Eat-All-You-Can Barbecue in Tokyo

(November 8, 2008. Tokyo, Japan) Together with some friends from my previous company, we went to eat at an “all-you-can-eat barbecue” restaurant at Shimbashi. With all the excitement, I forgot to check the name of the place. For 1,200 yen, you choose from a buffet of meats (beef, pork, chicken), vegetables, etc., and barbecue them right at your dining table. There are ready-to-eat complements too, like rice, dumplings, noodles, etc., a selection of fruits and desserts, and an unlimited refill of juice and colas. The patrons were a mix of different nationalities (Japanese, Filipinos, Asians, Europeans, etc.), and two buses full of Chinese occupied only a fifth of the packed place. My stomach was so full when our 1-hour time limit expired, I felt like needing a wheelchair to leave the place.

To burn some of the fats away, we went for a walk at Ueno Park. After taking some interesting pictures and visiting some of the nice places there, we decided to call it a day and go our different ways (I was living at a different area than them, and had to take a different train line). But we felt like there were still much to talk about, and lost time to catch up. We decided to chat for a little bit more at Starbucks, or any other cafe house, but we ended up at Mc Donalds. some had coffee, others had nice cold drinks. We were still too full to eat. Before we knew it, we already spent more than two hours just chatting about anything.

But most of our discussions revolved around some news and happenings about their company, AWS Systems. Somehow I felt like I still belonged to the company, as it was my first (and only). I had to leave it (after more than 12 years) when I started raising my family and transferred to Davao. Somehow our discussions gave me renewed energy to pursue the current challenges I am facing, and helped clear my mind to set the direction of my return to IT, this time focusing on skill development of the next generation of Filipino IT engineers.

We also talked about how we can motivate young Filipino IT students and enthusiasts to pursue a future in IT. Informally, I asked for their support in sharing their stories and experiences, both good and not-so-good, about their IT career and life. We agreed with the observation that one of the problems facing future IT engineers is the lack of a clear image or idea of what is in store for them in the field of IT, and how they can grab those opportunities. We also talked about the values, knowledge, skills and attitude that should be taught and introduced to them based on the actual needs and requirement of the current IT industry. I hope one day we can make concrete steps towards sharing these stories with others.

Then finally it was time to go home. Aside from being re-energized with meeting my friends again, I was so happy because our Nihongo teacher (sensei), who is also a good friend of mine and a baptismal godmother of my son, gave some gifts for her godson, and a lot of Japanese food stuff to bring home to Davao. Unfortunately for those in Davao (but fortunately for me), some of those stuffs may never reach them, as they are too tempting to ignore, specially when I am by my lonesome in my hotel room studying and preparing for my lessons the next day.

Seven Passers from Davao for the October 2008 PhilNITS-FE Exam

In an earlier entry (see Davao Aims to Make a Mark in PhilNITS), I wrote that I finally had a chance to conduct review classes in Davao for the PhilNITS-FE exam, which I hoped will help bring notice to the IT competency of Davaoeños.

A total of seven (7) passed in Davao. Five (5) of them were fortunate enough to have passed the exam in their first try. All five attended my review program. The other two passers passed one part of the exam (either the morning or the afternoon part) in their previous take, and the other part in the recent (Oct 2008) exam.

I would like to extend my congratulations to the seven recent Davao passers of the PhilNITS-FE certification exam!
(FE03-0081) Andrin, Rendell Caldona *(USEP)
(FE03-0088) Atiagan, Rosfield Cabanes
(FE03-0041) Badoy, Larvi Jerrick Ocsio *(UP-Min)
(FE03-0070) Brion, Raymond Bryan Solomero *(UP-Min)
(FE03-0064) Mahilum, Jedd Benedict Kris Tahil *(AdDU)
(FE03-0027) Plaza, Ian Jay Cañares *(UP-Min)
(FE03-0077) Sereño, Mylene Estandarte
* attended the review program I conducted in cooperation with PhilNITS Davao

(you may visit PhilNITS website for the complete list of passers)

This brings to 12 the PhilNITS-FE passers of Davao. If we include my wife, who passed the exam in Manila but is now residing here in Davao, then we have 13 PhilNITS-FE certified passers here in Davao. I know we have more Davaoeños who already passed the exam but have taken it in other exam sites throughout the Philippines. I hope one day we can gather together, physically or virtually, and help promote Davao's IT capability.

SW Design and Development Engineer Training in Japan

I am fortunate to have another chance to visit Japan this year (2008), from November 2 to 23, for an IT training sponsored by AOTS, in cooperation with PilNITS. The training is about the Software Design and Development Engineer Exam, or SW for short, which is also being conducted by PhilNITS in the Philippines. The exam is one level higher to the Fundamental Engineer (FE) exam of PhilNITS also. Both SW and FE are recognized by Japan as a valid measure of one's IT competence, and can be used to facilitate getting work in Japan as an IT engineer. For my case, passing the FE exam has allowed me to participate in two advance IT trainings in Japan this year alone.

My current training, SWIT as we officially call it, comes in a good timing for me, as I am also planning to conduct more IT trainings and reviews in Davao. I recently conducted reviews for the October 2008 FE exam in Davao. And hopefully next year reviews for SW can follow.

I plan to write about the technical details of the training in a future entry, but for now let me share the other aspect of our visit here. For the SWIT training, there are a total of 23 participants, from Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. We are lucky to have the most number of participants, a total of 8 came from the Philippines. Most of the participants are working in the academe or educational institutions, and are quite experienced and knowledgable in their respective fields or specialization. Aside from my learnings in the formal lectures, I am sure to learn a lot from my colleagues too.

We are staying here in Tokyo, and our training is conducted at AOTS Tokyo Kenshu Center (TKC). The weather is quite nice, compared to the Philippines it's like being in an airconditioned room anywhere you go, but not yet too cold that you will need gloves already. Our formal lectures are being conducted by NEC Learning Ltd., and they provided us each with individual notebook computers for our use during the training period. The training room is also very nice, with all the necessary facilities you will need for a seminar/training, and more (like a big TV set for film showings, and wireless access points, etc.) How I wish trainings in the Philippines can be as nice as they do it here. In general the lecturers are good, but not all. Some also just looks at their powerpoint and reads everything that is written there. But all lecturers are well experienced in their respective expertise in the IT field, every lecture time is a treasure cove of experience and learning.

More about the training and my acitivities here in the coming days...