Archbishop William Goh’s speech on good govt?

Below is a speech attributed to Archbishop William Goh. I am unable to confirm, anyone who can confirm either way please let me know. From the content of the speech I have serious doubt that this is William Goh’s speech. It was not like him. I do not want to be seen spreading fake news. I do not know in what context or in what occasion he found it necessary to say such things in his speech. It is a speech about conscience above all things. This speech has all the signs of a fake news and is circulating by mobile phones and probably in social media. Here, read it.
 
‘…it is not about the form of govt but whether the govt works selflessly and without vested interests for power, glory and wealth. If those in the govt seek to enrich themselves at the expense of the people, this will breed jealousy and resentment. Only govts and leaders who work for the good and wellbeing of their people without discrimination and favor will earn their respect and appreciation.
 
The task of every govt is to ensure that there is progress for the people and that the economy grows to support the needs of its people. At the same time, they are to ensure peace and order by protecting the citizens from all harm, whether from within or without. When they do that, there will be less cause for rebellion and revolution. If these take place, it is because the people feel that they are being short changed by their political leaders who cling to power and wealth.’
 
This is as political as the church could be in talking about govt and leadership. In a way this speech has crossed the OB marker for a religious institution. I hope he would not be accused by the small minds of meddling with the politics of the country or trying to influence govt policies. Very likely it won’t as it is unlikely that William Goh would want to skirt so close to commenting about good govt. Nonetheless I think this is a good generic speech about good govt.
 
God bless. Amen.

Empire dying – Synchronicity of events

When an empire is dying, many events will take place to bring the empire to its knees. Some called it a confluence of events, some called it a synchronicity of events. History always repeats itself, without failed. Some human beans think they are above this law of nature, that they can change the rule of the game, that they are above nature. As long as they can control and manipulate things to their advantage, they will live happily forever ever after.
 
All the empires came and gone, no matter how powerful and brutal they were to suppress and oppress the people to remain in power. The evil empire is no difference. Militarily it is supreme, unchallenged and can wipe out any country it wants within a few minutes. This is no joke. The overwhelming power of the evil empire is frightening. But it is telling the world that some little countries are threatening it and coerced its allies, some willing, some unwilling, to go along with the farce, to bully and threaten those that are not willing to compromise their independence, with boycotts, sanctions and threats of war.
 
Never the evil empire believe that whatever it tries to fix, eventually it would fix itself and bring its own downfall. All the signs are there that the evil empire is falling apart. At the top it is run by a bunch of crooks and greedy people masquerading as angels, virtuous, righteous and selfless, but evil by all counts. Many of these charlatans are passing themselves off as talented leaders when reality said they are duds, hopeless in what they are doing, pretentious and hypocrites in their own rights. Many are bankrupt of ideas, unproductive except for making silly comments that are worthless and useless.
 
And the economy is running to a halt except for a few isolated industries, notably selling arms and weapons of destruction. The real economy is gone or reduced to a rubble. The banking and finance industry is anything but a farce, churning and producing worthless papers to con and cheat the unthinking, without producing anything of value. Derivatives is a swear word that they made it out to be the thing going forward. The gullible around the world swallowed it with gusto. When the ability to print paper money to be accepted as currency for exchange no longer holds, it will be the end of the empire.
 
The broader picture, a synchronicity of events would take place beyond the control of the evil men in charge. Bad and idiotic leaders will rule unchallenged. Accidents will keep happening, keep repeating. The spate of accidents involving the evil empire’s navy is a point to note. Why would such accidents happen to the most advanced and supposedly best trained and best equipped navy, with sophisticated technology and very clever people cannot go unnoticed. There is a designed to make these events happened. Nothing the dying empire does will stop these events from happening.
 
The most powerful evil empire cannot be defeated militarily. They are so advanced that they need not send their soldiers to fight and be killed in the battle field. But their soldiers should die, by a synchronicity of events that should not happen at all, unexplainable and uncalled for.
 
