Why so serious?

Ok, this is a ripoff from a few things:

1. Heath Ledger's famous Joker
2. Steve Johnson's infamous post TD celebration

Yet, I found myself over reacting to my friends' over reaction to many over rated things that I decided, you know what, I'll write about something I care about for the betterment of many kids in future.

Yep, you guessed it wrong, it's not education. Yes, it is related to education but really, it is more about life than just education. It is about bullying.

I noticed an up tick in the concern over bullying. Like really, when did we know that bullying is a problem? Oh now? What? Are you serious that poor kids are not suffering at the hands of bullies since the beginning of time? Why now? Because some celebrities' kids are bullied? Or some media moguls'? Or is it really a problem? Wait...Bullying existed since the first worm existed on Earth, and people are only worried about it now? Give me a break.

What people needs to really focus on is: Have they done enough good in life to not be worried about being scorched forever in Hell because if Armageddon comes tomorrow like some nut has it, a lot of "nice" people who are worried about things like bullying and corruption, and many problems that are not problems to them until it affected them, will definitely be burn in Hell when Death comes to shuffle us all in line to meet Michael and Lucifer to see who deserves to go into the Kingdom. Me? I don't really care. I think I have done enough to be able to sit around and have a cup of tea with all the big shots up there and chat what the world really needs other than apocalyptic nuts.

Ok, so back on track for the topic of bullying. Wait, wait. I need to state a few things first.

Truths about Humanity, or Life, or everything about the world we are able to understand due to our fantastic evolution with science:

1. Survival of the fittest is a fact, not a myth, because if you cannot win by brute strength, you will try to win by sheer intelligence
2. Power corrupts, another fact because of the above rule, because if you can get everything you want without having to work for them, why not?
3. Evolution is a fact, at least from a theological standpoint, and leads to (1) and (2)
4. Extinction happens when other species outgrow a current "master" race by a lot to the point where regeneration of the "master" race is no longer enough to keep their existence obsolete (I thought of this as I went along, not a fact but theologically sound)

Ok, now I can start.

So, why am I annoyed that bullying is now a public enemy?

First, it happened after so many kids have had their childhood messed up by societal mismanagement. Yes, societal, not just a kid, not just the teacher, not just the parent but society. If a kid is a bully, why aren't others stopping him? Kids don't know any boundaries to begin with, so they need to be put on the right track, which actually happens some times, or perhaps they should be jailed, which should not happen. Right now, bring the whole "bullying is bad" case is poor parenting and education to both sides of the bullying because no one learns from it.

Two, I mentioned learning, how? If you read the 3 points I mentioned above, you should have figured it out by now. Yes, thats how creatures evolve. Defense mechanisms, counter measures, anything. If our DNA did not alter for the past few aeons, how did we have better technology than we did a few centuries ago. But lets keep our fingers crossed as I hope the end of the 4th solar cycle and the birth of our 5th human recorded solar cycle will not render any of our current technologies obsolete.

To add a bit more to what I meant, I'll admit first. I was bullied in school when I was a kid. My teachers did not know, nor did my friends, nor did my parents. But that did not harm me. I later grew up with some of the more "bullying" type of people to be friends, not great buddies but ok friends that will help each other. Yes, I still hate some of the bullies I saw earlier in life but really, other than looking at where their life is now compared to mine, and bettering my life by actually growing older and better, I don't think there is much for me to do.

Dude, I had to be ostracized by the smartest boys in my class, made to look like a weirdo because despite my friends, I am not part of the "boys". I had the bully's mom call me at my home to reprimand me for picking my nose when I was twelve. Heck, seriously? You call the "fights" we see now on Youtube bad? Given the weapons we have on the streets, that's child's play. We as knowledgeable human beings can do better. By the way, my back was broken when I was twelve when one of the smart kid bullies did a judo slam on me for soccer. Yes, SOCCER.

My childhood was pretty much ruined by my last 2 years in elementary school, although I did have a relatively fun and crazy time when I was young. Now, how your kids will be like depends more on how you treat your kids, not just how you treat other people nor other "kids" treat your kids. Yes, the "kids" can be of any age, as long as humanity lives. Do I feel sorry for myself? Yep, maybe I should still be crying everyday now but frankly, no. I am having a good life and I'll do my part to help others have a good life too.

Three, if you stop people from bullying, aren't you acting like a bully yourself? Oh, you can't do this. No, my kids won't do this. Stop that nonsense, everyone makes mistakes. I got punished for my mistakes and I learn well from it. I listen and advise others on how to deal with their life and I learn well from them too. The minute you stop information from flowing because you believe you and your kids and do no wrong, you're obsolete, waiting for extinction. Maybe not in your lifetime but in one of your descendants.

