Someone misspelt pigeon

CFA Lv 2

noreply@blogger.com (vhadiant) — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:29:00 +0000

So I've signed my life away for the coming months for CFA Lv 2 exam in June 2009. I fully expect a repeat of this year's hell studying for CFA. Apparently according to those who have done it, Level 2 is the most difficult level. Sigh ... let's just hope this is all going to worth it ... somehow :)

CFA

noreply@blogger.com (vhadiant) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 14:12:00 +0000

OK ... by some miracle and an obvious marking error, I passed CFA level 1 exam. I've been trying to ignore it as I was certain that I failed. I've been trying to be a bit blase about it too.

But truthfully, I was there on the website, 10 minutes before the result was released and refresh my web-browser exactly at 2pm London time. OK yeah I admit it I was a bit anxious to find out about the result.

It took me at least 5 minutes to login. It timed out initially but it went through the second go. For a few seconds I can't believe that I see the word "PASS" there. Phew .... I guess all that hard work didn't go to the drain after all.

The incredulous feeling soon turned to joy and a few seconds later turned ugly, because you know what this means? I have to do Level 2 now! Arghhh ....

Well I can't really complain now, I'm rather happy that I passed. Yeah it's not all >70 like some people did, but I pass alright. I even got >70 in Economics of all subject. That is the one subject I was absolutely certain I will fail.

Turned out that I failed in Portfolio Managed (<50) and so so in Alternative Investment (50-70). The rest are >70.

Good times :)

NHS IT mess hits everyone

noreply@blogger.com (vhadiant) — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 12:59:00 +0000

Oh yes, I've had first hand experience with NHS IT system. I never did write any follow up on my broken wrist saga, but I'm so glad that the debacle that is the new NHS IT system has been brought up by BBC. Read the story here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7477099.stm

Please don't get me wrong. I have only praises for the very competent doctors & caring nurses on the NHS Trust hospitals, both the Royal London and Mile End Hospital. It is the utter lack of competence of the admin staff that or the IT system that I despise.

I can go on for a whole day listing my grief about the NHS admin/IT system but I think BBC has sum it pretty well. To cut long story short, I was sent to the wrong department twice (out of 4 appointments), system down for days when I urgently needed an appointment with no back up system (you'd thought for a hospital you have a backup for such an important system), not entered to the system properly, appointments not booked properly and gosh the list goes on. My local GP has been very helpful, but even she is powerless against this administration tragedy (ie: she can't get me an appointment to the correct department without going through the system).

It is indeed a debacle of astronomical proportion. To save life, I think NHS should go back to paper & pen system.

Anyway enough ranting for now. Let's just hope someone can fix this mess soon. I wasn't being serious about the pen & paper system. And I do agree that the NHS needs to have a top class IT system. It's the implementation that is a mess, this can't last for much longer.

CFA ... bah ...

noreply@blogger.com (vhadiant) — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 23:36:00 +0000

I bombed out CFA exam level 1 earlier this morning. Result won't be out for a while yet, but I doubt that I will see "Pass" on the that day. If, and I would say this is a minuscule probability, somehow I miraculously pass this exam there will be huge party with beer flowing on my tap. That's a promise.

I did reasonably well on the first part of the exam. Using my own intuition on exam result (I'm quite good at this, usually spot on during high school/uni days), I should get around 75% ish. It was the second exam that got it. I reckon I would be extremely lucky to score 60%.

What went wrong? And how did I manage to throw the past 4 months of studying down the drain?

On the long train ride to Baker St. from the Excel centre I thought about this. Basically it can be narrowed down to 2 simple factors:

1. I underestimated the amount of materials.
2. I severely overestimated my motivation and ability to study.

All those unanswered questions on exam are covered in the assigned readings, there's not a lot of derivation required but you do need to understand the materials. I simply could not recall them. I lost count how many times I said "Darn ... I wished I had reviewed this last night".

So where to now? It would seem to be a waste to throw away that study. Would I do it again this December? I don't know yet. I'm not sure if I have the motivation to do this again, although if I do, I would know how to study this time.

Suggestions to those studying for CFA Lv 1:

Study more ... earlier.

It is not a hard exam, but the amount of materials to be read can kill a person ... literally (those assigned reading books weigh a ton).

A consolation, straight after the exam I went to the new Wembley Stadium to see Foo Fighters. Those guys are amazing life and on recording studio. It was the best show I've seen so far. Nothing like it, great show, great atmosphere and great crowd. 86,000 people all came to see just 1 band. I had a bit of reservation earlier on a stadium concert, but they did such a great job. It's also great to see a band on their prime on a huge concert.

What a way to end this first half of 2008 :)

The Broken Wrist Saga: Part 2

noreply@blogger.com (vhadiant) — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 00:11:00 +0000

The medical clinic in Tignes is small but well equip for the most common injuries people normally have at snow resort ... x-ray machine!

