I'm an extreme perfectionist. I can't bear mistakes that could have been avoided or those which were detected but not ractified. Ugh. Need to tone this down a lil bit. To prevent future injuries. That's why i dont like the "ability".

This post is with rather random ramblings. Just let me end with some little plan for my final year in uni.
1. Three more actuarial courses left. One core. Two electives. Life Contingencies, Actuarial Stats and Asset Valuation. which add up to a total of 7 actuarial courses = 28 Academic Unit(AU)s. approx 1/4 of the total.
2. One more business core course. Strategic management. Man. OB again?
3. Two prescribed electives: one from Arts and Social Science. another from Science and Tech. Probably Language Puzzle or Reading of Modern Chinese Lyrics, TCM or Forensic or any other that fits my timetable.
4. More language electives! Jap. Korean. Spanish. German. in preferential order.
5. double fyp and don't ask.

Totally random post and hope you are not as annoyed (by its randomness) as the blogger.
Ciao.