Most people I've talked to in the last little while have asked me how work is going, and how I like it. So perhaps I should give a somewhat complete update on the work situation (leaving out anything that I don't think should be posted online).

In short, work is great. This company parallels the many things I liked about Spectrum when things were going well for us there. For those that know me well, you probably also know how much I loved working at Spectrum. The benefits are very accommodating as the company has been doing very well in the last few years. Vacation allowance is better than most, and company retreats seem to be coming a little more often than one expects.

I had a few fears (more concerns, really) working in Taiwan:
1) Extremely long and gruelling hours of hard work
2) Boring coworkers, nerdy and male
3) I'd get out of shape from doing no physical activity

Fortunately, in reality, none of those fears are quite true. We generally work from 9am - 6:30/7:00pm, which is far better than the 9am - 10pm hours I had heard about before coming. Of course, every company is different, and there are some that do do long long hours. I just landed in a company that values life a little more. That said, like at any non-governmental company, there will be deadlines and periods of extra work... but in general, it's good.

The coworkers, while mostly male, aren't boring nor nerdy on the whole. As Asians generally are, they're fairly playful and chummy, and it's actually pretty refreshing. And, as you'll read in the next paragraph, they're fairly active too. Anyway, there was no awkward moment from the time I started. Everyone was very friendly, and my coworkers have been really accommodating in all aspects of my settling in. But yes, there is a definite unbalance of male to female.

Our building, only 1.5 yrs old, is nicely equipped with a universal gym, some elliptical trainers, stationary bikes, treadmills, a massage chair, two ping pong tables, and half a basketball court which doubles as a badminton court. People play basketball or badminton or ping pong daily, which is awesome, because I'm finding that I've been more active here than I have back home in a long time. The starting times for ball or badminton are around 6:45pm - 7:00pm, so it encourages people not to work too late (unless they really have to).

From a work work perspective, things are also going well. I've been given the opportunity to learn firmware programming and aspects of IC design, which I always had an interest in, but gave up because I didn't have the skills coming out of university. As such, I've been enrolled in a crash (night) course in Verilog HDL at a famous local university, NCTU, to learn these skills. I think, on a whole, the experience I'll get out of working here will be rewarding and valuable.

So, all in all, for just about all aspects of work, things are going very well.