Looking at the previous date stamp, you'd have noticed that it has been ages since I've written anything on this blog. But in this day and age, who does 'blogging' anymore? I'd be surprised if any of my old-timer friends are checking if there's any updates to this page, and/or be still subscribed to any feeds related to it (if the feed readers are still surviving themselves!)
I've moved the blog to Heroku+git a while ago, and while it has also has been stagnant, in the last month, it seems like someone/something has been pinging the site pretty hard that caused all my dyno hours to be used up, bringing it down for the remainder of December. Whoever the ddos'er is, well *you win* [not like it matters anyhow]
Makes me wonder if my move to Heroku was really warranted, thinking that it is easier to post code-related snippets (and it still is), but at least with blogger, there's no risk of the site being shut down just because someone exceeded the 550 hours of use.
At least there's a choice :)
Showing posts with label Life. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Life. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 27, 2017
Saturday, March 17, 2012
Happy St. Patricks!
It's been busy, but I haven't forgotten.
Shout out to all my friends:
Work has been busy, but life is chugging along.
Will need to catch up with everyone soon.
Till then, remember your friend in the Emerald Isle :D
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Finding the inclination to write
I'm still here; yes, I have been very quiet.
Mostly because I'm busy with things. Work mainly. Some aspects I do not enjoy, but it is still fun when it comes to the technical bits. Enjoying those!
Off work, life consists of quite a bit of physical training, something I have come to enjoy too. That is complementary to another habit of mine: sleep. I'm sleeping sufficiently early to wake up for exercise these days. That is a luxury for most people. Ask yourself, when is the last time you have had a good sleep? People are usually so sleep deprived these days, which is sad, literally.
It does mean I sacrifice other material enjoyments in life; TV watching, net surfing or out having a few late night drinks with friends. I don't miss them much, perhaps just a little bit on the socialising. But there's no point in hanging out late in this country; people tend to go overboard with their drinks - there'll hardly be any sensibilities left for meaningful interactions after late ... but I think a lot of people here will digress!
Life is coasting along. It does feel a little aimless sometimes. But then again, what is there to be aiming for? Does it matter whether if you have not done the gazillon things that you wanted to do? In the long run, we are all dead anyway. Maybe that's not enough, for we need that epitaph to survive us?
Well right now, it is enough.
For myself, keep writing. For my friends, keep in touch.
Monday, April 19, 2010
A Little Less Efficiency and a Little More Humanity
Singapore is a country that prides itself on its efficiency.
The country is efficient. Not as efficient as the Japanese, but not as polite either.
When things are not running smoothly, people whinge, threaten and complain.
Nevertheless, efficiency is expected of when I was growing up in Singapore.
And I never knew how refreshing the lack of efficiency can be. Until today.
It was the usual train I catch to work each day, and I was running late.
Chasing after the train as it was leaving the station.
I was not alone. There were a few other people, all running behind me, all hoping to catch it too.
We paused as the train slowly inched away from us.
And then it stopped.
The train driver had waited. Just for a few of us.
Nevermind it was off-schedule.
It was a beautiful illustration of humanity above efficiency.
As I made my way to the seat on the aisle, it left me to wonder, "Singapore, isn't it possible to just have a little less efficiency and a little more humanity?"
The country is efficient. Not as efficient as the Japanese, but not as polite either.
When things are not running smoothly, people whinge, threaten and complain.
Nevertheless, efficiency is expected of when I was growing up in Singapore.
And I never knew how refreshing the lack of efficiency can be. Until today.
It was the usual train I catch to work each day, and I was running late.
Chasing after the train as it was leaving the station.
I was not alone. There were a few other people, all running behind me, all hoping to catch it too.
We paused as the train slowly inched away from us.
And then it stopped.
The train driver had waited. Just for a few of us.
Nevermind it was off-schedule.
It was a beautiful illustration of humanity above efficiency.
As I made my way to the seat on the aisle, it left me to wonder, "Singapore, isn't it possible to just have a little less efficiency and a little more humanity?"
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Food and the meaning in life
I have not been writing for a while, you may have noted. What have I been doing with my free time?
These days I have been researching on a number of quite arbitrary and seemingly unfocused things, but even with all that arbitrariness, it still has much to do with my philosophising on life. If there is one notable aspect that has consumed my more of time these days, it will have to do with researching about nutrition. So how is that to do with philosophy? If you think about how much food actually affects your quality of life, then the answer is 'a lot'.
Food has always been an on-and-off topic between colleagues and friends, and it is still surprisingly a subject area that I can't seem to be able to form an objective opinion upon. There is a bewildering number of conflicting literature on the science of food, and nobody, not even medical specialists, seem to be able to come to an agreement of what actually is good for you. What we have out there today is mainly unquestioned conventional wisdom, versus various splinter food cultures with their advocates and strong opinions to boot.
One aspect of food nutrition that I am interested in has been the topic of weight loss. For those who know me, you will be challenging on why this would even be my subject of interest, given that I have no personal stake in dealing with any weight issues. True, but I have always been curious to why I'm a perpetual a non-gainer no matter what I eat, while others seem to put on weight on even the most minuscule of calorie intake.
Sometimes people blame it on genetics. It makes sense from an evolutionary aspect since some people are more efficient at storing extra energy than others, given that food supply was inconsistent in the past. It would have been beneficial for humans to store surplus energy, but I have my doubts that this is the key reason, given that the obesity problem has only surfaced within the last century - I'm willing to bet my money that it's more likely that the problem comes from the composition of our food itself.
Recently, one of my colleagues had completed his weight-loss regime. He had been going on a low carbohydrate diet, coupled with a sachet of weight loss formula, which he had good results in losing around 10lbs (4.5kg) within 3 months. The talk about a 'low carb' diet became a talking point as it reminded me of the Atkins diet that had been associated with a reputation of varying between effective and crazily faddish.
Given my current interest in food nutrition, I decided to offer some interesting, counter-intuitive opinions on his diet. Basically, I told him that his 'low carb' diet was essentially a 'high fat' one! Obviously he didn't seem happy with my explanation, since it flies in the face of conventional wisdom - you gain weight consuming fat, not lose it. My explanation was relatively simple, if not immediately obvious.
There are only 3 categories of energy sources we derive from food, carbohydrates, proteins and fats. It is not possible for someone to sustain himself purely from a protein only diet, as he would have suffered from a condition called 'rabbit starvation'. Proteins at high amounts is essentially toxic, aside one symptom that protein poisoning will have caused is ravenous, insatiable hunger. If that were the case, it would have been impossible for him to diet, since it is not an issue that can be subdued by willpower alone. Dieting in such condition is as futile as trying to stop yourself from breathing. Unless he's starving himself literally, his only viable energy replacement would have to be coming from fats.
I have no idea what he was eating during the diet period (hardly anything from my observation), but it was obviously likely that in the absence of any energy input through food consumption, his body would naturally utilise its fat reserves, causing him to lose weight. But I believe that weight loss through dieting is orthogonal to the real problem of keeping it off permanently. You do get quick and good results during short dieting binges, but it is equally likely that you'll regain it back as quickly as you have taken it away.
This is because the urge to over consume on your food has not decreased. It has been shown that willpower is a limited resource, and when you go on a diet, you are essentially pushing your willpower to overcome your urges given by your brain to consume (more) food. A diet is hardly anything natural or sustainable if you can only maintain it for a limited of time. Eventually your willpower will break down, and you'll go back to your normal eating habits again, so whatever loss you are seeing will be temporary.
The impetus to tackle weight gain is really to be addressing the real issue behind the problem over-consumption. The current science of blaming fats as a bogeyman to tackling the real problem, like any dismayal science, really isn't helping. It willfully ignores that fact that any food you eat will cause you to become fat when consumed in excess - it is just restating the laws of thermodynamics. Not besides the fact that I've seen plenty chubby friends despite being on a low fat diet for perpetuity.
I've recently watched this video titled, "Sugar: a bitter truth", by Professor Robert H. Lustig which has strengthened this belief. He labels sugar as the key cause of obesity, and presents a clear cut explanation of how sugar intake increases appetite:
Generally when a doctor puts his neck out against conventional wisdom, he is either convinced he is right or a crackpot out for fame and notoriety. I can only suggest to do your own research and make your own conclusions. There are good literature out there to suggest that obesity isn't the result of a high fat diet, but a high sugar one. Some might nitpick that it's very specifically high fructose, I don't disagree, but do remember that sucrose (table sugar) is one part glucose and one part fructose.
Sugar isn't categorically the culprit for obesity, but if it is a cause for driving your up brain signals to consume, then it stands to reason that an increased sugar intake will lead to over-consumption. And if willpower is expendable, the only sustainable way to ensure a permanent weight loss is to cut down on sugar intake.
I suggested to my colleague that the easiest solution to weight loss is to simply stop consuming all forms of added sugar. He was aghast.
"If I can't have my lollipops and cookies, what would be the meaning in life? I much rather be fat and lose a few years of my life than to stop eating sugar at all."
Which means to say that sometimes the most obvious solutions aren't always the easiest.
Isn't it remarkable that seemingly trivial things like food choices can be difficult when you have to make conscious, rational choices? Now isn't that worth philosophising about? Food for thought anyone? :)
These days I have been researching on a number of quite arbitrary and seemingly unfocused things, but even with all that arbitrariness, it still has much to do with my philosophising on life. If there is one notable aspect that has consumed my more of time these days, it will have to do with researching about nutrition. So how is that to do with philosophy? If you think about how much food actually affects your quality of life, then the answer is 'a lot'.
Food has always been an on-and-off topic between colleagues and friends, and it is still surprisingly a subject area that I can't seem to be able to form an objective opinion upon. There is a bewildering number of conflicting literature on the science of food, and nobody, not even medical specialists, seem to be able to come to an agreement of what actually is good for you. What we have out there today is mainly unquestioned conventional wisdom, versus various splinter food cultures with their advocates and strong opinions to boot.
One aspect of food nutrition that I am interested in has been the topic of weight loss. For those who know me, you will be challenging on why this would even be my subject of interest, given that I have no personal stake in dealing with any weight issues. True, but I have always been curious to why I'm a perpetual a non-gainer no matter what I eat, while others seem to put on weight on even the most minuscule of calorie intake.
Sometimes people blame it on genetics. It makes sense from an evolutionary aspect since some people are more efficient at storing extra energy than others, given that food supply was inconsistent in the past. It would have been beneficial for humans to store surplus energy, but I have my doubts that this is the key reason, given that the obesity problem has only surfaced within the last century - I'm willing to bet my money that it's more likely that the problem comes from the composition of our food itself.
