Got up around 6:30 am, got to work around 7:30 am. I had a few reports and emails to finish up before taking off to the airport. I had the 10:45 am Kuwait Airways flight to Dubai, I didn’t have any luggage to check in, I just had my brief case with me. Left work around 9:50 am, got to the airport by 10:15 am to find the flight had been delayed to 11:15 am which worked fine for me. As for the flight details I will be discussing that in another point.
The meeting was starting around 3:00 pm and I finished around 7:00 pm Dubai time. My flight was at 8:35 pm on Emirates, so I was flying to the airport. I had no choice in the matter, the next flight to Kuwait was around 1:35 am which is nuts. Luckily for me the driver took a back way to the airport which was a first time for me, we pass three or four very large round abouts and I got to the airport by 7:40 pm. If I took Sheikh Zayed road as the usual route then I wouldn’t have made the plane due to the rush hour traffic. Got home around 9:40 pm, and hungry as hell didn’t have a chance to eat anything all day and the airplane food wasn’t that appetizing.
I really do hate these one day flights, got a lot of work done but still really tiring.
Valleywag has been scooping up dirt on the Silicon Valley for a little while now, and they seem to have a very good idea of the worst IT jobs in that area. They can be monotonous jobs with low paying wages, no where to go, and each person would be burnt out mentally before completing one year at the job, not including the bad working environments which resemble caves in the basements.
These dusty days have been slowing things down a bit, and it isn’t the best days to be out. I’m a bit annoyed at the weather but there wasn’t much to do about it. I wanted to just stay home, do nothing, watch a lot of anime and relax. That is how the pace was going but I had an 8:00 pm meeting for work and hopeful that it wouldn’t take more then 1.5 hours.
At around 7:55 pm I got a call telling me there is a huge problem at a certain site and it needs to be solved post haste. That pretty much ruined my night, I was working for a couple of hours, and I was on the phone shouting my head off trying to get all the facts straight so I know what steps to take next. Its the worst thing possible when that sucker punch comes out of no where, and these days there have been a lot of sucker punches at work, I have managed to bring those numbers down just so we can organize all that is going on but it is annoying trying to diffuse every situation and make sure things go smoothly from that point forward. This is going to be a long couple of weeks.
The most entertaining and satisfying object there is in an office is the shredder. I feel very satisfied when I am done with some work and I take all the papers I have straight to the shredder. Then I stand there for some time watching it shred all the papers, there is that thought that something might get caught in it but we can avoid that. I remember all the desks got messier the first time the shredder broke, but now that we have a new one hopefully it will last a lot.
No time to work this week, and no time to rest. This is the first time I have had a course in Kuwait, and I think it will be the last time I have a course in Kuwait. The course is a simple 3 Day financial management course meant for non-financial people, even though their were some financial people. My phone wouldn’t stop ringing while I’m in the course, every 10 to 20 minutes I would get a phone call, and nobody would call unless something was very wrong. Then you would spend 5 to 10 minutes on the phone sorting things out, then you go back and keep thinking about it. Couldn’t fully concentrate on the class, but I winged a few things which was funny. The course was held at Court Yard Marriot so at least there were a few places to eat during the lunch break unlike the usual Shuweikh choices.
I haven’t been in a class room environment in over 3 years, its a bit of a funny feeling. I remembered all the idiots that drove me nuts in the classes with their dumb questions, it was the same case here. At the beginning of the day it was simple enough, and they were just an annoyance, but as the day passed by it got more annoying to the point I want to beat them like a piñata and just wait for the damn candy to come out. It was three days of hell since I had to handle the course as well as the work, my emails piled up and it was annoying to even look at them. Next time, course will be outside of Kuwait, if I could it would be outside the Middle East.
The last couple of weeks I have been coming back either 7:30 pm or 8:30 pm from work and it has been ongoing. Last night I got home by 9:15 pm and I don’t eat anything all day long. I can’t just stop for a snack because I get too hungry, and if I eat a full meal it slows me down so much that I want to fall asleep at work.
I was so exhausted today that I was falling asleep at the wheel, I new I had to get home and just some rest. I wanted to eat Dinner, or what was Lunch, as soon as I got through the doors. I didn’t feel like I got a chance to do anything, even when I was sitting in front of my desk I was dozing off and waking up after 10 to 20 minutes. I am going to need to recharge after some time, and at this time I’m reaching a limit, I just want to pass out but the problem there is a lot of work this week to finish. I keep missing phone calls and I’m barely able to keep up with all the work. A long hot shower does help unwind and some time off seems to be necessary. I need to pass out as soon as possible, and I need to take a few days off work when I wrap up the last of my projects.
This was one of the quickest business trips I have had in a while. We left on Qatar Airways which I was looking forward since I heard a lot of good things about it. Right away you notice that the plane is nice from the inside and the seat is comfortable. They had liban at take-off which helped with a quick morning nap, and the staff were very nice. We arrived on time, and the bus that takes you off the plane is a special bus for First Class passengers of Qatar Airways, which is different then anything I have seen before.
- 9:50 am Plane Took Off
- 11:00 am at Qatar Airport
- 11:30 am Meeting
- 3:30 pm Finished Meeting
- 4:00 pm Airport
- 6:30 pm Plane Took Off
- 7:40 pm Plane Landed
I didn’t see much of Qatar except for one hotel which was nice, but the rest of Qatar seemed like one huge construction yard. Construction every where, not necessarily towers but infrastructure and more. Their airport is pretty small, smaller then I expected but Qatar Airways has a terminal for First and Business Class all on its own which is very nice, didn’t get to see it though since I was coming back on Kuwait Airways. The one thing that surprised me was that Kuwait Airways left 10 minutes early, and landed 10 minutes early, I have never seen that in my life.
Link: Flickr
It seems I specialize in these one day trips. I have a few meetings in Qatar form 10 am to 4 pm, I was nominated with short notification. At least I will be back home in time to hang out with my friends. This trip is going to drain the last energy out of me. I keep hearing mixed opinions about Qatar, I really don’t know what to expect.
Even though this is supposed to be a long weekend, the timing couldn’t be any worse in my case. When you have deadlines and projects to close then you just have to step up. The thing I tend to follow is very simple, if my technical team is going to be onsite during a weekend or off work period then I am going to be there with them to help, and so they know that they aren’t solo. So today there is a lot of technical work from 9:30 am to about 3:00 pm. I will be following up with them and checking on a few things while I’m there.
Then I have a late lunch with family, then the schedule is open to a few things.
As stated this going to be landing to take-off the amount of time in Dubai. I have a few meetings the next day, and then I will pick up a few things that people have asked from me. These types of trips are exhausting but I have to get some of them done. One thing I am going to try to do is to get a movie into my schedule somehow.
This is the list of movies and the ones with a star is the ones I want to watch:
- 27 Dresses
- Jumper *
- Cloverfield *
- Rambo 4
- The Mist *