Life is a journey of discovery~

希望。遗忘

2012-01-21T23:29:00.001+08:00

美梦的开始

我是家中的老二，从小就夹在大哥与小弟中间。我的存在总被忽视，我的牺牲与付出是理所当然的。那年，合唱团欲筹办大型歌舞剧，要求校友帮忙。时间上配合得来，我也就答应了。没想到，这竟是美梦的开始。经过几个月的筹备，演出终于圆满落幕。谢幕后，你走过来，将一个印上我姓名的小杯子递给我，并感谢我抽出时间参与演出。我不是在做梦。终于有人注意到我的存在。我的付出不被当成理所当然。只是一个印上我姓名的小杯子，但却盛着满满的暖意，也燃起了我心中的希望。

期望

年底，学校派合唱团出国比赛，校友也获邀一同参赛。结伴同游的这几天，心中有个小小的愿望— 期望有机会更了解你、期望在你心中我能从一个普通的校友成为一位能谈心的知己。

盼望

我是幸运的。没想到出国比赛后，学校竟安排合唱团到本地知名的购物商场报佳音，一个星期数次。这让我有更多的机会和你相处。你总是设身处地地为他人着想，以至常常累坏自己的身体。看了真让我心疼，只盼望你能给我机会好好照顾你。

渴望

本想默默地在你身边照顾你就好了，但原来人是贪心的。愚蠢的我还是找了机会向你告白，渴望你能打开心中的那扇门，让我进入，成为你生命的一部分，成为你的守护者。这样，美梦就成真了。

绝望

期望、盼望、渴望只是我一个人的奢望。

梦醒了。

如今只剩下美梦幻灭后的绝望。

也许，我不该做梦。

遗忘。

我。。能。。

遗忘。。。

Quotes 2009

2009-12-30T11:11:00.003+08:00

The deepest secret is that life is not a process of discovery, but a process of creation. You are not discovering yourself, but creating yourself anew. Seek, therefore, not to find out who you are; seek to determine who you want to be.

~Neale Donald Walsch

Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.

~Colin Powell

Strength and courage aren't always measured in medals and victories. They are measured in the struggles they overcome. The strongest people aren't always the people who win, but the people who don't give up when they lose.

~Ashley Hodgeson

Successful people aren't born that way. They become successful by establishing the habit of doing things unsuccessful people don't like to do. The successful people don't always like these things themselves; they just get on and do them.

~William M Thackeray

The tragedy of life is not found in failure but complacency. Not in you doing too much, but doing too little. Not in you living above your means, but below your capacity. It's not failure, but aiming too low, that is life's greatest tragedy.

~Benjamin E Mayes

In a world filled with hate, we must still dare to hope
In a world filled with anger, we must still dare to comfort.
In a world filled with despair, we must still dare to dream.
And in a world filled with distrust, we must still dare to believe.

~Michael Jackson

Men often become what they believe themselves to be.
If I believe I cannot do something, it makes me incapable of doing it. But when I believe I can, then I acquire the ability to do it, even if I didn't have it in the beginning.

~Mahatma Gandhi

Happiness cannot come from without. It must come from within. It is not what we see and touch or that which others do for us which makes us happy; it is that which we think and feel and do, first for the other fellow and then for ourselves.

~Helen Keller

What I do you cannot do; but what you do I cannot do. The needs are great and none of us, including me, ever do great things. But we can all do small things with great love. And together we can do something wonderful.

~Mother Teresa

Nothing good for this world is ever attained without sacrifice. Nothing great in life is ever achieved without hard work. Nothing that we give to others, out of the goodness of our heart, is ever given without giving away a small piece of ourselves.

~Jay Goldman

Give out today like you will not see the next second; take in today like you will live for another 100 years to see the consequence of what you took in. What you take in determines your destiny and what you give out determines your legacy.

~Leussa Adrienne

You have a brush in one hand and paint in the other. You just need to realize that you are the Artist of your own destiny. The outcome of such a realization will transform the road ahead of you into canvas, waiting only for you to start painting.

~Conroy Sewepagaham

VRK Leaner

2009-09-05T15:10:00.001+08:00

The VARK Questionnaire Results

Your scores were:

Visual: 6
Aural: 3
Read/Write: 5
Kinesthetic: 6

You have a multimodal (VRK) learning preference.

