A LIFE WELL-LIVED...

MY AMERICAN DREAM The Clients

METPATH A Medical Laboratory located in Teterboro, NJ. The Shop was running on IBM 370 OS/MVS, CICS, COBOL, DB2. They needed someone who can help then migrate to COBOL II. Steve Clayton was the Project owner, and one of his lieutenants was a certain Sargento. Four guys from RCG were already in the Project: Ellise Dekker and Dave both from South Africa, Martin from England and Mario Murillo from Bicol/Surigao then Australia before moving to the US. Mario (his wife Cynthia also a Programmer) helped me found an apartment in Little Ferry, just a few blocks from Metpath. I learned from a common friend that they moved to Canada. IBM A Project to replace the ageing CICS with something that was going to be developed using C, a relatively new development language, was already on its few months when I was given the marching order to join. The four of us drove in my Plymouth Horizon to Manassas, Virginia. We passed by Manassas Park and we thought that was it. That's when we learned that it's a different town. The Project leader was a guy from Vientiane, Laos and so are his programmers. The moment I went in the Project, I knew it wasn't for me. We stayed in an apartment where Winwin and Cheche spent their days playing Mario on TV. HANOVER TRUST/CHEMICAL BANK Hanover Trust in Manhattan, NYC was bought by Chemical Bank. They needed someone who can help them with extraction, convertion and data migration. I reported to Ron, a Jew and work with David, another Jew. Like a typical project, the completion is yesterday, so we were expected to work long hours. What was almost funny is, whenever I go around 4PM, which was too early, I run into Ron somewhere in the building, hehehe, of all people. Goodnight Ron, goodnight Alex, very friendly! CONRAIL While waiting for another gig, I was temporarily attached to a team working right on The Avenue of The Americas in Manhattan for Conrail, the freight company based in Pennsylvania. MORGAN STANLEY A company dealing with Finances, Banking and Lending. The shop was mainly on IBM S370 mainframe running COBOL, NATURAL II and ADABAS. Based in Brooklyn, NYC, I get acquainted with the New York Subway System. SANDOZ PHARMACEUTICALS (now NOVARTIS) Based in East Hanover, NJ, it's an IBM S370 mainframe shop, their apps were written with assorted languages like COBOL, Maintis and BTRIEVE. I was there though to help them with their newly-installed SAP R/2 System. Andersen Consulting was their main Integrator. These are the names that I recall: Claire Nestor, Trishia (the only one I think who understands what was going on) Emil, a UP guy, Ramon Evangelista, Dick Tuhey, Wayne, a black guy, from Haiti, if I remember it correctly, the BTRIEVE expert. Debby, from Andersen, she was so upset that I was able to complete my tasks without even asking them for assistance. Here, I made IBM mainframe talk to BTRIEVE, something no one has seen before. When I was made to finish my gig, at the behest of Debby, Dick Tuhey commented, "why let someone who knows how to get things done go not even halfway of the Project?" That's politics, Dick! Before I exited, Trish gave me a farewell lunch in the conference room. EASTMAN CHEMICALS After a heated argument with RCG, I was told they could no longer employ me. A good riddance, I guess. The timing couldn't be more perfect. A newly-formed consulting company-International Consulting Solutions (ICS) was frenzy hiring SAP ABAP DEVELOPERS. Eastman Chemicals is in Kingsport, Tennessee and I have to fly from Newark, NJ (EWR) to Charlotte, NC (CLT) then to Tricities Regional Airport shared by: (Kingsport, TN, Johnson City, TN and Bristol, VA), TN (TRI). I was doing this weekly for a year. In this Gig, I was in the Team with Brian Marino, Mannfred-from Germany, Juliet Singh (from Trinidad and Tobago, who later married Mannfred), Raimund Shimanovski, a Polish-German, Susan O (Armenian), Monique, a French-Canadian, Paul Hubert from The Netherlands and Tamas Jaforfalvi from Hungary. Like the others, I was staying at Hilton Garden initially, but we were moved to an apartment complex later. Pay was very good but then grass is greener somewhere else-Boston, Massachusetts. ANALOG DEVICES They were located in Dedham, MA. When I got