11/05/2011

Singapore students came out tops in Critical Thinking

Organised by the Oracle Education Foundation, the competition challenged students to solve a problem using their critical thinking, communication and technology skills. More than 30,000 participants from 52 countries participated, showcasing the best of their young people’s expertise on a global platform.

The teams that came in tops were from Republic Polytechnic, Dunman High School and Nanyang Girls’ High School. Their projects ranged from helping a commune in Cambodia that has been living under the poverty line to developing an application to help users gain insight into their eating habits.


Our students came out tops, can you believe it? The students from a daft country came out tops among 52 countries and 30,000 participants. And we keep claiming that we need foreign talents to help the daft locals.

The problem with Singapore is that it does not believe in its own people. The only thing that Singapore believes in its own people is that they are daft. If Singapore does not believe in the talents of its own people, it will keep on searching the world for talents. What is the point of all the best schools and best universities when they don’t believe in them? Even in football, it believes that in order to do well, it needs to buy foreign talents. And look at what it gets after all the years and money dumped into the foreign talent scheme? The standard of football is getting worst than when there were only Singaporeans kicking the ball.

We need to believe in ourselves and our own people and talent. This statement is sounding more ridiculous every day. After building the country from the small pool of local talents, it is dismissing every local talent and bringing in foreign talents to run the institutions, to supervise and boss over the locals.

This is a sure sign that a country is heading into the abyss. So what if the above three local schools came out tops. Maybe the participants are foreign talents too. If that is the case, more reason to go into oblivion. If the students were mostly locals, then it is another slap in the face of local talents. No matter what they do, how good were their grades, the country does not believe in them.

Now who is the real daft one?

11/04/2011

The good guys planning to attack Iran

Many of the oldies will remember the early days of Hollywood and big movies like How the West was won. The good guys always won and the good guys were always the men in blue from the US Calvary. The Red Indians were always the bad guys, the savages. And it was only right that the good guys went in to occupy their land and kill them.

In Today’s paper there was a report by AGENCIES on the modern day good guys planning to strike at Iran’s nuclear facilities. They include the world’s most peace loving country, the US, the UK and Israel. Israel has the biblical authority to kill the Arabs which is Iran now. The Iranians, or Arabs in general, are the modern day bad guys, like the Red Indians.

Let us all pray that the good guys win. And the world should celebrate when the good guys kill all the bad guys. Good guys killing bad guys is the normal thing to do and a happy thing. And all the western media must all be geared up to write about the coming big righteous war and the cleansing of Iran by the good guys. They have just cleansed Iraq and Libya.

The stock market needs a savior

The state of the stock market is laughable at best. The media reports paint a picture that it is in the pink of health, and happily strutting its staff around. Some say that it is like the emperor without clothes. Actually more, the emperor is without clothes and having VD. I am trying to imagine the pathetic sight of the staff.

The stock market is a system with its own component players, the regulator, administrator, stocks, brokers, remisiers, funds, big and small investors. Removing any one of these players will cause the system to grind to a halt. At one time some thoughtlessly think that removing the remisiers will be better for the brokers, but this has since proven to be a mistake. The trouble today is that one key component is dying, ie the local investors. And along the way, the stocks/companies too are thinking of fleeing the market.

Industry players are quite clear of the causes that are leading the market to the abyss. However, no one is saying so. Instead everyone is cheering at the emperor and his new clothes and his sore staff.

The industry needs a savior to turn the market back on the right path and nurse it back to health. I say savior not for no reasons. A savior is godlike, to be above the mortals, to be able to call the shot, and have no fear that anyone can harm him. He shall be the light that cannot be concealed by darkness.

He must also be well versed about the market and its mechanism, and be able to see the plagues and where they came from. With prescient knowledge and an untouchable position, only then can the savior carve out the rots and give the market a good cleansing.

There are not many people in the industry that can fit this bill. All I can think of is One. He is the One that can save the market. He is the One that can carry this yoke on his tall shoulder, stand on high moral grounds, to save the market and its players. And he can count on justice, fairness and righteousness on this side.

Saving the market and its players will allow the savior to live up to his name. The One shall then be elevated to his rightful throne, when he succeeds. Yes, when and not if he succeeds. If the One dares to follow this calling, light shall triumph over darkness, he shall be the shining light of his believers.

Who is the savior? The One shall know.

11/03/2011

Another lemon crisis

The sudden and abrupt closure of MF Global has caught many Singaporean investors by surprise. And many are in panic mood, with open positions that may turn to become big losses in their CFD trades. These are complex derivatives that used high leverages for big gains or big losses.

Investors with cash deposits with MF Global are also extremely worried as it was reported that the company actually used their client’s funds to make big bets in European sovereign debts. It seems that there is a high possibility that Singaporean investors’ money are also taken out to feed the company’s gambling in Europe.

The MAS has come out to assure the Singaporean investors that they are doing all they can to protect their interests and investments. Singaporean investors should not be unduly worried as we have the best and most stringent regulations in place to protect their investments here. Though the scoundrels are the same, the derivatives and products are the same, the modus operandi are the same, as those in New York and Europe, our stringent regulations are also in place to protect our investors.

Investors should relax and everything shall be fine.

Singapore’s new normal

I think this trend has been going on for too long but is finally surfacing in the private sector as well. The private sector probably takes the cue, like monkey sees monkey do. So what is this new normal?

The ST has a big article on the outages faced by the telcos. And the blame is simply pointed to the unexpected demand in usage. This is the first new normal. Everything is unexpected, or probably there is no need to do any projection of demand and supply. If it is unexpected it is ok and no one is to be blamed for it.

I can see the logic in a once in 50 years flood in Orchard Road. But planning for commercial activities like providing and selling services without a care for unexpected demand is pretty new in first world management planning theory. Don’t remind me about the over supply of housing and the sudden under supply overnight. These could be due to unexpected drop in demand and subsequently unexpected high demand caused by unexpected influx of foreigners.

What is the next new normal? It’s easy. Cut down on the services or raise the charges. So it is not an issue of increasing the supply to meet the demand but charge more. Me thinks of ERPs and public housing solutions. Don’t worry about supply, it is good opportunity to charge more and make more profits. Every problem or complaint is a money making opportunity.

Next, it is ok to have such unexpected demands and high usage. Just live with it. It is normal. As long as the provider of services tells the customers when is the breakdown, when the services will resume and they are doing their best, it should be fine. ATMs will break down every now and then because of high usages. Just accept it.

I think the next great statement will be, ‘Outages or breakdowns of services are signs of progress.’ How’s that for another new normal? What if PUB or other essential services get their normal breakdowns every now and then?

Selamat akan datang is the typical new normal of this first world city. The people are lucky we have so many breakdowns and outages. It shows how vibrant this city has become. Singaporeans should be happy and live with the new normals, of having breakdowns and outages as part and parcel of first world city living. They should not be imposing fines on MRTs and the banks. These institutions are running at full capacities and what is a little breakdowns now and then?

Just compare with Bhutan, they don’t have these kind of breakdowns and outages to complain about. We are so lucky and so happy.