Cool~ I can learn in any way. (Or i can't learn well in any way...)

Danish Saying

2009-09-01T01:32:00.000+08:00

Life is not simply holding a good hand; life is playing a poor hand well.

Failing Forward

2009-08-27T23:46:00.000+08:00

Got this from John C Maxwell's Failing Forward...

Failure is the price we pay to achieve success.

Hence, we should not be afraid of failures because that's the only way we can get to success.

A Lawyer and a Chinese

2009-08-19T00:52:00.002+08:00

Just read it as a joke. No offence intended.

A lawyer and a Chinese are sitting next to each other on a long flight.
The lawyer thinks that all Chinese are so dumb that he could get over on them, easy.

So the lawyer asks if the Chinese would like to play a fun game. The Chinese is tired and just wants to take a nap, so he politely declines and tries to catch a few winks. The lawyer persists and says that the game is a lot of fun. I ask you a question, and if you don't know the answer, you pay me only $5; you ask me one, and if I don't know the answer, I will pay you $500, he says. This catches the Chinese's attention and to keep the lawyer quiet, he agrees to play the game.

The lawyer asks the first question. 'What's the distance from The Earth to the Moon?'
The Chinese doesn't say a word, reaches into his pocket, pulls out a five-dollar bill, and hands it to the lawyer.

Now, it's the Chinese's turn. He asks the lawyer, 'What goes up a hill with three legs, and comes down with four?' The lawyer uses his laptop and searches all references he could find on the Net. He sends e-mails to all the smart friends he knows, all to no avail. After one hour of searching he finally gives up. He wakes up the Chinese and hands him $500. The Chinese pockets the $500 and goes right back to sleep.

The lawyer is going nuts not knowing the answer. He wakes the Chinese up and asks, 'Well, so what goes up a hill with three legs and comes down with four?' The Chinese reaches into his pocket, hands the lawyer $5 and goes back to sleep.

Advice from Mr Ng

2009-07-25T12:12:00.003+08:00

Care to discipline, Discipline to Care

Khaw Boon Wan as rock star!

2009-06-01T09:08:00.001+08:00

Now, this is refreshing. The Health Minister is now a rock star! Check this out... http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=105001829413&h=TqvRB&u=lsq-8&ref=nf
Can really see the effort the government is putting in for the campaign~

Toilet Break

2009-05-18T11:41:00.004+08:00

I thought this was funny~ Check out the poster!

Taken from http://gangasudhan.com/blog/2009/02/exclusive-interview-with-mas-selamat.html

G (Interviewer): So it's been a whole year and the authorities in Singapore are still searching the boots of budget cars and the storage compartments of motorcycles, hoping to find you. What do you think?

MSK (Mas Selamat): Eh, betul ke [Note: is that correct]? Bike box also they search ah? I am not THAT good lah - how to hide inside such a small space.If I do, I just call my brudders activate 3 Bangla [Note: Bangladesh Nationals who are illegal immigrants], hide in 3 different cars of sama-sama [Note: same] brand and then tip off ICA. When they get the first Bangla, they will search high and low for the specific brand and let other types go without checking much.So I will hide in another type of car driven by one pakcik and makcik [Note: Uncle and Aunty] with groceries - simple. Maybe if I boring-boring, wear disguise also can jalan [Note: go] through lah!

G: Interesting tactic. So was that how you left Singapore?

MSK: Oi! Nice try.... Who say I already left? Singapore government ah? Not so safe if narrow down further right. That minister [Note: Wong Kan Seng] already tembah [Note: shoot] he narrow down to 2 possibilities, you still want me to reveal further? Cannot lah, must jagah [Note: protect] a bit. But can confirm that the minister was spot on with his predictions sial!

G: Ok, ok, just trying our luck there to help the Singapore authorities, sorry. Well, since they have narrowed it down to 2 possibilities - one of which is where you actually are - within a short span of just one year, how safe do you feel about your status?

MSK: Correct also lah. They quite fast bring down to just 2 possibilities - a bit scary. I think one more year, become one possibility already - confirm. Then must lebeh jagah diri [Note: extra protect] myself to not get caught. Hopefully they narrow down to the wrong one, then a bit safe. Otherwise Selamat must Jalan [Note: run] again, hahahaha.

G: You seem quite upbeat and confident that even if they narrow down to the one correct possibility of the 2, you can still evade arrest. Why is this so?

