The guide to a better life in Singapore.

A lot of people have spoken of "consumerism culture". It is a culture that makes people want to get items to satisfy their wants/ego/status quo. A man in his late 30s said that " Many years ago when my salary was $2000, I wanted an alpha numeric pager, which was quite cool back then. When my salary increased to $3000, I wanted the latest mobile phone, there was no end to it."

In Singapore, you will see people in their teens comparing their latest bags, handphones, shoes, clothes or electronic gadgets like ipods. You see young and successful executives/managers comparing their cars, like their lexus, bmws or mercs. You see uber rich people comparing their huge bungelows. I too, was once part of a teenage consumerism culture, in secondary school, I desperately craved for a pager when I had no need for one. Such was the importance of being "in" with my peers.

True, sometimes you get the feeling that the Govt doesn't allow you to live below your means (i.e income ceilings for HDBs), but that doesn't mean it isn't possible. When your kids are young, it is of the utmost importance to inculcate into them the values of being frugal and how image is nothing but a facade which the human race, driven by material acqusition, invented.

Having spare cash on your hands is always a good feeling, it provides security, comfort and it acts as a buffer, to ensure you survive in the event of a calamity. If you've lived most of your life without needing a certain item, chances are, you probably don't need it. If you've lived your life with certain items, chances are, you'd be hard pressed to do without it. It's all in your mind.

Forget the gucci, DKNY and armanis. Forget the porsches, ferraris and lambos. Forget the lame stigma of public housing, cause there isn't anything wrong with public housing. Relieve yourself of the pressure bestowed onto you from your parents' successes. You will always be you and you are unique in your own way.

May God be with you. =)

MERRY X'MAS to ALL.

It was great catching up with so many of you all during the festive period, especially for those THAT I haven't seen in awhile (Perth Peeps).

Thank you all for the cards and presents, sad to say I didn't buy anything for anyone cause I never got into the practice. But thanx anyhow.

Got to spend more time than expected with my dear, who has been great in supporting me through my various "difficulties" in "certain" aspects of my life.

Despite rain making the season feel abit dreary, I feel it really makes it quite cool and nice. Especially @ night when we sleep. (yes/no?)

Haha, I think I have recieved a number of complaints that my blog is too political, so I'll try to lighten up a bit.

In view that X'mas is around the corner..I would like to make my wish-list to Mr. Santa Clause. Due to the fact that I'm a very childish man and I still decieve myself that he actually exists.

Dear Santa,

I would really like to be happy, I would like to be a 'glass half-full' person. I would like to be able to seek personal fulfilment in whatever I do. I would also like to be a better boyfriend, because sometimes I'm too caught up with material possessions, work and other aspects of life. I don't buy 4D, TOTO or go to Singapore pools, so hoping that I win the lottery is quite irrelevant.

In short, I would like to be happier in my own circumstances. To always take life's knocks with a pinch of salt and life's successes with humility. (although I haven't experienced many of life's successes). I would like to be a better son to my parents and I'm sorry I used my cat to wipe the floor when I spilled some water.

I don't wish for a house in the Tanglin area, with several ferraris (although if you give, I sure take). Rather I wish I would make better use of my time for the loved ones in my life. I also wish to be of greater use to my current employers as I fear neither death, pain or my boss' diatribes aimed in my general direction.

All that I wish for, is intangible and can't be sent to me gift wrapped in a parcel but that's fine. If you would like to bestow me with some material luxuries I will not decline inview that good things are hard to come by. I have this old friend of mine who always tells me "Good things come in good time". But lets ignore him cause he's old.

Material presents.

1) Maybe Kwek Leng Beng, in an attempt to transfer money to his wife, enters the wrong acct number and transfers 10 million to me. He subsequently loses the receipt so he is unable to trace where the money went to. I am willing to pay GST for the amount of money transferred to me, it will help the poor.

2) Mindef loses my reservist record and replaces it with "killed-in-action"

3) All the parking fines that I paid gets given back to me in a new Gahmen progress package

4) Instead of having a subaru challange, where contestants see who wins the subaru by putting their hands on their car. (subsequently staying there for afew days). I hope for a ferrari challange, I will then proceed to glue my hands to the car, refuse to go toilet and defecate in my jeans.

