Been busy doing stuff for theCICAK, ferrying my sister to her A-level exams - and going for interviews.
My first interview was at Gizwiz Studio, which is in Northam Tower. It’s an easily recognizable building, because the engineers must have been colourblind - it’s purple. Yes, the building is PURPLE!
The interview was cancelled, unfortunately. The next day (Tuesday), I was in Northam Tower at the Samsung customer service center to replace a broken ice tray. That same evening, I got a call from Netcentric Sdn Bhd to go for an interview the next morning. The address I was given was “Menara Northam, 20th floor“.
“Ah yes yes, I know where that is - see you tomorrow”.
When I arrived for the interview half an hour early I thought everything was going fine… until I went up to the 20th floor and couldn’t find the office. I went down, called the company; “Yes, yes, it’s the 20th floor”.
Then I realized Northam Tower has two wings. So I went up to the 20th floor in the second wing… nope, not there. I actually went up the first wing *again* before making another call. This time the person mentioned Maxis being on the ground floor.
But Northam Tower has Samsung, not Maxis, on the ground floor! I went out and realized that:
The building on the right, where I was, is called Northam Tower. The building on the left is Menara Northam!
Seriously, which genius came up with these names? (Probably the same fella who decides when to use Bahasa “Melayu” and Bahasa “Malaysia”).
Needless to say, I was late. Thankfully, the interviewers were understanding - I get the feeling this is not the first time this has happened.
The day was about to get more surreal though. I was sent outside after the interview, and someone came in whose face looked vaguely familiar… Ewe Thiam! We used to go to the same church youth group - ten years ago. He seemed to recognize me (well my face at least) as well. I was like “oh you’re working here? or coming for interview?”
This is an example of how getting used to skimming over articles is bad. Netcentric is the company behind Nuffnang, a Malaysian web startup that does blog advertising. If you read blogs often, you’ll have noticed their ads, along with their rival company Advertlets. They were featured in In-Tech recently.
Anyway… I skimmed over “Timothy Tiah” - co-founder. His full name turned out to be “Timothy Tiah Ewe Thiam”…
Small world, no?
To cut the story short, I’ll be starting work at Nuffnang :).
I think localized blog advertising is a good thing. I absolutely HATE advertisements as a rule, unless they’re one of the more entertaining, funny ones like you see on ASTRO sometimes. I hate it when people throw flyers over your gate, or stick them on car windshields. Online, the much-touted Google Adsense NEVER serves any relevant ads to Malaysians - what more generic banner ads. Even “established” sites like these run inane “HOME BUSINESS!! EARN RESIDUAL INCOME!!” ads.
If you read my earlier (gushing) review of Opera you’ll know it’s freaking easy to zap any offending ad (along with all similar ads) in a few mouse clicks, then you never have to see it again. But somehow I never blocked Nuffnang (and this is way before I joined the company!!), because I had to (grudgingly, at the time) admit that the ads it serves were relevant. For example, they recently had some MPH discount promo, and now they’re offering some free drink thingie at Foodloft, Gurney Plaza. In both cases these are actually places I go to all the time.
What’s ironic is that I can’t serve Nuffnang ads here with free Wordpress. The affiliate program they’re having with Exabyte web hosting looks tempting though.
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