A dying empire will be brought down to its knees, no matter how powerful, how manipulative, how cunning, and how ruthless it is. There is no where to run or to hide. What must come down must come down. Surely and steadily.
 
The empire will try to impose more repressive and oppressive measures to keep the empire alive, believing that these would work. They would keep to their old ways of doing the same old thing when the world is changing rapidly in their face. They would not accept the change, cannot believe that it is changing to their detriment. If they would, all the empires of the past would still be around and be as ruthless as they were in their dying days.
 
There is no escape for the dying empire. It is a matter of when or how fast it would come crumbling down.
 
PS. What if everything is breaking down but pretending that everything is fine?

Productivity would increase if supertalents are engaged in productive work in the private sector

For several decades, the crème ala crème of little Red Dot were given scholarships to be educated in the best universities around the world only to return to be employed in unproductive works, mostly administrative and policy making and in devising clever schemes to tax the people. What would it be like if these talents are released into the private sector instead, in manufacturing, in engineering, in financial services etc etc instead of becoming top civil servants and politicians?
 
The sinking feelings in the industries, in manufacturing are ringing loudly in the ears of many when productivity is at rock bottom, also thanks to the influx of dubious foreign talents into the island. Fortunately or unfortunately, the industries are supported and saved by the less talented, academically. What happened to the once very productive Singapore with the best workers in the region? When suddenly all are duds, unproductive and practically useless, only good enough to drive taxis and be security guards? Even first class honours from NUS are booted out by dubious foreigner with likely fake degrees and credentials. And these foreigners mostly came from sick countries and sick economies.
 
If only there is a change in policies to redeploy the best brains and talents in productive works, in the industries, things would likely change for the better, and productivity must go up instead of down and down. No? I stand corrected on this as some may continue to resort to sophistry to con their way instead of working and being productive. The only difference is that in the real economy, they do not have the political power to shaft shit into the people’s throat. Any incompetence would not last another day.
 
Or at least the high million dollar salaries of these super talents would be paid by the private sector, by their organizations, instead of the public services and the govt having to tax and tax and raising taxes in every opportunity to feed these million dollar gang of super talents. If their average salary is $1m, and if there are 3,000 of them, that would be $3b annually. How to find such money, how to earn such money from profits in services like MRT and bus fares and selling products? You need to earn $1 from 1 million trips to get $1m to pay a million dollar man.
 
When the best brains are not in productive businesses but in unproductive public service, how can productivity go up?
 
What do you think?
 
PS. The weaknesses of the mandarin system would be exposed, especially in the dying days of a dynasty when instead of working for the people, it is all about self aggrandizement and self interest. It will snowball into dreaded case of 升官发 财above everything else. How many more millions would be enough?

Foreign recruitment firm survey said more Singaporeans seeking contract jobs

If one is to believe the result of Robert Walters, more people, presumably locals, are seeking contract jobs instead of permanent jobs as such positions offered more flexibility or work life balance. Randstad Singapore, another foreign named recruitment agency confirmed that ‘the year on year growth for contract roles is 35 percent. Randstad has seen a 40 percent growth in such roles in the information technology industry, while the banking industry has seen a 30 per cent increase.’
 
Though contract jobs are growing, more workers, presumably locals or Singaporeans here remain keen to secure permanent positions. For foreigners or locals that are not citizens, it makes sense to have contract jobs, after all their homes are not here and they would not be here for good. For Singaporeans, with the albatross housing loan hanging over their neck, it would be foolish to think that they preferred contract jobs. Equally foolish is to say that Singaporeans prefer part time jobs and temporary jobs. These are Singaporeans that are forced to take up part time and insecure jobs out of no choice because permanent and better jobs are taken by foreign talents. Randstad’s country director confirmed this, ‘In Singapore, employee expectation is still on securing permanent employment because the salary is tied to long term debt.’
 
