Normal Business

I have written in this blog in the afternoon, but when I read it again, gawd, it was such a boring read.  So I delete them all and re-wrote a new one.

So basically, for today, it's business as usual, a little relaxed because the weather has gone bad for a couple of hours.

So instead, I'll rant out about my thoughts that ran pass me today.  While I was eating my dinner at 1800 hrs, I looked around the mess room, I noticed, about how certain races stick to their own 'tables'.  Near to the food buffet, are the malay group, the middle area of the mess room are the ibans and indians and far corner are the chinese group.  

There's no racists issues here, everyone is free to sit anywhere, and I assume everyone tends to stay in their own race group, at their own comfort.  Even, that's not the type of group diversity, there are the contractors and operations group, for some people like me, I sit anywhere, why?  I don't belong to either the contractors or the operators.  So I usually find myself sitting somewhere in the middle amongst the ibans and indians, which sometimes I get a raised 'curious' eye or two because my coveralls are the same as the operators.  Oh, coveralls here play a role here in terms of hierarchy, orange i.e. operators are the host, thus they have more say in the mess room, and different other colours are the guests.  And tonight when I was having snacks at 2100 hrs, when everybody is out of their coverall, the race group remains.  

The thing here, it is not about the groups that makes it interesting.  It is the different nationalities that you find here, filipinos, indonesian, dutch, malay, ibans, nigerian, indians and middle easterns are amongst the residents here.  It's a great melting pot of cultures and races.  It's great that these people are working together in consensus to ensure that this nation continue to produce hydrocarbon by being away with their families to earn money.  I have a great respect for them.  For example, my crew stays for 8 weeks for their shift.  Imagine that.  8 freaking weeks.  I'd go crazy, or perhaps I won't because I would probably be used to it.  The longest stay offshore is this shift that I am doing, and a week has passed and I didn't realise it that much, I'm half way through my shift.  And in fact I can't wait for next week, not that I want to go home soon, but I'm feeling quite comfortable here, and enjoying my work here.  It's great.  It's like living in a hostel, but instead of studying, I work.  And enjoying the company of many people, enjoying the network, which is a really good skill to have here.  You'd have to melt pretty quick to get to know them.  

And sometimes, believe it or not, if my roommate's stop snoring, I would wake up.  It's like suddenly you felt alone, or worried.  Being offshore, and the work they do, is a very risky business, some people wonder why they are being paid so much, but if you take into consideration, being away from family and producing hazardous products out of the ground, they deserve the money, in fact, at a point I think it over and over again, there's not enough money to replace them, being away from home for so long, and risking their life every single day even it doesn't look like it.  Can you put a price tag on that?

So anyway, a food for thought.  Do you think that you've done the nation proud by ensuring what you do is helping the nation?  I think I am.  But indirectly.  I play my part here to ensure integrity is restored so that the facilities here continue to produce for our nation.  

So there, my blog's been quiet although the number of readers are still consistent.  I'm glad.  Keep reading my blog, ladies and gentlemen...  More updates soon, I'm wondering if I could bring my camera here, because at times, there are so many beautiful things to shoot here.  I miss my camera...  So until then, take care and Adios.  

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