What I did to justify my pay

As a photographer or an artist, there is always the moment in time to ask this question, how much to charge for my work. A photograph is a photograph, and so is a painting. They are basically ink on paper. They don’t cost so much.

Why is a Picasso worth several millions? Why is a Munch worth just as much? And why is the work of a new artist worth nothing much more than the ink and paper that he called art?

There are efforts, skills, time and talent elements in them. As for the ancient masters, there is the rarity, cannot get any more. And there is the hype element as well as the fictitious value of investment in rare art pieces.

The value or worth of an artist is debatable and controversial unlike those of a hard working labourer who earns his keep by the number of hours he sweat and muscle on. Then there are the pen pushers or those who use their fingers instead to work. How much is their labour worth?

And there will be those who demand to be paid in the millions. Could they really justify the millions for the daily chores they did? How many workers and employees, including those in top management could really justify the money paid to them? Just tally the things one did in the 8 or 12 hours of a day, half an hour for chit chat, half an hour for shitting, half an hour for tea breaks, one hour for lunch, half an hour reading newspapers and an hour reading reports and correspondence, an hour meeting people and getting to know people, a couple of hours attending meetings, talking cock and so on. How much would that be worthed?

The changing values and meaning of affluence

With increasing affluence, the meaning of good life today is very different from those of yesteryears. There was a time when the goals of life and living were fairly straightforward. Work and acquire enough wealth for a carefree retirement. This would mean a roof over the head and some savings that would last till the end of one’s life, and some children and grand children to share some family warmth and joy.

Many today have achieved this state of financial independence many times over while in their 30s or 40s. They have their dream homes, plenty of cash and could do many things more without having to work till retirement. There are exceptions at the other extremes.

For the successful and those who have acquired enough for their lifetimes or many lifetimes, the meaning of life becomes a pursuit for happiness in their chosen ways. Some choose to continue to acquire more wealth to last another few generations, some choose to make themselves merry.

Front page news in the ST today shows a very jubilant supporter of Holland in the Euro Cup. He decked his balcony with all the colourful banners of the Holland which cost him some small change. You can see that his joy is real. It came from his heart. The past misdeeds of the colonialist were long forgotten. There is a revived pride to be part of the colonial master’s celebration.

ST also gave two full spread to the celebration of the Queen of England’s Diamond Jubilee. Full colour pages must have cost a bomb to put them in our papers. Many former subjects of the British monarch must be reliving their glorious past and good times with memories of the Queen of England. The young fed with fairy tales of kings and queens and handsome princes and beautiful princesses will have their dreams come true with such extravaganzas.

In times like this, when all the material needs are fulfilled, and bloating bank accounts, something seems to be missing. How nice would it be if Singapore is represented in the Euro Cup or whatever Cups so that the Singaporeans can have something really to cheer about, to be part of and to be proud of and to hang colourful banners on their balconies. How nice would it be if the Queen of England is once again our Queen and we can dress up Orchard Road and the whole country to celebrate the event just like we did in 1953. Long live the Queen, and everyone can burst their lungs with God Save the Queen.

We sorely need a football team that can do us proud and give us a reason to cheer and celebrate and spend money wearing their jerseys, the scarves, waving their banners and beating the drums. We need a political figure to enjoy this kind of adulation and deference and an excuse to party, to sing and to dance.

Time to seriously consider spending a couple of billion to own a world class football club. It is a pity that Peter Lim failed or we will have Manchester United at our doorstep to adore and cheer for. It is a pity that we don’t have princes and princesses to make our dreams come true. A monarchy is not really a bad thing, really, when life is aplenty and everyone has all the money and time to look for occasions to celebrate.

We already have mayors, like the Mayor of Nottingham. We can go a few steps further by having dukes and duchess, counts and countesses, and a living king, and then write our own fairy tales for children in schools.

Xenophobic/sinophobic foreign talents

Why are people blaming Sinkies for being xenophobic? Sinkies are the most timid and useless bunch of people around. Small built, specky, inarticulate, dumb and always willing to oblige as foreigner’s punching bag. I just read a taxi driver being beaten unconscious by a Korean passenger he was picking up. What happened to all the macho taxi drivers that think they own the roads, their grandfathers’ roads? This taxi driver was punched unconscious without even knowing how to hit back.

Then those angmohs that attacked another taxi driver in Suntec, and another in Orchard Road. But the most infamous foreigner must be the one at Clementi coffeeshop that beat up a Singaporean couple, including their son, and chased them all the way to the car park for wanting a second helping of chilli sauce.

