make legal recourse available or more affordable

i was impressed by the son of jb jeyaratnam when he spoke as president of the law society. his main gist was to make legal recourse more affordable or cheaper to those who cannot afford it. did he overhear the things that we discussed here? i helped a friend to get a legal firm to represent him for a royalty case. and the firm was highly recommended to me by another friend. the case was settled after one hearing. my client was happy that he won and was awarded about $120k. it was quite straight forward. he paid his legal fee which came to about $110k. actually my one year as a law student had given me enough knowledge to know that the facts were in my friend's favour. what a great victory and great legal firm. my friend is still celebrating it today and everyday, with four letter words.

bird flu: god is kind

the bird flu is spreading all over the world. the casualties are not that high and it provides a lot of time for the human race to react to it, and tackle it before it becomes a pandemic and wipe out half of the earth. but looking at it from god's point of view, it is a warning against those countries that think it is ok to use chemical or biological warfare against another country, espionage or covert actions to damage a country's economy. god said simply, 'don't try, it will come back to you in more ways and faster ways than you can imagine.' chemicals and bacteria or viruses in the air will be airborned or be carried by birds, produce or simply humans, to all corners of the globe. no country can think of being immuned from it once it is let out. let us pray that no idiotic leaders will embark on such a warfare.

budget terminal, nice name

the budget terminal fits very nicely to the new budget terminal. no frills, just simply budget. and we got to thank them for not engaging a pr consultant and spend another $300k trying to find a more suitable name. and a forumer's reaction in the new paper, one steve ngo, was hilarity. i too feel the same way. it would be more fun to call it heartland terminal. then we can bring it closer to the heartlanders since they will probably be the people who cannot afford to travel in class and use the classy terminals at changi. and heartlanders can also feel proud to have a terminal name after them. and later they can change the name of changi to something more classy and fit the image of the sophisticated travellers. let me see, high class terminal? for high class people? or maybe spend another half a million for a pr consultancy to find a more suitable name. heartlanders' idea of a high class name may not be appropriate.

hdb pushing out 400 units unsold flats to property agents

hdb states that it has 9000 units of unsold flats. assuming the average price of each unit is $200k, it means $1.8 billion stuck in these flats. servicing the interest at say 3% of cheap loan will cost $54 mil a year. and these flats have been left unsold for an average of 10 years, i think. this means $540 mil and on a simple equation of depreciation, losing 10 years is 10% of its value at $200k per unit or $180 mil in value. does this mean that hdb has made a loss of $720 mil on these 9000 units of flats over a 10 year period. and the losses will add on if the flats remain unsold? the figures are just guesstimates but it sure looks big if true. like i said to matilah, today's success is tomorrow's failure. what we think is good today could actually destroy us. the same success and failure story is nkf. because it becomes too successful, it leads to its downfall. hdb was a success story but then over built. our birth control policy was so successful that it has now become a big problem. life just go round in circles.

singapore top students not world beaters

this came from a letter by a dr huang shoou chyuan in today's straits times. the general argument is quite similar to what leong szehian wrote the other day. dr haung touched on a few key points. 1. very few top singapore students become 'truly top ranked scientists, entrepreneurs, inventors, business executives or academics.' 2. these top students would choose easy courses to score 3.8. and 3, it would be beneficial and they would better benefit from their overseas education if they try some other unrelated subjects. i personally have known of many singapore students who are top ranked in their fields. and some of them are not even the top of their cohorts in singapore. for the top of their cohorts are now prime ministers, ministers, permanent secretaries and ceos. they could not become inventors or scientists or others as their career paths are towards government and public services. if only they were channelled to the other fields, these creme ala creme will definitely do much better. lee hsien loong could become a john nash. why not? and many will emerge as top ranked scientists and inventors from A star and dso and other r and d facilities. dr huang must take note that r and d is fairly new in singapore and would take a while to bear fruits. and i think it is an underestimation to think our top students would opt for easier courses just to score 3.8. they might take a few easier subjects. but their core subjects will not be forsaken. doing unrelated courses is always a good diversion and helps to widen one's perspective. and no one can disagree that it will benefit the student in having a more versatile and interesting student life. but it would not necessarily make them better scientists or whatever. no one who wants to push the frontier of science and technology can afford not to specialise and spend gruelling hours in their field of study. taking time off in unrelated subjects is only useful to a little extent. without them will not hurt. but unable to excel in their fields of study, to score As, will weaken their foundation in what they are doing. some of the frills and thrills of life can be acquired along the way as one moves along in life. the basic and foundation courses must be very strong to advance further to test and discover new knowledge when new knowledge are becoming more technical and scientific. spending a year reading the animal farm or about mozart and picasso would be nice but not really that critical.