Recently, one of my colleagues had completed his weight-loss regime. He had been going on a low carbohydrate diet, coupled with a sachet of weight loss formula, which he had good results in losing around 10lbs (4.5kg) within 3 months. The talk about a 'low carb' diet became a talking point as it reminded me of the Atkins diet that had been associated with a reputation of varying between effective and crazily faddish.
Given my current interest in food nutrition, I decided to offer some interesting, counter-intuitive opinions on his diet. Basically, I told him that his 'low carb' diet was essentially a 'high fat' one! Obviously he didn't seem happy with my explanation, since it flies in the face of conventional wisdom - you gain weight consuming fat, not lose it. My explanation was relatively simple, if not immediately obvious.
There are only 3 categories of energy sources we derive from food, carbohydrates, proteins and fats. It is not possible for someone to sustain himself purely from a protein only diet, as he would have suffered from a condition called 'rabbit starvation'. Proteins at high amounts is essentially toxic, aside one symptom that protein poisoning will have caused is ravenous, insatiable hunger. If that were the case, it would have been impossible for him to diet, since it is not an issue that can be subdued by willpower alone. Dieting in such condition is as futile as trying to stop yourself from breathing. Unless he's starving himself literally, his only viable energy replacement would have to be coming from fats.
I have no idea what he was eating during the diet period (hardly anything from my observation), but it was obviously likely that in the absence of any energy input through food consumption, his body would naturally utilise its fat reserves, causing him to lose weight. But I believe that weight loss through dieting is orthogonal to the real problem of keeping it off permanently. You do get quick and good results during short dieting binges, but it is equally likely that you'll regain it back as quickly as you have taken it away.
This is because the urge to over consume on your food has not decreased. It has been shown that willpower is a limited resource, and when you go on a diet, you are essentially pushing your willpower to overcome your urges given by your brain to consume (more) food. A diet is hardly anything natural or sustainable if you can only maintain it for a limited of time. Eventually your willpower will break down, and you'll go back to your normal eating habits again, so whatever loss you are seeing will be temporary.
The impetus to tackle weight gain is really to be addressing the real issue behind the problem over-consumption. The current science of blaming fats as a bogeyman to tackling the real problem, like any dismayal science, really isn't helping. It willfully ignores that fact that any food you eat will cause you to become fat when consumed in excess - it is just restating the laws of thermodynamics. Not besides the fact that I've seen plenty chubby friends despite being on a low fat diet for perpetuity.
I've recently watched this video titled, "Sugar: a bitter truth", by Professor Robert H. Lustig which has strengthened this belief. He labels sugar as the key cause of obesity, and presents a clear cut explanation of how sugar intake increases appetite:
Generally when a doctor puts his neck out against conventional wisdom, he is either convinced he is right or a crackpot out for fame and notoriety. I can only suggest to do your own research and make your own conclusions. There are good literature out there to suggest that obesity isn't the result of a high fat diet, but a high sugar one. Some might nitpick that it's very specifically high fructose, I don't disagree, but do remember that sucrose (table sugar) is one part glucose and one part fructose.
Sugar isn't categorically the culprit for obesity, but if it is a cause for driving your up brain signals to consume, then it stands to reason that an increased sugar intake will lead to over-consumption. And if willpower is expendable, the only sustainable way to ensure a permanent weight loss is to cut down on sugar intake.
I suggested to my colleague that the easiest solution to weight loss is to simply stop consuming all forms of added sugar. He was aghast.
"If I can't have my lollipops and cookies, what would be the meaning in life? I much rather be fat and lose a few years of my life than to stop eating sugar at all."
Which means to say that sometimes the most obvious solutions aren't always the easiest.
Isn't it remarkable that seemingly trivial things like food choices can be difficult when you have to make conscious, rational choices? Now isn't that worth philosophising about? Food for thought anyone? :)
Friday, July 03, 2009
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
I ♥ Amsterdam!
First Stop, Brussels. Ok, you must be scratching your head now, and asking "Brussels? Like did you read your maps upside-down and got lost?" Well, the truth can't be any simpler: it is cheaper if I fly into Charleroi and drove to Amsterdam! Seeing two cities for the price of one, nice!
That's the town centre of Brussels, gorgeous!
In one part of the city, there's a wall with the mural of Tin Tin. There's quite a bit of Tin Tin stuffs here, no surprises, given this the birthplace of its author, Herge.
Belgium waffles! Quite delectable, I had the one covered with strawberries and laced with chocolate, mmmmh! And it was free! Not from the shop, but from a new friend of mine that I've met while travelling out from Dublin airport, a fellow Singaporean traveller, which is as rare as hen's teeth! Surprisingly, he was from Singapore's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and remarked that I'm quite possibly the only Singaporean living here! I feel so special already! :)
The architecture in the town centre is just incredible. Look at all the life-like statutes that are part of the walls of the buildings. For the lack of time, since I had a long drive ahead, that's all from Brussels. After which I had to take off and drive down to my newest favourite city, Amsterdam!
My new friend had actually spent a few days in Amsterdam already, so essentially I've gotten a free guide to show me around, which was really cool. It's really a quirk of fate, given that most Singaporeans may gladly give Ireland a pass, but not him - being an avid reader, and a fan of James Joyce, which was the main reason why we got to cross paths.
Weed! You can now understand why I find this place so charming - not the soft drugs if that's what you're thinking about! It's the liberalism, dammit! People are free to do whatever they want here, but take the responsibility for their actions, of course. Still can't believe that I'm travelling with a ranked civil servant here - hopefully he picks up a few lessons and report to his political masters that it is fine to have more liberalism! There aren't any major law and order problems here just because soft drugs are available - proves that we certainly don't need to hang people just because they have a bit of grass in their pockets. Well, even Barack Obama has inhaled it ... had he been living in Singapore rather than America, they would have snuffed the life out of him before he can ever live up his potential to become the 44th President of the United States.
Sorry guys, if you are looking for NSFW pictures - for consolation, you can see that I'm in the 'red light district' of Amsterdam. There's an Erotic Museum where I was told you'll be able to learn all you need to know about the history of sex. Fortunately, or unfortunately, Amsterdam has cleaned up quite a fair bit the last couple of years - I was told that half the city centre used to be areas where you can see skimpily dressed women behind glass boxes. Today, it's reduced to a only small section within one alley - and there isn't much to see as well. Hell, there's probably more naked bodies lying on Bondi Beach (NSFW!) any given summer day than in Amsterdam!
The only nakedness I've witnessed was from a drunken Englishman who had decided that his penis was probably a better show than all the ladies there. The crowd were wild, clapping, cheering and cat-whistling while he's twirling his thing out of his pants and flashing it to the crowd. On a related note, the booth you see up there is a peeing booth - yes, you go in and pee on the side of the streets, pretty visible to everybody else. No prizes for guessing what that dark patch on the floor is. ;)
Amsterdam is full of canals and quaint little houses, some tilted with age, as you can see up there. Quite charming, although I wouldn't want to be living in there if there's a serious risk of it toppling over.
That's how beautiful Amsterdam is. Oh, yeah you can see that it's devoid of people in the picture, which is kind of cool - that's because I woke up at 5am on a Sunday morning to take a wander about. The only people left on the streets were the few revellers who were probably too drunk to know how to go home.
I'll leave you with a final picture of one of the canals of Amsterdam. It's absolutely gorgeous for a place, and certainly one of the best cities I've been to in my life, and if you ever have the opportunity to visit it, go - I assure you won't regret it!
That's the town centre of Brussels, gorgeous!
In one part of the city, there's a wall with the mural of Tin Tin. There's quite a bit of Tin Tin stuffs here, no surprises, given this the birthplace of its author, Herge.
Belgium waffles! Quite delectable, I had the one covered with strawberries and laced with chocolate, mmmmh! And it was free! Not from the shop, but from a new friend of mine that I've met while travelling out from Dublin airport, a fellow Singaporean traveller, which is as rare as hen's teeth! Surprisingly, he was from Singapore's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and remarked that I'm quite possibly the only Singaporean living here! I feel so special already! :)
The architecture in the town centre is just incredible. Look at all the life-like statutes that are part of the walls of the buildings. For the lack of time, since I had a long drive ahead, that's all from Brussels. After which I had to take off and drive down to my newest favourite city, Amsterdam!
My new friend had actually spent a few days in Amsterdam already, so essentially I've gotten a free guide to show me around, which was really cool. It's really a quirk of fate, given that most Singaporeans may gladly give Ireland a pass, but not him - being an avid reader, and a fan of James Joyce, which was the main reason why we got to cross paths.
Weed! You can now understand why I find this place so charming - not the soft drugs if that's what you're thinking about! It's the liberalism, dammit! People are free to do whatever they want here, but take the responsibility for their actions, of course. Still can't believe that I'm travelling with a ranked civil servant here - hopefully he picks up a few lessons and report to his political masters that it is fine to have more liberalism! There aren't any major law and order problems here just because soft drugs are available - proves that we certainly don't need to hang people just because they have a bit of grass in their pockets. Well, even Barack Obama has inhaled it ... had he been living in Singapore rather than America, they would have snuffed the life out of him before he can ever live up his potential to become the 44th President of the United States.
Sorry guys, if you are looking for NSFW pictures - for consolation, you can see that I'm in the 'red light district' of Amsterdam. There's an Erotic Museum where I was told you'll be able to learn all you need to know about the history of sex. Fortunately, or unfortunately, Amsterdam has cleaned up quite a fair bit the last couple of years - I was told that half the city centre used to be areas where you can see skimpily dressed women behind glass boxes. Today, it's reduced to a only small section within one alley - and there isn't much to see as well. Hell, there's probably more naked bodies lying on Bondi Beach (NSFW!) any given summer day than in Amsterdam!
The only nakedness I've witnessed was from a drunken Englishman who had decided that his penis was probably a better show than all the ladies there. The crowd were wild, clapping, cheering and cat-whistling while he's twirling his thing out of his pants and flashing it to the crowd. On a related note, the booth you see up there is a peeing booth - yes, you go in and pee on the side of the streets, pretty visible to everybody else. No prizes for guessing what that dark patch on the floor is. ;)
Amsterdam is full of canals and quaint little houses, some tilted with age, as you can see up there. Quite charming, although I wouldn't want to be living in there if there's a serious risk of it toppling over.
That's how beautiful Amsterdam is. Oh, yeah you can see that it's devoid of people in the picture, which is kind of cool - that's because I woke up at 5am on a Sunday morning to take a wander about. The only people left on the streets were the few revellers who were probably too drunk to know how to go home.
