Work

The Global Café years - The Interview

The Recycled Bits Factory — Sun, 19 Feb 2006 01:22:00 GMT

Back in 1996, there were very few internet cafés in the world. One of the first few well known ones - Cyberia - opened in London in 1994, but it would be a few years before everyone would become used to the internet. One of the owners of Cyberia, Nigel Foster, told me this story:

"I invited one of my ex-colleagues at IBM to have coffee and look at the WWW. By way of a demonstration I pulled up a weather map from Australia and showed it to him. He refused to believe it was an actually on a computer in Australia, and suspected instead, that we had a file server in the back office serving up the maps."

Nigel later sold his shares in Cyberia and started Global Café, and this was where I came into orbit. I had joined a company in KL which had acquired the franchise for Global Café in Kuala Lumpur, and went to Genève — ostensibly to observe the operations, but ended up helping them set it up.

Genève is a brilliant place for Global Café to start - it's the birthplace of the WWW, and hugely international community surfing right on the edge of the technology. Being Genève, the clientèle wasn't just anyone either. One day the Peruvian UN Ambassador walked in and was hooked for the whole day.

Plus they had the International university there, so all the café assistants (not only to serve coffee, but more importantly help people start surfing) were students at the U. There were girls from Sweden, Mexico, US, England, Spain, Venezuela — so that anyone who walked in could easily be speaking their mother tongue.

Back in KL, (and to our story…) I started interviewing candidates for the positions available in our setup. This particular interviewee is a diploma holder in computer science with experience in F&B (specified in the advertisements, and the CV fit)

Me: OK, what are you doing now?
Interviewee: I'm studying in a Computer Science degree program at ITM. The course is better than any local university computer science course.
(Me, thinking) really.. I graduated in Computer Science from a local university
Me: Has this course started, and can you take on the job, if you are offered?
Interviewee: Yes it started 3 weeks ago, and it will be half days so I can spend afternoons at the café
Me: What were you doing after graduation and before this course?
Interviewee: I worked in a hotel
Me: In what capacity?
Interviewee: Programmer
Me: Doing what, exactly?
Interviewee: Writing programs
DOH!
Me: (exasperated) Yes of course, but what systems - front office, back office, F&B, reservations?
Interviewee: Uh, I can't remember
what? this was just 3 weeks ago!
Me: What language were you using?
Interviewee: English!

When durians fight…

The Recycled Bits Factory — Fri, 25 Mar 2005 19:19:00 GMT

There's a Malay saying literally translated to “When durians fight, the cucumber gets minced”. If you have not seen a durian — it's that hard shelled fruit with spikes all over, tastes exquisite but (to non durian lovers) stinks to high heaven. I've heard eating durian described as having the most exquisite strawberry sundae in the stinkiest toilet you can ever be in. We are so lucky this product didn't get off the ground.

Reminds me of how fond my Japanese colleagues and bosses were of durians. Durians were somewhat expensive in Japan back in the early 90s (I remember seeing a supermarket as for around RM300 per fruit). You can imagine these guys who were posted to FMM then.

One of the newer arrivals was in a cab heading home when he saw a durian seller by the roadside, and he asked the cab driver to stop so he could buy some. He got down and pointed to a stack (they're stacked up like a pyramid, 4 fruits a stack, asked how much and was told RM15. He then grabbed the topmost fruit and went home. I guess it was still relatively cheap.

Not only that but there was the director of finance K~san — everyone was somewhat fearful of him — very strict guy. One day we went to a meeting somewhere near FRIM, and on our way back to Shah Alam, he actually asked the company driver to stop by the roadside so he could eat durians.

Coming back to K~san, his staff would wait for him to go home everyday before they'd dare leave the office. And that would generally be 8pm (10pm at month ends). What they, and most staff didn't know however, was that K~san would be in the office at 6.45am sharp (office hours was 8am to 5pm).

But I digress (again, it seems). Needless to say, a cucumber doesn't stand much chance of surviving getting caught in a durian fight.

We're Live!!!

Feisal Kamil — Wed, 09 Mar 2005 03:10:00 GMT

Yeah! it's finally live. Games Xtreme League (v3.0) is finally launched. Not without a last minute scare though ;)

If you read the GXL mechanism, you'll see why this project was interesting. or maybe not…

The terminator project

Feisal Kamil — Tue, 08 Mar 2005 21:02:00 GMT

ugh, ever have any one of those? the ones that — despite you putting them to bed once (and you cheerfully think) for all — opens a glowing red eye and growls ominously “I'll be back”. I haven't seen a weekend for months, and God knows how CK put up with me not being mentally at home (oh wait…)

Tonight I'm hoping that it's out the door, finally (hope I'm not speaking too soon!). It's not that I won't be working on it ever again, but post launch support isn't like being interminably in development, chasing shadows calling themselves “targets”. Let's not start on Project Management cr*p, now ok? Everyone knows no-one's to blame in these cases and the client, bless their damned souls, is always right.

Actually it'll be three websites this week, hopefully. The AFC Champions League from the day job launched yesterday in its new livery, and starts a new season tomorrow. Not quite the European Champions League, but the talent is there. After last season's awesome comeback by Saudi Arabia's Al-Ittihad in the two legged final, this seasons matches are surely going to be as fiercely contested.

It's a lot different in Europe, the countries — and teams playing each other in the UCL — are but a stone's throw away (even then a certain Mr Bergkamp refuses to fly, so there goes the retirement plan in the J-League). The ACL spans the whole of Asia, which is why the initial group stages have been set up regionally. And the final has to be two-legged… even if you are a die-hard Persebaya fan, you're not likely to make the trek to a pre-set location halfway across the wrold.

Then by Friday the new-look Standard Chartered Singapore Sevens 2005 (to call it by its full name) website goes live. Haven't played rugby for years and much less than football, but I have more memories of rugby games than I do football. (reminder to self: must put them down somewhere, sometime before I totally lose it).

It's generally philosophically a much less serious affair, rugby. During the opening ceremony of the Hong Kong Sevens, all the teams march past in their national kits etc. The last group out will be wearing dark glasses and carrying a blind-man's stick each. These, of course are the “Oi!! Are you blind??!!?” refs. Ever see this in a world-class football tournament? Thought not.

But I digress.. uhm... yes.. the terminator project. grrr! whew! pwease pwease pwease launch! I'll post the URL if ~~when~~ if when we go live.