She is not bitter about leaving for she perfectly understands the situation and her place in the company. But we have to admit, we are all saddened by the fact that another friend will have to leave...again. And what makes it more sad for me? I will not be there to send her off. For I am at home now taking care of the kids who still have fever and cough and my hubby who just got out from the hospital. I won't be able to see her on her last day in the office. *sob sob*

Last year, when the global economy news spread around the world, everyone was shocked and all hoped that they could all survive it without losing their job. The ones who were immediately affected were those on contractual jobs. In many companies, they were immediately released and they immediately lost jobs. Though we are permanent employees already, we can never be sure of what is bound to happen and we should all expect for the worst and be prepared. Acceptance is also necessary, so to speak.

During the time when all of us need not worry about our positions in the company, we were a bit relaxed. Everyone has very low engagement with their own companies. Almost everyone seemed to continuously look for a greener pasteur. But when 2009 came, slowly, one company after the other announced recession and others, completely closed down. Several thousands of employees lost their jobs. Even permanent employees were affected by redundancy.

Will we be OK? I've heard in a news that the economy will be able to recover in mid 2010. But my friend said, will waiting for 2010 be any better than praying NOW? I was taken aback, and realized that probably, we are forgetting something....something very important.

Though we've lost a number of friends because of this crisis, this surely brought us a lot of lessons, too. Each of us have their own experience on this and we all have lessons we learned. We are all hoping this crisis will soon come to an end and more importantly, we have all learned to value the present. What we have now is more important than what we can still have in the future. I am not saying we shouldn't be futuristic, it's just that we shouldn't focus on the future too much that we are neglecting the present. What we are and who we are now...are also important.