I'll leave you with a final picture of one of the canals of Amsterdam. It's absolutely gorgeous for a place, and certainly one of the best cities I've been to in my life, and if you ever have the opportunity to visit it, go - I assure you won't regret it!
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Internet, Finally!
I finally have Internet at home!
After 3 long months of going cold turkey involuntarily. I have finally gotten an Internet connection to my home, via mobile broadband. It's clocking about 300kbps download at best, which isn't great, but at least I can use it to type whimsical blog posts like these in the leisure of my home, rather than having to deal with late nights in the office. With commuting time after hours being unreliable and subjected to long half hour waits, it seriously isn't worth wasting the time just to be able to use the Internet, really.
Surprisingly, the new place that I've moved in does not have a fibre-to-the-curb connection to my apartment - and it's only built 2 years ago! Not only that, the apartment does not even come with a phone line, which means I can't even get ASDL. I can get a technician to get it especially wired to my place, but that means installation charges + line rental for a phone that I do not want in order to get Internet access, making it a rather expensive proposition.
So the only alternative left was to rely on cheap wireless broadband, which at 20 Euros is the cheapest by Irish standards (That's excluding VAT, which is another major bloodsucker in this country :P). That's roughly about $40 dollars AUD/SGD, which I suppose would have gotten me a decent network connection, and without any download restrictions (on a land line)?
Oh well, at least for an el-cheapo bastard like me, it should suffice, since I don't do much that consumes a large amount of bandwidth anyway. 10Gb is quite hard to use up no matter how much blog posts, email or news I do in a day, but obviously it's never quite enough for the YouTube generation.
Which is fine for an 'old fogey' like me - I belong to the '640k ought to be enough for anybody' generation anyway, ;)
After 3 long months of going cold turkey involuntarily. I have finally gotten an Internet connection to my home, via mobile broadband. It's clocking about 300kbps download at best, which isn't great, but at least I can use it to type whimsical blog posts like these in the leisure of my home, rather than having to deal with late nights in the office. With commuting time after hours being unreliable and subjected to long half hour waits, it seriously isn't worth wasting the time just to be able to use the Internet, really.
Surprisingly, the new place that I've moved in does not have a fibre-to-the-curb connection to my apartment - and it's only built 2 years ago! Not only that, the apartment does not even come with a phone line, which means I can't even get ASDL. I can get a technician to get it especially wired to my place, but that means installation charges + line rental for a phone that I do not want in order to get Internet access, making it a rather expensive proposition.
So the only alternative left was to rely on cheap wireless broadband, which at 20 Euros is the cheapest by Irish standards (That's excluding VAT, which is another major bloodsucker in this country :P). That's roughly about $40 dollars AUD/SGD, which I suppose would have gotten me a decent network connection, and without any download restrictions (on a land line)?
Oh well, at least for an el-cheapo bastard like me, it should suffice, since I don't do much that consumes a large amount of bandwidth anyway. 10Gb is quite hard to use up no matter how much blog posts, email or news I do in a day, but obviously it's never quite enough for the YouTube generation.
Which is fine for an 'old fogey' like me - I belong to the '640k ought to be enough for anybody' generation anyway, ;)
Saturday, April 18, 2009
A Good Friday It Is!
Decided that I wanted a reckless, unplanned holiday over the Easter weekend, so I packed my bag with only a toothbrush, a set of clothes, and took off on my bicycle.
Given that I had a 4-day weekend, I had this 'delusion of grandeur' that I'll try to cycle to Waterford and back, which when I recounted my little adventure to my friends later, they all had thought that I was a little 'ambitious'. I'm sure they were just be polite with me not to point out that I was deranged to try to cycle 320km to and back. :)
Without even a map or any plans on how I'm supposed to get there, I cycled aimlessly south, passing through Shankill, Bray then Greystones. I had never been in those places before, and each of them were a lovely little towns of their own, with Bray the biggest, Shankill the smallest, and Greystones just nice. In a way this Goldilocks (yours truly) is certainly tempting fate without even planning for where he's going - it is really not funny trying to tough it out on the streets; there's still plenty of cold in mid-April to try to sleep on the streets when you're in Ireland!
Stopped in each town for a while, and had plenty of soft-serve vanilla ice-cream cones along the way, which was when I noticed this Irish anomaly on their menus called the 'Special 99'. Even after later when I try to figure out they story behind the name by asking my Irish colleagues, nobody seems to know why having a stick of chocolate in the ice-cream makes it a 'Special 99'. Very well then, I'm just going to have to make up my own story, and bluff anybody who asks that an Irishman invented this in '99, which took the whole country by storm which is how the name came about. So take note that you've heard it here first!
Along the way, I met a couple of French backpackers whom I started chatting up with. They were asking for directions and I found out that they are travelling to Glendalough (pronounced 'Glen-da-lock'), where the main attraction there is some old ruins. They were lost, but they had a plan where I had none, so I thought I could give them a hand by trying to look up the place they are going on my Blackberry-cum-GPS, which only gave me a rough idea of where we were, and had no relevance to any of the landmarks that they have shown me on their map. ( A mental note to self: don't ever rely on the Blackberry's GPS to find your way out of the woods if your life depended on it! )
Anyhow, given that I didn't have a plan, and they were quite adamant to go there, I thought they must be on to something, so I decided to abandon my original plan to Waterford via zipping along the coastal fringe, and follow them inland instead.
With hindsight, this had probably turned out to be a pretty good choice.
Given that they were travelling by foot, and didn't have too much luck with hitch-hiking, we decided to camp out in someone's paddock:
Obviously it was a little illegal, given that we're trespassing, but certainly the tripedation made it a little bit more exciting. Claire set up the tent while Alexandre and I started to look around for some wood to start a little campfire of our own. (When I recounted the story to an older guy later, he was curious where I got my firewood from - unbeknown my insanely dumb luck in retrospect, he was surprised that we managed to get some wood for burning; someone had left some strewn around when cutting down some overgrowth.)
Spent the evening camping out with them, to which later they mentioned the fact that I had no place to stay. They had only a two-men tent, and didn't have any room for me, so I had go try my luck when they pointed out that there is a "Bed and Breakfast" somewhere adjacent to the street across the paddock. It just might be as well, to leave them some privacy to have some romantic personal time under the nice Irish moonlight. I think they did enjoy their camp there, but they did try their darn best not to make me feel left out by admitting to me about how cold the night was before, and that I must have had a better time living under a properly heated shelter.
To me, living in a 'Bed & Breakfast' was a rather interesting experience . I had never lived in one before this, and certainly had no knowledge of the existence of such a concept. I had this mistaken idea that it was just another style of commercial hotelier gimmicks where they charge you extra by tagging breakfast to your bill compulsorily. Armed with this half-baked idea in my head, I was kind of worried when I made my approach to the residential property the BnB was signposted, and getting rather concerned that I won't be having a place to stay for the night.
While the place did turn out to be a BnB, my lack of knowledge became even more of a comedy later when I was seated with the hostess in the living room for a rest when I remarked about how much the place resembled a family home, to which she responded in confusion, "but, aren't you looking for a Bed and Breakfast?" She would have gotten into bed that night confused, not only until the next morning would she have found out that I had absolutely no idea what I was in for when confessed that I thought I was going to be living in some funny-styled, breakfast-included hotel.
The next Saturday morning past Good Friday turned out to be another glorious day, with the sun streaking above the country fields. I joined the couple once they got packed up and started on our way again:
Even when one is outside a city, nobody can really escape into what is truly countryside anymore, as a helicopter hovered nearby in mid-air:
Glendalough was still a while away, and the French couple hitched their way there, while I was left to cycle in the vast country road in the early morning. It was an absolute bliss, all nice and serene, which is only irregularly punctured by a car whizzing through once in a while. And then I got to my intended destination:
Glendalough is like a nice national park, certainly reminded me of Yosemite, just a lot less crowded and commercial. If I had my way, I can certainly spend the remainder of my life here - if not only for this damn thing in life called 'work'!
Along the way, I got to know a few more friends - this is Fabio from Italy. I bumped into him along the way cycling. He and his mate happens to be heading towards the same direction as me, so I became the new party in their convoy. It's always fun to meet people from different cultures, you get to learn how very much people are different from you first hand. One of the early things I've come to learn ab0ut the Italians are they're rather fond of appending 'no' after their phrases, when they are actually wanting to mean 'yes' - talk about confusion!
It was my good fortune to bump into them, as they had been instrumental in my return journey. I had no map, and had a lame-GPS that was running out of battery. Since they knew their way, and happen to be cycling their way back to Dublin, I decided to not push my luck any further, and tag along their return journey home.
Along the way back, there's more of the lovely Irish countryside:
Sheep! The damn cutest thing in the whole wide world! Baaaaa!
In the Chinese Almanac, I'm born in the year of the Sheep/Goat/Lamb (what's the difference?), maybe that explains why I have this weird sense of affection towards these cuddly little creatures. :)
For an absolutely unplanned weekend, I must say the outcome has certainly been wildly positive. I can't believe my incredible luck I had for the couple of days - had a few firsts, made a few friends, and enjoyed an incredibly lovely weather for a country more renowned for cloudy, rainy weather - I must have had a 4-leafed clover stuck in the underside of my pants somewhere! So then, all that's left for me to do in this country is to catch some Leprechauns and find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow! (Apologies to my Irish friends for such corny jokes ;p)
Given that I had a 4-day weekend, I had this 'delusion of grandeur' that I'll try to cycle to Waterford and back, which when I recounted my little adventure to my friends later, they all had thought that I was a little 'ambitious'. I'm sure they were just be polite with me not to point out that I was deranged to try to cycle 320km to and back. :)
Without even a map or any plans on how I'm supposed to get there, I cycled aimlessly south, passing through Shankill, Bray then Greystones. I had never been in those places before, and each of them were a lovely little towns of their own, with Bray the biggest, Shankill the smallest, and Greystones just nice. In a way this Goldilocks (yours truly) is certainly tempting fate without even planning for where he's going - it is really not funny trying to tough it out on the streets; there's still plenty of cold in mid-April to try to sleep on the streets when you're in Ireland!
Stopped in each town for a while, and had plenty of soft-serve vanilla ice-cream cones along the way, which was when I noticed this Irish anomaly on their menus called the 'Special 99'. Even after later when I try to figure out they story behind the name by asking my Irish colleagues, nobody seems to know why having a stick of chocolate in the ice-cream makes it a 'Special 99'. Very well then, I'm just going to have to make up my own story, and bluff anybody who asks that an Irishman invented this in '99, which took the whole country by storm which is how the name came about. So take note that you've heard it here first!