MSK: Ya lah, no problem. They already kalang-kabut [Note: confused] the other time, use all their manpower, dogs, army - still cannot find me. I think my tactics can tahan [Note: withstand] lah. I use toilet paper and extra clothing already can bypass everyone.

G: So what are your plans moving forward?

MSK: Good question man. My Toilet Break episode is still an icon and macam I am the most 'published' man in Singapore sial - heard my posters are still pasted at many locations. More like 'In Memory' lah - they want everyone to remember about my success ah? Sure as hell doesn't look like it is meant to alert anyone....One thing I learn from Singapore is to market knowledge and experience to other countries so I am now conducting workshops on 101 Ways To Escape With A Limp. Quite popular and a lot of people join in - criminal biasah [Note: normal], terrorists and even civil servant also. Maybe the civil servant want to jagah their rice bowl so want to learn where are the lubangs [Note: loopholes].My rates are reasonable for everyone but of course got a special discount if member of Terrorist Organisation lah - cannot forget my brudders and the past.

G: I see. Sounds like the whole episode has been a blessing in disguise for your 'career'.

MSK: Yah, definitely! Now, no need to worry about money matters already - set for life. Really, it is so good that I decided not to hantam [Note: hit] Singapore already lah. Don't think they will learn anything anyway - old people kena 'export', poor people asked to go [censored]-spider, you think they really care if people die? Like that, seriously no point attacking lah.Who knows, if business picks up, maybe I anonymously pledge some money for my own capture lah, hahahaha. That one will be kelakar [Note: funny] seh! Maybe I do for second year anniversary, so can keep my semangat [Note: spirit] going - good for business also.

G: Interesting ideas you have. But nevertheless, you are still on many a Wanted List around the region and maybe even Interpol will be looking for you. In any case, you can never go mainstream with your business development. Any thoughts on that?

MSK: True also. Too bad I cannot anyhow say 'sorry' like that minister... what's his name.... Wan Kosong? [Note: Wong Kan Seng] ... and continue with my own thing macam [Note: like] no problem. But I really like the PM style - diam-diam [Note: quiet] for dunno how long then come out and tembah [Note: shoot] one 'what to do'. Class lah, that one.As for my business, no problem lah. I am in niche market and with celebrity status, I just need to wait for people to come. Aiyah, even that minister [Note: Wong Kan Seng] don't have photo on his wiki page ok!Also, Osama is impressed with my strategies so maybe got one lubang [Note: opportunity] from his side as consultant coming up. Like that, can go Saudi or Afghanistan macam [Note: like] Foreign Talent seh. Not bad for a 'Mat' fella right?By the way, ask Jack Neo if he want to do movie on my escape lah - he can call it Toilet Sure Break or something. But must pay royalty one...

G: Hahaha, yet another enterprising idea. Too bad you can't join politics in Singapore. With your popularity, poster-reach and iconic reputation, you can be a great Minister of Home Affairs! What better person to take charge than the man who exposed all the frailties of the arrogant system?

MSK: Thanks for the compliment man! You like macam angkat [Note: curry favour] me because I agree to this interview sial... Anyway, politics maybe not for me. If got problem and I go into the toilet, dunno if anyone will trust me to return.

G: That's a good point Mas Selamat. Well, we're coming to the end of this chat and would like to pose you a final question. What do you think will happen if you do get arrested and brought back to Singapore?

MSK: Sure habis [Note: finish] one. They will lock me up and throw away the key sial. Not to mention throw one big, fat wayang to trumpet their success to the world - even if I were to be overseas and be caught by some other country's authorities and sent back.I expect they will put their best-of-the-best officers to 'look after' me and have dedicated officers to watch me round-the-clock. But one thing's for sure - they have to give me a Toilet Break...

G: Ahhh, I see. A man who can escape from a toilet, will always have an opportunity! Happy Anniversary, you 'Limping Terrorist'.

MSK: Thanks lah, nice to be remembered. Let my fans in Singapore know every time I go toilet and hear the tap running always remember that wonderful day lah. Brings a tear to my eye and a twitch to my limp...
Mas Selamat remains a fugitive and anyone who does not doubt the authenticity of this interview really needs to check themselves into IMH - good news, they now have a bigger budget!

Quote from George Akerlof

2009-05-16T10:25:00.001+08:00

Meaningful quote for my future economist students...

