Vuthy's Sharing Mission

June 1, 2014

Love History?

When it comes to loving someone, what do you normally expect? To be the first one? To be the last one? Or be ready to discover more about your loved one? To me, I am ready to hear all of the surprises. It should be damn good to know about girlfriend's past.

In this post, I am not going to focus on the girl's side, but the boy's side only. I would like to ask you readers a couple of questions:

Does it matter if a man used to flirt many girls before? Would you bother to seek for more information? I have seen many girls got jealous and even want to dump their boyfriends for that. Well, it's fair enough to dump him if he betrays while having you, but when you have a look back at his past. Probably, you should only use it as a sign to alert, but you can not judge that quickly. It depends whether the flirtation was for fun. Is it him just like that, flirting every pretty girls? Or he has been interested in one girl at a time, but faced many rejections already? Because facing rejections could lead to depression. Should you pity him for that because now he is yours?

If he faced rejections, now that you are his girlfriend. What would be your reactions when you read his old messages and found out that he used to chase a lot of girls. Let's say you found out his messages to many girls before you knew him. The messages could be "I love you til the end of my life". "Oh dear, I miss you so much". I know you may feel stupid to be his girlfriend, right?

Would you pity him? Or would you simply think he's a jerk chasing girls since he was a kid? Please share your opinions.

April 2, 2013

My Qingming Festival 2013

Vuthy 8:44:00 PM Diary , 1 Comments

Every year, both Khmer people and Chinese people celebrate for their ancestors. For many people in Cambodia, we celebrate both Pchum Ben Festival and Qingming Festival. April 2, 2013 was the day that my family chose for Qingming festival. For this year, I went for the festival with my parents, sister, and an elder brother. We managed to arrive Oudong at around 9:00AM and went straight to the first tomb who my father's grandparents

My Father's Grandparents

My Brother Preparing on the Top

Paying Respect to His Grandparents

We brought along a battery fan and umbrellas for such a hot weather

After Everything is prepared, we have monks saying prayers to the ancestors and the living

After spending the morning seeing my ancestors at their tombs, I went to my grandparents' house which is about 5 kilometers further. Here is a picture of my lovely grandma walking on her own with a stand and my grandpa sitting on a chair. They are both in their 80s and not very strong but are pretty healthy.

Grandma (left), Grandpa (right)

We relaxed a little bit at my grandparents' house. Probably after an hour, we went to another tomb which belong to my grandmother's grandparents. Interestingly, it is my first time to be there!

The tombs last for more than 200 years, I guess.

We can't drive directly to the tomb, here is a picture of my parents walking to their great grandparents' tombs

This man newly cute his palm fruit for us for free. How lovely! However, we paid him some money as well

It normally costs 2000 Riel only. Can you believe that?

My grandparents' grandparents' tombs

Just hope that the next generation of the Chour family visit their ancestors here every year. The year is being added from time to time :D

Here are pictures of my elder sister and brother

These kids are lovely. They helped with the festival and lined up for some give away

How about you? Have you celebrated the festival for this year?

March 13, 2013

Massive Certificates Printing at Once

Vuthy 11:54:00 AM How To , 0 Comments

Technology has made things lot easier for us to perform tasks conveniently, but the thing is we do not know how to use them wisely. I had to print out name of participants with many mistakes on the name, and it is very time consuming if the participant number is up to more than one hundred.

In this post, I am going to guide you on how to print certificates on many papers without having to rename them one by one.

This probably does not benefit everyone as you may not have to use it, but if you do, you can do it smarter with the guidance you are about to read.

Requirements:

- Microsoft Publisher

- Typed Participant Name in Microsoft Excel

First, open the typed participant list in the Excel file. Edit what you have to edit. (Don't worry if you want to edit the names later because it will automatically apply to the Ms. Publisher)

Leave it there. Do not close it.

Next, open Microsoft Publisher and design your certificates. You may use the templates available in the publisher if you do not want to spend more time on that. Below is a sample certificate with name in English and in Khmer.

Say you have 40 names to retype. Without having to retype one by one, all you need to do is to merge the typed participants name in another excel file to the designed certificate in the publisher through:

1. Go to Tools > Mailings and Catalogs > Mail Merge

Then, it will guide you to select a Recipient List (that Excel file).