Along the way, I met a couple of French backpackers whom I started chatting up with. They were asking for directions and I found out that they are travelling to Glendalough (pronounced 'Glen-da-lock'), where the main attraction there is some old ruins. They were lost, but they had a plan where I had none, so I thought I could give them a hand by trying to look up the place they are going on my Blackberry-cum-GPS, which only gave me a rough idea of where we were, and had no relevance to any of the landmarks that they have shown me on their map. ( A mental note to self: don't ever rely on the Blackberry's GPS to find your way out of the woods if your life depended on it! )
Anyhow, given that I didn't have a plan, and they were quite adamant to go there, I thought they must be on to something, so I decided to abandon my original plan to Waterford via zipping along the coastal fringe, and follow them inland instead.
With hindsight, this had probably turned out to be a pretty good choice.
Given that they were travelling by foot, and didn't have too much luck with hitch-hiking, we decided to camp out in someone's paddock:
Obviously it was a little illegal, given that we're trespassing, but certainly the tripedation made it a little bit more exciting. Claire set up the tent while Alexandre and I started to look around for some wood to start a little campfire of our own. (When I recounted the story to an older guy later, he was curious where I got my firewood from - unbeknown my insanely dumb luck in retrospect, he was surprised that we managed to get some wood for burning; someone had left some strewn around when cutting down some overgrowth.)
Spent the evening camping out with them, to which later they mentioned the fact that I had no place to stay. They had only a two-men tent, and didn't have any room for me, so I had go try my luck when they pointed out that there is a "Bed and Breakfast" somewhere adjacent to the street across the paddock. It just might be as well, to leave them some privacy to have some romantic personal time under the nice Irish moonlight. I think they did enjoy their camp there, but they did try their darn best not to make me feel left out by admitting to me about how cold the night was before, and that I must have had a better time living under a properly heated shelter.
To me, living in a 'Bed & Breakfast' was a rather interesting experience . I had never lived in one before this, and certainly had no knowledge of the existence of such a concept. I had this mistaken idea that it was just another style of commercial hotelier gimmicks where they charge you extra by tagging breakfast to your bill compulsorily. Armed with this half-baked idea in my head, I was kind of worried when I made my approach to the residential property the BnB was signposted, and getting rather concerned that I won't be having a place to stay for the night.
While the place did turn out to be a BnB, my lack of knowledge became even more of a comedy later when I was seated with the hostess in the living room for a rest when I remarked about how much the place resembled a family home, to which she responded in confusion, "but, aren't you looking for a Bed and Breakfast?" She would have gotten into bed that night confused, not only until the next morning would she have found out that I had absolutely no idea what I was in for when confessed that I thought I was going to be living in some funny-styled, breakfast-included hotel.
The next Saturday morning past Good Friday turned out to be another glorious day, with the sun streaking above the country fields. I joined the couple once they got packed up and started on our way again:
Even when one is outside a city, nobody can really escape into what is truly countryside anymore, as a helicopter hovered nearby in mid-air:
Glendalough was still a while away, and the French couple hitched their way there, while I was left to cycle in the vast country road in the early morning. It was an absolute bliss, all nice and serene, which is only irregularly punctured by a car whizzing through once in a while. And then I got to my intended destination:
Glendalough is like a nice national park, certainly reminded me of Yosemite, just a lot less crowded and commercial. If I had my way, I can certainly spend the remainder of my life here - if not only for this damn thing in life called 'work'!
Along the way, I got to know a few more friends - this is Fabio from Italy. I bumped into him along the way cycling. He and his mate happens to be heading towards the same direction as me, so I became the new party in their convoy. It's always fun to meet people from different cultures, you get to learn how very much people are different from you first hand. One of the early things I've come to learn ab0ut the Italians are they're rather fond of appending 'no' after their phrases, when they are actually wanting to mean 'yes' - talk about confusion!
It was my good fortune to bump into them, as they had been instrumental in my return journey. I had no map, and had a lame-GPS that was running out of battery. Since they knew their way, and happen to be cycling their way back to Dublin, I decided to not push my luck any further, and tag along their return journey home.
Along the way back, there's more of the lovely Irish countryside:
Sheep! The damn cutest thing in the whole wide world! Baaaaa!
In the Chinese Almanac, I'm born in the year of the Sheep/Goat/Lamb (what's the difference?), maybe that explains why I have this weird sense of affection towards these cuddly little creatures. :)
For an absolutely unplanned weekend, I must say the outcome has certainly been wildly positive. I can't believe my incredible luck I had for the couple of days - had a few firsts, made a few friends, and enjoyed an incredibly lovely weather for a country more renowned for cloudy, rainy weather - I must have had a 4-leafed clover stuck in the underside of my pants somewhere! So then, all that's left for me to do in this country is to catch some Leprechauns and find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow! (Apologies to my Irish friends for such corny jokes ;p)
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Happiness is ...
Happiness is a warm steaming bowl of instant noodles
when you are feeling cold and hungry.
Happiness is a warm fuzzy feeling of a full tummy
after a piping hot bowl of instant noodles.
Sometimes happiness isn't too hard to attain after all :)
when you are feeling cold and hungry.
Happiness is a warm fuzzy feeling of a full tummy
after a piping hot bowl of instant noodles.
Sometimes happiness isn't too hard to attain after all :)
Monday, February 02, 2009
Brrrr! It's Cold Today!
Last night, the BBC Met Service reported of snow in several areas in the UK from the Arctic blast. Seems like the Emerald Isle is not immune from it too, look what's outside my window this morning - frost!
A zoom-in shows the football field and rooftops covered in white:
And the pavements:
Addendum : It started snowing today! I was told that this is a rare sight for Dublin, but snow just isn't funny to me! ;-/
A zoom-in shows the football field and rooftops covered in white:
And the pavements:
Addendum : It started snowing today! I was told that this is a rare sight for Dublin, but snow just isn't funny to me! ;-/
Monday, January 26, 2009
Bad Start to the Week
You know you have a bad start to the week when your freshly shipped computer from the US gets fried because the power supply unit is set to '110V'.
The single 'pop' sound and the fresh smell of a fried PSU has just ruined my day. :(
Does anybody know where do I get a power supply unit with a funny looking connector like this?
The single 'pop' sound and the fresh smell of a fried PSU has just ruined my day. :(
Does anybody know where do I get a power supply unit with a funny looking connector like this?
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Saturday, October 18, 2008
An Emotion I Much Rather Not Have
Love, that is.
A friend left, and on my own, I sat down by myself and watched 'Becoming Jane' tonight, which had still left me with a barrage of thoughts as I type this. The film has accomplished what it had set out to do; to evoke emotions and feelings, in this case, a sense of empathy towards one's unrequited love, as if you were living in the same moment with Jane Austen, sharing her emotions of wanting but not having. Like all good movies on the genre of love, it leaves one with a feeling of longing for something more.
I could still feel the raw emotion coursing through, that feeling of want, the need to be desired and be loved. Ironically, as with the irony the film featured, love is exactly the feeling if given a choice, something that I willingly forgo.
Reel life, unlike real life, compresses a lifetime into a span of mere hours that is made up of only dear tender moments, and the soothing, lulling message that leads us to believe that life is an everlasting bliss of joy and happiness. Even as we accept it not to be so, it doesn't preclude us from wishing, and even willing to believe possibly that at a given moment in time, when we look deeply into the endearing eyes of that perfect someone, which at that precise moment of sheer intensity, it will be of an eternity.
If it's hard to pause for a moment to not believe in the eternity of love, then it is even harder to contemplate on just how transient it is. But love is exactly just that: as much as food is constantly on the thoughts of a hungry man, a man starved of love is just as much be seeking to satisfy his emotional fulfilment. But it is from this derision of hunger that we lose sight of the fact that satiety that is the nemesis of all wants. It is when we get enough of something that makes it so much less desirable. The scrumptious meal is merely a palatable one to the full tummy; the pair of endearing eyes is much less so for the umpteenth time; and all that is exciting simply becomes the mundane.
Some say that love is what makes us human, but perhaps what makes us human is what makes us weak. If we are always aspiring to be reach our potential each day, then maybe we should be trying to surpass the weaknesses of ours, rather than to be merely succumbing to it?
But even if it is a weakness, I have no qualms if love was merely a tempered emotion. However, it is nothing like the tame beast that we all wish it to be; rather it is more like a raging wildfire that engulfs us, leaving us at the mercy of its whims and fancy. I would have certainly been less disagreeable about the notion of romantic love had it been of one that leaves us with some measure of control and self-dignity in tact.
If romantic love was to be more like the selfless love and compassion to the fellow man, it would have been one that I would have preferenced towards, for it is unlike the selfishness of personal desire that leaves no room for rationality, and one that transcends above language, culture or creed.
But as much as my own personal internal intellectual discourse will and want to rationalise that love is merely a barbaric relic that is passed down for generations for the purpose of continuing our progeny, I know there'll be no way of not be ceding control to this ever insatiable feeling to want and be wanted, to desire and be desired. But had it been a matter of rational choice, it will have been an emotion that I'd much rather not have wanted.
A friend left, and on my own, I sat down by myself and watched 'Becoming Jane' tonight, which had still left me with a barrage of thoughts as I type this. The film has accomplished what it had set out to do; to evoke emotions and feelings, in this case, a sense of empathy towards one's unrequited love, as if you were living in the same moment with Jane Austen, sharing her emotions of wanting but not having. Like all good movies on the genre of love, it leaves one with a feeling of longing for something more.
I could still feel the raw emotion coursing through, that feeling of want, the need to be desired and be loved. Ironically, as with the irony the film featured, love is exactly the feeling if given a choice, something that I willingly forgo.
Reel life, unlike real life, compresses a lifetime into a span of mere hours that is made up of only dear tender moments, and the soothing, lulling message that leads us to believe that life is an everlasting bliss of joy and happiness. Even as we accept it not to be so, it doesn't preclude us from wishing, and even willing to believe possibly that at a given moment in time, when we look deeply into the endearing eyes of that perfect someone, which at that precise moment of sheer intensity, it will be of an eternity.
If it's hard to pause for a moment to not believe in the eternity of love, then it is even harder to contemplate on just how transient it is. But love is exactly just that: as much as food is constantly on the thoughts of a hungry man, a man starved of love is just as much be seeking to satisfy his emotional fulfilment. But it is from this derision of hunger that we lose sight of the fact that satiety that is the nemesis of all wants. It is when we get enough of something that makes it so much less desirable. The scrumptious meal is merely a palatable one to the full tummy; the pair of endearing eyes is much less so for the umpteenth time; and all that is exciting simply becomes the mundane.
