February 21, 2008
Moving ...
Yes ... this blog has been discontinued. The new version is located here: http://www.hadianto.net/mtv2
Posted by vhadiant at 09:45 AM | Comments (0)
January 23, 2008
Update from the Northern Hemisphere
I’ve been slacking on the blogging department in the past few months, especially in the last half of 2007. So a bit of an update for everyone about what’s been happening up here in London.
First, I’ve changed job from CIBC to Credit Suisse since last October. Still doing pretty much the same kind of work (C# development), similar area (credit derivatives) but not that similar (lower in both technology & business stack, which was what I wanted). I’m enjoying this current contract, good team & good piece of software too. And I’ve been learning heaps about the business.
In order to get closer to work, I moved house to Canary Wharf, Yep pretty boring location, or no soul as other have said, but ultra convenient for work. It’s 5 minutes walk to work and I’m not under the mercy of The Tube anymore, well except when I’m going out but that’s somewhat tolerable.
Since arriving back from Indonesia/Australia trip, I’ve been making a lot of weekend trips. Namely to Bremen, Hanover, Wales (to watch the World Rally Championship, UK leg), Amsterdam, Oslo & I just came back from a long weekend in Iceland. Each and every location is unique and fun on their own respective quirky way, that’s including Bremen :)
During Chrissy & New Year, I went to Egypt for 2 weeks with Intrepid. You can tell that I’m loving this company ;) That was my second (or third) trip with Intrepid. While Egypt is very touristy, somehow Intrepid can structure the trip to make it really cool & adventurous. Highlights of the trip are spending 2 days & 2 nights doing nothing in the Felucca and the desert safari. The desert is absolutely stunning. Photos are uploaded here: http://vhadiant.sharpcast.com/ and more here by Hieu: http://hobs.sharpcast.com/albums/image/49035_210603721359401
Iceland was amazing, cold & dark, but stunning. After the hot desert of the Sahara, I went straight to the snowy field of Iceland. Incredible, I’ve been enjoying the past few months here.
Now for the scary part. I’ve made up my mind to do the CFA Level 1 exam this coming June. To help my study I enrolled myself on 7City's CFA preparation weekend course. It’s a full Saturday, 9 – 5, course starting this Saturday, which coincidentally is Australia Day. Doh’
Now that I have received all the materials with me (CFA curriculum & Schweser notes) and as I skim through the mountain of readings, I’m wondering what on earth did I get myself into? CFA Institute reckons on average you need 250 hours of study for the exam, of course the more the better. I definitely need a lot more than 250 hours as I have no backgrounds in neither finance nor accounting. And to make things worse accounting is a big part of level 1 exam.
Tough times ahead.
Posted by vhadiant at 06:22 AM | Comments (0)
January 22, 2008
About not blogging
Yes a few of my mates have complained about the lack of update on my blogs. There are various reasons, but mainly is just me being slack. On top of that my MT install on this host seems to be a bonker. Tried to upgrade to MT 4 without much success.
This is more of a promise to myself to keep the blogging again, it has been too long.
Posted by vhadiant at 09:24 PM | Comments (2)
October 07, 2007
The End
After big hopes and expectations, the high-flying teams of southern hemisphere's Wallabies & All Blacks both crashed out from the World Cup.
Unable to get into Walkabout in Temple & Covent Garden because we were late, we wandered to Porterhouse where there were more locals than antipodean. We were there with imported Coopers, three each in our hands, but all our shouting and cheering were drowned by the "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" of the locals as we watched Wilkinson kicked four penalties to send The Wallabies home.
I could not believe that England went through without scoring a single try. But I guess we deserve to lose, we had too many drop balls, losing ball in the ruck and conceding far too many penalties.
After a few more Magners, I was slightly intoxicated and decided to watch arch rival All Blacks match at home. It was a slight consolation to see them crashed out from the tournament too.
Posted by vhadiant at 09:32 AM | Comments (0)
September 20, 2007
Correction on AMEX rate
Whoops a quick correction on the exchange rate given by AMEX on my previous post. 13,760 was not the exchange rate. After a quick call to AMEX we established that their system is not displaying the full information. AMEX told me that the exchange rate on that day was 183.68 Rp per 1 GBP.
This doesn't make sense, unless you multiply everything by 100. See 13,760 is the actual amount of my spending which was Rp 1,3760,000. And the exchange rate at that day was £1 = Rp 183,680.
The AMEX system must not be able to cope with such a high exchange rate :) I wonder how they deal with Zimbabwean dollars.
Posted by vhadiant at 06:46 PM | Comments (0)
September 12, 2007
Horrible exchange rate from American Express
On my recent trip back to Indonesia & Sydney, I've used my two (UK) cards to pay & withdraw money from the cash machine. HSBC gave me a rather good rate at around Rp 18,300 for £1 and AMEX shockingly gave me a mere Rp12,600 for £1. That's insane! I can't believe how bad the exchange rate given by AMEX.
I made two purchase around the same amount in Indonesia, using my AMEX card cost me £18 more than HSBC card. This is a good lesson to be learnt, never ever use AMEX outside the original country of origin (in this case UK). I've been using AMEX locally because of its cashback feature, they're giving up to 1.5% back from your total purchase. Granted it's only 1.5% but it's better than nothing.
Anyway ... no more AMEX overseas for me!
Posted by vhadiant at 08:00 PM | Comments (0)
August 12, 2007
The Oval
The flatties and I went to the third day of the England vs India test cricket at The Oval, the home of Surrey County Cricket Club. It was a good day out, unlike today, the weather has gone bonkers again. Ah well what can you do, it's London after all.
I have to say I've always wanted to go to a test cricket match in London. Ideally at The Lord's, but The Oval is just as historical. It's a lot smaller than I expected, we sat at the Bedser stand, on the first row. It's really close to the wicket and we can pretty much see everything. The ticket was a bit pricey at £75, but hey that's one of the 'tourist' thing to do in London :) And no I still haven't been to the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey, The Big Ben, St. Paul cathedral and so many others. Ahh so many things to do and yet so little time ;)
Posted by vhadiant at 10:04 PM | Comments (0)