Any clown wants to say otherwise, that Singaporeans prefer contract jobs, part time jobs, temp jobs? Some clowns said Singaporeans preferred to be taxi drivers so that they are their own boss, and ending spending most of their time fetching maids and foreign workers around in their taxis. These irresponsible clowns would continue to tell their lies that all is well for Singaporeans unable to secure a permanent job and having to service their expensive mortgages, providing for their families in this most expensive place in the world.
 
The pathetic Singaporeans unable to secure permanent jobs would be buried in a mountain of debt that they would not be able to service. Thanks to the free influx of foreign talents with dubious and questionable qualifications and experience.
Who should these jobless or underemployed Singaporeans thank for their plight in this most expensive city in the world? There must be many very happy Singaporeans working part time or in contract jobs, not counting those that could no longer find a job. The pain has not hurt yet.

Preserved quarters of old Rugao City

Below are some pics of the old quarters of Rugao in the days of Ming and Qing Dynasties about 400 years ago. The area is still occupied by some residents and commercial shops. The houses are small and the roads and lanes are very narrow. The floors are layered with bricks.

The eastern entrance to the old city.

The western entrance where I started my discovery journey. It was just off the main road.

A short distance into the preserved quarters.

This was about 2pm and this part was quite quiet.

There were several of these 3 storey houses in this corner.

Behind this row of low houses were the new buildings.

The other side of the street.

Old houses, new uses.

The narrow backlane with brick floor.

An entrance that led to a few homes.

This is a wider lane.

This does not look like a backlane with a main entrance here.

This lane led to a pavilion sitting on the edge of a river dividing the preserved quarters into two halves.

One side of the river with willows.

The other side of the river.

This looks like a wealthier home.

An elderly man with a pack of lunch on his way home, a right turn about 12 feet in front of him.

These are authentic homes other than the few modern fixtures around them.

This is not a backlane.

The height of these homes are really low.

These are real modern city folks from Beijing visiting the town.

Looking from the other side of the river.

Another lane with very old brick walls.

The water supply for the folks.

A narrow backlane.

Another narrow main street.

An old bridge.

A wide angle view of the east entrance to the ancient quarters from the main road.

Singapore - A very sad state of affair

Confession of a daft sinkie

Below is an article posted in TRE supposedly by an ex PMET. I presume that this is a real story. Please read it before it is took late, that you have been sold and your turn will be next, if you continue to choose to be another daft sinkie. Betrayed but did not know. Just blame your own stupidity. The death of a once proud people has begun.

This situation is widespread, has been going on for many years, and is still going on. Who are responsible for this sad state of affair? Who allowed this crime against Singaporeans to continue unabated? Do you want this to continue to affect you and your children?

Replaced by FT finally – I voted for it!

I worked for MNC for last 10 years, before I was in a GLC. I am First Class honours from NUS ComSc. I had it easy with my good grade, I joined a GLC and got a good head-start and pay. I was in IT software development and later became manager of the department. That was in the 2000s, FTs were streaming in but the numbers were not significant, I always believe that we probably need more IT talents, the brainwashing on media worked on me. But nevertheless, at that time, I was making good pay, I thought of nothing. Every GE, I voted PAP for sure, life was good and money was good. I never once thought of voting opposition except I thought WP was credible enough to consider. But then, since life was so good under PAP, why bother. Politics are politicians, we were just making a living and when living was so good, would you want to make any change? Over the 10 years, my pay tripled and I bought a condominium, living the 4Cs that many of us dream of.

2010 onward, the stream of FTs were too obvious, particularly from China and India. I made a switch from GLC to MNC, I did notice growing number of FTs. But well, I got another pay hike, so who cares!