Some say that love is what makes us human, but perhaps what makes us human is what makes us weak. If we are always aspiring to be reach our potential each day, then maybe we should be trying to surpass the weaknesses of ours, rather than to be merely succumbing to it?
But even if it is a weakness, I have no qualms if love was merely a tempered emotion. However, it is nothing like the tame beast that we all wish it to be; rather it is more like a raging wildfire that engulfs us, leaving us at the mercy of its whims and fancy. I would have certainly been less disagreeable about the notion of romantic love had it been of one that leaves us with some measure of control and self-dignity in tact.
If romantic love was to be more like the selfless love and compassion to the fellow man, it would have been one that I would have preferenced towards, for it is unlike the selfishness of personal desire that leaves no room for rationality, and one that transcends above language, culture or creed.
But as much as my own personal internal intellectual discourse will and want to rationalise that love is merely a barbaric relic that is passed down for generations for the purpose of continuing our progeny, I know there'll be no way of not be ceding control to this ever insatiable feeling to want and be wanted, to desire and be desired. But had it been a matter of rational choice, it will have been an emotion that I'd much rather not have wanted.
Thursday, September 04, 2008
Japanese vs. Singaporean Women
I'm not sure about the rest of Asia, but when I was growing up in Singapore, there was a huge consensus among Singaporean males that Japanese females are much prettier than our Singaporean counterparts. Given that most of my friends who claimed it as a fact only came to that conclusion based on seeing pretty Japanese actresses on TV, I've always felt quite ambivalent about this point - come on, people always put on prettier than average faces on TV, but does that prove the case for the general population?
Given that I recently had the opportunity to visit Japan, I decided to put the claims to the test and do some observations on my own, through the perennial hobby of mine - people watching. Given that I had time to spare on Sunday noon after checking out, and too lazy to lug my luggage around to do sightseeing before hopping on the train to Narita, I decided to sit down in Tokyo subway station and record my observations. It isn't surprising that I get funny stares by people, wondering what I was doing, but predictably, nobody did ever approach me and asked questions (not that I'll be able to answer them anyway, given my command of Japanese is utterly atrocious!)
Exactly where I sat in Tokyo JR Station during my observation
I've done the same measurement at the linkway to Suntec City along the way from City Hall MRT station as a comparison, which my observation is carried out on a Thursday evening at around 6pm. Both measurements are timed at a 50 minute interval. There's nothing scientific about why 50-minutes was chosen, I would have much rather made it an hour if I could. But in Tokyo, I had to take off to catch my train to Narita, which explains the duration. You might think that it's a fun exercise to do, but it does get tiresome past the 40 minute mark. Try it out if you aren't convinced!
In my observations, only females are observed and also, only East Asian looking women are considered in the study, so that it's a fair comparison between apples with apples. I've also excluded young children who I deemed below the ages of 14 and people who looked over their 40's. It should however be noted that this process isn't scientific, given that there's no reasonable way to assess their age without any verification. This and other potential biased-ness are all recorded duly after the results presented. The observation is segregated into roughly 4 categories, which I'll briefly explain below:
The results are tabulated below:
Before we go into the analysis of the results, I'll just like to note all the potential biases that can occur in this observation.
Analysis
When it comes to beauty, I've always maintained my thesis that the ratio of beautiful women to the general population should remain roughly the same, irrespective of regions - which means it is the size of the population that determines the number of pretty faces that you'll see on the streets, which I've reasoned that it is why you naturally see more pretty faces in populous countries like Japan, China and Korea, than say, a small country like Singapore. I had classified 46.5% of the Japanese females sighted as pretty, compared to 23.7% for Singaporean females.
A possible factor may be in the differences in their attitudes towards cosmetics and dressing. From casual observation, I had the impression that Japanese women put on much more make up than Singaporeans. Almost all Japanese women, young and old, are dabbed in cosmetics of some sort. The second observation I had, is that Singaporeans have the tendency to dress much more casually than the Japanese, which may have also have been a factor. Both trends seem to be more pronounced with younger Singaporean teenagers and women in their early 20's, maybe it's because they either have less spending power on such 'frivolities', or they are letting their youthfulness compensate for the lack of need to dress up.
Talking about women is always a touchy issue, and that said, I'll profess that my opinions are not meant to be taken as fact of any sort, and neither do I imply any sort of preference toward women of either country. My observations are solely done for fun, and mainly in satisfying my personal curiosity of trying to debunk the broad assertions of attractiveness that Singaporean males seem to profess over Japanese women. I'm not sure how much of that actually correlates with reality, even though my observations seem to affirm such a bias. I suppose if any of my Singaporean mates sprout such 'nonsense' again, I should learn to just keep my mouth shut!
Given that I recently had the opportunity to visit Japan, I decided to put the claims to the test and do some observations on my own, through the perennial hobby of mine - people watching. Given that I had time to spare on Sunday noon after checking out, and too lazy to lug my luggage around to do sightseeing before hopping on the train to Narita, I decided to sit down in Tokyo subway station and record my observations. It isn't surprising that I get funny stares by people, wondering what I was doing, but predictably, nobody did ever approach me and asked questions (not that I'll be able to answer them anyway, given my command of Japanese is utterly atrocious!)
Exactly where I sat in Tokyo JR Station during my observationI've done the same measurement at the linkway to Suntec City along the way from City Hall MRT station as a comparison, which my observation is carried out on a Thursday evening at around 6pm. Both measurements are timed at a 50 minute interval. There's nothing scientific about why 50-minutes was chosen, I would have much rather made it an hour if I could. But in Tokyo, I had to take off to catch my train to Narita, which explains the duration. You might think that it's a fun exercise to do, but it does get tiresome past the 40 minute mark. Try it out if you aren't convinced!
In my observations, only females are observed and also, only East Asian looking women are considered in the study, so that it's a fair comparison between apples with apples. I've also excluded young children who I deemed below the ages of 14 and people who looked over their 40's. It should however be noted that this process isn't scientific, given that there's no reasonable way to assess their age without any verification. This and other potential biased-ness are all recorded duly after the results presented. The observation is segregated into roughly 4 categories, which I'll briefly explain below:
- Definitely Good Looking - People I consider good looking, in which my opinion is unlikely to be subjected to change.
- Considered Good Looking - People I think are good looking, but which my opinion may change depending on conditions.
- Considered Not Good Looking - People I think are not good looking, but which may change depending on conditions.
- Definitely Not Good Looking - People I think who are not good looking, in which my opinion is unlikely to be subjected to change.
The results are tabulated below:
| Japan | Singapore | |
| Definitely Good Looking | 7 | 0 |
| Considered Good Looking | 149 | 96 |
| Considered Not Good Looking | 130 | 157 |
| Definitely Not Good Looking | 49 | 151 |
| Total People Sighted | 335 | 404 |
Before we go into the analysis of the results, I'll just like to note all the potential biases that can occur in this observation.
- Beauty is always in the eyes of the beholder. I'm judging beauty by my standards, so this is definitely a case of 'your mileage may vary'.
- I've noticed that internally, if I had a period when I'm seeing a string of consecutive good looking faces, I'll have the tendency of becoming stricter in my grading criteria. The same principle applies in reverse, which means that the results may be possibly skewed, but it should hopefully be equally skewed in both observations.
- Given there is no means of checking the ages of all the people I've scanned, I did notice my tendency of adding attractive middle-aged women, and possibly excluding less good looking women who may be in actuality, under the 40's criteria. This has myself convinced that the perception of age is highly dependent on how a person looks, however unfair it sounds!
- The stream of commuters are not uniform, and are more spiky in nature, given the fact of increases in traffic only happens during the arrivals of trains. This results in uneven observation times, where I have longer periods to scan during non-peak periods vs peak periods.
Analysis
When it comes to beauty, I've always maintained my thesis that the ratio of beautiful women to the general population should remain roughly the same, irrespective of regions - which means it is the size of the population that determines the number of pretty faces that you'll see on the streets, which I've reasoned that it is why you naturally see more pretty faces in populous countries like Japan, China and Korea, than say, a small country like Singapore. I had classified 46.5% of the Japanese females sighted as pretty, compared to 23.7% for Singaporean females.
A possible factor may be in the differences in their attitudes towards cosmetics and dressing. From casual observation, I had the impression that Japanese women put on much more make up than Singaporeans. Almost all Japanese women, young and old, are dabbed in cosmetics of some sort. The second observation I had, is that Singaporeans have the tendency to dress much more casually than the Japanese, which may have also have been a factor. Both trends seem to be more pronounced with younger Singaporean teenagers and women in their early 20's, maybe it's because they either have less spending power on such 'frivolities', or they are letting their youthfulness compensate for the lack of need to dress up.
Talking about women is always a touchy issue, and that said, I'll profess that my opinions are not meant to be taken as fact of any sort, and neither do I imply any sort of preference toward women of either country. My observations are solely done for fun, and mainly in satisfying my personal curiosity of trying to debunk the broad assertions of attractiveness that Singaporean males seem to profess over Japanese women. I'm not sure how much of that actually correlates with reality, even though my observations seem to affirm such a bias. I suppose if any of my Singaporean mates sprout such 'nonsense' again, I should learn to just keep my mouth shut!
Monday, June 02, 2008
The Four-Letter Word of Independence
For a long time I've been rather vague in describing my ultimate goal - the attainment of freedom - only because the definition of freedom itself is rather broad and I had found it difficult to frame it in my own way. But I've actually found the version of 'freedom' that matches closely to what I'm thinking of from Nassim Taleb's book 'The Black Swan' (I'm retyping from his book, so there might be inaccuracies from me. Also the emphasis in bold is mine):
And like how Taleb describes the rich, I do not understand why are there people out there who, even after having an obscene amount of money, will still need to prostate themselves in the never-ending quest to seek out more. I have a target, and its reasonably modest compared to most people - a number of people I know had a definition of wealth that's in the range of $6m and above (don't ask me how they came up with that figure - ask them!), the ability to own at least a few Lamborghini-type cars, a private yacht and a Gulfstream jet.
Well, I'll be quite happy if I have the capability to pay for my own place to live in, a recurring income stream that satisfies my daily expenditure (which is modest, compared to most people), and possibly some excess money left to afford a yearly vacation (business-class tickets are nice, but not necessary!). Given I'm not the kind of person who needs to rinse my mouth with 'Chateau Lafite' every morning, mandate my meals to be caviar and foie gras every day, I hope it is a goal that I can attain at a reasonable young age, so that I can become a flâneur - someone who has attained the freedom to seek out whatever experiences he desires and being able to live by his own rules.