Yes, and power corrupts. The minute you get to call the shots on how others should run their life, I don't expect anyone to be able to be themselves without you calling the shots. Yes, I'll fire my maid which I do not have yet if she keeps breaking my plates not because of money but because it is a household hazard. Oh, and where's the saying that no human should play God? Is that something the politicians, religious leaders, pop icons and media moguls say to others so that they themselves can Lord over people's lives?

And finally, four, the lack of innovation. I need to credit USA and Ryan for helping me understand this. I sort of know it when I was young and it is most probably why I left Singapore. Laws and bans are just pathetic excuses to stop someone from doing something without being legally called any names from prejudiced to racist. Yes, I'll fire someone if they smoke crack and mess up their work but if thats not the case, I'll just avoid crack myself. By stopping the whole idea that bullying exist, how are kids going to learn from adversity? Because they are competing against foreigners? That's nonsense. We are all neighbors and friends living in the same planet.

Fact, I am a foreigner in USA because I'm not really born there. I am half a foreigner in Singapore because I am away for so long. Where do I belong? I belong to Earth. I should have the right to decide my own life, learn my own life and not take crap from nonsensical people. Yep, that's my rule for myself. And I try to help people stand up for themselves. Give a beggar a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach him how to fish and you feed him for life. We all need help from each other and we all learn, day by day.

Yep, the whole hype thing is crap. The media focus on "bullying" is crap. The "counter measures" are crap because as adults, we cannot fix our problems with our societies and resort to the same solutions that kept us alive to keep our pathetic lives longer. Yep, QE, bailouts and after votes are thrown into the hate, post GE complaining. Some good things will come out of it, but most of it is still hot air. I find the lack of creativity in media nowadays boring and obsolete. Really? I need more drama over the petty things in life?

What I did instead of all these and will continue to do is what I have done all my life, Listen and Feel. If you cannot even spend some time to listen to someone's problems, you will never be able to feel their pain. Yep, doctors, nurses, lawyers, accountants, bankers, managers, whoever. If you tell me that I cannot complain because my suffering is not worse than yours, then you need a brain scan. And yes, your suffering is worse than mine because you're too mentally damaged that you need a brain scan.

What I propose to solve for "bullying" is this: Social Responsibility. I never liked the whole "Green" movement, but heck, I have been conserving for the natural environment since I was young and I may not look like it, I'm quite a tree hugger, as long as the bugs don't get to me because I like to feel the cool breeze.

Frankly, the whole idea of the Social Responsibility thing is this, if you can't execute responsibility, I doubt you can manage anyone's behaviour. Also, your kids are not stupid. They are smart, just like you and me. They learn from you and me and they will adapt. We grow old and become obsolete, but are all people mass murdering old folks? No! Because we're smart enough to know that wisdom does come with age. Some get it faster than others. That's why Social Responsibility is more important than some rule or law that prevents bad people from being bad. Because there are bad people, like how apples will rot naturally and the whole "Power Corrupts" thing.

By stopping a bully or putting him or her on ice, we are allowing stopping our kids from evolving into smarter creatures. Also, who says bullying must be using fists? My bullies were sophisticated, smart and never really threw any punches. Where did they end up? Not doing society any good, that is one thing I know. If they are bad, they are bad. We punish them for what they did, no more, no less. What we need to do is to ensure that everyone gets the same amount of opportunity.

Ok, not completely equal, since we know from the earliest days of life that not all things are equal but you know what I mean metaphorically. It's not like I can control other people's life anyway so I cannot ensure that the brightest kids can grow out of being bullied or resist bullying others. But if I can put them on the right path as much as I can, I know they will grow up happy. I think that's what you want as a parent, right? Or no? Ok, I'll stop here regardless then.

Today, I successfully explained the idiosyncrasy of having fiat money. We need fiat money but we should not be a slave to any form of money, real or fiat. Yea, I felt like a good preacher today. And if you feel aligned to what I said about the whole nonsensical drama about bullying, I think I did even better. I'm definitely open to how we can be charitable to our community and help kids learn how to deal with bullies, defend themselves and not to become bullies themselves, and if you feel my blog might help people understand how to form a better community, feel free to pass this post on.

Ok, I might want money for it but that's not the biggest thing in my mind. We'll figure it out when people help one another more.

Time to finish the beer I have before I started this post.

Un-Hibernating in May

Well, I finally caught some time to spare to blog, especially after wasted time driving and waiting at a MVA to realise I need a million other things to register my car.

Anyway, I thought I wanted to blog because of all the nonsense going around all week in Singapore.

For starters, I'll have a legend key:

WP = Worker's Party, GE = General Election, SG = Singapore, OPM = Other People's Money (Taxes),

LKY = Lee Kwan Yew, LHL = Lee Hsien Loong, LTK = Low Thia Kiang,

MP = Member of Parliament, FT = Foreign Talent, CPI = Consumer Price Index,

FB = Facebook, MVA = Motor Vehicle Admin, QE = Quantitative Easing

One, as I now know that Hougang is again safely in WP's hands, I don't care much more than that. But knowing that SG still has a lot of selfish, incapable MPs sitting on insanely high wages on OPM does make me very sick.

