I hate Great Plains

I’ve been quiet about this but I can’t take it anymore.

I hate Great Plains!! After a year, it still gives me issues & problems that slows my everyday tasks. You think dealing with NOD issues is frustrating, well, try dealing with them all by yourself with no peers to help. I had to implement the entire software on my own, Company wouldn’t give me budget to hire any consultant to help or to ease off my workload. And I had to deal with the ongoing operating issues all on my own; no one understood how painful it was. All I get is continuing staff complaining why they are not getting their cheques or why they haven’t got their reports.  You guys only have to enter your own encounters yet I have to input all the invoices for the entire organization! I’m always getting the blame for everything even if it was Mgmt who didn’t catch the mistake in the first place or I was given wrong information to work with or I wasn’t even told of the situation yet they expected me to have known about it. Don’t give me the crap that I’m the last person to look at it so I should pick up all mistakes. It’s your job to approve so then review it properly. I’m not getting paid your salary so I’m not going to do your job!

I’m tired of this crap!

What is left of my high school

My high school was not in the ideal condition when I attended. When it rained, sometime the roof will start leaking and drip into the hallway. After I graduated, they have started to build a new building at another location. I still haven’t visited the new school yet but I wish I was able to attend the new school. Now that the old school is abandon, lots of the floors, ceiling, desks has been destroyed. I came across an article where someone has recently visited this old relic and what is left of it.

It’s scary to see how I used to go to school here and not it looks like an aftermath of a disaster. Apparently it was used to film the TV show Falling Skies.

This is the desk where I’ve spend my high school days from English, French, Math, History, Geography classes … also where I first learned about the accounting of debits and credits and ended up being the beginning of my career.

The auditorium where I played my violin in the Christmas concerts, musicals. This is also where my graduation ceremony was.

The hallway with the colourful lockers. Luckily, I was never stuffed into one.

Where the science classes was held, with sinks to do lab experiments.

Happy times here at FJR, where going to school was actually carefree.
I miss these days. Good memories 😦

Photo credits: Jerm IX from Jermalism

Read his full article here: http://jermalism.blogspot.ca/2013/11/abandonment-issues-alderwood-collegiate.html

Merry Christmas

Some people has this person in their lives that any little gestures he or she does, it will bring a smile to this person’s face. Even if it is short text message, it will make this person’s day. Waiting is very painful. Can a person really be happy when the person they like is happy with someone else? Is that really a human characteristic that can be accomplished? Or is this the way to hide the fact their evil side.

Merry Christmas to all!

Ice storm followed by extreme cold weather alert

After the big ICE STORM that hit Toronto on Sunday, many homes are still without power and now today, we get an extreme cold weather alert. This is not helping the clean up aftermath at all. We need warmer temperatures to melt the ice …. Today was so cold, with -15 C, burr cold just walking from the parking lot to work all bundled up. Shout outs to all the Hydro workers working 24/7 in the cold to restore the power in Toronto. My parents’ place finally got power back today after 2.5 days in the dark but there are still over 85,000 customers without power and likely not be restored until after Christmas. This was not a Christmas families have planned, oh mother nature. This winter has not been very pleasant so far.

Merry Christmas and stay warm everyone!! 🙂

Home Alone 1 & 2

Came back from Costa Rica safe and sound. Missed some big snow storm last weekend and luckily I had good weather in Toronto when I landed. And just in time for another ice storm that just hit Toronto last night. I’m lucky that I live downtown where it was mostly just rain and not ice. Everything here is just slushy and I have power.  I didn’t know how big the storm was until I turned on the tv and realized streetcars are shut down, no subway service or GO train. Many people in GTA are without power including hospitals. Hope everyone will get power soon.

Almost Christmas time, doesn’t really mean much to me as not much of my family is in town. Just be relaxing at home and enjoying some Christmas movies and tv marathons. My annual Christmas movies are the Home Alone 1 & 2 series. I grew up watching it and now I get my dose every Christmas. TV is running marathons on this movie the entire week. Cheers!