there, Manfred and Raimund were there already working for SPO America. They bolted out from ICS couple of months before I did. My first client on R/3, SAP's Client/Server Architecture landscape. NOVACOR PETRO-CHEMICALS Leominster, MA, some 45 minutes drive west of Boston. Many of their Consultants were British, Indians and Pakistanis working for ICS. CHIPCOM (later 3COM) They were a computer and accessories hub. Located along The Silicon Highway (Rt95) in Marlborough and Southborough, MA. STREAM INTERNATIONAL Also in Dedham, MA. They manage Software Licensing for Microsoft, Norton Anti Virus and the likes. It was here that a guy from Price Waterhouse was assigned to spy on me, disguised as junior developer. They stole my idea of an Automated Configurator. CABLETRON SYSTEMS A compute hub located in Rochester, NH. I did their Invoicing System. I was almost done when SPO sent Jacko Aadmiral to the Project. He talked the Client into letting me go pre-maturely. A line was crossed, I left SPO for Softline, a consulting company based in Silicon Valley, CA. LITELFUSE Des Plaines, IL, could have been 20-30 minutes drive from Midway Airport. I was here for ony a month to cover someone from India who was on-leave, wife's maternity. They manufacture electrical equipment and based or have an operation in Switzerland. CALLAWAY GOLF Big Bertha was the thing they developed at that time. Located in Carlsbad, CA, I get there by flying to San Diego then drive 45 minues north. Project Manager was Chinese, he offered my job, I politely declined. BALDOR INDUSTRIAL MOTORS I was here to help them with their Material Management and Sales and Distribution modules. A certain Mike was the Project Owner and Pam Chance from Softline, my account manager. Their Programmers were friendly. Bill Robinson, one of them, several times we fish in one of the lakes in Oklahoma close to its border with Arkansas. They were located mainly in Fort Smith Arkansas, but some parts on the Plant were actually already part of Oklahoma. An older gentleman who developed an extract Program he called Swahili, tried a number of times talking me into working for Baldor. It was in this Gig that we go once a week to a restaurant with a Karaoke. One consultant from Graysom, TX, divorced three times, like to sing 'All my Xs ive in Texas'. METHODIST HOSPITAL The facility is in Memphis, TN. I usually swing there on my way home from Baldor Motors in Fort Smith, AR. Their principal consultant was an Indian, Prasad Reddy, and there were others: Sajid-a Pakistani and Jegnassa-an Indian girl, and a Native American named Dow. I did a Dialog via a User Exit on Fixed Assets Module, something they were afraid of doing. They love it. LYONDELL PETRO-CHEMICALS Located in Houston, TX, later acquired a small chemical plant in Cleveland, OH. My first shop for a Windows NT O/S as opposed to Unix. I was in a group of mostly RCG or former RCG consultants. Bruno Magnani, a Dutch of Italian descent, was my sushy bar buddy my entire gig. Tokyo Garden was the name of the sushy bar. I learned later that the place was burned. VALERO ENERGY This was not the Valero of today. That time they only have few refineries, all located at Corpus Christi, TX. Initially a guy from South Africa and I were sent there. Only after two weeks that they moved us to San Antonio, TX, their Headquarters. I met several consultants and client developers who were appreciative of our help implementing their IS-OIL Module. They even sent me to Houston for a two-week bootcamp on IS-OIL Downstream. These names still ring bell when I hear them: Francisco Martinez, Hal Zech-the Project Manager and eventually the CIO, Rambo, Ed, Frank, Tony Terini and Szuszana-a couple and both from Hungary. ENRON ENERGY Based in Downtown Houston, TX, the company specializes in Risk Management in the Oil & Gas industry. Virtually all of the Big-6 were in The Project. Andersen Consulting, Price Waterhouse, KPMG, E&Y, EDS... and some smaller ones like Softline. I was in Beverly Flanigan's Team and every Tuesday & Thursday around 2:00PM we go down to the ground floor (we were on the 44th floor of 45) for cocktail. Life was good. WEST PUBLISHING Partly American, partly Canadian company based in Eagan, MN, a few miles south of Minneapolis. They