One of my old colleagues called me to ask him to help him to look for a job. He was from Indonesia but came here when he was 13, became citizen. He had MBA from US and remained unemployed for 4 years, that was in 2013. I found it hard to believe his words because I had never experienced such incident nor heard from anymore. Perhaps I was sent overseas then, I rarely came back to the HQ in Singapore. But I did understand his Pinoy wife with a dubious degree was promoted so many times after joining the PA. So the Pinoy wife was the sole breadwinner and senior manager in PA. I never really thought of much, I thought he was lazy. As long as you want a job, you could get it easily. I also failed to realise, government had already started PRO FT policies, grooming and promoting FTs in ministries and government agencies. Yes the Pinoy wife took the cue and became new citizen.

I came back to Singapore HQ in 2014 after working for few years in Australia. Life was good, pay was good but coming back is for the family. And I heard on media that PAP wanted all the locals who are based overseas to come back. That gave me some kind of assurance that I did not apply for PR nor thought of migrating there. Once back in the HQ office, I discovered almost 60% of the workforce were FTs, mostly from India.

I was made to report to a regional VP from India who became a PR not long ago. Back in Singapore, the office politics became quite obvious, I felt that my boss was trying to find problems with me. Although I tried hard to please and work to the best of my abilities, there was always something to pick on. I had great records through the years of work and in my last posting, strangely back in Singapore I was branded as “non performing”. Then I realised there was nothing wrong with me, I was being targeted. I saw no point carrying on, I decided to resign. After my resignation, another FT Indian was hired quickly, and to my knowledge they seem to know each other.

Since the resignation, I had not landed any job for almost 2 years. For some reasons, even with good regional software experience and excellent academics, I had very few interviews. And when I met with FT managers, the outcomes had always been negative. It looks to me locals are heavily discriminated.

I also went to WDA, E2i and government organised events, I found that they were mostly “wayangs”, they just want to have put up a show that they are helping locals but it was purely bs.
Since then, I reflected the years when government decided the FT policies, I was too busy making good money. I never realised one day I would be hit. I always voted PAP and trusted that my future would be secured. But it looks to me, I had been too trusting and this has
caused me dearly. I am planning to downgrade and sell my condo to free up cash so that I can continue to live with dignity.

For many of us like me, we are all caught up with chasing career and money, we never really thought about government policies and gave blind faith and trust. I always voted PAP, no matter some of my opposition supporter friends who kept warning me.
Well I had to face the music and I had to say, my time is really over, the next generation will bear the brunt of our decision. If we continue to vote blindly, we are creating the black hole for ourselves and our children. My vote for PAP has come back to haunt me dearly. This is what I had to remind you.
Former PMET

PS. Did those betrayed know that they have been betrayed? Did those betraying the betrayed know that they are betraying the betrayed?

Joo Koon collision – 10 sec to react

This is the excuse or explanation given on the train collision at Joon Koon. I don’t think this is a necessary exercise and the people should not try to pin the fault at the driver. Let me try to recreate the situation, just my thought and not necessary the whole truth. The train came to a stop as expected. Everything was normal and the driver could be trying to do something or may even try to stand up to open the door or to move from his seat. The driver would not expect that a train that had stopped would suddenly pull off on its own to hit a stationary train ahead. It never happened before and it was not meant to be like that. This is just abnormal, like a twilight zone event. No driver in his right mind would expect this to happen. So please leave the driver alone. The 10 sec was just too brief for him to react if he was off his seat or was doing something, maybe communicating with the station.
 
What was relevant to this accident in my view are three things. One, the merging of two software and hardware systems to work seamlessly as one. Was this fully understood, that the protocol and interfaces would work smoothly without problems? Were these tested fully to ensure that it would be the case before implementation?
 
Two, how could a lapse or fault cause a trip in the system for the software to read differently and malfunction?
 
Three, why was there such a thing as a 3 carriage train when all our trains are 6 carriages? A 6 carriage train must be the default programme, not a 3 carriage train. How did this 3 carriage train sneaked into the programme? This is a serious flaw in the system. Thales better explain.
 
