You can just imagine me standing there, staring at that tin box with all the intensity of a child whose eyes gazed upon a coveted dream toy. And that’s how the idea of a gingerbread house appeared before me.

I want to have fun with our Forecepts’ corporate Christmas eCards, so I created this simple, fun and quirky illustration of a gingerbread house. I added those four tiny birds flying up towards the top of the house carrying four Asian-inspired house accents. I have used curly Christmas trees in our last year’s Christmas eCard, I want to keep that as a “trademark”. 

Forecepts’ Christmas Gingerbread House: rendered as animated Flash electronic Card – http://forecepts.com/greetings/

Forecepts' Gingerbread House

The fun had not ended that  Christmas Season. I’m living in a country where people all get hyped up for Chinese New Year the same way that I used to get hyped up on Christmas Day when I was still a kid. My gingerbread house morphed into an eclectic mix of orange hues with pseudo-Chinese elements. And oh, the rabbits, they must be cute and at the same time, help to usher in a new year of prosperity. This time, we sent out Chinese New Year postcards to our clients.

Forecepts' Chinese New Year Postcard

Gingerbread:

The harder German-style Gingerbread is often used to build gingerbread houses similar to the “witch’s house” encountered by Hansel and Gretel. These houses, covered with a variety of candies and icing, are popular Christmas decoration ^[5] often built by children with the help of their parents. This form of Gingerbread houses is also popular in Norway. (Source:Wikipedia)

The Rabbit:

Cuddly, warm and affectionate are the attributes of the Rabbit. Mysterious and a great party-giver and host, the Rabbit enjoys being the centre of attention once in a while. The Rabbit is occasionally over cautious and can be a bit boring. He is also one of the luckiest signs in the Chinese Astrology chart.

As of now, I can’t find the words to describe the things going on inside my muddled mind. So let me just share with you these simple photos that I was able to capture these last few days with my point-and-shoot camera. While the city is covered in red and everybody is bathed in the excitement of the Chinese New Year, these are the images that captured my eyes.

Happy Chinese New Year to All!!!

Note: Please take note that A Crayon’s Life website is still in the final stages of completion. Hopefully, I’ll be able to update all the pages soon.  :)

Presenting Forecept’s new Design Machine: She comes in a small package, barely five feet tall, with long black hair (that still keeps on getting long because she finds the hair salons in Singapore very expensive) and bright-colored shoes. A Filipina with 6 years of design experience behind her, this little woman braves six people (read: Project Managers/Account Executives) who regularly turns on “The Design Machine” to create new web design, revise the new web design, create simple flash animations, draw stick figures and rough storyboards, create direct mail marketing designs, design new logos, brainstorm for a pitch project, understand creative briefs and try to create a design brief for clients who wanted to have a website but don’t have any idea on what to place on their websites. This design machine can work with grace under pressure, fragile yet hardened by experience, works best when listening to her favorite music and knows how to laugh at her own mistakes.

This is most likely what will be written in my product brochure if I happen to be a design machine. And I’d like to think that I am exactly that.

On Tuesday, I will be celebrating my 2nd month as Forecepts’ (http://www.forecepts.com/index.php) new design machine. They say that the company is known for its back-end programming and web development services with its back-end operations done in their Johor office in Malaysia. The sales/account executive office is situated near Jalan Besar in Singapore. Companies seek out their web development and programmers and along the way, they were also faced with clients requiring the whole package that includes web design. In the past years, they were able to outsource the design until finally, they decided to hire a new web/graphic designer on board due to increasing demand for the complete package. 

The Road to the Forest

It was April 24 when I first set foot on Forecepts’ cozy office for my first interview with the manager and, like any other job interviews that I’ve had in my whole life, he delivered the default ending to every job interview conversation, “We’ll call you”. Six days after the interview, I received an e-mail from him and told me that they’re having a final round of choosing their new designer, so they decided to hold a sort of “web design contest”, the lucky winner will get the job as the coveted prize. He asked me if I will be participating and of course, the design machine that I am, I bowed to the challenge and willed myself to create a good design.