own the largest database of every law, legislation, precedence, case, any legal matter local & international for that matter. They make money from subscriptions from law firms, law schools, practicing lawyers and law students. Our Team was led by the Development Director based in Newtown Square, PA, Philip Loots himself. A strict but no-nonsense guy from South Africa. Also in the Team were Siew Chong, Zamri, Liza Al-Rajhi, Bolek Tabor,, EXXON MOBIL Frm West Publishing, I went straight to Mobil Oil in Fairfax, VA. A few months down the project, Mobil was acquired by Exxon, hence, Exxon Mobil, though eventually, Mobil was dropped from its name. I was just rolled from the project (Project Everest) when the unthinkable happened, 9/11. SOTHEBY'S Is an auction house based in NYC. I started there in the worst of time. Their employees were mostly Russian and Ukrainian Jews, and the murder of Versace, a Jew, by a Filipino named Conanan was still fresh in their mind. When my project was done, they made me sign an agreement that I can't work, directly or in-directly at any aucion company, specifically Christie. RAYTHEON A big Department of Defense contractor based in Tucson, Arizona. The Project I was in was for the US Air Force, and was directly managed by SAP (Boston, Massachusetts based) itself. Raytheon specializes in the research and development of Air Defense Systems. This was my shortest gig. The Blue Print was not even finalized yet when I was recalled for an assignment close to home. COACH FACTORY I believe this was one of my Clients that has made use of me to my fullest potential. I must have pumped hundreds of thousands of lines of codes to their install. Several slow-running batch jobs I optimized, so much so that they made me sit in meetings that pertain to optimization and upgrade. Mary, Pooja, Phadmah, Dave Stone, Rhonda Dowling, Mel, Sandra, Les Byrnes and many others... I was with kind and smart people, just like in most of my Gigs. It was a privilege being the consultant they keep the longest time, considering that the company is dubbed "a revolving door for consultants". US ARMY-LMP LOCKHEED MARTIN I was in High School when I read about Lockheed, Martin Marietta, Northrop, General Dynamics, Raytheon, Boeing... the big names in research and development of military hardware: bombers, jet fighters, aircraft carriers, and many many other weapons systems. Not even in my wildest dreams that one day I would have the privilege of working in one of them, let alone three. Lockheed Martin (Lockheed and Martin Marietta merged some years back) has already sold 2,000 units of the fearsome Fighting Falcons (F16) to airforces around the world - including USAF. But I was at Lockheed Martin for the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Program. Developed jointly by nine countries: US, Canada, UK, Italy, Norway, The Netherlands, Denmark, Australia and Turkiye. Then it was renamed F35 Lightning II. We were like in a bunker, if not only it's not underground. The building, I gathered, was designed to withstand a nuclear attack. Inside, we were like in a movie, in a Command and Control Center (CCC). And after work, you see from the parking lot, F35s soaring overhead in testflights, an awesome spectacle! Another unique thing I experienced in this gig is in Fort Worth, TX, in a typical winter, there's not much snow - it's ice. Everything outside is covered in ice, all works are done remote. I can't even get to the hotel's detached kitchen for breakfast without holding the pathway railings. I had an interesting year there. JONES GROUP BOEING AIRCRAFT CORP I first wished of working for Boeing in my first year at CIT. Engr. Ramientos, the Dean of Civil Engineering was once offered to work for Boeing, but declined the offer. Said to myself, someday day I will be working for Boeing. Fast forward, a dream come true. Based in Renton, WA, I was with their 737 Upgrade Program. Boeing was running BAAN, flagship of a software company based in The Netherlands, before deciding on SAP Enterprise. They put me in their Plant Maintenance Module, the core for a company like Boeing. I flew Continental, later United, when they merged. Stayed in a hotel that was Marriott-owned, where most of other consultants were staying.