[1] Referring to the stock market crash of 1987 ( Black Monday )
... It was hard to tell my friends, all hurt in some manner by the crash[1], about this feeling of vindication. Bonuses at the time were a fraction of what they are today, but if my employer, First Boston, and the financial system survived until year-end, I would get the equivalent of a fellowship. This is sometimes called "f*** you money," which, in spite of its coarseness, means that it allows you to act like a Victorian gentleman, free from slavery. It is a psychological buffer: the capital is not so large as to make you spoiled-rich, but large enough to give you the freedom to choose a new occupation without excessive consideration of the financial rewards. It shields you from prostituting your mind and frees you from outside authority--any outside authority. (Independence is person-specific: I have always been taken aback at the high number of people in whom an astonishingly high income led to additional sycophancy as they became more dependent on their clients and employers and more addicted to making even more money.) While not substantial by some standards, it literally cured me of all financial ambition--it made me feel ashamed whenever I diverted time away from the study for the pursuit of material wealth. Note that the designation f*** you corresponds to the exhilarating ability to pronounce that compact phrase before hanging up the phone. ...Yes, I'm looking for that same psychological buffer to ease me from having to worry about the vicissitudes of everyday life, and to attain the ultimate goal of being the master of my own fate, rather than a serf of others. I'm not sure if this applies to any of you out there, but the very quality of independence is one that I see as keystone - nothing else ranks higher (except good health maybe), given most other things in life can be subsequently attained once you have the freedom to seek them out.
And like how Taleb describes the rich, I do not understand why are there people out there who, even after having an obscene amount of money, will still need to prostate themselves in the never-ending quest to seek out more. I have a target, and its reasonably modest compared to most people - a number of people I know had a definition of wealth that's in the range of $6m and above (don't ask me how they came up with that figure - ask them!), the ability to own at least a few Lamborghini-type cars, a private yacht and a Gulfstream jet.
Well, I'll be quite happy if I have the capability to pay for my own place to live in, a recurring income stream that satisfies my daily expenditure (which is modest, compared to most people), and possibly some excess money left to afford a yearly vacation (business-class tickets are nice, but not necessary!). Given I'm not the kind of person who needs to rinse my mouth with 'Chateau Lafite' every morning, mandate my meals to be caviar and foie gras every day, I hope it is a goal that I can attain at a reasonable young age, so that I can become a flâneur - someone who has attained the freedom to seek out whatever experiences he desires and being able to live by his own rules.
[1] Referring to the stock market crash of 1987 ( Black Monday )
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Values Investing: Nicolas Berggruen
I don't normally copy and paste news articles verbatim, but here's an article worthy of note about another reclusive, wealthy philanthropic person. Like Chuck Feeney, he's putting his money into good causes. Certainly a person worthy of emulation, I hope I'll be able to be in his shoes someday, and have his kind of wealth to spend my life working for the benefit of society too. From WSJ:
Putting His Money Where His Values Are --- Restless Billionaire Now Prefers to Invest 'In the Real World'
Nicolas Berggruen became a billionaire through classic value investing. Now, he is switching to a new strategy. Call it "values investing."
With rice farms in Cambodia, windmill farms in Turkey, an ethanol plant in Oregon and glittering new skyscrapers in poor inner cities around the world, Mr. Berggruen is pumping millions of dollars into projects that he hopes will both expand his fortune and alleviate social ills.
"Historically, I've made my money in financials," says Mr. Berggruen, 46 years old, whose net worth is estimated at more than $3 billion. "Now, I'm investing in the real world. I'm investing in the ground, in things that will last for generations and improve people's lives."
Mr. Berggruen's big bet on social investing isn't unique. Richard Branson, the Google founders, Ted Turner and a vast new generation of eco-investors have all espoused world-friendly investing.
The quest is more personal for Mr. Berggruen (pronounced: BerGREWin). After amassing billions and buying all the usual trophies of success -- a Florida mansion on a private island, a luxury condo in New York -- Mr. Berggruen is paring down his material life. He has sold his properties and now lives in hotels. He is about to sell his only car. Because he doesn't have children and is unmarried, he is planning to leave his fortune to a personal foundation and an art museum.
"Living in a grand environment to show myself and others that I have wealth has zero appeal," he says in an interview, standing in a hotel room in New York's Upper East Side. "Whatever I own is temporary, since we're only here for a short period of time. It's what we do and produce, it's our actions, that will last forever. That's real value."
The obsession with legacy is increasingly common among today's super-rich -- even for relatively young billionaires like Mr. Berggruen. "For some of these people, they're growing concerned about how they're going to be remembered," says Russ Alan Prince, president of Prince & Associates, a wealth-research firm that conducted a recent study on legacy. "For others, they've always wanted to do something and they realize that if they don't do it now, they're never going to do it."
For Mr. Berggruen, the transformation follows a life full of eccentricities and unconventional success. The son of Heinz Berggruen, the famed Germany-born art collector who befriended Pablo Picasso, Nicolas Berggruen grew up in France and Switzerland hoping to become a writer. He studied Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre and other existentialists and rebelled against his privileged upbringing.
When he was 17 years old, he moved to New York City to attend New York University. He also started investing with a few thousand dollars of his own money. After graduating -- in two years -- he started investing in stocks, bonds and early forms of private equity.
Soon, he was buying entire businesses. Berggruen Holdings, his wholly owned investing vehicle, has net assets of more than $3 billion, according to Mr. Berggruen, business associates and corporate documents.
One of his biggest victories was FGX, the eyewear company formerly known as Foster Grant, which he acquired when it was declining in value. After making acquisitions, expanding the product lines and shoring up management, he took it public for a big profit.
He also created Media Capital, one of Portugal's largest media companies, after acquiring newspapers, television, radio, magazine and Internet assets. He has since sold the company.
"He's a disciplined buyer," says Martin Franklin, the chief executive of Jarden Corp., the consumer-products giant, and a partner with Mr. Berggruen in several businesses. "Nicolas is one of those guys who turns lemons into lemonade."
Mr. Berggruen was also behind two of the world's largest special-purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs. These so-called blank-check companies raise money through initial public offerings to make acquisitions. A U.S. SPAC he helped launch in December, called Liberty Acquisition Holdings Corp. raised more than $1 billion. A European SPAC he launched in February, called Liberty International Acquisition Co. raised $878 million. Mr. Berggruen is still shopping for companies to buy with both funds.
He has experienced his share of setbacks. One of his earlier SPACs, Freedom Acquisition Holdings, merged with the British hedge-fund GLG Partners Inc. in 2007 to take the fund public. The stock surged initially, but plunged more than 30% in recent weeks after one of GLG's top traders abruptly resigned. Mr. Berggruen, who owns about 6% of the company, says he is disappointed in the loss but confident the stock will bounce back. In 4 p.m. New York Stock Exchange composite trading Friday GLG's stock was down 11 cents to $7.78.
Despite his wealth, the boyish-looking Mr. Berggruen remains a mystery. He has avoided the press and has never appeared on the Forbes list of wealthiest individuals, although he would likely qualify. When a Dutch magazine tried to publish a profile of him several years ago, Mr. Berggruen bought up all the copies and destroyed them.
His personal habits are legendary among friends and colleagues. He works 12-to-14-hour days. He rarely visits his offices around the world, preferring to work in hotel rooms and restaurants. When he is in New York, he does most of his work on his BlackBerry while speed-walking around Central Park.
For Mr. Berggruen, chocolate is a primary food group. He eats two meals a day, one of which usually consists of chocolate cake. When David Bonderman, founder of TPG, the private-equity firm, went trekking with Mr. Berggruen in the Himalayas, Mr. Bonderman rode a horse. Mr. Berggruen bounded up the mountain fueled on chocolate bars.
He is restless to an extreme, logging 250 hours on his Gulfstream IV last year (his biggest indulgence) and visiting more than 80 cities around the world.
Mr. Berggruen's shift to socially responsible investing was gradual. When oil prices started soaring a few years ago, he looked into alternative energy sources. He acquired the Cascade Grain ethanol plan in Port Westward, Ore., the largest ethanol plant on the West Coast.
In researching ethanol, Mr. Berggruen realized that the world's food production -- which was increasingly being used for fuel -- wasn't keeping pace with demand. He formed a team of top agricultural experts and started researching ways of boosting farming productivity.
He bought up hundreds of thousands of acres in Australia, where he plans to grow grains. He is in talks to buy land in various other areas of the world, and he is negotiating with several governments to lease land for farming cassava, corn, rice, olives and other crops.
After his food ventures, Mr. Berggruen realized how many similar social problems could be solved -- or at least targeted -- through investing.
"Government wasn't solving these problems," he said. "So the market has to step in."
One area was real estate. An avowed urbanist, Mr. Berggruen started investing in projects aimed at reviving decaying inner cities. He is working with partners to buy up large parcels in downtown Newark, N.J., to build a mixed-use development with offices, homes and retail. He is launching similar developments in India, Turkey and Israel, working with top architects such as Richard Meier, David Chipperfield and Kazuyo Sejima.
Mr. Berggruen is also making plans for his foundation, which will target a wide array of social problems. One of the few things he is still acquiring for his personal life is art, which he says will withstand the test of time and eventually be given back to the public through a museum.
"The art I buy now goes to storage," he says. "I don't have a home to hang it in."
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
The Devout Atheist
Just for kicks, I decided to label myself as a 'devout atheist', which is an oxymoron - being 'devout' is meant for people of faith, and an atheist symbolizes the lack of it. Surely they cannot co-exist?
It might, since there are varying semantic interpretations of 'atheist' itself. Some defines an atheist as 'an active disbeliever in god'[1] - which sounds ridiculous, because it exactly describes what the religions do: actively promoting a faith, in this case the faith that 'god doesn't exist'. How is this any different to having 'an active belief in god (or the Flying Spaghetti Monster)' itself?
The background to the atheist's mindset is based upon the fact that god's existence is unprovable - nobody has yet been able to scientifically witness and/or peer-review the presence of god. Yet we have to give it a benefit of a doubt, because we cannot disprove that the possibility exists: the rule 'you cannot prove a negative' applies.