Now, is this 3 carriage train programme completely removed and deleted from the system and would not be a source of another accident? There must be a full debugging of the software to rid this 3 carriage thing from the system. If this is not removed, it is going to cause another accident of the same nature sometime in the future. Murphy said so. This bug must be taken care of for good. It must not remain in the programme. Period.
 
My 2 cent worth commentary.
 
PS. While Thales, the French provider of the signaling system had apologized for the signaling fault that caused the accident, many sicko sinkies in TRE are still putting the blame on train carriages supposedly Made in China. Were these the cause of the accident? By the way, China’s high speed trains are criss crossing the Asian and African continent in the thousands daily. At those speed the quality of the trains, the signaling system, the tracks, engines, maintenance etc etc the whole system are under real time test. Any faulty part or system would not stand the test of time. On record they have performed extremely well, for any minor mistake or fault would be blown out of proportion in the western media.
 
The Americans would be the next big customer of Chinese high speed trains when Trump decides to rebuild the ailing train system in the USA.
 
Oh by the way, are those injured compensated?

USA, the world’s number one terrorist state holding court

The world’s number one terrorist state, the USA, harbouring the world’s number one terrorist organization, the CIA, got the cheek to accuse and brand North Korea as a terrorist state and acting like they are Gods, all virtuous! Can you believe that? All the evils committed by terrorists around the world have their source in the CIA and the USA. The bombing and demolition of the World Trade Centre in 911 have been conclusively proven that it was an American job but putting the blame on Osama and a few Arabs that are still alive. The killings of Saddam Hussein and Muammar Gaddafi were two state sponsored terrorist acts committed by the evil Empire, conspired and fabricated in the White House and no one dares to take the terrorists in the White House for trial for crime against humanity?
 
And the biggest joke of all, the rest of world believing or accepting the world’s number one terrorist state passing judgement on North Korea and other countries and organizations as terrorists without question? They accepted this fait accompli meekly, afraid to ask question, or unthinkingly accepting these as the American truth.
 
What the hell is going on to the people of the world? Where is their conscience and sense of justice? Satan is ruling the earth and they pray to Satan as their new God. Unbelieveable but this is the situation today. The devil is in charge and branding everyone the devil dislike as devil and all the unthinking people of the world would say aye, aye sir and went about screaming at the victims.
 
Who is the biggest devil that is supporting and giving birth to all the terrorist organizations in the world? Who has been financing them, training them and arming them? Who has been fomenting and provoking acts of terrorism around the world which they called it war to legitimize the killings of the innocents?
 
No prizes for the correct answer. It is definitely not North Korea. The criminals of the world are passing judgement on other states. They assume the role of judge, jury and executioner and the daft of the world meekly accepted this fate and worse, some even happily and voluntarily bowed to this world number one terrorist and willing to do its bidding and went about screaming North Korea is a terrorist state.
 
Stupidity has no cure. Or is it criminals will flock together to commit crimes together?
The series of accidents involving the naval boats and aircraft of the evil Empire is God’s way of dealing with this devil. The accidents would not stop and more American boys and girls will die under mysterious situation, not in war. Be warned!

The temple of God is not in the White House. The White House is the throne of Satan.

What, raising taxes again?

After so many tax hikes, grabbing more CPF money, higher ERP fees, higher COEs, 30% fee water hike, still want to tax more? What is happening, our treasury drying up? Something must be seriously wrong with our finances. With more tax revenue, with the huge profits of GIC and Temasek bringing in billions, still not enough meh?
 
What about cutting down on the grandeur items, on frivolous expenditure that is not necessary, not essential like the F1 and the fake garden and the free scholarships given to foreigners, just to name a few? What about cutting down on the hiring of so many foreigners in the academia and so called think tank agencies? When money runs out, isn’t it the first thing to do should be to look at the expenditure, cost cutting? What about cutting down on military toys and extravagance and stop spending as if we have a mountain of gold and money is not important, endless supply?
 