Click on Use an Existing List, and Click on Next: Create or connect to a recipient list

There will be a new window opens, Browse to find your Excel file.

At this stage make sure that you have a proper typed Excel file

Untick those that you do not want them to appear on the certificates. Just tick those rows that you want to appear (Names). Then, click Ok

Notice the left hand side column (F2, F3, F4, F5, F6)

One of them contain the Khmer name.

Select Mao Sopheak and click on F2 (for example, if it contains Khmer names). Then, it will apply the names.

There, you go. Do the same thing to the name in English if you have one.

Then click on Next. It will take you to Step 3.

In this stage, you may print the document automatically. All of the certificates will come out consecutively.

Cheers!

February 13, 2013

Networking to Employment

Vuthy 11:47:00 AM Critics , Professional 5 Comments

I used to think that getting a job through network is not rewarding. It always made me feel like I have no ability to find a job on my own.

But then, I think about the use of having a Recommendation Letter. If you could get a Recommendation Letter from a supervisor at workplace, then you are more likely to find a job. It is actually from the higher, the better. The thing is that people could know that employee better through the letter or the network before they decide to employ. They do not want to risk employing someone they have never heard of before.

The problems could be both on the task fulfillment and also on the behaviors at workplace. Some might just come to work and is not that sociable so it might be hard to communicate; and some might be sociable, but is not very proactive. To avoid such problems, employment through network takes place.

However, I still think it is not very rewarding and discouraging for employees to seek for a new job. It took me about four months to find a new job. It made me feel so discouraging that I would not be qualified for any workplaces; and moreover, I could see lots of fresh graduate looking so fine and found a new job in just a few weeks.

Also, from here I also want to raise a problem arising nowadays; and that is good positions are often filled. For example, one workplace wishes to employ a new employee, then announce the recruitment to public. Hundreds have applied, but at the end of the day, it's the internal employees who also applied got the position.

Why? Because the internal people know better about the organization and its needs; and also the organization knows about that person better than the other candidates. Also, that individual is of course better qualified than others where he could answer most of the questions during the interview.

Here is another answer to that why, a NGOs posted a job announcement on Cambodia Daily, again hundreds have applied, but those people might have very slight chance for an interview because normally NGOs work on project and when the project ends their staff contract will be ended as well. Some of those people might be lucky and find a new job, but some would wait for the same NGOs to start a new project. So, who else should they employ beside their previous staff? and those people know about the NGOs better than the others.

Personally, I have been employed through network twice. Once was at HML Law Firm & Consultants, at that time, my friend Chenda told me to apply for the Translator position at HML. I applied just like the other candidates. However, I had a network which was Chenda. I guess not just through the network that could get me the job, but it was the network which could facilitate the recommendation and the job announcement to me. I did not know much about the internal issue. However, after I was recruited, Chenda said the boss did ask her about my characteristics and some of my personal background.

Later, in late 2012, after I resigned from ITC, my friend Sokha was on Maternity Leave and told me to apply for a short-term contract at her workplace - ILO. Again, that's what's so called network. There were 5 candidates as I was told. However, I was recruited for the position and later was favored by the supervisor and he recommended me to apply for another higher position at the same workplace. So far, I have not been informed about the higher position whether I will get it or not. However, the intention of this post is to illustrate the bad and the good of networking to employment.

Only til that day that it completely changed my mind regarding having a network to employment because now I believe that not everyone could reach us. It does not matter how good we are. It is better to have a network in addition to our qualifications. It is cool if you could get a job on your own hunt. However, many times jobs are filled by the network; and I am not saying those who are recruited through network are not great people. They are of course great people with great opportunities. If they are not qualified, those workplaces would not risk employing them, no matter how good behavior one has.

As above illustrations, I still have the negative ideas regarding networking to employment since it is a burden to people to find a job. The recruitment process could never be based on merit of the individual.

Here, try not to confuse with Nepotism. Nepotism is completely a different thing. :) Anyway, what do you think about recruitment at workplace?