Two, the (non) creativity induced nonsense spewed to get people to vote with their "mind", not their "heart". This makes me sicker, and justifies my thought that the current crop of ministers can't handle what's left of LKY's mantra.

Three, for all the science and tech stuff we're proud to be capable of in Singapore, really, explaining the "problems" in Singapore is that hard? Really?

I really want to get this off my chest but I thought it would be really be misunderstood if I put it in less than three paragraphs on FB.

GDP. Can a country's GDP grow like SG organically? Yes. It's only a numbers game anyway. Print as much money as you want and your GDP can "grow" from 1 trillion to 2 trillion. Of course, I left out details of how the financial system works but I'm sure you get the gist of it. But Singapore did not do QE. So why the explosive growth?

Well, for one, with USA and Europe struggling with debt and unemployment, where do people put their money? Japan? China? Taiwan? Hong Kong? South Korea? Singapore? Well, pick your poison. Either way, there is always a reason not to put all your eggs in one basket.

Still, being one of the tidiest places on Earth, Singapore does make the top of many banker's place to be in. Oh, did I mention that people are generally bilingual in English and one other language, like Mandarin, Malay/Bahasa or Tamil?

Ok, so why didn't my paycheck grow as fast? Well, not mine, since I'm in USA.

Let's stop for a second and look at Singapore's population growth. Why population growth? Well, if there is only one gold bar for one person, he is rich. What if there is a lot of people? Yea, duh, everyone will fight, so no one is rich.

Now, Singapore's population has grown at least one percent almost every year over the last two decades. There are only three years with less than one percent and only one with a negative, although it is quite a strangely large drop in 2003, maybe because a few immigration law changes.

So, is most of these growth organic? Well, maybe, but that means at least a family in a hundred has a new baby every year, not taking into account deaths and aging. So no. It's because of Singapore's FT program, from actually screening good candidates to blatantly giving away free citizenships.

I have no doubt the people we scouted are smart, but how many are loyal? Productive? Blended well into Singapore's kampong culture while many upstarts are trying to get out of it? Are we treating them as part of the family? All these affect how good the society is. As a foreigner myself in USA, I know what it feels when locals are pinning problems on you, and I have absolutely no illusion than SG's version is any different.

I know at least one example where we brought over the smartest man we can get from another country, only to have him leave us for greener pastures because NUS is not big enough for him. This is uncommon, I know, but this is not rare. And this is of no fault to the man in question, or the many immigrants who came to Singapore. It is the program's fault. You cannot blame people for taking free money when MPs offer it with OPM irresponsibly. Maybe you can blame PAP, but did anyone try to advise otherwise?

Ok, not to ramble too much over something which I condemned long ago anyway. Now, with steady, if not strong, inorganic population growth, CPI will go up faster than it does in general, with or without GDP growth.

Add the foreign investments that has come into Singapore, or perhaps simply Singaporean (people or funds) withdrawing funds from foreign investments, that explains the GDP and CPI increases. Let's not forget all the well publicized problems with other countries, hurting supply streams of oil, vegetables, fish and whatever you need in your life, yea, life is expensive.

Now, how does all this affect paychecks? Well, no connection really, if you believe what I read, but of course, I don't. I love to see connection in things even if its not there. Well, I am not throwing darts into the dark for this one though.

SG have a large supply of work, turning into a huge demand for skilled workers, but wait, we're also growing our supply of workers through FT. We're also importing people to do the harsh labor work we no longer want to do, so, am I getting the best job I can get in the market?

Let's see. In 2003, I came out with just a BSc in Stats. I can't get into Department of Stats because I do not have do honors for playing around too much taking courses that I think will help me create the craziest math theory in the world, well, so I did temp work there.

So, while I was there, I found out that I am equally trained as my supervisors and I think now, I code far better than them. Oh, I also do analyses, although RCI did not give me any modeling opportunities other than simple ones, so maybe they win in that one. Still, I'm good at automating reports. I like to look at things outside the box. But wait, I'm not good enough for the Statistician position in 2003. Do I believe that has changed now? Maybe, but I have a MSc now, so it's a different scenario we're talking about.

So, can I get a high paying job in Singapore now? Probably, with my current qualifications and work experience. Would I get the same opportunities if I had stayed in Singapore? Based on my personality, probably no. I'm too much of a wild sheep. Unsynchronized with the other sheep because I like to be myself. But I am also too in tune with the herd, preparing for the worst like most Singaporeans. Not preparing for Doomsday like the funny stories but similar.

Ok, so does my experience explain why a typical Singaporean's paycheck cannot grow? No?