What about improving productivity, from the top down? Why is there a need for so many ministers, two ministers plus so many ministers of states, etc etc to helm a ministry, so many mayors? Is this productive or counter productive? What about the many million dollar jobs that may not be necessary or justified? Not every ministry is the same, not every stats board is the same, not every GLC is the same. It is time to cut down on extravagance and frivolous million dollar salary. If jobs do not justify a million dollar pay, then the incumbent should not be paid in millions. Let the highly qualified incumbents that could command million dollar salaries to go where they could be paid justly for their contributions. Anyone earning million dollar salary must account and justify by his contribution. Did they produce goods or services that are worth more than their million dollar salary? Million dollar salary in public service must not be a given. It is taxpayers’ money and derived from taxes, a big burden on the people.
 
The people have been squeezed dry to the bones. Even their CPF savings are said to be not their money and people can anyhow make them pay by compulsion for things they did not want nor agree to pay.
 
The belt tightening should be at the top, aim at those with a 50 inch girth than the lean and bony citizens that have nothing much left to be taxed. Take away a few hundred thousand dollars from a million dollar man is nothing compare to taking a few dollars from a pauper. Stop being so mean to the less able. They are poor but not idiots, not fools. Stop squeezing them so very often. Where is your heart?
 
Do you think raising taxes would raise cost of living and would turn this place uncompetitive and bad for the economy? Who cares? What is important is that high taxes mean that there will be enough money for big bonuses, for more pay hikes, and continued to be paid in the millions. You die your business?

Japan should stop sneering at our world class SMRT

An article in thenewpaper on 20 Nov by a SM Ong took offence at an apology issued by the Japanese MRT for a slight hitch in the departure of its train. SM Ong was incensed, felt insulted because the apology was not because the Japanese MRT had a ponding problem, not because their MRT had regular and frequent breakdown, not because their train had a collision. The apology was because their train departed a mere 20 seconds earlier than it was supposed to. How would 20 seconds affect the lives of the commuters? This is like a case of perfectionist mindset, a privilege only a perfectly efficient system can brag about. But they were not bragging, it is just their culture, something very different from our SMRT culture. Want to blame them for having an efficient culture?
 
By the way, the Japanese apology was reported in the Japanese media for Japanese consumption. How did it appear in our local media? Who did this and what was his agenda? If this is done by the Japanese, then it is right to feel offended for rubbing in on our serious train problems. But if the Japanese did not do it, instead it was done by a Singaporean or new Singaporean, or a local, then it is very unfair to blame the Japanese for it. It is misplaced anger that is typical of daft Singaporeans.
 
I quote SM Ong, ‘So we don’t need you, Japan, to make us feel worse about it. We don’t need your Japanese CEO of your Japanese car company Nissan to say last Friday that he will return part of his salary after an inspection scandal led to a recall of 1.2 million Nissan vehicles…Our transport minister, Mr Khaw, once said: “In Japan, the chairman, the CEO will call a press conference and take a deep bow, and in the good old days, they may even commit hara-kiri.”’
 
Now, aren’t this going too far and being overly sensitive? Actually we have a lot to learn from the Japanese if we adopt a healthy and positive mindset. We should be striving to be like the Japanese in terms of efficiency, be on time, not every day apologizing for delays and breakdowns. We should learn from their culture of accountability, failure to perform, return the salary for not performing, and…ok perhaps committing hara-kiri is demanding too much. Just simply resign may be an honourable thing to do.
 
This is a case of failure to see the real problem, refusing to see the problem and beating the messenger for bringing the bad news. This is our daft culture, a nation heading from first world to third world and behaving like third world people.
 
The decline is evident and very assured. And in the article SM Ong quoted Hsien Loong saying that our SMRT is among the top 4 cities in the world and Japan not even mentioned. Is this the same as bragging that our local universities are ranked among the best in the world while Japan’s are not so highly ranked, so we are better than Japan, our SMRT are better than Japan’s?
 