I want you to also remember that the best predictor of how good an economist you are, or will be, is not some grade, but your commitment to the subject matter. There are billions of poor people out there. There are also some rich people who have economic and social problems so there is very good reason to make such a commitment.

Would Americans like to work as little as Europeans? What's stopping them?

2009-05-16T10:17:00.003+08:00

Taken from http://economist.com/finance/displayStory.cfm?story_id=3987228

MOST people greet the weekend with gratitude. But some economists view it with puzzlement. Why, they wonder, does the bulk of the population rest on the same two days each week? Why does everyone's week end at "the" weekend? From an economic point of view, it would surely be more efficient to stagger days of rest throughout the week. That way, expensive pieces of equipment would not lie idle for two days in seven, and infrastructure would be less congested the other five.

One person impressed by this logic was Josef Stalin, who rationalised the Soviet calendar in 1929. Workers were given every fifth day off, but their shifts were staggered, so that factories could run without interruption. The staggered week appealed rather less to the people who worked it, however. According to Witold Rybcynski's 1991 book about leisure, "Waiting for the Weekend", Stalin's four days on, one day off, was unpopular, even though it was less onerous than the six-day week that preceded it. Families and friends rarely had the same day off; administrative staff rarely worked at the same time. After less than three years, the staggered working week was abandoned.

Echoes of Stalin's discovery can be found in a recent paper* by Alberto Alesina and Edward Glaeser, both of Harvard, and Bruce Sacerdote, of Dartmouth College. The authors begin from the premise that Stalin unwittingly proved: people complement each other at work, and perhaps at play too. Couples want to go on holiday together; parents want time off when schools are out. As a result, the economists say, people do not make solipsistic decisions about how much labour to offer in the marketplace. Their choice depends on everyone else's. Knocking off early carries less of a stigma if others do the same. Jobless youth find unemployment more tolerable if their friends are also out of work. Conversely, an ambitious underling will want to put in at least as many hours as his boss, whatever time she clocks off.

Messrs Alesina, Glaeser and Sacerdote think this principle might help to explain why Europeans work so much less than Americans. The gap is quite striking. According to the Luxembourg Income Study, the typical American worker puts in 1,820 hours over the course of a year. Meanwhile, according to the OECD, his German and French counterparts clock up a mere 1,480 and 1,467 hours respectively. They put in five or six fewer weeks per year, and three fewer hours per working week.

Edward Prescott, a winner of the Nobel prize for economics, blames these transatlantic differences on tax. Europeans would like to work more, but are deterred by the high percentage of their extra earnings the state would confiscate. Olivier Blanchard, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, puts it down to transatlantic differences in taste. Europeans, he says, put a higher implicit price on their leisure. "There is plenty of anecdotal evidence that Europeans enjoy their leisure more than their American counterparts," he writes.

But why? Some speculate that Americans, being the cultural heirs of the industrious Puritan settlers, are still gripped by a Protestant work ethic. However, as recently as 1970, Europeans worked more each year than Americans. Why should their work ethic have lapsed since then?Rather than blaming culture or taxes, Messrs Alesina, Glaeser and Sacerdote instead credit trade unions. The strength of organised labour peaked in Europe in the 1970s, about the time that work hours started falling. After the first oil shock of 1973, the authors write, Germany's unions marched to the slogan "work less, work all", and the same mantra, in different languages, was recited across the continent. In France, the unions eventually won an agreement in 1981 to cut the working week to 39 hours. The government then took up their battle, culminating in the national 35-hour week implemented in 2000. Indeed, their cause has gone continent-wide. The European Union's working-time directive, first issued in 1993 and subject to fierce debate again this month in the European Parliament, insists that workers toil no more than 48 hours each week on average (see article).Let's all go home.

There is an obvious liberal objection to any regulation of work hours: workers should be free to sell as much or as little of their labour as they wish, and employers free to buy as much as is profitable. Union demands and working-time directives are unnecessary encumbrances, stopping workers and employers striking deals to their mutual advantage.

But Messrs Alesina, Glaeser and Sacerdote float an alternative possibility. Such regulations might solve a co-ordination problem, they suggest. If Europeans complement each other at work and rest, they may prefer to work shorter hours and fewer weeks provided others do the same. If so, the authors write, "national policies that enforce higher levels of relaxation can, at least in theory, increase welfare." Perhaps Americans would also like to work less, if their family, friends, or bosses worked less also. But in a competitive economy there is no way to co-ordinate their decisions. The individual American can act with others, but not too far ahead of them.

