{"id":11469,"date":"2008-12-31T19:17:46","date_gmt":"2008-12-31T16:17:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/?p=11469"},"modified":"2008-12-31T19:17:46","modified_gmt":"2008-12-31T16:17:46","slug":"happy-new-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2008\/12\/31\/happy-new-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Happy New Year!"},"content":{"rendered":"<!-- google_ad_section_start -->\n<p>I&#8217;d like to take this moment and wish everyone a Happy New Year.\u00a0 Let the new year bring more good to your life and take away the pains and troubles.\u00a0 Be happy, healthy, wealthy, and have tonnes of fun!<\/p>\n<p>Maybe it&#8217;s also a good time to take a brief look back at the year 2008, as well as examine some expectations for the year 2009.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>2008 was a difficult year.\u00a0 Difficult in both good and bad ways. There were some losses in the family, with my mother-in-law losing her fight with cancer, Olga&#8217;s grandmother passing away, and my uncle unexpectedly dieing recently.\u00a0 Also a few friends of the family were lossed.\u00a0\u00a0 These were the difficult times, difficult in such a way that I wish nobody has to experience.<\/p>\n<p>The good difficulties were related mostly with my job changes.\u00a0\u00a0 I changed the company, and then outgrew the initial position and initial project.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve learned a lot about financial industry, managing an IT department, managing a group of developers, coordinating several projects at once, and more.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve worked more this year than any other year in my life &#8211; more hours, more work done, more stress managed, more achieved, and that&#8217;s a lot.<\/p>\n<p>Talking about my new job I can&#8217;t avoid mentioning the good people that I met this year.\u00a0 Quite a few!\u00a0 Interestingly, I&#8217;ve also got acquanted with some other languages and cultures.\u00a0 And it was amazing to find out that people so different can understand each other so good.<\/p>\n<p>I have to say that 2008 was as good as <a href=\"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2007\/12\/31\/the-year-2007-in-review\/\">I expected it<\/a> to be, or at least most of it was.\u00a0 I was hoping to travel more, which I didn&#8217;t.\u00a0 I only went for a few days to Amsterdam, Netherlands, but even that was an eye opening experience.\u00a0 Now that my finances are getting back in order, hopefully this year will be the one to bring more travels.<\/p>\n<p>As for the expectations towards 2009, here is what I have to say:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I&#8217;m sure there is plenty more to learn and do work-wise.\u00a0 Now that the team is almost fully assembled, and most of the initial clean-ups are taken care of, we can start working on some really interesting things.<\/li>\n<li>Technology will continue getting cheaper and more mainstream.\u00a0 Web is entering daily lives of more people everywhere and that brings up a lot of interesting opportunities.\u00a0 Mobile devices are getting better by the day, and hopefully this is the year when Android-based devices and overall smarter smartphones will gain in their presence.<\/li>\n<li>I want to get back into gaming.\u00a0 These few days that I have PlayStation 3 at home proved to me that I like gaming and that there is plenty to discover.\u00a0 I should be wasting more of my time with controller in hands.<\/li>\n<li>Travelling should be mentioned again.\u00a0 I expect to travel more this year.\u00a0 At a minimum, I want to go back to my home town for a few days, and then also visit at least one country that I haven&#8217;t been to before.<\/li>\n<li>Paperwork.\u00a0 This is something dragging from the previous years, but I expect that I will at least finish the citizenship paperwork for my wife and kid.<\/li>\n<li>And I also <span style=\"text-decoration: line-through;\">expect<\/span> hope that this year I won&#8217;t hear so many bad news.\u00a0 I really hope that everyone that I know will survive this year, and in good health and memory.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>With that, once again I wish you a very Happy New Year!\u00a0 Let me know how your year went, what you expect of the new one, and how did you celebrations go.\u00a0 Let the fireworks begin!<\/p>\n<!-- google_ad_section_end -->\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<!-- google_ad_section_start -->\n<p>I&#8217;d like to take this moment and wish everyone a Happy New Year.\u00a0 Let the new year bring more good to your life and take away the pains and troubles.\u00a0 Be happy, healthy, wealthy, and have tonnes of fun! Maybe it&#8217;s also a good time to take a brief look back at the year 2008, &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2008\/12\/31\/happy-new-year\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Happy New Year!<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<!