Oh my God. 无药可救. No medicine can help liao.
If one takes into consideration lightning strike and one SMRT train captain was injured, be mindful, be very mindful that HE is watching and obviously not happy with how things are developing. When the collision hit, I was asking what can be worse. Now lightning struck. What can be worse after this.
 
Someone suggested that commuters should think seriously of getting travel insurance. I hope no clown would jump onto this and suggest making this compulsory and using CPF money.

When multi million dollar pay produces nothing

When the scheme to pay multi million dollar salary to govt scholars was introduced it was only a small dent in the budget. There were only a handful of such scholars to talk about and to be paid. No big deal. Today there are thousands of such scholars floating around waiting to be put into multi million dollar jobs, or was it thousands of scholars being paid multi million dollar salary but with only a few multi million dollar jobs available? In the end jobs that do not need to be paid multi million dollar salary would still have to pay multi million dollar salary because the incumbents have to be paid multi million dollar salary regardless of the jobs?
 
How did we end up in such a situation? How can this be sustainable? In a production and manufacturing economy, the people being paid multi million dollar salary earned their keeps. They created values, sell goods and services that brought in the revenue and profits. What did our multi million dollar scholars produce that are of value, what did they do that brought in the dole? Practically everyone is involved in pen pushing jobs, unproductive, no real value added jobs. They did not do anything of real value. They produced nothing. They are unproductive.
 
Oh, they raised taxes, raised fees, raised rentals, create COEs and ERPs. Oh they raised the values of properties in asset enhancements to make everyone a millionaire property owner. They are also very good at creating demands and turning them into revenue and profits by using the savings of CPF members by legislation. They are also very good at holding the people’s savings in the CPF forever. They are also very good at telling the people to put in more money into the CPF. Are these really productive work, work with real value?
 
Seriously, did they create or produce anything of real value, commercial value, goods and products like mobile phones and online businesses? Did they do anything that is real, of economic value to deserve being paid in the millions? What have they produced, the thousands of multi million dollar salary scholars in public services?
 
Do they deserve to be paid in the millions for being unproductive in real economic sense, for producing nothing of real economic value? How can an economy survive and sustain itself with so many thousands of people being paid multi million dollar salary but not producing a thing of real value, without producing anything that is useful economically? Can you believe that?
 
Here is a quote from Teo Ser Luck, MP, former minister, now a happy entrepreneur. ‘It gives me great satisfaction to see that I have created something and that it is helpful and beneficial of others. That to me is very fulfilling.’

Architecture of old China

I briefly mentioned about the mansion of Mo Biqiang and Dong Xiaowan in my previous article and the little corner of the city that was preserved for posterity, a past that should not be forgotten. Here are some of the photos I took of this part of Rugao. Incidentally the mansion of Mo Biqiang is now a tourist attraction, very well preserved and maintained. Here are the pics of the old rich in dynastic China.

Park entrance to Mo Biqiang's mansion.

First bridge after the entrance with a statue of Mo Biqiang, a rich gentry.

The actual main door to the home of Mo Biqiang, a 400 year architecture in the dying days of Ming Dynasty.

Portraits of Dong Xiaowan and Mo Biqiang. Dong, a famous courtesan of the time was a mistress of Mo. She died at age 29. Mo was a few years older than her but lived past the 60s and the portrait was painting after his death as customary practice then would not paint a portrait of a living person.

The garden with thousand year old bonsai.

One of the building in the garden.

Another well preserved building.

Roofs of connecting walkways.

The lake in the garden.

Intricate carved walls of room dividers.

Walkways around the mansion.

Connecting rooms and open access area.

A back section of the mansion with a stone painting of Kwan Yue, the God of War.

Main hall for receiving visitors.

A different angle of the main hall.

A pavilion in the garden.

Some of us in the mansion.

The wall around the mansion.

Another view of the wall.

I will post more pics of the ancient quarters in my next article.