By recent evidence, however, Europe's unions got ahead of themselves. By demanding shorter working weeks with no loss of pay, they raised the cost of labour and undermined employment. In the past year or so, the French government has backed away from the 35-hour week, and German unions, most prominently at Siemens and DaimlerChrysler, have agreed to work longer for no more pay. The unions that once marched to the slogan "work less, work all", have now conceded the need to work more, if they are to work at all.

* "Work and leisure in the US and Europe". Prepared for the NBER Macroeconomic Annual, 2005

Random knowledge learnt

2009-05-09T16:41:00.002+08:00

sometimes girls tend to tell guys their problems instead of other girls cos they know that the guy who like them will be more sympathetic to them as compared to other girl friends who may be too busy with their own work...

Ok point taken~ Din noe girl girl interaction can be so complicated too... (No offense intended)

Jokes about JC

2009-04-12T11:21:00.000+08:00

Got this from my friend's blog...

Q: How many RJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: 4 whole faculties. One to design the new bulb, one to manufacture and test it out, one to write a proposal on it and one to market it.

Q: How many HCJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: The whole school. To compete with RJC.

Q: How many VJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: The whole school. One student to screw it in and the rest to cheer and wave flags and banners to give him/her support.

Q: How many NJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. They can study without light.

Q: How many AJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: They're too busy trying to be one of the top 5 JCs.

Q: How many ACJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. They'll rather use all their money to employ YJC to do it for them.

Q: How many YJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. Only one teacher to tell them what a light bulb is in the first place and to demonstrate how to change the light bulb. (So how do you think they're able to change it for ACJC?)

Q: How many CJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: They'll prefer it to be darker.

Q: How many JJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. Their physics is so bad that they made their macho male physics teacher cry.

Q: How many TPJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. Would they even bother?

Q: How many SAJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. They believe in praying for it to turn on by itself.

Q: How many NYJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. They are still using oil lamps.

Q: How many SRJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Huh, what is litebarb?

Q: How many PJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Heck the light bulb; the principal would do something about the rightbarbs. Let's do 300 jumping jacks for not wearing the proper school attire.

Q: How many MJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. They are too busy trying to get promoted.

Q: How many IJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. They are Innovians. They'll find ways out of the dark.

Q: Who wrote all this?
A: A TJCian.

Q: How many TJC students does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None. They think they are already very bright.

Bus 96 on the expressway

2009-03-04T15:23:00.004+08:00

Ever imagined what it would be like if life decides to take an unexpected break from its monotonous routine?

I was on bus 96 yesterday when it decided to 'deviate' from its planned route and take an 'unexpected' detour along the expressway.

At first, I thought it was an unfortunate traffic accident. Later, after catching the news, I realized that it was a war relic- a Japanese bomb from WWII. In any case, the road leading from NUS to Clementi was sealed off. All traffic was directed onto the AYE. I wasn't paying attention to the route the bus was taking since I did not expect it to be any different from what it had taken for the past 4 years. However, 2 things caught my attention.

1) Instead of travelling straight, the bus took a left turn and I could immediately see the expressway.

2) (And the more hilarious, unnerving factor) The driver called his superior on the mobile phone and blabbered in Mandarin: "Ya! I'm on the expressway. Ya AYE~ How do I get to Clementi?" I had to control myself and not laugh hysterically out loud lest all the pessenger thought I went berserk. But oh my! It was so hilarious! ( Of course, at that time, it didn't occur to me that I was just miles away from a bomb site!)

I thought to myself: Oh great! I'm in a hurry to get home so that I can start studying for EC4333 Midterm Exam the next day and now I'm on a round-the-island tour that god knows when it will end. Hopefully at Clementi too.
However, a part of me was secretly enjoying the unexpected break from the monotony of school life. Never in my wildest dream had I expected 96 to take me on a ride along AYE. So I was secretly enjoying every moment of this chanced occurrence.

After a brief journey on the AYE, the bus exited the expressway and came back to the bus stop opposite New Town Secondary School. I thought to myself: Great, we are back to Clementi again! Just take the right turn in front and we'll be on the road all the way straight to Clementi.