Costa Rica – Playa del Coco

We decided to check out the closest town at our resort which was Coco Beach. It was about a 30 minutes drive. We had 2 hours to hang around here before we catch our bus back. We thought it was not going to be a lot of time as our main goal was to get some cheap souvenirs. But as it turned out … the town consist of like 5 stores and then bars and restaurants which we went through in about an hour. The souvenirs were not cheap at all, the cheapest fridge magnet we found was $3 USD, key chains at $2 USD. Yeah, not cheap at all.

Coco beach was pretty nice, we got there around sunset time so we saw the beautiful sunset by the beach. But then it got dark fast! The town is mainly filled with bars on the street, more than souvenir stores. Since it was dark, we weren’t really exploring much but just stayed at the main street. The mosquito in town were more poisonous than the ones at the resort. I got 3 huge bites from just walking around for 2 hours, big bump bites!

Costa Rica – Monteverde

I was still in so much pain from the ATV fall but since I paid for everything, I couldn’t give up the opportunity to see. So took some advil and hope for the best. There are very limited paved roads in Costa Rica. Their highway are just like our main roads so can’t go very fast. Also, there was construction going on building new lanes for their new highway so many parts of the road was only one lane. And then a lot of the tourist attraction is up on mountain and there, there are absolutely no paved roads. It was all dirt or rock roads and uneven roads. 4km drive up took over 30 minutes. The van we had was not a comfy coach bus, those 14 passenger vans with not much seat cushioning. Sitting in that with a bruised back was not a fun ride. The 1.5 hr up the mountain was the most painful bus ride of my life. There were times which I want to tell the driver to stop for 5 minutes so my back can rest for a bit. It was a torture ride but it was worth it.

Our first stop was to the coffee plantation. I love drinking coffee but this is the first time I visited a coffee plantation. It takes a lot of work before the coffee beans are ready to be made into a cup of coffee. From growing the coffee plant, harvesting, drying, roasting, grinding and then finally brewing. It’s really sad to hear that the workers get pay $2 USD per basket of coffee beans picked and it is not a small basket and coffee beans are small so it does take hours to fill up. The coffee bean actually comes from a red berry on the coffee trees. Then there is still a lot of man labour to pick the beans, drying and roasting before it is packaged. And then stores like Starbucks buy them (relatively cheap) and then sell it for at least $2 a cup here in North America. Now I know why Starbucks makes so much money. Different roasting time produce different type of coffee flavours. Dark roast has stronger coffee taste but less caffeine, while light roast has less coffee taste and more caffeine. For some reason, I always thought it was the other way around. We got to taste there medium roast coffee, it was good, not as strong as I thought as I didn’t have to put any sugar. They also use a cloth filter instead of paper filter to make their coffee as they believe paper filter absorbs the nutrients and coffee taste compared to the cloth filters.

After admiring the coffee, we had lunch there for another local meal. It was family style meal with beef stew and lamb stew with rice. It was a lovely family meal and then we were ready to continue on. Next we were in the bus for another bumpy hour ride up to Monteverde to see the real rainforest.

First when we got there, we got a tour to the Butterfly Conservatory. He brought us through and explain the different types of butterflies as well as their life span and their DNA. The main species is the brown ones with blue on the other side. There was another special one that looks like an owl, pretty cool.

Then to the Hummingbird Garden. I’ve never been so close up to the hummingbirds, they were literally flying right beside me. And they fly so quick everywhere and non stop buzzing from their wings. They can’t rest for more than 3 minutes and has to keep flying. Also, they eat a lot, equivalent to eating their size of 250 burgers. They were so pretty, green, purple and blue heads.