But even so, what sets the atheist apart, is while he is certain about the unprovability of god, he does not see the need to hold onto a belief that god is, or will be provable (or not). Given there are an infinitely limitless number of things that are unprovable, the atheist, unlike the theist, does not arbitrarily chooses or selectively accepts the presence of one god, while discriminating the others. The atheist accepts all gods as equally unprovable, and unlike the agnostic, has no need for beliefs in any or all them. Yet, that does not preclude him from changing his mind, when there is evidence that proves otherwise.
So by definition, I am an atheist, but what is with the 'devout' part? The lack of beliefs does not indicate I reject the values espoused by most religions, and certainly doesn't mean that I am opposed to it. In most cases, I am happy with many tenets that most religions share; they are generally good codes of conduct to live by for a harmonious society to function anyway.
As childish a religion may be, childishness is also attributed with to the connotation of fun. That quality of fun, while considered as trivial for someone as great as Einstein, is something that general mortals relish in, and in some ways a representation of our society today. There is too much history that is related to religion that's pervasive in our way of life; without it, we would have lost a fair amount of art, literature, music and culture that we know of. If atheists do rule the world, what is it will they be replacing that void with?
The only thing I'm dead set against religions on, is of the absolutism and fanaticism of some individuals toward their beliefs - their assertions that 'I'm right and you're wrong', when it comes to their god - only theirs is the sole representation of truth. They choose to live and die by their faiths, consuming them where their existences are solely defined and dictated by religion alone. This is when the irrationals and the insane arise.
Even though I am weary of religion, I consider myself 'devout' as an atheist, for even with my lack of need for faith, there shouldn't be a need to pass judgement on others' need to believe. To promote atheism and denying the need for faith in individuals where they rely upon as an emotional crutch, or as a means of keeping themselves from straying into their bad side, is no better than proselytising religion itself.
Practitioners of faith may appear Machiavellian, but the trade off is to be able to keep society functioning in a relatively good order. A world full of atheists without good moral sense is no better than having no religion at all: there is nothing that stops them from being guided by only their own selfish needs. Religions should be viewed as a bootstrap for getting to the atheist's state of self-realisation - sure, only some will get out of that dreamy, 'religious state of mind', but ultimately one will come to appreciate atheism to be a 'beautiful thing' only when he arrives to that conclusion himself.
[1] The usage of 'god' should be gods. In this case, I mean any god, rather than the singular God from the monotheist's perspective.
It might, since there are varying semantic interpretations of 'atheist' itself. Some defines an atheist as 'an active disbeliever in god'[1] - which sounds ridiculous, because it exactly describes what the religions do: actively promoting a faith, in this case the faith that 'god doesn't exist'. How is this any different to having 'an active belief in god (or the Flying Spaghetti Monster)' itself?
The background to the atheist's mindset is based upon the fact that god's existence is unprovable - nobody has yet been able to scientifically witness and/or peer-review the presence of god. Yet we have to give it a benefit of a doubt, because we cannot disprove that the possibility exists: the rule 'you cannot prove a negative' applies.
But even so, what sets the atheist apart, is while he is certain about the unprovability of god, he does not see the need to hold onto a belief that god is, or will be provable (or not). Given there are an infinitely limitless number of things that are unprovable, the atheist, unlike the theist, does not arbitrarily chooses or selectively accepts the presence of one god, while discriminating the others. The atheist accepts all gods as equally unprovable, and unlike the agnostic, has no need for beliefs in any or all them. Yet, that does not preclude him from changing his mind, when there is evidence that proves otherwise.
'An atheist is always willing to change his mind should convincing evidence of God actually come to light'- Stephen Hawkings
So by definition, I am an atheist, but what is with the 'devout' part? The lack of beliefs does not indicate I reject the values espoused by most religions, and certainly doesn't mean that I am opposed to it. In most cases, I am happy with many tenets that most religions share; they are generally good codes of conduct to live by for a harmonious society to function anyway.
"The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish."- Albert Einstein
As childish a religion may be, childishness is also attributed with to the connotation of fun. That quality of fun, while considered as trivial for someone as great as Einstein, is something that general mortals relish in, and in some ways a representation of our society today. There is too much history that is related to religion that's pervasive in our way of life; without it, we would have lost a fair amount of art, literature, music and culture that we know of. If atheists do rule the world, what is it will they be replacing that void with?
The only thing I'm dead set against religions on, is of the absolutism and fanaticism of some individuals toward their beliefs - their assertions that 'I'm right and you're wrong', when it comes to their god - only theirs is the sole representation of truth. They choose to live and die by their faiths, consuming them where their existences are solely defined and dictated by religion alone. This is when the irrationals and the insane arise.
Even though I am weary of religion, I consider myself 'devout' as an atheist, for even with my lack of need for faith, there shouldn't be a need to pass judgement on others' need to believe. To promote atheism and denying the need for faith in individuals where they rely upon as an emotional crutch, or as a means of keeping themselves from straying into their bad side, is no better than proselytising religion itself.
Practitioners of faith may appear Machiavellian, but the trade off is to be able to keep society functioning in a relatively good order. A world full of atheists without good moral sense is no better than having no religion at all: there is nothing that stops them from being guided by only their own selfish needs. Religions should be viewed as a bootstrap for getting to the atheist's state of self-realisation - sure, only some will get out of that dreamy, 'religious state of mind', but ultimately one will come to appreciate atheism to be a 'beautiful thing' only when he arrives to that conclusion himself.
[1] The usage of 'god' should be gods. In this case, I mean any god, rather than the singular God from the monotheist's perspective.
Monday, May 12, 2008
I Just Don't Like Children!
I have said it before and I will say it again, I do not like children. I don't hate them, but I sure don't have much affinity for them. I remembered a candid moment when I remarked to a friend on how 'cute' a kid we saw on the street was, to which she immediately gave me a rather curt retort - haven't I said before that 'I didn't like kids?'
Sure I did, but it doesn't mean they can't be cute right? Puppies are cute too, and I don't see the need to have them either. But if I had to choose, puppies might just as well be a more desirable alternative to babies - at least you can always rely on them for unconditional, non-judgemental love!
A lecturer of mine remarked on his website that 'the only good baby... is a working baby', which drew quite a vitriol from a classmate of mine, but funnily it was his strong reaction that was more appalling to me than my lecturer's view.
Him, like most people, perceives that having a child as a 'god given right' [1], for otherwise, nature wouldn't have given us the ability to procreate in the first place.
Yet, nature had also given us 'consciousness' of free will - humans are given the ability to make conscious choices that enables us to override our primitive desires, which if not the case, we will still have mating seasons, bright red bosoms, and and irresistible desire to copulate when it happens. Can't say I don't miss those good ol' days, since it is never less than difficult to read the right signals from women anymore! But since we have evolved to make procreation a function of conscious choice rather than an involuntary reflex action, I don't see why an individual should not make his choice based on his own personal convictions.
Yet, the more interesting reason I have, is the fact that all life, will ultimately come to an end, where our destruction is a foregone conclusion. The only thing that's variable in our destruction, is just on which timescale of that it will happen to us. And given that we are living in a world that resource scarcity is increasingly become a more tangible reality, true irresponsibility comes from the fact that we are bringing more life into this world than we can sustainably maintain, rather than not having children.
To frame it in context, it took humans millennias to reach the population of 1 billion people in the 18th century, and only a century later grow this figure by an additional 5 billion. There are plenty of detractors who refutes the Malthusian theory that such permanent exponential growth can be possible, and many citing that throughout the timeline when man has dwelled this Earth, it hasn't happened. But it is misleading, and misguided to reach the conclusion by measuring it on a timescale - the mistake is that we've gotten the timings wrong, not that the eventuality will not happen. Perhaps the recent increases in the prices in oil, gas, wheat, rice, corn, poultry and other food staples is just a testament where this eventuality may be much closer than we'll like to think.
But finally, from a more 'selfish' perspective, why shouldn't we not have children?
This, improbable as it may seem, somehow links us back to the reason why nature had given us the ability to have children in the first place. Perhaps the more interesting question we haven't been asking ourselves is 'why are we able to procreate in the first place?'
'It just is', is not good enough, even though many might think it's an adequate answer. If you are familiar with the works of Richard Dawkins, his book, 'The Selfish Gene' suggests that our need for progeny is simply the gene's mechanism to ensure the continuation of its existence. That double helix structure is the sole reason why we have the ability to bear offsprings, and why the need to make us need, feel and want it.
And to come back to notion of 'cuteness' that I've alluded to earlier, surprisingly, it is just another example of the 'Selfish Gene' in action - a peculiar trait that serves no function other than eliciting a strong emotional response that is steeped deeply within our psyche - the 'cuteness' that we perceive, be it in a baby tiger or human, is intentional by design so that we will develop a sense of affection to the baby to take care of it. Yet it is irrational, for the case of a tiger, to grow affectionate to it presents a life threatening risk to oneself should it grow to full maturity - and yet the inherent cuteness is what inhibits our minds from perceiving the actual threat. Cuteness acts in same way in human babies, that when parenting have reached past its point of usefulness, the 'cuteness' trait subsides in a child as he grows into an adult, when he has reached self-sufficiency. It is not hard to infer then, that 'cuteness' is a form of emotional parasitism that confers the host no benefit in return in its raw, biological state.
But the good news is, since we humans are unlike the rest of the animal kingdom, we are able to choose between succumbing to our 'Selfish Gene', or my own 'Selfish Utilitarian Individualism'(TM), which is why I have chosen the latter. That all shouldn't be too surprising, given that I am supposed follower of Schopenhauer's school of thought, which seems just like the perfect, natural thing for me to do! But the next time someone asks me on my view about children again, well, I'll tell them 'it's a looooong story'.
And maybe, they should just read my blog. ;-)
[1] 'god' as an abstract construct, given the idea to the right of childbirth is inherently present in all cultures and not just limited to people who believed in the Christian God!
Sure I did, but it doesn't mean they can't be cute right? Puppies are cute too, and I don't see the need to have them either. But if I had to choose, puppies might just as well be a more desirable alternative to babies - at least you can always rely on them for unconditional, non-judgemental love!
A lecturer of mine remarked on his website that 'the only good baby... is a working baby', which drew quite a vitriol from a classmate of mine, but funnily it was his strong reaction that was more appalling to me than my lecturer's view.
Him, like most people, perceives that having a child as a 'god given right' [1], for otherwise, nature wouldn't have given us the ability to procreate in the first place.
Yet, nature had also given us 'consciousness' of free will - humans are given the ability to make conscious choices that enables us to override our primitive desires, which if not the case, we will still have mating seasons, bright red bosoms, and and irresistible desire to copulate when it happens. Can't say I don't miss those good ol' days, since it is never less than difficult to read the right signals from women anymore! But since we have evolved to make procreation a function of conscious choice rather than an involuntary reflex action, I don't see why an individual should not make his choice based on his own personal convictions.