-- google_ad_section_end -->\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1,2],"tags":[2603,856,572],"keyring_services":[],"class_list":["post-11469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","category-personal","tag-new-year","tag-plans","tag-reviews"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":14582,"url":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2011\/03\/14\/free-wifi-to-be-introduced-on-cyprus-buses\/","url_meta":{"origin":11469,"position":0},"title":"Free WiFi to be introduced on Cyprus buses","author":"Leonid Mamchenkov","date":"March 14, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Cyprus Updates shares the following: Internet access will be available via wifi for free to passengers of Nicosia buses by next month. The service will start intiially on route 158 (Nisou \u2013 Pera Chorio) and then will be expanded to the rest of the routes. Furthermore, by 2012 buses will\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;All&quot;","block_context":{"text":"All","link":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":18931,"url":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2013\/12\/10\/until-now-it-was-particularly-difficult-to-obtain\/","url_meta":{"origin":11469,"position":1},"title":"Until now, it was particularly difficult to obtain&#8230;","author":"Leonid Mamchenkov","date":"December 10, 2013","format":"quote","excerpt":"Until now, it was particularly difficult to obtain reliable figures on the results of the Android operating system in China. Indeed, there is no \"centralized app store\" and most smartphones sold in the country do not use Google services, including activation. In fact, it is very difficult to know the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;All&quot;","block_context":{"text":"All","link":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8341,"url":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2004\/12\/16\/the-25-most-difficult-questions-youll-be-asked-on-a-job-interview\/","url_meta":{"origin":11469,"position":2},"title":"The 25 most difficult questions you&#8217;ll be asked on a job interview","author":"Leonid Mamchenkov","date":"December 16, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"25 questions and something to think about for the answers are here. These are primarely for managerial staff, but most of the questions are general enough for the rest of us.","rel":"","context":"In &quot;All&quot;","block_context":{"text":"All","link":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10061,"url":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2006\/04\/19\/technology-helps-growing-families-stronger\/","url_meta":{"origin":11469,"position":3},"title":"Technology helps growing families stronger","author":"Leonid Mamchenkov","date":"April 19, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"There's plenty of new stuff happening all around us. Technology gets a lot of hype on a 24x7 basis, with new things happening here and there. In this constantly updated environment it is sometimes difficult to notice the real pearls. I think that I just came across one - JotSpot\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;All&quot;","block_context":{"text":"All","link":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8120,"url":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2004\/10\/27\/blogs-for-kids\/","url_meta":{"origin":11469,"position":4},"title":"Blogs for Kids","author":"Leonid Mamchenkov","date":"October 27, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"I came across an interesting article - \"Blogs for Kids\". Author suggests that bloggin is very useful for kids. It helps them to develop a number of skills, which are difficult to teach otherwise. After thinking some time about this, I tend to agree. Typing, writing, and editing skills with\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;All&quot;","block_context":{"text":"All","link":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12249,"url":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2010\/03\/12\/parting-ways-with-fxpro\/","url_meta":{"origin":11469,"position":5},"title":"Parting ways with FxPro","author":"Leonid Mamchenkov","date":"March 12, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Today was my last day with FxPro Financial Services Ltd.\u00a0\u00a0 Looking back at how much I've learned and at how much the company changed during my time there, it's really difficult to believe that I was there for only two years.\u00a0 In that time, the IT infrastructure was totally redesigned,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;All&quot;","block_context":{"text":"All","link":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11469"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11469\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11469"},{"taxonomy":"keyring_services","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/keyring_services?post=11469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}