Holiday... again

Yeah, I know I'm on holiday again, right now I'm under the sun, my hair still dripping from my afternoon swim, eating my sister-in-law's freshly baked delicious cholocate and cream cheese cookies. I did not use to tan but this time around I tanned on the first afternoon I arrived, thereafter, I am just cautious not to get a sunburn on my nose. It is a very cool holiday, except that because of Chinese New Year all the stalls are closed and I haven't had a chance to eat all the great food I miss so much, next year my in-laws will visit us in England for New Year and we will come at a later time when we can eat anything we like.

I occupy most days playing Pokemon or PS3, here Jacques is teaching me to play Pokemon, I borrowed his cards 'Leaf deck' against Nicolas' 'Fire deck'; it is a surprisingly very clever game.
In the afternoon, we swim, but only for a short while, most of the afternoon is spent playing 'Shark', so Tata (aka me) is the shark and the corners are home and I am supposed to lure and catch the fishes: Jacques, Nicolas, Kitem and Anna. That can go on for a whole hour at a time.
On CNY's day; Anna 's family celebrate in a traditional manner where the youths and children must serve tea and wish a Happy New Year to their elders and in exchange collect red packets Ang Pows.

Alex and I had a more relaxed New Year, my mom in law cooked a traditional vegetarian dish and spring rolls and the whole family played Nintendo Wii games all day.

Mr Garden and Kitem have started a tradition of inviting once a year the whole family, both Anna's and Alex' parents and sisters for a nice family reunion. Julien worked with my father in law for a short while many years ago, so they are always very eager to catch up.

Ole!

Our Kick-Off Meeting this year was in Madrid. I had more fun than last year in Vienna, I guess it is because this time I knew to expect lots of drinking and very short nights, so I was very good throughout, but I did not let the lack of alcohol prevent me from having good hearted silly fun on Friday night.

The hotel bar was a popular meeting point and we spend most evenings in the hotel bar, drinking mojitos made by our favorite barman, Javier. The bill for the team on the Wednesday night came up to USD5500, in our defence, the German team was drinking whisky at 60 dollar a glass! So it was not the mojitos.... (Here from L to R: Nikolai (who replaced Klaus in the Nordic), Alison, Ron, Manny, Torsten and Carrina).

On Thursday night, we had a very tasty tapas dinner in una taverna that has stood here for the last 400 years and that was a hostel for travellers. The main course was a whole leg of lamb, delicious. Followed by dancing the night away in a popular night club. Here from L to R: Alison, Carrina, Me, Estelle (from French office) and Karmelita (new marketing for the Eastern European Market based in German office). On Friday, after the meetings we took a tour of Madrid by night, unfortunately all monuments pictures came out dark. Here Simon (UK product manager), Peter, Martin (German Office - IT), Nick and Martin (who had a bad back and walked funny for 4 days) in front of the royal palace.

The dinner on Friday night was wonderful fun seating with the Italian team (above Matteo, Massimiliano and Marco) The famous Spanish red wine (Riojo) was flowing and these sexy Italian men were a feast for the eyes. Beth, Emma and I were overwhelmed with their attention and silly games. Here from left to right: Mauro (the Italian GM), Seda (Sales for Turkey and Greece), Matteo, Massimiliano, Emma (EUMEA secretary) and you all recognise Beth by now.

The gala dinner on Saturday night was hosted at the very luxurious hotel we stayed at, I am slighty disappointed that we did not have flamenco dancers for our entertainment, but we had a famous flamengo guitarist. (Here with my SA girls Dani and Alison).

Toledo

I've got some updates coming soon, but I am travelling all the time and find myself sleeping the evenings away when I'm home... I leave you with a few photos of Toledo, Spain before the big Kick-Off meeting (party) pictures in Madrid. Catch up with you lots this weekend. XXX

The cathedrale of Toledo both in Roman and Gothic styles
One of the four doors of the cathedrale
Toledo over the river Tuja. The city incorporates architectural influences of Christianity, Juadism and Islam. We also visited the Alcazar and a Synagogue. Toledo is famous for its steel and there was numerous shops selling knives, swords and even armors.

