Morinn Buzz

Merry Christmas people!

2009-12-23T12:21:00.001+04:00

So dudettes and dudes, we've reached the 23rd of December. Today is cookie-baking day and I'm making chocolate chip cookies and napolitaines because my parents hate chocolate chip cookies. I know, I was shocked when I got to know that they both hate chocolate chip cookies too. How can anyone ever hate that?

Anyway, I'll be spending the afternoon baking then going out for dinner and shopping tonight with Jev. Tomorrow will be hectic what with the pre-Christmas lunch and dinner and all the gift wrapping and unwrapping, decorating and re-decorating. You know how it goes...

Our Christmas tree is still a naked green thing for now. I took out all the Christmas decoration boxes but then I haven't yet felt the Christmas spirit overcome me. Hope that it overcomes me soon enough or the decorations will be spending Christmas in their boxes.

I took Missy to the vet on Monday. The guy says she's doing great except for a few bruises and a fur problem she's acquired during her time spent as a wild puppy.

So dudettes and dudes, I was supposed to wish you all a merry Christmas 'cause I know I won't be able to tomorrow probably. So here goes:

Be happy people and binge eat 'cause Christmas is a good excuse for that, don't feel guilty about the gifts you're giving to people, (this year I'm offering pickles, cookies and flowers as gifts, you couldn't have done worst that me), be around the people that you love 'cause that's what Christmas is all about, (at least in my books it is) and then have yourselves a merry little Christmas...

I would have loved to say "I love you all" but I know you'll hate my unexpected display of affection but then heck, I LOVE YOU ALL! Haha! Merry Christmas.

Ooh, I'm feeling the spirit now. Gotta go people! A Christmas tree is awaiting me.

And the weekend comes...

2009-12-18T21:35:00.001+04:00

Jev is away for the weekend with his friends. I think the two of us would make the most of those days spent away from each other. I have planned to read Twilight, yup Twilight. I've kept the book waiting for too long. I'm not really looking forward to it but I can't ever leave a book unfinished. There'll be this feeling of something I might be missing that'll keep hunting me. About Twilight, I don't think I'll be missing much but yet I gotta finish the book and this weekend is the perfect time for it.

I was supposed to go to Ile aux Cerfs with my HR buddies tomorrow but I'm not feeling like it. I gotta look after Missy and one of my good friends is not coming. It won't be quite the same without her...

Anyhow, yesterday we tried to go to Nando's but guess what? There was a huge crowd of people who did the exact same thing. So we ended up grabbing a sandwich at Shoprite and having dinner at Riche-Terre instead of joining the queue.

The freaky Nando's mascot

Anyone of you dudettes and dudes has been to Nando's yet?

How to...

2009-12-17T09:42:00.000+04:00

You know how when you start typing something on Google search, it automatically starts giving you popular search terms that probably depend on your location. For instance, when I type 'M' on Google search I get this:

MSN, Mauritius turf club, Myjob.mu, one can infer that those are popular search terms used in Mauritius. So I decided to take a look at what "How's" people searched for and here's what I got:

Now that was hilarious, especially for the first 3 terms.

Productive holidays!

2009-12-16T20:26:00.000+04:00

I always used to think that holidays were meant to laze around, do nothing in particular, just enjoying those free moments. To be honest, most of my past holidays were happily spent that way, until... well, this year. That's one thing about having responsibilities, you just can't sit around and enjoy being free, at least that's what happened to me. So I ended up doing all those stuff I've been wanting to do and saying I would do from the moment that I manage to have some free time. Stuff like cleaning the vegetable patch or removing all dried leaves from the flower garden have been checked off my list. I can now proudly say that I have been busy right from the time that I got my holidays and that week and a half has been very productive so far.

Part of my time has also been spent taking care of a lovely creature and I would like you dudettes and dudes to meet Missy.

I've adopted her on Saturday, she had been wandering about before landing before our gate and she gave me the puppy-look. Now who can resist that? So she's now part of the family and she seems to be happy about it...

Sweet December

2009-12-07T20:31:00.002+04:00

I'm done with my exams. Actually I got done with it since last Friday. Everything went fine. I got my case study two days in advance and I nailed the paper. Now that was not cheating though. The lecturer arranged for us to have our exams case study 2 days ahead of the exams. How cool is that?

As from Friday, I got involved in a lot of stuff, I lunched and shopped for Christmas with my sister, I went to La Nicoliere to get some pine cones for Christmas decorations with Jev and I'm planning a little something for this Sunday with my family. There'll be cakes and stuff...