February 2, 2013

Network Marketing and What I Hate About It

Vuthy 4:52:00 PM Critics , Recommendation 47 Comments

According to Wikipedia,

Multi-level marketing (MLM) is a marketing strategy in which the sales force is compensated not only for sales they personally generate, but also for the sales of the other salespeople that they recruit. This recruited sales force is referred to as the participant's "downline", and can provide multiple levels of compensation.Other terms for MLM include pyramid selling,network marketing, and referral marketing.
Most commonly, the salespeople are expected to sell products directly to consumers by means of relationship referrals and word of mouth marketing.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-level_marketing

In Cambodia, MLM is often called Network Marketing. Some people do not know what it means by the term Network Marketing as they are not familiar with the term and do not even know that they are being in the game, what they know is that they could make a lot of money without much effort.

Are we clear with the definition? :) Let's go to the next part. I am going to share what I have experienced, not what you might have heard of in any books or elsewhere. Thus, please excuse me and bear with my personal idea regarding MLM.

Network Marketing Process in Cambodia:

The top level tries to gather people through holding a workshop to explain about the benefits of MLM with very little focus on the quality of the product they sell, and will tell you a lot of successful stories; for example, some people could make 50,000 USD per month, some starters could earn 2,000 USD per week and stuff. Some people might be inspired and register to be a member immediately through paying a hundred dollars or so. However, some who are smart enough to doubt about the quality and understand that it is not easy to get the money as others expected; and what is even smarter, they do not spend a hundred of dollar on the product they have heard for the very first time - and do not know about the origin of the company, never heard even a bit of it. Blah! I treat them as smart people.

How are you going to get more members in order to boost your sales? You may approach your friends, family, and relatives so that they can become your distributors. You are not sure of the quality, but since you are so much absorbed into it. You go advertise so that you could grow more network; all you need is distributors, a lot of them. After your friends realize that the product should not be that expensive and is not as good as they were told - they hate you.

MLM of medicine, for example, the top level might brings a few types of medicine and explain the benefits of them; after the presentation, he would ask you to try buy some; and those are not cheap. They would dare you to try it. Only if it works well with you that you should distribute. That's what you might be told. Sound nice, eh? All you could hear is easy-incoming money.

What I really hate about the idea of MLM is that in Cambodia. Friends who are so much absorbed into it do not want to tell you what they are doing. They suddenly drag you to hear what you do not want to spend a single minute on it.

For example, a classmate who took a Master degree in Public Administration with me gave me a call and told me there was an opportunity to make a lot of money in a month. I did seek for the reason, but he could not help but told me to attend a workshop. Later, I asked another classmate who attended the workshop which was informed by the same guy. He said the speakers advertised about a type of medicine which would work with many types of diseases. He was promoting more distributors. Distributors would get a lot of benefits as he could make a lot of commission without having to do anything. Just sit still and the money will grow.

After knowing what it is about, I immediately gave the guy a call and told him I am not interested.

Lately, another friend told me that there would be a translation business and I might get a loyal client. First, she posted a comment on my Translation Ad that she might introduce me to her CEO and stuff. We agreed that we would meet at some points. One day, I went to meet her at her shop as she said she would be available to talk at that time. What I do not understand is why we can't talk on the phone when she has nothing for me to translate at the time being, I went there anyway. We spent a couple of seconds to talk about translation and lots more to drag me into MLM.

Later, I got back home, we chatted and I told her it is beyond my business scope. I want to focus on my 8 hours work and translation. Then, I also told her if her CEO is going to introduce me to MLM, not straight to Translation; then, we do not have to meet. The answer is there! She responded if I think so, then there is no need to meet. All in all, her CEO is about to spread the sermons as well.

Moreover, the price of the products that you purchase are double or triple higher than the regular price after three or four layers distributors. :D

I would call that kind of activities deceitful.

^Victims:

^{The possible victims are provincial people, older generation, uneducated people, and greedy people.}

I do not suggest any of my readers try that Network Marketing. Money never comes easy. Even if it does, it will spoil you. You are supposed to earn it tough. Never do the gold digging!

All I hope now is that those who are involved in MLM bring a lot of quality products, not just to cheat through network down the line.