How many times did anyone hear of Sinkies beating up foreigners? And don’t forget the nepalise gurkhas beating up Sinkies after ogling at the Sinkie’s girlfriend. Then the angmoh cyclist who beat up a Sinkie motorist.

And the slashing of Sinkies in the Kallang area when a bright young student nearly got all his fingers chopped off.

Aren’t these foreigners xenophobic or a better word, sinophobic? The best joke I heard was this Sinkie man got scolded by two nubile PRC women in a train and went gaga. The women chided him as untalented as the reason why they were invited here by the govt to improve the Sinkie genes. And all the useless Sinkies in the train were equally useless as they stood by watching helplessly at the helpless and useless Sinkie man.

What on earth could Sinkies be xenophobic when foreigners feel so comfortable bashing them around and insulting them everywhere? This is the only country in the world that the citizens were proudly presented to foreigners as no talent, and that foreigners came here believing that they are here to help them. And the Sinkies better be grateful and be good or they will deserve a bashing. And of course the bokok Sinkie would be told to take legal action against the talented foreigner who would probably scoot before anything happens. And those who did not scoot, nothing much would happen to them unless the Sinkie got money to bring them to court. Civil matters lah.

Luckily they have scrapped the rugged society campaign. Too much computer games, fighting enemies with the fingers, by pressing buttons. There are many four eye warriors in the computer games arcade shops. Thank God that in modern warfare everything is just push button. If it is street fighting and close combat, our specky boys would kenna jialat jialat. Still garang, want to be xenophobic?

So easy to con the Sinkies

It is so easy to con the Sinkies by the boiling frog technique. Sinkies are very adaptable to pain and soon forget how and where it started, and a little relief will be all they are asking. A good example is like a forum writer to the ST calling for a lower increase in the Minimum Sum to factor in real and relevant inflations and not all inflations. The writer forgot that the Minimum Sum was not supposed to be there in the first place. He also forgot that no one, not even the govt should be allowed to write away their money into Minimum Sum. Now the writer will be feeling so grateful if the amount to be drafted into the Minimum is a bit lesser. Does he know that it is his money in the first place, that he should be the one to decide whether to put money into the minimum sum and how much?

Similar kinds of thinking are applicable in many areas. The huge increase in foreigners, in the millions has been forgotten. Sinkies are happy if the increase is a little lesser.

The COE, which is a flawed and biased system, now between $60k to $80k. Any little fall in the COE price the Sinkies will be celebrating. Likewise public housing price, from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands and now a small decrease in price and Sinkies will be shouting cheap cheap, buy buy. In the first place the price should not be so high by any count.

Another example is that some are so happy that the govt has started to ramp up the building of public flats. In the first place the building programme should not have been so drastically cut to force many Sinkies out of the public housing market, cannot buy because of the delays and the ceilings.

The small incremental technique is so effective in dulling the thinking of daft Sinkies. It is like shifting the goal posts every now and then, a few inches a time and Sinkies could not notice the difference over time. After the goal posts have been shifted by 10 feet, Sinkies will be begging for a one foot reduction and will be so grateful if it is done.

More migrants – The Sinkies are not convinced

With the barrage of ministerial speeches, reports, surveys and what have you, the people are obviously not convinced that the influx of population should continue unabated. There are just too many people on this piece of rock and enough is enough. As the voices of protest gets louder and angrier, what were the response from the govt?

A govt that pledged to listen to the people is expected to really listen, take stock of the people’s unhappiness and do the rightful or needful. The govt also can take the deaf frog attitude and do what it wants according to what it thinks is right, the ‘I know best and no need to talk more’ approach.

What we are seeing is a govt that is growing impatient when persuasion does not work. From trying to coax the Sinkies that more migrants are necessary for the growth of the country and good for the people, it has changed tack. It is now resorting to chastising the people, branding the people as xenophobic, unleashing unjustifiable and unfriendly tirades at the foreigners.

Really? The Sinkies are angry with the foreigners? Nay. They are not angry with the foreigners. That is rubbish. The Sinkies are tolerating the foreigners and knowing that it is not their fault for being here in such big numbers. They are angry with the govt and its policies for allowing so many foreigners here. It is the Sinkies against the govt, not against the foreigners. The foreigners only came under attacked when they misbehaved or broke the law of the country as individuals. There is no xenophobia here.

No one should try to pitch the fight as Sinkies against foreigners. This is just a diversionary tactics. The Sinkies are angry with the policy makers. They are not that daft to pick on the innocent foreigners.