This month promises to be hectic and I'm really looking forward to it. There's nothing better than December to cheer me up. It's all about the celebrations, happy moments and events. More will be said about the events later...

I'm now off to watch some TV dudettes and dudes! Oh, and did I mention I'm on holidays? :p

Ah revisions!

2009-11-26T09:52:00.001+04:00

When I'm supposed to be revising, I always tend to find everything more appealing than my revision notes. For instance, I'm always making up breaks and giving myself treats. You've got the tea break, the toilet break, the let's-cuddle-the-cat break, the let-me-put-on-some-kohl break, the what-I-am-wearing-tomorrow break and finally, my favourite, the let's-try-a-new-recipe break. As for my treats, they come in the form of an episode of How I Met Your Mother after each 2 chapters are done with.

Despites all those breaks and treats, I'm managing to progress with the revision fairly smoothly. I'm not rushing into it 'cause my exam is on the 2nd of December. Some people might find that short, I'm really thinking that I've got lots of time. I hope I won't be proven wrong.

The thing is, giving myself breaks and treats really motivates me to keep going and I'm actually close to finding the revision fun! So I'll say that this breaks-and-treats method is definitely a keeper!

Let there be kindness...

2009-11-21T08:58:00.048+04:00

People don't always understand the importance of being kind in everyday life. In businesses in particular, kindness or politeness plays a crucial part. It's not just about greeting people or smiling at them, although it does start from these. It's also about the overall attitude adopted while meeting the customers or clients. Most importantly it's about how you welcome people to participate in your business.

In Mauritius, some organisations all too often neglect to give enough importance to how customers are being attended to, thus keeping an important part of their stakeholders unhappy. Shops and supermarkets are concrete examples of this. Quality service rarely prevails in those organisations, at best the service is acceptable.

Do you ever come out of a supermarket feeling satisfied or saying "Wow! That was one hell of a service!"?

You see, the low quality of service is so generally dispersed that customers could stop expecting something better. I mean, if you have no means to compare the service, you won't even notice if one particular supermarket's service is better or worse. The service would just fall in the mean, it would just be acceptable service, as usual. And that should be avoided.

Supermarkets should compete in terms of quality of service and other factors other than price. If we, as customers, start being choosy about quality of service then probably changes would start taking place. That might take some time but the most important part of it is to get out of that "zombie customers" state and to stop letting organisations choose the way they want to treat their customers.

All-in

2009-11-19T20:32:00.000+04:00

So the cyclone was a disappointment, the next day, that is on Wednesday, we got the whole package of hot, sunny and slightly breezy weather. No dark clouds, no rain, everything had disappeared. But that was good as well. I attended classes and most importantly I played poker with my gals.

Apart from that, yesterday I got to know that the Saturday test I've been supposed to be revising for has been postponed and guess what I did after knowing about that? I started revising! Hell yeah! I was so grateful for this that I actually started reading my notes. Now how good is that as a motivator?

I'm off to revise dudettes and dudes, 'cause I've got no test. So, no pressure. See y'all!

A cyclone is a cyclone

2009-11-17T18:47:00.002+04:00

We've got a cyclone coming up (hopefully) which goes by the name of Anja. Weird name if you ask me. The name does not promise the destructive intensity that Hollanda or even Gamede had. But I'm not going to judge a cyclone by its name. Instead, I'm going to hope and look forward to what it has to offer.

The weather has been cloudy and rainy right from this morning and that discouraged me from going out and kept me cozy in the warmth of my home. I've tried to revise for a test scheduled this Saturday but you know how distracting a day at home could be, at least for me it is. So I ended up watching TV, tidying up my room and taking two showers.

So now I'm off for dinner dudettes and dudes and I hope that the weather gets worse by tomorrow. Oh and I'm going to give my revisions yet another try! But I don't promise anything...

Coach Carter

2009-11-16T19:50:00.000+04:00

Today started like any regular Monday morning. I woke up early, lazily read some blog posts and news in bed and managed to get myself late. So I showered in a hurry, dressed in a hurry, ate in a hurry, made my bag in a hurry. And in my hurry I managed to forget a thing or two at home. But in all this, I got to catch the Express bus without even having to sprint.

Yet, in our human resource development class, something "out of the box" happened. We got to watch the whole of this movie, Coach Carter, starring Samuel Jackson and that was awesome! I should have thought of bringing the popcorn! The movie, which is based on a real story, depicts the life of young high school basketball players and how the new coach, Ken Carter, changes their lives by applying unusual coaching techniques and making use of his own life principles. This movie is poignant, full of humour and contains some valuable lessons.

