Went for the Grand Prix last Sunday. Fantastic ambience - and was thankfully seated right in front of the first corner where Montoya clipped Schumacher immediately after start-up. Pretty good stuff - not to mention the absolute lack of fan support the so-called "Malaysian F1 driver" Alex Yoong recieved. (The Petronas-Sauber cars performed a lot better, and were a lot better received than the pathetic Minardi team). Also enjoyed idle speculation during the Malaysian Air Force flyover about the prospects of a military coup d'etat, missile fire into the box seats(which I didn't get this year, thanks to declining corporate sponsorship), and being amused at the large number of old rich guys with young stewardess-lookalike women.

We were overtaken by a TVR Chimaera and a Maserati Merak on the drive home. Although, in a freak twist of joyful malice, it started raining, and we soon spotted the poor bastards in the TVR huddling under a bridge fiddling with the convertible roof while about 15 other motorcyclists watched them in amusement, and probably contemplating some ad hoc banditry.

Anyway, on to today's golden moments at work(orientation training at the main branch in KL). The ride into town really made me appreciate the luck I have at being chauffeured to work.

Today's Golden Moments.

"but the account never changes.. it's very nature.. you know.. NATURE."
"erm.. do you mean NEUTRAL?"

"if you go from 0 to 20 that mans you increase 200%" (if you can't figure out the two horrible mistakes with this sentence i hereby revoke your sentient status)

"(COMPANY NAME) is not tan sri XXXXXXXX but rather the combined sum of you employees..." (AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAH)

watching the cartoon from www.whomovedmycheese.com and trying to resist from alternately laughing out loud, pointing out the various moral loopholes of the story, and throttling my instructor with the XXXXX corporate tie. not to mention resisting that our function at XXXXX is more to add to the XXXX family's overflowing cheese station rather than find out own "new cheese"

learning the 7 habits of highly effective people in malay("menajamkan gergaji")

being the ONLY overseas graduate in the whole orientation group

listening to the cheerful internal audit guy tell us: "we don't beat you up or cut your hand and pour salt in it.. but we have psychological techniques and our staff are trained in interrogation... so don't play play." (he also had some good stories about fraud cases - particularly regarding people who escaped)

Participating in asinine exercises involving throwing balloons around - which tied into quality management through some arcane syllogism that eluded my comprehension.

Constructing 3d representations(origami!) of the corporate culture(my group did a very lopsided cottage that resembled a "old-fashioned kampung toilet")

Noting the utter absence of any attractive females in the group

And, to Dan, Vernon, Jason and the rest of the happy 350 PYC people, there was a half-hour talk on "synergy". I now understand why you guys hate me so:) I repent of my sins:)

Also, they described their Global Industrial Master Plan - or GIMP. The importance of GIMP 1(domestic) and GIMP 2(regional) were highlighted repeatedly(in the typical corporate power-point presentations with lots of fancy colours, bulleted buzzwords such as "innovation" and "continuous improvement"). Clearly the corporate strategists at XXXXX have never watched Pulp Fiction. Or else they have, and this is their twisted way of revealing just what the company represents to them.

And, in a final, utter act of blackest hypocrisy, the last talk was on the importance of "spiritual" and "mental" well being, the importance of making deposits into your "emotional bank accounts", the need for constant psychological renewal, and a touching, tear-jerking expression of concern: "We don't want you to die for our company." (Yeah, because they can wring more labour out of your breathing, work-sated, barely mobile zombified form. And avoid life insurance payouts.)

I am now convinced that the HR/Training departments of organisations worldwide are participating in a massive conspiracy to use cutesy phrases, self-help books(there was a whole session on @#%@#ing Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People), one-shot animated parables, inane "teambuilding" activities, and repeated pep talks as a way of breaking the spirit of the working man. Since the baton and chanting of Maoist slogans have gone out of popular fashion, this is a more terrifying and insidious way to destroy you as a person. And after one day, I can say that I'm almost ready to break.

If anyone calls me on the phone these days, my instinctive reply is: "good afternoon this is XXXX bank, XXX branch how may i help you?" in a breathy, telephone-audit-passing, optimistic, "smile-on-your-face-which-can-be-percieved-by-listeners"(a theory propounded during one exercise in practicing our phone habits - probably through some mysterious and little understood kinaesthetic process. Oh, and the phone habit exercise is part of the organisation's efforts to have customised greetings from all staff members.