Yet, the more interesting reason I have, is the fact that all life, will ultimately come to an end, where our destruction is a foregone conclusion. The only thing that's variable in our destruction, is just on which timescale of that it will happen to us. And given that we are living in a world that resource scarcity is increasingly become a more tangible reality, true irresponsibility comes from the fact that we are bringing more life into this world than we can sustainably maintain, rather than not having children.
To frame it in context, it took humans millennias to reach the population of 1 billion people in the 18th century, and only a century later grow this figure by an additional 5 billion. There are plenty of detractors who refutes the Malthusian theory that such permanent exponential growth can be possible, and many citing that throughout the timeline when man has dwelled this Earth, it hasn't happened. But it is misleading, and misguided to reach the conclusion by measuring it on a timescale - the mistake is that we've gotten the timings wrong, not that the eventuality will not happen. Perhaps the recent increases in the prices in oil, gas, wheat, rice, corn, poultry and other food staples is just a testament where this eventuality may be much closer than we'll like to think.
But finally, from a more 'selfish' perspective, why shouldn't we not have children?
This, improbable as it may seem, somehow links us back to the reason why nature had given us the ability to have children in the first place. Perhaps the more interesting question we haven't been asking ourselves is 'why are we able to procreate in the first place?'
'It just is', is not good enough, even though many might think it's an adequate answer. If you are familiar with the works of Richard Dawkins, his book, 'The Selfish Gene' suggests that our need for progeny is simply the gene's mechanism to ensure the continuation of its existence. That double helix structure is the sole reason why we have the ability to bear offsprings, and why the need to make us need, feel and want it.
And to come back to notion of 'cuteness' that I've alluded to earlier, surprisingly, it is just another example of the 'Selfish Gene' in action - a peculiar trait that serves no function other than eliciting a strong emotional response that is steeped deeply within our psyche - the 'cuteness' that we perceive, be it in a baby tiger or human, is intentional by design so that we will develop a sense of affection to the baby to take care of it. Yet it is irrational, for the case of a tiger, to grow affectionate to it presents a life threatening risk to oneself should it grow to full maturity - and yet the inherent cuteness is what inhibits our minds from perceiving the actual threat. Cuteness acts in same way in human babies, that when parenting have reached past its point of usefulness, the 'cuteness' trait subsides in a child as he grows into an adult, when he has reached self-sufficiency. It is not hard to infer then, that 'cuteness' is a form of emotional parasitism that confers the host no benefit in return in its raw, biological state.
But the good news is, since we humans are unlike the rest of the animal kingdom, we are able to choose between succumbing to our 'Selfish Gene', or my own 'Selfish Utilitarian Individualism'(TM), which is why I have chosen the latter. That all shouldn't be too surprising, given that I am supposed follower of Schopenhauer's school of thought, which seems just like the perfect, natural thing for me to do! But the next time someone asks me on my view about children again, well, I'll tell them 'it's a looooong story'.
And maybe, they should just read my blog. ;-)
[1] 'god' as an abstract construct, given the idea to the right of childbirth is inherently present in all cultures and not just limited to people who believed in the Christian God!
Thursday, May 08, 2008
My Investment Journey So Far
I haven't traded in the stock market in the last couple of years - the last time I checked, my trade history was probably about 3 years ago, which only amounted to just about 4-5 transactions.
To tell you the truth, I started investing without knowing much about anything at all, and had a lot of apprehension to the idea of putting money into the stock market, given that I had neither any prior experience, nor knowing anybody who could help me with learning how to invest in the stock market.
And what complicates matters, it is an area that I wasn't going to get much familial support from - mom had taught me the virtue of being sensible and frugal with money, but she has regarded the stock market as nothing more than just a big glorified casino, and would had probably balked at the idea of me throwing money into buying stocks.
Anyhow, since I was quite intent on taking control of my own financial matters, I was rather tight-lipped on what I was doing, and saving off a portion of my salary even though it would have been more tempting to spend it, and learning about whatever I can about stock investing from books and off the Internet.
The investment world to me then, was still an enigma. Names like Benjamin Graham, Buffett, and Munger were relatively new to me, but for all that they had been saying, I had distilled it down to a single rule to follow - 'buy good companies, at a good price'. But I didn't know what 'a good price' was, and certainly did not understand much to know what to look for.
At that time, P/E, Beta, Black-Scholes or various esoteric methodologies were just funny sounding words that were totally alien to me. Even though I have better conceptual understanding of certain financial indicators now, things like the Black-Scholes model still remains just a financial buzzword - till today, I still am clueless to what its significance is.
The only homework I did, was to understand what business the company was in, looked at their financial reports to find out if they were or going to be profitable, did a bit of comparison among their peers to see how they fared, and decided if the sector would do well on the whole based on the social-economic factors that would influence the business the company was in. The last point was probably my strongest and my only saving grace, given that I have an avid interest in keeping up with current affairs. There wasn't really any fixed form or methodology in the way I picked my stock. I guess the only thing I was really looking for was that I was comfortable that the company was having a productive business that I understood.
So far, my hazy, hodgepodge methodology hasn't been too bad - one stock has grown into a two-bagger, and another, from relative obscurity into a mid-cap company that's now in the ASX200. Given that my investment capital was from my hard earned savings from my initial few years of employment, it has been a bit of a personal vindication.
But I should still thank my lucky stars, given that 'Mr. Market' had been rather merciful in the last few years, without going into too many schizophrenic bouts volatility we've been seeing since the tail end of 2007. I am probably quite risk-adverse by nature, and if the market had been as tumultuous as it currently is, the volatility itself might have just made my stomach turn enough to put me off from investing altogether.
Well, at least now I can somewhat justify myself as being an investor, rather than a speculator after 3 years years of holding onto my stocks, and watching them grow. And I'll likely to continue holding them unless I really needed the money, or when the sentiment of the company's prospect changes.
These days, the financial markets have caught my interest once again, mostly for the second reason of the rule - 'good price'. The markets have been battered quite badly, especially the financial sector, from credit crunch that the US sub-prime crisis has caused.
Admittedly, even with the downward-spiralling market sentiment, 'good price' may still not be 'good enough' yet, as I'm mindful of the words of Buffett, Soros, and the various problems caused by rising oil prices, its ripple down effects on inflation, interest rates and the economy in general, the effects from the largest reset of sub-prime loans in the US and the ramping down of China's economic activity from the Olympics that are set to occur simultaneously post-August. To it all, we may have yet to encounter the next 'perfect storm' that's brewing ahead.
I can only hope that my foresight is 'right enough', given it is tempting to start accumulating 'bargains' during this period of negative market sentiment. I can't be certain if I am able to avoid stomach churning volatility that may be ahead, and that the good run I had for the last few years will continue, given that it is not the typical of the maniac-depressive behaviour that I've often read about stock markets. Hope I'll have the conviction to hold it on if things do get rough and not lose my pants in the process!
To tell you the truth, I started investing without knowing much about anything at all, and had a lot of apprehension to the idea of putting money into the stock market, given that I had neither any prior experience, nor knowing anybody who could help me with learning how to invest in the stock market.
And what complicates matters, it is an area that I wasn't going to get much familial support from - mom had taught me the virtue of being sensible and frugal with money, but she has regarded the stock market as nothing more than just a big glorified casino, and would had probably balked at the idea of me throwing money into buying stocks.
Anyhow, since I was quite intent on taking control of my own financial matters, I was rather tight-lipped on what I was doing, and saving off a portion of my salary even though it would have been more tempting to spend it, and learning about whatever I can about stock investing from books and off the Internet.
The investment world to me then, was still an enigma. Names like Benjamin Graham, Buffett, and Munger were relatively new to me, but for all that they had been saying, I had distilled it down to a single rule to follow - 'buy good companies, at a good price'. But I didn't know what 'a good price' was, and certainly did not understand much to know what to look for.
At that time, P/E, Beta, Black-Scholes or various esoteric methodologies were just funny sounding words that were totally alien to me. Even though I have better conceptual understanding of certain financial indicators now, things like the Black-Scholes model still remains just a financial buzzword - till today, I still am clueless to what its significance is.
The only homework I did, was to understand what business the company was in, looked at their financial reports to find out if they were or going to be profitable, did a bit of comparison among their peers to see how they fared, and decided if the sector would do well on the whole based on the social-economic factors that would influence the business the company was in. The last point was probably my strongest and my only saving grace, given that I have an avid interest in keeping up with current affairs. There wasn't really any fixed form or methodology in the way I picked my stock. I guess the only thing I was really looking for was that I was comfortable that the company was having a productive business that I understood.
So far, my hazy, hodgepodge methodology hasn't been too bad - one stock has grown into a two-bagger, and another, from relative obscurity into a mid-cap company that's now in the ASX200. Given that my investment capital was from my hard earned savings from my initial few years of employment, it has been a bit of a personal vindication.
But I should still thank my lucky stars, given that 'Mr. Market' had been rather merciful in the last few years, without going into too many schizophrenic bouts volatility we've been seeing since the tail end of 2007. I am probably quite risk-adverse by nature, and if the market had been as tumultuous as it currently is, the volatility itself might have just made my stomach turn enough to put me off from investing altogether.
Well, at least now I can somewhat justify myself as being an investor, rather than a speculator after 3 years years of holding onto my stocks, and watching them grow. And I'll likely to continue holding them unless I really needed the money, or when the sentiment of the company's prospect changes.
These days, the financial markets have caught my interest once again, mostly for the second reason of the rule - 'good price'. The markets have been battered quite badly, especially the financial sector, from credit crunch that the US sub-prime crisis has caused.
Admittedly, even with the downward-spiralling market sentiment, 'good price' may still not be 'good enough' yet, as I'm mindful of the words of Buffett, Soros, and the various problems caused by rising oil prices, its ripple down effects on inflation, interest rates and the economy in general, the effects from the largest reset of sub-prime loans in the US and the ramping down of China's economic activity from the Olympics that are set to occur simultaneously post-August. To it all, we may have yet to encounter the next 'perfect storm' that's brewing ahead.
I can only hope that my foresight is 'right enough', given it is tempting to start accumulating 'bargains' during this period of negative market sentiment. I can't be certain if I am able to avoid stomach churning volatility that may be ahead, and that the good run I had for the last few years will continue, given that it is not the typical of the maniac-depressive behaviour that I've often read about stock markets. Hope I'll have the conviction to hold it on if things do get rough and not lose my pants in the process!