How about some logic now?

Good GDP growth, good.

Good population growth, good? Yea, it's good. I like more friends anyway. Ok, back to the point.

Good growing demand for work, good.

Good growing supply of workers. You decide. Need I mention that the need for MSc isn't really there in Singapore anyway? So maybe I won't really get paid as well as I am over here, even with the low tax rate. Simply, I'm not the only smart human around. And I'm not even near being smart enough in the world.

Oh and yea, SG need more PhDs to push us higher in the tech world, but we don't have that many PhDs, so we import them. Yet, we don't aggressively get them to train Singaporeans.

Maybe, it is ineffective to get them to train our citizens because they are too smart.

Maybe, we don't give enough opportunities to talented Singaporeans to learn from them.

Maybe, we brainwashed Singaporeans with Capitalism so much that learning from the smartest isn't efficient enough for most people to make a living?

Anyway, does that explain the disconnect between GDP growth and salary increases?

One thing I like here in USA is that I can fight for what I want. I can challenge myself, fail and given an opportunity to try again. If I feel I can get paid better, the only thing stopping me is myself. If I am really not as capable as I think I am, all I have to do is to challenge myself to accept the truth. Either way, I am myself.

So, am I sympathetic to the "problems" in Singapore?

Yes, because I have friends and family there. Did I also tell you how much I think it is still a good place to be in?

I always try to advise them what to do even if times are tough. Coming to USA is another big challenge and not everyone wants to take that up, and I understand that. I don't advise it for everyone but I definitely support any courageous effort.

So what do I dislike about all the "drama" I'm hearing from the internet and friends to make me complain this much?

Everything. Really. Everything. Frankly, if I learnt something in my life that I didn't know before over the past year, it would be that I am myself and I always have to do what I think is right. That is where the mind and the heart is the same thing.

Singaporeans can argue for or against PAP, from the dirty tricks LKY used to gain power, to the great work he did with Singapore, to the excess fat the Parliament has gathered over the past few years with their insanely high pay to the many smart people we still have in PAP. People should just decide on one thing. What do you want?

You can argue that you don't know it when you're a teen. You can explain you are misguided by propaganda over the past decade. But really, in GE, you only have one thing. Decide on what you want now. Regretting past mistakes is normal, but how is your past mistake affecting your current decision?

I know what I'll do.

I will whine like I have been since young about things I don't like.

I will complain like I have since young about things I don't understand.

I will listen to your problems and care for others like I have since young.

But I certainly am not stopping to think about all these nonsense more than that one minute that I need for this. I have far more responsibilities to far more people in my life since young.

If you want PAP like you have since 1965, then go ahead, vote for them. If you dislike certain overpaid politician, voice it out and make a stand. If you want a change in Parliament, vote for the opposition. Either way, its your choice. Party lines do not affect how I vote.

LTK did a good job for Hougang and I think he left a good lieutenant to succeed him so he can take on Aljunied. If he ages enough like CST and becomes incapable or simply that I worry for his health out of goodwill, I'll not vote for him. WP will decide on how my town should be run.

But I don't think LHL has done anything bad to Singaporeans, so I will continue to respect his leadership, especially with LKY mentoring him. I do agree to the fact I cannot vote against him, but there isn't enough proof of incompetence to make me do that either. If he makes a big mistake or a bad policy, I'll adjust my assessment accordingly. And I will be watching, for myself, my family and my friends.

Most importantly, I decided to work in a country where I think I can develop myself well, even if it is not where I was born. All animals move from time to time, including humans. So I did move and do I regret it? Maybe, but why think?

I have to surmise that I cannot see how PAP will remove their excess fat if they don't restructure, but if LHL tries to reinvent himself, maybe. But most importantly, no matter how much you complained, it is just words if you don't put your money where your mouth is. Unlike the many foul words a bully can throw to ruin another person's life by perception, complaining is like looking at yourself in the mirror. It is natural and it is just what it is.

As much as I don't like this line, or how it pertains to the person who told me this, or the many things I can complain about the person who told me this, it does work. "If the kitchen is too hot for you, get out of it."

As of this time, GE counts are all out, with all forms of media tormenting people I know over LTK's exploits in taking over Aljunied by delaying the inevitable announcement. That is probably why I really wanted to write about this. Really? The results is out at midnight and you can only announce it at 2am on TV?

I'm definitely glad Hougang will continue to have taller grass than other towns and I think LHL will rethink how SG looks at PAP now. Either way, I cannot predict what will happen until life comes around.

Also, luckily, I did more productive things like work, eating ice cream and blogging since midnight. And thinking how to actually not waste another trip to MVA for my license and title. And wishing all of Singapore a Happy Mother's Day because I am sure my mom will be happy.

Either way, I win, not because I won anything or outdid someone, but because I am happy. Do I really need to really do something to think I won?