5) I wish for a Man Utd Jersy, signed by Wayne Rooney, which I will place on a pike in orchard road...and set on fire. I also hope the ash from the burning goes into some Man Utd fan's drink and gives him diarherrea. (jus kidding)

Singapore and Globalisation

I studied basic economics in JC and learnt that in most cases low price means more demand and vice versa. I also learnt that there were luxury goods, This means that the demand of these goods could be relatively high despite stagnant or moderately increasing prices. I also learnt of goods with inelastic demand, goods that had a very steep demand curve and the demand for these goods would remain high despite price hikes. (cigerettes, alchohol, petrol. etc)

Ok, I grasped the fundementals of demand and supply, or so I thought. I reckoned that wage levels would be determined by the same market forces that dictate acquisition of goods. Well, I was only partially right, because I didn't understand that markets were merging. Two years ago, the wealth management industry began to grow and the demand for private bankers grew proportionately. In fact, today there is still a shortage and because of that, their wages are relatively high. Inspiring.

Just what is THE MARKET? The market which encompasses the intangible pull and push of demand. The market is US. We are the market, when people do business they always term markets in-terms of geographical locations. (eg. Singapore market, China market, USA market). Or more specifically demographic markets. (eg. Baby boomers, Gen X, Gen Y). However the barriers between world markets are slowly eroding.

Enter Globalisation.

Singaporeans who take a personal interest in economics don't really like the term "Globalisation". Why? Globalisation often challanges minimum wage, previously secure job markets and entire industries. No one can escape globalisation. But just what is globalisation? Globalisation opens up a world market, where individuals & organisations are free to trade with each other, eroding geographical boundaries and information barriers. It simply enlarges the market to a world economy.

Implications:

Lets say local cleaners are willing to work for a paltry S$700 a month. That's barely enough to survive, let alone live comfortably. Bangladesh workers are willing to work for maybe S$400, because they don't bear the full brunt of living expenses here. Even sending back S$100 home is able to feed their families for a whole month. Therefore, market forces dictate that the most cost-efficient way for cleaning companies is to hire a bangla cleaner. The poor Singapore cleaner goes out of a job because taking a wage cut to $400 is suicidal.

Also, Singapore's manufactoring industry is in decline, operations are being shifted to China and India where the labour costs are low and profit margins are higher. We lose jobs because we can't compete in terms of wage levels.

Simply put, globalisation opens more alternatives, which is great, if you are a consumer. But it's also bad if you're a middle aged fella in a middle-management position, because you're an expendable commodity. Face it, if I can employ someone cheaper to do your job, why shouldn't I? That's why job security has been an issue in Singapore for years now. It's not the PAP's fault as many people think. (Although I stand firm the Govt is there to help us. If not, why the heck are they there?).

What can we do?

Frankly, we can't do squat. Every country is affected by globalisation, we're just a tad worse-off because we don't have any land or natural resources. LKY stressed that one of the commodities we can produce is 'intellectual property'. He's a very smart man but we aren't as smart as him. With a population of only 4 million people and with an uninspiring and rigid education system, what kind of 'intellectual property' do we expect to come up with? Even if we have the highest proportionate number of inventers, America will still whoop our asses because they have more in absolute terms, that's what counts. How many Sim Wong Hoos (creative tech founder) do we have? Even he is growing more white hair trying to fight the IPOD.

Maybe we should expand our boundaries and look beyond our polluted shores, over the horizon of industrial ships and our haze filled skys. The notion of graduating, working, buying a condo and car is gone. It's simply not true anymore, maybe for our fathers' it was true, but the notion is gone, dead and buried. Don't limit yourself, explore job opportunities elsewhere, don't close off that option, dare to dream and maybe you will end up better off than the rest of us.

Ok...It is time to watch my weight!

Ok, today's post is not political and I'm actually going to be abit self-indulgent with the topic at hand. After enduring people calling me fat for the past week. I have decided to do something. Something I should have done such a long time ago.

Before my exams in my previous semester, I was too lazy to exercise and my weight ballooned to 70kg. Which is quite alot for my height 172cm. Ok i'm not FAT in absolute terms, but people who have known me for years aren't quite used to seeing me like this.

Then exams came, and i lost some weight. Not because I was stressed but because I didn't eat regularly. I went back to 66kg, which was pretty acceptable.

Ever since I came back to Singapore, my weight has been flucuating. I remember I was 67kg 3 weeks ago and when I weight myself recently, I had gained 3kg.

ARrrgh, the agony. So now I have decided to only eat fruits for lunch on weekdays. And burn 350 calories every two days on the step machine. I've only stopped taking carbonated drinks as well as teh-ping, milo-peng and other sugary drinks.

I was browsing through my photos from my canoeing days and thought to myself, "damn I was lean!" *heartbreak*

OKOK so now I declare I weigh 70kg....I will post my weight up here again next friday to see if I have lost any weight. I know its awfully nassacistic of me but please forgive me my friends.