Finally, we headed to the rainforest. This is the first time being in a real rainforest. The other times I’ve only been to the “fake” ones in science centre. Now that I have been to a real one, it is very different. It is wet but not like soaking wet and not steaming hot like the ones in science centre. We didn’t see much wildlife in the forest, but a lot of different trees, flowers and plants and learned a lot about the history and their roles in the forest. They also build 8 sky suspension bridges that we walk across the forest. It was scary to be on the bridge (I have a slight fear of heights) so I try not to look down but to look eye level at the magnificent view of the mountains, trees and fog. And when the bridge is wobbling, I had to hold on in order to be brave enough to keep walking. Normally, I would say this hike around the rainforest was nothing but with my hurting back, it was a lot of painful walking. Now I know how it is like to be old person who has to rest every 10 minutes, it is indeed painful. And quite ashamed when the older people were walking faster than me. SIGH… but I’m glad I did make it up here instead of staying at the resort.

After the walk, we were back in the bus for another torture bus ride down the mountain. OMG, tears were coming out from me from the pain. Awful awful but after 3 hours, we made it back to the resort.

ATV congo trail

My second time on an ATV and probably my last time ever after this accident. I was riding with the same friend who rode with me last time. I was the passenger and he was the driver. Last time in Mexico, he threw me off when we were going up the hill. Somehow as we were going slow, I just fell off to the ground, I was able to get back up with no cuts and bruises. This time, I let him be the driver again so he can redeem himself.

We did a 4 hour ATV ride, the first 2 hours, we were in the jungle tour. We were driving through rock roads, water, forest etc. It was fun going into the water to get the splash. We stop by another local waterfall, it was beautiful hidden behind the trees.

After the jungle tour, we did the ATV beach tour. Going through hills and beaches. We were going up to the mountain to see this magnificent view of the ocean. And as we were heading back, the roads were more bumpy with more rocks. I don’t really know what happened but we were turning and then we hit a rock or something and the next thing I know, I fell over and off the ATV. Then the ATV flipped over as well, luckily it didn’t fall on top of me. I was able to get up but my left side was all scratched and bruised and my back was bruised. I was able to walk but in a LOT of pain. Good thing I was wearing my helmet and my face did not get scratched.

I was so scared that I broke something so I just really wanted to get back to the resort. I went to see the doctor at the resort, I told her I was in so much pain but she told me I was just bruised and didn’t break anything. I guess that was good news but for the rest of the trip, I was in so much pain and could hardly walk. Taking advil helped but still, was walking really slow and sleeping was painful. I couldn’t go into the water after this so was just lying by the pool or the beach for the rest of the trip. Sucks!! I will never go on another ATV again!

Costa Rica – Palo Verde, Hot Springs, Llano de Cortes Falls

Our first excursion to see Costa Rica. It was a busy packed schedule. First, we went to Palo Verde for a river ride on a tube boat to see some wild life. There was lots that we saw, many different birds, iguana, crocodile. There was a lot of different types of iguana, brown, green. They were big and we saw a couple that was mating. At times, lots of the birds were on trees, I’m like blind, sometimes I don’t see it. It was a nice 2 hour river ride, some spots have shades, some have direct sun which was steaming hot. But it was worth it, there was some downstream and water splashing into the boat.

After the boat ride, we have another authentic fish meal with beans and rice. They also have coke served in the glass bottle but I don’t know, the coke seem diluted.  After lunch, we headed out to the hot springs for a nice mud bath. This was my first time, first, we had a tour around the hot spring. It was hot and steamy, with bubbling water and mud all over the area. We first went to the sauna room, man that was a hot sauna room, we were there for 3 minutes and I was sweating like a pig. I’m a hard person to sweat but I was dripping sweat from my pores. After our pores are open, we went for a mud bath. I don’t really know how purifying the mud was, but I did look a bit whiter after the bath. Then we were relaxing in the hot springs. There was different water temperatures to dip in, from hot, medium to cold to close the pores. It was very relaxing. It’s great that we pretty much had the whole place to ourselves so we didn’t have to share with anyone.

After the spa, we headed to the Llano de Cortes falls. It is a hidden gem, a beautiful waterfall hidden in Guanacaste. We went for a swim, the water was very cold and refreshing. We swam towards the falls and have the water falling onto us. It was cold so I couldn’t stay there too long and just swam around. It is so nice swimming in the fresh natural water. Something that cannot be done in the big cities. After a relaxing swim, we headed back to the resort. We stop by a local coffee shop and stock up on some local brew coffee.