The reason why we were showed this movie in class, dudettes and dudes, is simple; we are currently studying coaching at work and this concept is very much inspired by sports coaching techniques. This movie is in this sense a case study for us and I guess it's the first time that I really and entirely enjoyed a case study.

That diet...

2009-11-15T10:11:00.001+04:00

I've been thinking of dieting. You know how it goes, there's a cousin's wedding coming up and I wanna look decent in a saree. I've started out last Monday and the hardest part of it had been giving up on the chocolates and ice-creams. I can even hear those tasty beasts calling me from their spot in the fridge. Damn! I should have eaten them all before embarking on this diet. But it's too late now so I might as well cope with it.

Italian ice-cream (cookies and strawberry) bought at Pereybere.

The wedding's on the 2nd of December if I'm not mistaken, I never seem to be remembering exact dates. A wedding in December's heat, that gotta be crazy! I will have to endure 2 long weeks of deprivation and be done with the wedding ceremony.

Did you dudettes and dudes ever go on a diet? How did it turn out?

3 years of blogging

2009-11-12T12:50:00.000+04:00

I'm quite jaded for the time-being, I've lost a great deal of my cheer and sense of humour somewhere down the road between projects and tests. I've had a weird sleeping pattern for the past week and I need to get back to normal again. I know I should always be doing my work in advance but there's some kind of thrill in working when the deadline's close and submitting the work just in time and that hardly affects the quality of the work, I wonder how. Perhaps it's the adrenaline that gets the mind to work better. Have you guys ever felt that?

Coming back to the 3 years of blogging, I'm letting out an unenthusiastic "yoohoo". I haven't really been blogging lately and I hope that the coming holidays would cater for that.

So it's been 3 years now since I wrote my first post. It was about cheerleading and looking back on it, I've realised how stupid but fun I was back in those days. You see, that's one of the major reasons why I blog. No, not to realise how stupid I was, but to remind me of all the good or bad times I've had and to share those incidents with you dudettes and dudes and aliens out there!

So that's a happy three years to my blog and a huge thanks to the dudettes and dudes who've been reading it...

Bed ain't bad

2009-11-05T13:15:00.000+04:00

After going through a project-marathon, I feel free today. I haven't yet recovered from my messed up sleeping pattern but I'm getting to it, slowly. I submitted by research proposal yesterday and will hear feedbacks on it as from next week. So I can relax a little.

Yesterday I attended an HRMS committee meeting for the first time. HRMS is short for Human Resource Management Society and it's a club comprising of HRM students at UoM. I managed to have a responsibility assigned to me for a forthcoming event, that of contacting the media and I backed an activity proposal from a friend of mine. The president of the society is hoping to draw the interest of more students to our activities and I think that what has been proposed will probably do the trick. Briefly, it's about interpreting common scenes at work and making the audience decide what went wrong and what could be improved. I hope we manage to find enough volunteers who are willing to play the roles.

Ah anyway dudettes and dudes, I think I'll go for a nap. It's so good to be at home during the day, plus the weather is warm and breezy... Think my bed is calling me. See ya'll!

Dear Cookies and Co.

2009-11-03T16:38:00.000+04:00

Dear Cookies and Co.,

Thanks for not letting me down on Saturday. You did not just taste awesome, you also helped me impress my mother-in-law and that, is a great feat considering that she is an amazing cook.

I was complimented on my cooking talent thanks to you and you guys helped in making this party oh-so-memorable for more than a few.

So once again, Cookies and Co., Thank You!

The bloody chocolate cake

Sometimes you gotta thank the cakes dudettes and dudes, even if that makes you sound a loony, especially if it's on your blog.

D-1

2009-10-30T12:52:00.000+04:00

The weather is crappy and I don't feel like going out. All this humidity is messing up my hair and giving me allergies. I don't know how this is even possible. so I'm going to cozily stay at home, watch TV and read stuff.

On some other note, after one month of waiting, tomorrow is the D-Day - the halloween party. I'm getting so excited. Today we're gonna start setting everything up and decorating.

Tomorrow there'll be lots of cooking and finally partying. I hope I manage to get everything ready for tomorrow...

P.S: Some previews of the halloween party decorations.

Cheers!

Recommendations could do the trick.

2009-10-23T14:02:00.000+04:00

Several months ago I wrote a post about how the pricing strategy of a particular supermarket is, in my opinion, not enough to attract and sustain customer loyalty. The points I mentioned did really seem like empty words, I'm the first one to acknowledge that.