I didn't have to wait too long since it was one of the quiet days. During peak season the nurse told me that around 50 people will come in a day at the injuries section.

The doctor came and with a glance he said that it looks broken, I must have been patient number 50 billion by now :)

He took a few x-rays and confirmed that it was indeed broken. I fractured the radius bone as well as the other fore-arm bone. I had my wrist guard on, but you can imagine that if I hadn't been wearing the wrist guard, the injuries would have been a lot worse.

Phew ... all that post was written using one handed keyboard simulation. It is a lot harder than it looks :) More on this if I ever have the time to do it. It is already a struggle to type this.

Broken Wrist Saga

noreply@blogger.com (vhadiant) — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 18:04:00 +0000

I broke my left wrist on the second day of 8 days snowboarding trip. It's rather unbelievable really, I could have broken it on the last day or second last day, but no, it had to be the second day. My own stupidity rewarded me with a 6 days of doing nothing at the snow resort during a much packed powder action in Tignes (it was dumping like crazy when we were there). I'm being philosophical about it and filing it on the "shit happens" folder. I escaped with minor fractures but it could have been worst.

A bit of consolation is that we did quite a few runs on day 1, and I did my first foray off-piste and black run on the second day. I wish I could say that it was the star black run that got my wrist or it was the 20 foot jump over the 720, but like most injuries it happened at the lease scary situation.

After the action packed first day, I had my lesson with Alliance Snowboard on Sunday morning. Neil took us off-piste a bit and some hairy slopes, for me anyway. Out of the 6 people on the Cruiser level, I was probably the weakest having only snowboarded for a grand total of 4.5 days before. Still I was happy with my progress and can safely go down the red runs (slowly).

In the afternoon, visibility dropped and myself, JY and Heng caught up to have a rather long lunch with me shopping for a helmet. At 3:30, armed with a new Dainese helmet and feeling invincible, I decided to practice what I was taught earlier. I should have practiced at the nursery slopes, but then it was getting late and I chose to do the hills. JY and Heng went up another way to do (much) more difficult runs.

After a short chairlift up, I snowboarded down Rhodendoron. Visibility was horrendous at this stage, however I went down without much drama. At the junction I saw the gondola tha can take my down to Les Brevieres. I thought about it for a split second before ditching that idea and turn right down Melezes. I was being greedy. Should have listened to my inner voice and took damn gondola.

As it were, not much down Melezes, I slipped on my heel edge and my I slammed my left wrist uncontrollably on the ice. Just like anyone who has broken a bone will tell you, you know straight away that something is not right. The pain was very different, and the fact that I could barely move my wrist was an indication that it was rather bad.

I probably sat there, on the piste, for about 10 minutes before deciding that I could not continue anymore and called the piste patrol. Whilst waiting for the rescue, unbelievably JY & Heng found me and stayed for the whole ordeal.

Not long after, the piste rescue came, put my arm on makeshift cast and put me on the body bag to be dragged down on the rescue sledge. This cause much hilarity and pictures taking by my two mates. After all I've only broken my left wrist, not dead. I was strapped on the sledge, board next me and head fully covered.

I can't really see what was happening, but I was told that the guy who took me down did a darn good job taking me down on a steep slope to the road. I have to admit it was quite an experience :) - not that I would ever want to be on it again.

Down the road, an ambulance was waiting for me to take me to the hospital.

Next post: the hospital and the damage. For now it's rather difficult to type with one hand :)

Friday night post (or more about the CFA)

noreply@blogger.com (vhadiant) — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 20:23:00 +0000

Doh' Friday night at home posting to my blog. I'm rather sick this past few days and unfortunately it's school day tomorrow. I have mentioned in my earlier post that I'm taking the 7City course to have someone kick me on my behind to keep me in track with my study.

I have to say I'm quite impressed (so far) with the quality of the tutors and the service that they give to the clients. I chose to do the weekend programs, it will be 10 Saturdays spread over roughly 4 months. Yep it's rather drastic, taking a lot of my Saturdays this first half of the year, but I really won't be able to do it in the evening or worse, taking 10 days off during the week. Not after the many days off I've taken in the past few months (and more in the coming months).

And to make things worse, since I'm an IT contractor I have to do this on my own time and dosh. So taking 10 days off work is terribly expensive for me. No other options there for me but for the Saturday classes.

So anyway 10 Saturdays written off for me (and probably including Friday nights) except I'm going to miss 1 session to go Snowboarding in mid-March. However 7City is great in this way. The online class room is great (although can be improved ... technically). They record the lectures and put the archive online for students who miss them.

Plus they give extra questions for each study sessions, 6 workshop sessions, 2 days revision and mock exam. Plus the evening sessions are stream live over the Internet for those who are doing self-study. Pretty darn good value in my opinion.

Of course none of this matter if you don't actually study.

Misspelt V2

noreply@blogger.com (vhadiant) — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 22:07:00 +0000

This is the new version of my personal blog. More details here.