Having fun working at Google's California headquarters are (from left) algorithm geek Teng Junbin, Mr Lim Yew Jin, Meng's Wall's Mr Tan Chade Meng, Mr Ang Pet Chean and 'Orthonormal Eigenhector' Hector Yee. -- ST PHOTO: BHAGYASHREE GAREKAR

The wall is unremarkable in itself but beneath an eye-catching replica of a space shuttle hang rows of photographs.

They show Mr Tan Chade Meng, a 37-year-old Singaporean engineer, beaming as he poses with an array of celebrities - former United States president Bill Clinton, Nobel laureate Al Gore, financier George Soros, boxer Mohammed Ali, primatologist Jane Goodall, actors Robin Williams and Gwyneth Paltrow. Singapore's President S R Nathan too. 'I kissed one of them,' says Mr Tan with a smile. 'I'm not going to say whom.'

In September last year, Mr Tan - or Meng as he is commonly known - was on the front page of the New York Times, introduced as 'the geeky fellow with a big smile who is a household name only in his own household'.

Still, the powerful and the famous grin and grip his hand as they arrive for a tour to learn what makes Google one of the most successful companies in the world.

The article quoted Google chief executive Eric Schmidt as saying that Mr Tan and his photo gallery are 'representative of much of what is right and fun about Google'.

Mr Tan, a graduate of Nanyang Technological University and University of California, Santa Barbara, started out meeting the visitors out of his own interest. But he was so good at attending to them that the company has come to expect him to do it regularly, although it is not part of his job description.

Googlers, as they call themselves, swear by the 'fun' part of their work.

It's lunch hour and many of them are taking advantage of the spring sunshine to lounge on the lawns. A few are out walking their dogs on leashes - the company, which topped a Forbes list of the best places to work for, famously allows employees to bring their pets to work.

Not a single suit or an Oxford-toe is in sight. Jeans or slacks and sneakers rule.

A few bikes stand at the edge of flowerbeds dotted with bright yellow nasturtiums. The receptionist tells me casually to take a right by the T-Rex to arrive at the venue where I am to meet some of the Singaporeans working at Google.

I pass by an empty volleyball court and an assortment of notices stuck on glass doors variously announcing the start of a social network of Indians, a hobby class, and an exhortation to grow more food to end world hunger. The dinosaur is a sort of centrepiece, an installation with pink plastic flamingos 'perched' on it.

Inside a cafeteria named Charlie's Place after one of Google's first chefs, Mr Lim Yew Jin, 28, is trying to explain the 'Rule of 100' to me.

The software engineer, a product of Dunman High School, University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, and the National University of Singapore, joined Google late last year.

'The rule states that anywhere in Google you are never more than 100 feet away from food...A guy actually measured that,' he says when he sees me trying to digest that.

Whether or not that's a fact, there is such a thing as a free lunch at Google. Food, snacks and drinks are free at the 17 cafeterias on the campus. They serve world cuisine, using uncaged meat and organic produce.

'Which is why there is a corollary to the 100-foot rule,' says Mr Lim. 'The 'Rule of 15', which says people put on 15 pounds upon joining Google.'

Seated around the table, three other Singaporeans are tucking into their sushi, curries, rice and noodles. One of them sips from a tender coconut. They laugh when I suggest that they joined Google just for the makan. 'Whenever chilli crab is on the menu, we pass the word around among Singaporeans and meet up at lunch,' says Mr Lim.

Mr Ang Pet Chean, who is coy about his age and education, offers his card. 'It is the first card I'm giving out,' he says.

Chimes in Mr Lim: 'You know, I got a box of cards printed just so my mum could see it.'

Mr Teng Junbin, 26, the quiet third engineer in the group, introduces himself as a 'geek passionate about algorithms'. He studied at Raffles Institution and the National University of Singapore.

When Mr Hector Yee presents his card, it makes me sit up. Orthonormal Eigenhector is his title. He explains: 'It's a pun on a mathematical object called an orthonormal eigenvector. It's a special vector that comes from solving some matrix equations, and it usually means a direction perpendicular to all other directions. It also has the special property that no matter how much you transform it with the original matrix, it always points in the same direction.'

Sublime, but it does nothing to describe his work at Google, which is to enhance the accessibility of Google Images. The 32-year-old studied at St Andrew's Secondary and Victoria Junior College.

It is not the first time I come across an unusual designation at Google. Mr Tan calls himself a Jolly Good Fellow (which nobody can deny). Google certainly didn't and that is his official title on his business card.

After the styrofoam lunch boxes, bottles and cans are suitably discarded into appropriate trashbins (Google is determinedly green), I wait eagerly to meet Mr Lim Jing Yee, who was part of a team that invented Gmail, possibly Google's most popular application after its search engine.

He is a soft-spoken 37-year-old, a former Hwa Chong Junior College alumnus who earned his bachelor's at Cornell University and master's at Stanford.

'Google was a small Silicon Valley start-up then,' he says of the days when Gmail was in incubation. 'It was among the first projects to be taken up. The Gmail team started small. We were just five to 10 people on the Gmail team,' he says in his matter-of-fact tone.

If he takes much pride in inventing a product that is used by millions worldwide, he does not make it apparent. The most he is willing to say, when I try to draw him out, is: 'Yes, people feel happy when they learn that I work at Google and was part of a team that created Gmail.'

Now he is at work improving the infrastructure at Google Maps applications, making them faster and more responsive.

The other Singaporean involved in the creation of Gmail, Mr Sanjeev Singh, is no longer with the company.

Altogether, there are about 20 Singaporeans working here.

Google says its mission is no less than to organise the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. Its holy grail is the 'perfect search engine', defined by co-founder Larry Page as something that 'understands exactly what you mean and gives you back exactly what you want'.

Does that demand 100-hour work weeks? On the contrary, the Singaporeans claim that they have a 'lot of work-life balance'. Says Mr Yee: 'They don't want you to burn yourself out. Google wants you for the marathon, not a sprint.'

Says Mr Lim Yew Jin: 'My boss pointedly told me not to come to work on weekends. I am married and my wife doesn't complain. That should tell you something.'

Still, he admits that he sometimes stays on until dinner time.

Mr Teng, the quiet geek, ventures that it's all the same to him. 'When I get home, I log on and am back working on my algorithms.'

Either way, Google makes it its business to make life simpler, and on a tour of the premises, Mr Tan points out the Google perks - the on-site laundry room, the barber, the massage rooms. And its newest promise to 'change the world again'.

'We changed the way the world works when we introduced Gmail, Google Maps, Google Images, Google Earth. Now we want to do it again with a programme that teaches people SIY - search inside yourself,' he says, in all seriousness.

He is trying to develop a course to train Googlers in emotional intelligence. 'Happy people are productive people,' he says, adding that the course will be open source - that is, freely available on the Web.

'We value people at Google, you can see that. We trust people so much that unlike most companies we don't have a five-year plan. We trust we'll be excelling at what we do. Few Singapore companies have that kind of trust although Singaporean engineers are right up there with the best in the world.'

He points to the volleyball court saying: 'Where else can you see employees playing ball without managers worrying about productivity going downhill?'

In Silicon Valley, where the battle for talent is fierce, Google's unique package, that includes competitive pay, seems to inspire loyalty.

The Singaporean Googlers stay connected with one another and make regular trips home for work and pleasure.

But the thought of going back to Singapore for good is not uppermost just yet. 'We're having too much fun here,' says Mr Tan Chade Meng.

bhagya@sph.com.sg