I, however, truly wanted to bring a change or at least find ways to improve customer service within organisations of that kind by making use of HR practices. And so, as from next week I'll be carrying out employee satisfaction surveys in order to assess the employee satisfaction level within a similar supermarket. This will be part of a research I am supposed to do in my coursework. I will be linking employee satisfaction to customer service and based on my findings I will make recommendations for improvement. Those recommendations should be valid and applicable within the organisation.

I am quite excited about all this and a little scared. OK, very, very scared. But I'm gonna make it. I will have to. :)

Oh Kaka!

2009-10-21T20:42:00.001+04:00

I swear I'm not swearing. Kaka is just the name of the football guy. Oh I know you know him. Everyone knows him. And guess what? I've got a crush on him. Oh I know it's an impossible love but I can't help it, can I? Ever since I watched his totally cool advert for a kids' chocolate cake brand called Doowap (don't you love saying "Doowap"? Like Rooch loves saying "Olga"). Anyway we're getting out of the point. And I must make sure to explain why I got the crush on Kaka. You see I was always hearing his name on TV and never actually saw him. You see (again) my dad is a huge football fan, and even now, as I'm writing this, I'm hearing the sound of all the cheers of stadium spectators. So I thought, basing my biases on his name, that Kaka must be some totally ugly guy. I mean you just have to hear the name to think "eew" and so I got this huge shock and pleasant surprise when on that advert the kids shouted "Kaka!" and instead of seeing a pile of faeces, I saw that guy who was a pile of good looks.

And so began the crush on Kaka, it was about 1 hour ago and I feel like it's fading away slowly. Still 1 hour, that must be some kind of record. Oh well, I'm off to prepare myself for tomorrow, we got a group assignment to work on. So long dudettes and dudes!

Totally Divali

2009-10-17T20:08:00.000+04:00

Today was one hell of a hectic day and it all started right from the morning. It involved cleaning, placing the mini light bulbs, baking and finally praying and enjoying the lights and cakes. I just wanted to share some photos and wish you all dudettes and dudes out there a wonderful Divali. Enjoy the sweets and lights and do ponder on how this festival came to be!

How I went internet-less for 4 days

2009-10-16T09:54:00.000+04:00

It all started on Sunday morning when a bunch of lads, who were cutting down tree branches in the neighbourhood, mistook our telephone line for a branch. So they cut down the line and ran away like any other respectable coward would have done. And so we called Orange's hotline the very same day and nothing unexpected, we were told that it might take days for them to send a team to our place. Anyway, yesterday, at around noon, the team came and fixed the problem in five minutes. No need to say how elated I was to be "connected" again.

Oh and yesterday was my sister's birthday. I baked a cake for her. As you can see she was totally into the pink and white theme this year.

And so tomorrow's Divali, we haven't yet made any cake. Should we start giving in to panic? I think I gotta go shop for provisions and start making some gateaux batate. I can't wait to eat that!

Halloween Shopping

2009-10-10T18:29:00.000+04:00

Today we begun the 1st part of our shopping for the halloween party; we went to get the non-perishables. We bought some elements of the party decoration and a bunch of customised paper plates. We found all these at a shop called Deco Fete in Grand Bay.

I discovered the shop last Saturday as we were returning home from Trou aux Biches. As you can see, the front window is really striking. At the very first glance I could tell it had everything we were looking for in terms of halloween decoration and I was so right. Even the saleswoman's appearance fitted the halloween theme. She had loads of make-up on and had totally worked on the "witch look". Oh how I loved that!

On another note, earlier today we brunched at Sunset Cafe. Jevin seemed to have enjoyed his feast and I found the croissants great-tasting!

We finished the day at Pereybere, which was crowdy as usual. And now I'm really tired and I feel like I need a good foot bath which I'm gonna get in a few minutes.

So long dudettes and dudes. How has your Saturday been?

Hot and here.

2009-10-09T21:17:00.000+04:00

Summer's here, at least in my part of the country it is. I'm sweating, not like in December but it's still sweat and mosquitoes are doing their rounds, as usual, for the sole purpose of annoying people and to occasionally feed on their blood.

Today I woke up at 3 a.m by the sounds of those pests as they were hovering around my ears. I did all I could to make them stop but to no avail. So I ended up wasting some precious sleeping time. I rose at 5 and got a mosquito repellent. Haha! And they were done. I could now sleep for another 2 hours before waking up at around 7. Dr Thomas Garavan, the Limerick guy's lecture was supposed to start at 10:45. I had ample time to shower, have breakfast, get ready and take the bus to Reduit.

The lecture was very interesting. The guy is truly well versed in Human Resource Development (HRD) and he applied some of the concepts to the Mauritian context.

By noon the lecture was over and I chatted with my buddies for a while before heading home. Port-Louis was warm and stuffy. The north was a little less warm but I still felt like I badly needed a shower when I got home.