It was the 5^th of May when I received an email stating a job offer. I thought to myself, so I’m the winner huh? In the field of design, being chosen as the new designer or winning a pitch project does not mean that you’re better than the other designers. I think all of us, the designers, the account executives, the clients, the boss are all playing mind games. Its just a matter of second-guessing what design approach will work for a certain client, and when you hit the target bulls-eye, then you get the job, or the project.

So I think I have to add some new text in my product brochure: Forcepts’ new design machine also comes with the ability to play mind games with clients, account executives and other designers.

To date, this Design Machine was able to produce 9 new web designs, some flash animations and a lot of internet direct marketing materials. 

Now, the account executives pressed the “pressure” button, so that the machine can produce Forecept’s new corporate identity that includes logo, letterheads, business cards, new website, the works! The Design Machine just smiled and a button started to light up, blinking are words in red letter, “Grace Under Pressure”.

May 15, 2008

34 days and 2,285.75 miles away from the Philippines, my employer informed me that I have to wait another 7 days for the approval of my Employment Pass from Singapore’s Ministry of Manpower.  So it’s another week of doing what I want to do whenever I feel the urge to do it. I’ve really tried to plan my activities for each day, and at times I was able to follow them. But most of the time, I would take a detour from my plans and let my whims and mood take over.

It was the 5^th of May, 23 days and 5 interviews later, that I received a job offer as a web designer for a web design company.  I felt utter relief and the plain old feeling of happiness when you have finally been given the thing that you need most. 23 days of stress and a feeling of uncertainty is a sad companion, even more so when you’re in a foreign land and you have this feeling that you’re just an outsider looking in.

That was 10 days ago and at last, I was able to really relax and sink in the still unfamiliar way of Singapore’s life. I even received another job offer a week after I received the first one, but hey, first come first serve. For the past ten days, I had watched TV series on video streaming until the wee hours of the morning. I slept late, ate breakfast at 10 a.m. and had lunch at 3 p.m. At times I would go to this place called Kovan City, some 3 or 4 bus stops away from my place. It’s quite near our place and if you’re in the mood, you can walk all the way up to there. I would usually eat my lunch at the hawker food stalls and spend the rest of the afternoon at MacDonald’s. I read Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s “Strange Pilgrims” and indulge in melancholy as the characters in the short stories mirror the way I feel to be in a foreign land on my own and for the first time. When I don’t want to read anymore, because these short stories are meant to be indulged one at a time, I would open my sketchpad and doodle my thoughts away.

When my eyes got tired from all the reading and doodling, I would enter the Heartland Mall to feast my eyes on things I couldn’t buy. I only have meager allowance and I reserve it for food, rent and necessary things that I need. Sometimes I would just wander around this small space aimlessly, looking into things that I don’t really see and hearing spoken words that I can’t understand. I feel so detached from the mall and the people, and there I am again, an outsider looking in. I never would have thought that I’m going to miss the familiarity and the “happy atmosphere” that one can feel whenever I enter malls back home. I never would have thought that I’ll fondly remember SM Megamall or the smiles and “good morning ma’am, welcome to Jollibee” warm greetings from fast food chains. Now, I can see and feel with my own eyes that Filipinos are one of the warmest and welcoming people I know.

So here I am, still suspended in the anxiety of waiting. But I carried in my heart the things that can’t fit in my luggage. Faith and hope.

I boarded the 2:45 flight of Philippine Airlines and arrived at Changi Airport at almost 7 pm on April 12, 2008. I felt really strange, for the sun sets late along Singapore’s horizon, and the sun is just starting to hide at 7 in the evening. I had this feeling that the clock is only pointing to half past five. It’s a bit disappointing, ‘coz I thought I’ll be witnessing a magnificent sunset while the plane is landing as I set foot on Singapore’s land for the first time. Turns out that it’s not the cinematographic event I had in mind.

I felt like a zombie, an outsider looking in on another person’s life. Slowly, I became an outside observer of the person living inside me. I watched as I mechanically go through the immigration and collect my luggage, headed where the arrow pointed the exit and thought to myself, at the late age of 28, I was able to enter a foreign land on my own. I only have meager allowance loaned to me by my cousins and a suitcase full of hope. I didn’t even get to bring all my favorite things, for fear of paying excess luggage.