Chris.

This is a great post from a Singaporean blogger, pls take 5 mins to give it a read.

IS presents “I am a Singaporean” by Dan E, inspired by Mr Brown

===I was born in 1970 at the KK hospital and grew up in a kampong near the old airport. My parents stopped at 2 after having my younger sibling.

I moved from my kampong to a HDB flat in the west-end of Singapore when the government exercised the Land Reclamation Act on my kampong to build new flats.

I schooled through PSLE, O-level, A-level, and took a 2.5 years Army conscription break before disrupting to return to NUS for a degree course.

I followed the Singapore dream: study hard, serve the country, work hard, listen to the government and have a good life.

I remember vividly an illustration from the National Education text in primary school where it depicted a happy family of four walking towards their car from a high-rise apartment.

I observed the property market riding waves after waves of increase and read the dosage of how “investors” harvested profits within weeks without even seeing the apartment they bought. Inspiring.

And I quietly wondered how I can afford a high-rise apartment. But I thought that the government has a plan and I went for my Reservists and IPPT.

I watched my mother fell sick, admitted for emergency treatment and ICU observation. I saw the hospitable bills piled to intimidating figures but I have one and just only one mother – priceless. I knew I had enough CPF savings to cover her.

I thought I knew, but the CPF Board knew better. I watched in horror as the clerk punched her calculator and calmly informed me that the combined CPF of my 3 family members could only pay for less than 15% of the $25,000 bill.

I wiped out my first few years of cash savings in one cheque. Little did I know, then, that this one cheque would go on to change my Singapore dream.

I researched the CPF and learned about the limited medical scheme, housing scheme, and the ever-rising minimum sum requirement. I found out that I can’t access my money even if I have a dying mother requiring an operation for which I have no cash to pay.

I finally understood why some old people say, “in singapore you can die but you better don’t fall sick”.

And I went for my Reservists and IPPT – but I began hating it for its inflexibility and infringement on my personal life.

I started asking “why”. I questioned and discovered that no one had a satisfactory answer, (or perhaps they just didn’t want to answer) – except for slogans like “More Good Years”, “Swiss Standard of Living”, “First World nation”.

No one, in fact, could tell me what constitutes a “Rainy Day” or who can decide if its going to be a rainy day. Certainly not the weatherman, I know.

I took up a job that led me away from Singapore, relocating to a few locations. Someone called me a quitter subsequently.

In Japan, I concluded that World-class transportation network is quite a bit more than just 4 lines running through the city.

In Taiwan, I realized that Singapore is really a western society that happens to speak functional Mandarin. I learned what is civic participation, media independence, and how absolute power will corrupt absolutely eventually.

I now know it is the electorate’s responsibility to ensure that the government does its job – not the other way around.

I married and bought my own high-rise apartment (not a cent from the CPF) – all outside of Singapore. I found out that I don’t need a car to complete the picture in order to be happy, or to support my ego.

I watched the post-911 GE and the recent Lee-junior GE. I saw Martyn See’s documentary on CSJ. I observed the emergence of political forums and their haste relocation from singapore, the evolution of the “persistently non-political” blogs, not to mention the blogs’ coverage of GE-2006.

I read with interest the emergence of civic awareness that are well articulated and presented on the Internet.

I am amused at the PAP’s apprehension of this new media, as well as its instinctive need to “fix” this emerging trend. I wonder how the new fix will reconcile with the new slogan, “Open and Inclusive Society”.

I continue to be amused by a shriveled 80+ years old man who persists in putting on his gauntlets and meeting his imaginary opponent in a cul-de-sac. And yet when the time comes for reckoning he backpeddles and calls out for judgement without trial.

I pay the government to do its job of providing governmental services to the country, including a fair, equitable and non-partisan method of upgrading older estates.

I didn’t pay to be told what can or cannot be expressed as opinions, be it constructive, partisan or otherwise. I have my wife at home to discuss freedom of expression – it is not the call of a civil servant or a minister employed by my tax dollars.

I have this to tell the civil servants and ministers: create more jobs, keep prices steady and try to move singapore upwards a little more in the Happy Nation Index. And stop complaining about how you cannot cope with rising oil prices, globalization, terrorism – you need to think really hard and come out with solutions.

And you do really need to worry about losing confidence because you are already there: through non-performance.

I am a Singaporean, who now understand the separation of State and Government, and who knows government must be managed and can indeed be changed (as opposed to some misguided musings).

I am a Singaporean, and I want a democratic society based on justice and equality. And I believe we will slowly but surely dismantle the obstructions accumulated from years of apathy.
So say we all.