Lunch was fabulous, in a gorgeous setting and we were served Paella, followed by caramel ice cream. yummy.

Christmas

It was a beautiful Christmas Eve with good food (as expected) and lovely presents but best of all, with the wonderful company of the family, cousins and baby Antoine.

First present for first Christmas, with Mom and DadWith Mémie, aka Kitem
With Tonton Alex, who more than ever wants one of these all for himself
Mamie Ese with all four grand daughters, shame her three grand sons were absent, especially my brother and his boys, but I've seen them loads on MSN on Christmas day and Santa Claus, via Tata Hélène brought them very cool Light Sabers; I'm delighted.
I can't complain and got to play loads with Antoine on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and today, Yay!!!!

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

It's been another busy year end - I transferred to my new role successfully with a couple of teething problems as you would expect but with more victories than setbacks. We closed 2007 with a bang and now, 2008, Here I Come!

A line up of beauties: (L to R) Beth, Sarah, Alison, Tracy, Dani, Sarah, Me (Thanks go to Hannah for my hair)

A very jolly coach ride to Madame Tussaud

From top to bottom: Me enthusiastically pooring champagne

Ann, Julie, Sue and Jane

Emma, Me, Dani and Hannah

The next morning, Alex asked what wax figurine I saw, and I said "There wasn't a lot, I don't remember seeing any", the photos betray me! (darn photos), however, after seeing this picture, I do remember watching Johnny Depp and thinking, I would not have thought he was taller than me and also thinking he's wearing too much make-up. Martin met with his idol, (I can't believe I did not spot Shrek!!!), anyhow, Martin has been the most wonderful friend this year, he will be my boss next year but we will work as a team needing to achieve one common target; most of the best things that happened to me this year was with a little help from him.
Jun is unfortunately leaving our team, having to relocate to the mother ship in Japan, hope he stays in touch, I know I'll miss him next year.

The girls are a little bit worse for wear at the end of the night, but you are all my witness I never had that much of a good time last year and it was awesome.

Have a very Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year!

Happy Birthday Julien!

I'm copy-catting Kitem with an ancient picture of the best big brother in the World, surrounded with toys, no ferrari yet. Joyeux Anniversaire mon Juju!

The City Where Giants Roamed

Rome... It's an aboslutely incredible place. The scale of the city is beyond words, there you are walking down a narrow and dark street wondering what is that pretty church that is coming into view, when all of a sudden you are the end of that street and that Rome comes in full view with giangantic buildings of huge proportions. In the photos below I'll try and represnet that grandeur to you, use your imagination, and remember that most of this city was build 2000 years ago.

Bellissima! The Trevi Fountain
A Detail of the Arch of Optimus Severus (3rd century AD)
Posing in front of the Colosseum, built in 8 years with 40,000 slaves in 3rd Century AD
I liked the remains of this bridge built in 3rd Century BC!

You can see more photos on my facebook page here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=21561&l=55209&id=583215597
(You don't need to set up an account or register to view this page)

What's the big secret keeping me away from blogging?

I can finally reveal (I think I can anyway) the reason that has been and will continue keeping me away from my blog and reading your blogs (I still get regular updates from Kitem though).

You are now reading from the new UK Retail National Account Manager - Ta-Da!

A few months ago, a young man joined the team as sales executive to support Martin and take away the load from me so that I could focus on Marketing and business development, unfortunately things did not go as planned and sadly Russell left our team as quickly as he joined - No, I did not beat him or torture him - he had a long journey to work, which he hated, amongst other reasons which are irrelevant now. So I found myself absolutely swamped trying to catch up with all the range reviews and year end promotions to plan, the marketing events to organise and attend. To put it simply I was doing two full-time jobs in the time given to one human being. It was exhausting but I coped really well, and before I knew it, Ron was calling me to his office to say very nice words indeed: "Helen, I don't know why we're looking to recruit outside the company when we have the perfect candidate within"... Not being the brightest one, I waited for him to continue, till the light switched on in my head that he was actually talking about me!!!! memememe, perfect, clever, beautiful me! (oops I'm being over confident again).