Things to Bring: (Dated April 5, 2008, 6 days before my departure)

IMPORTANT DOCUMENTS:

1. EPEC – Employment Pass Eligibility CertificateI applied for my EPEC online through Singapore’s Ministry of Manpower website. I submitted the application last December 30, 2007 and got my approval on January 2, 2008. I can use this Certificate to apply for an extended social visit pass, so that I can stay in Singapore for a whole year and legally look for a job
2. International Passport
3. Resumes, I printed around 85 sets (these papers took up at least 10 pounds from my 20-kilo luggage allowance)
4. Cover letter
5. Portfolio of my previous design works
6. DFA approved college diploma and transcript of records. My diploma was translated into the English language for UP diplomas are written in the Filipino language.
7. NBI Clearance (although until now, they haven’t asked me to present this kind of document yet)
8. NSO Birth Certificate (just in case I need it)

ART STUFFS AND GADGETS:

1. 1 small sketchpad, hardbound
2. 9×12 sketch pad, a collection of sketches/drawings from my Fashion Illustration Course at the Fashion Institute of the Philippines.
3. A collection of my sketches from college up to present. (Maybe I can sell them if I haven’t found a job yet and I ran out of money)
4. Carandache colored pencils, a remnant from my college days and has been with me for almost 9 years.
5. Prang watercolors, a leftover from my Fashion Illustration course.
6. Aaron’s Mac iBook G4 (I’m happy that Aaron was able to let go of his beloved Mac and lent it to me for a few months)
7. My Wacom Tablet (I’m more comfortable in using the tablet rather than the mouse)
8. My new 80-gig Lacie external hard drive, loaded with gigabytes of Adobe Psd and Illustrator files, photos, music and some tutorials.
9. 1 small figure of Bulul (rice god of the Kalingas)
10.  An Ifugao-woven cloth from my former Art Director
11.  Jessica Zafra’s Twisted Flicks (if I had known that they wouldn’t be strict on the hand carry’s weight allowance, I wouldn’t have left my favorite author’s new book, Laura Esquivel’s Malinche.

 PERSONAL STUFFS:

1. 2 formal jacket for job interviews (I already have 3 scheduled interviews)
2. 1 pair of denim pants (I wish I can bring more but denims are heavy)
3. 1 pair of black slacks from Plains and Print
4. A few of my favorite blouses and shirts
5. 2 pair of short pants
6. Undies (I shopped for new sets)
7. 5 pairs of high-heeled shoes (a bad decision though, coz I have to do a lot of walking and high-heeled shoes are not that advisable) I wasn’t able to fit all my shoes in my luggage and it breaks my heart to leave some of my favorite ones.
8. 1 pair of leather boots the color of old rose
9. 1 formal dress I bought last Christmas for our company’s Christmas Party
10. 1 Single-sized set of bed sheets and pillowcases (turned out my bed’s size is Super Single, though  I’m not sure if we have this size in the Philippines)
11.  2 small bags: a white Mango and a black Nine West (again, I was not able to pack my big bags, and  the ones I’ve brought, I can’t even fit my big wallet)
12.  1 pair of rubber slippers

TOILETTRIES:

1. 1 big bottle of Finesse Shampoo
2. 1 tube of Cream Silk Conditioner
3. Modess feminine napkins
4. 1 Big Dove Cream Bar soap
5. 1 Big stick of Rexona
6. 2 bottles of perfume, a CK and an Elizabeth Arden
7. Body Polish Scrub from Icelandic Waters
8. Touch of Sun Body Lotion from Lacoste
9. 2 packs of Clean & Clear Oil Control film
10.  3 bars of papaya soap
11.  6 pots of moisturizing creams

There…27 kilos of my whole life inside a luggage and a hand carry bag. The things that won’t fit I carried in my heart: guts, hopes and dreams.

I met Camille at around half past seven in a coffe shop located nearby Terminal II of Changi Airport and we boarded the taxi to our apartment in Lorong Ah Soo.