Costa Rica

My first time in Costa Rica, we were going to Liberia and to the Guanacaste area. The good thing was that we were leaving from the cold winter weather to a tropical hot weather. Our flight was early in the morning so I was at the airport at 6am. I haven’t been to this said of the terminal and it was great, lots of tables with seating and with full power plugs and wifi. Too bad we didn’t have that much time before we boarded as spend most of the time just lining up at Tim Hortons, man, they are slow at the counters there! Not regular downtown Toronto speed status.

We didn’t get a direct flight to Liberia, we had a stop over at Roatan – Honduras to let people off and get people on. A normal 5 hours flight turned into 6 hours but it definitely feel longer. We couldn’t get off the plane to stretch so it does make it longer. Finally, we arrived in Liberia and we started to feel the hot air. Luckily, there was A/C on the bus so we had a transition into the hot weather from the cold we left behind. It was about a 45 minute ride to the resort. Their highway is not really a highway, more like our HWY 7 is their main highway with traffic lights so the ride was a lot longer than expected. And their road signs are not correctly measured, we saw a 10 kms sign to the resort and it was another 20 minutes on the road, that is a long 10 kms!

We stayed at Riu Guanacaste which is beside Riu Palace, the set up is the same as the resort I stayed at Los Cabos. The layout of the resort and decorations were similar to the Riu chain. This time, they listened to our request and put our rooms side by side instead of all the way across the resort so a lot more convenient. The A/C was working fine in the first few days, but towards the end, the A/C seemed to be turned down, maybe because there was more people in the resort. Also, we found they turn off the power in the rooms during the day, probably assuming most people will be outside, so no need for power so that is smart.

We were starving after we checked in but we just miss the lunch serving and still another hour or so before the dinner serving starts. So we went to the snack bar for some nachos and popcorn. They were all stale but it will do until we get some real food. Their food buffet was alright, not impressive, I got sick of the food pretty quick. Their breakfast was blah, not much selection, they had bacon but it is not the same. There were days that I just wanted cereal… yes, cereal! Lunch and dinner was pretty similar, there is always a special main dish – like roast beef, suckling pig, turkey but it didn’t taste that great. The only good thing that I look forward to each night is to have the mashed sweet potatoes, it was good!

On the weekend, they had locals that come to the resort to stay, it was crazy packed. Especially during the buffet, they love their food, it looks like they haven’t eaten for days. They all had big family reunions. Line ups on all the buffet station, and when you think there was only one person lining in front of you, then 5 family member comes and line in front of you. Sometimes, these people don’t understand the concept of lining up, they just bud right in and grab plates of food. I thought I was back in China again?!?! Any plates of fresh meat that comes out, they all run towards it. CRAZY. Thank god they left after Monday and we had the quiet resort to ourselves again.

The pool was pretty big with an infinity pool, there was a swim up bar and a few whirlpool to chill. There was right at the Matapalo beach. It is not a private beach but it was pretty private as it is not that easily accessible by locals. But as it is not a private beach, there are people walking around selling things and massage huts. I ended up getting a massage for $25 USD for 60 minutes, not bad. It was the fastest hour but it was very enjoyable listening to the ocean waves and getting a massage.  There was a few iguana walking along the beach which is new to me, they like climbing onto trees and nap.

For some reason, being in a tropical country, even if the entire place is decorated with Christmas trees and decorations, it just doesn’t feel Christmas-y in the hot weather. To me, it has to be somewhat colder and with snow. We went all out one night and did over 10+ shots of lemon drop. I stopped around 10 but my friend went to 17 shots. Clearly, they diluted the shot with lots of lemonade cause if it was reals shots, we would have been passed out by the 10th shot.

No complaints from this resort, thought the nightly entertainment was lacking entertainment but overall, good resort, 2 out of 2 resort, good enjoyable stay. We got to stay here for 9 days for the price of 7 days which was awesome. I wish we could have gone to another excursion but they only offer majority of them from Friday-Sunday only so they didn’t have it the day we wanted.