All these go to say that the signs are here; we're entering summer!

Despite all these, I don't hate summer. Infact, when it comes to summer my feelings are quite mixed. On one side there are the perspirations, mosquitoes and smelly people in the bus and on the other side there are the flowers, colours, beverages and most importantly the holidays and celebrations.

I think out of the two seasons that we have, summer is definitely my favourite as that's the season wherein we have Divali, Christmas and New Year and I always associate it with shoppings and gifts...

October is the month baby!

2009-10-06T09:26:00.002+04:00

Two of my friends just called; no classes today. I can't even say how happy I am and I'm going to make the most of today, not by going through books but by planning for 2 parties coming up this month. The first one is my sister's birthday party and the second one is a halloween party that Jev and I are throwing on the 31st. Oh, by the way, everyone's invited for the halloween party. We'll be posting more details in the coming days!

Pictures from 2007's halloween party

Parties parties! I just can't wait! I'll be taking care of the decorations and I'm hoping to make it awesome!

P.S: I forgot Divali! How could I? It's on the 17th. Ooh ooh! 3 great events in October for me.

Enter the Limerick guy

2009-10-05T16:11:00.000+04:00

We got the news today; an eminent HR guy from the University of Limerick is going to be lecturing us on Strategic HR Development this Friday and we're supposed to show how erudite we are on the subject for 2 main reasons; first not to embarass our lecturer, who I'm sure wants to show to what extent he has been transmitting us the best knowledge ever and second, not to embarass ourselves by avoiding to be our regular selves.

Ideally, we are supposed to be asking the guy questions and those, of course, do not include questions pertaining to the weather. So I've got a strategy, it's not an innovative one but I'm sure as hell no one in my class have thought of it yet. I'm gonna go through the guy's books. Oh I know, it's gonna take time but I've got till Friday and it's not as though I'll really read the books. That's the delightful difference between "reading" and "going through".

Ah anyway dudettes and dudes, I guess revision is coming sooner this year. Oh! And did I mention, they are going to be counting our attendance on that day. Yeah, a deterrent, just in case anyone decided to ditch the Limerick guy.

The trip to Ile aux cerfs.

2009-10-02T19:41:00.001+04:00

Yesterday Jevin and I went to Ile aux cerfs with my HR buddies. The day was cool; there were great friends, food, drinks and a whole lot of laughter! We first went to Flacq, then around Trou D'eau Douce to take the boat to go to Ile aux Cerfs. On our way to the boat quay Jevin realised a wonderful drift on a roundabout. I was all shaken from the experience. But Jason and Ashwin, who were riding with us, we totally happy about it. This made me wonder why guys love stuff like that. I mean it's dangerous, isn't it?

Anyway, talking about the boat trip, I was finding the first one quite long until we saw some dolphins. The chaps, however, preferred realising stunts for tourists rather than approaching us for some photos! Damned dolphins!

Then we reached the island and installed everything for the barbecue. It took a formidable team work to get on with the barbecue and provide enough grilled food for all of us, but we made it. We've been trained to work in teams, ain't it? And guess we're really good at it. :p

After the food, some indulged into a football match while most of the girls, including me, played poker. Yeah! We're totally into poker lately!

On our return boat journey, the boatman proposed to take us to a waterfall found nearby. Damn! That was amazing! It was like a trip in a prehistoric jungle. Even the birds look weird there and we thoroughly enjoyed that!

Back to the boat quay, it was the end of the day. I'm looking forward to yet another day like this, 'cause one was surely not enough!

How a flu took away my weekend.

2009-09-30T20:08:00.000+04:00

Wednesday - On my way back from uni, I sat next to a girl who was sneezing like crazy. Oh that was a hell of a sneeze! I think that was what infected me.

Friday - I was happy that I did not fall sick and told my sister how I've survived this winter without catching a single flu and she was totally certain that I'll have it now that I've bragged about not having caught the flu.

Friday night, guess what? I had sore throat.

Saturday - The sore throat was still here and the nose was running like a damned open tap.

Sunday - The sore throat was gone, running nose remained plus I had a bad cough and fever.

Monday - The fever was still here and the bad cough remained.

Tuesday - I only had the cough.

Wednesday, today - I almost went to uni with a 5-day greasy hair. But I couldn't do this to myself, so I washed the damned hair.

On the overall I hated being sick, all I did during those days were playing poker and watching dumb Disney channel ado TV shows and I missed so much classes...

Anyway, I guess I'm recovering great. Take care dudettes and dudes and don't catch the flu! It's awful.