That said, I wasn't meant to tell anyone, and what happens when something is not quite official? Well, you start doing the new job but continue doing the old one at the same time. Martin introduced as the UK Retail National Account Manager to all of his customers that will now be mine (and as you know, I get on famously with all of them, so it's simply awesome) and I still have to cope with my current job until someone comes in to take over my role; that will be in January by the looks of it, so I won't be around here much till then - but I do think about all of you everyday and I do miss you loads.

In the meantime, Alex and I are escaping this stressful times, with a four day trip to Rome! So have a brilliant weekend. Love you all.

PS: Kitem is offline for a few days while she is changing ISP. She sends her love to you all and will be back on Wednesday.

Who is the shittiest of them all?

In this age governed by modern economy, where businesses aim at customer satisfaction and compete to be the best in their field, I am always stunned to see that some of the world giants in turns of company size and revenue compete at providing no customer service and at who is the shittiest of them all?

Our first participant is never on time; they will make you wait on the runway for an hour so you cannot use the loo and miss connecting flights/appointments, they will loose your bag at least once; and when you check in your very fragile package because you cannot take it onboard it is against their new security policy, well you can be sure that it will arrive wrecked and soaking wet; they will not apologise for doing so as it isn't their fault they are so incompetent; (possibly their parents'?) They are British Airways!

Our second participant is another airline; they will delay your flight for two hours followed by 20 minutes more, followed by 20 minutes more, followed by another 20 minutes (Note that if a plane is delayed more than two hours the company must buy you dinner, by splitting three hours that way, they are saving themselves quite a bit of money); they will not compensate you in any fashion, they will not put you in the other flight that is leaving to the same destination; the customer service will close in front of you, next, in a long line because she finished her shift and won't be replaced by anyone, you will not be informed by anyone except the flight information TV flashing orange on the black screen "now departing 22.20", then "now departing 22.40", (you get the picture). Once in the plane they tell you you're going to be served dinner as a compensation but when the food trolley comes, you realise that you need to pay for your food. They are Scandinavian Airways!

The last one is a UK retail, (I won't divulge the name because they are a customer of ours). they advertise that they have an excellent customer service in store and great prices (#COUGHBULLOCKSCOUGH#); but they do have a great range and are very conveniently located so I do shop there; I have never got any help from anyone; I have spent a lot of time in their stores going "excuse me" "Can I get some help please" "Can you spare me a minute" "I have a question" and be ignored dramatically, leaving everytime without my purchase because after standing around like an idiot trying to buy something, I thought I'd have the time to find the same item from another more helpful store and possibly at a cheaper price. Needless to say they are not doing very well.

This competition is open, you may submit new candidates.

Paris to Norway

Wow. It's been a while and I'm only dropping by to give you a brief update. I've missed you, I miss reading your blogs everyday, although Kitem has been keeping me updated with your stories. It's been very busy lately, Paris, Conference, Norway, more meetings, deadlines and visits from my brother and now I'm waiting for Kitem and Mr. Garden to come over for a week and before going back to Norway for a few more days. Everything is going great, although I am feeling very tired, I am looking forward to seeing mom and dad again, and Alex will be taking me to Rome in November, I can hardly wait as you can imagine.
Miss ya all
Take care!

Rugby World Cup England Vs South Africa. Here with my colleague Nick and customer Keith.

Some of our customers from South Africa and customers from England posing in front of the Eiffel Tower. The trip was great, I also caught up with childhood friend Faustine who just moved to Paris.

A nice snapshot of the Place de la Concorde, taken by SA colleague, Clive, while I was busy playing the Tour Guide of my country's capital.

At the sales conference a week later with SA colleagues, Dani and Clive and UK colleague, Peter.