However, there was no right turn! The road did not allow vehicles to take a right turn, so 96 took a left turn and headed in the direction of NUS!

"Oh no! I'm going back to NUS again?"

I'm starting to worry that this journey would never end.

However, the bus driver decided to have mercy on me and took a left turn along the highway to NUS onto -- guess what? -- AYE again! For the second time in the hour, I was on AYE again albeit on the other side of the expressway heading towards Jurong.

The bus took another 12 mins to navigate the expressway and all the major roads in Clementi before it finally arrived back what it started -- Clementi Interchange.

Great! Bus 96 had taken me on a tour of the major roads in Clementi and the AYE, no less!

It's this kind of unexpected encounters, I believe, that adds that element of excitement into our usually monotonous routine. Things often happen unexpectedly and adds joy and thrill to our life! =)

我是一隻小小鳥

2009-02-16T18:20:00.005+08:00

A song I have always liked since young~

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qKSZnIdo9I

PS If anyone knows how to make the video appear here, tell me.

Is race a factor in Obama's presidential election? An economic perspective

2009-02-14T12:37:00.000+08:00

From an email by Dr Wong.
Quoted from

http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2009/02/12_postracial.shtml

BERKELEY — Reinforcing the notion of a "post racial" nation, two University of California, Berkeley, researchers' analysis of voting patterns indicates that voters were not motivated by race in the 2008 U.S. election of Barack Obama, the country's first black president.

Enrico Moretti, a UC Berkeley professor of economics, and Alexandre Mas, an associate professor in the economic policy and analysis group at UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business, presented their research findings on race and the campaign for the Oval Office at the annual meeting of the American Economic Association in San Francisco in January. Their report, "Racial Bias in the 2008 Presidential Election," will be published in a forthcoming edition of the association's journal American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings.

"Our research doesn't support the idea that race is not an issue in other dimensions, or other elections," Moretti said. "But for the most important election of all - the presidential election - the race of the candidate didn't seem to play a role one way or the other."

Despite pre-election handwringing by reporters, pundits and others about whether white voters could or would cast their ballots to make an African American candidate the country's commander-in-chief, "the average guy in the street didn't really agree with that," said Moretti. "The winning performance of Obama wasn't associated with racial attitude in America."

He said that he and Mas were intrigued by the discussions around a color-coded map that ran on the front page of the New York Times the day after the election, that depicted states (many of them on the East and West coasts) that supported Obama in blue and states (many in the South and Midwest) that went for Republican Sen. John McCain in red.

"If you looked at the map, read the blogs and listened to the pundits, the states where Obama underperformed looked more stereotypically racially biased," said Moretti. "But it's not that simple. Do a little more analysis and control properly, and it turns out that's not the case."

Moretti and Mas analyzed voter support for Republican or Democratic candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives and for the presidency in both 2004 and in 2008. Then, they compared the results with a National Science Foundation-financed, state-by-state General Social Survey of whites' attitudes in some 3,100 counties across the country toward laws against banning interracial marriage, and whether whites have a right to segregated neighborhoods or to not sell homes to blacks.

The Democratic vote share in the presidential election increased about 5percent between 2004 and 2008, although it was relatively smaller in Appalachia and in some Southern states, while the increased voter support for the Obama-Biden ticket was about 1 percent less than Democratic candidates for House seats.

But Moretti and Mas said the real racial bias would be evidenced by Democratic congressional candidates doing better than Obama in areas where voters are more racist, according to the General Social Survey. That didn't happen.

Overall, the researchers found little evidence of higher voter turnout rates among the white electorate in areas reporting higher racial bias. While there was a slight increase in Obama's relative decline in votes in states in the top one-third for racial bias, the difference was not statistically significant, they reported.

The overall voting picture showed that older voters - a block that tends to be less racially tolerant than younger voters - turned out in substantially lower numbers in 2008 than in '04. "It's kind of an optimistic finding," Moretti said. "It means that as time goes by, we probably will find less and less bias, as today's younger, less biased voters move into middle age and beyond."

A native of Italy, Moretti said he is curious about American media and politics and the historic 2008 presidential race, in particular. "What I found remarkable throughout the campaign was that although the media were very focused on trying to find a racial angle, the campaigns themselves and the American people weren't very focused on the racial aspect," he said.

Data about racial attitudes were found in the General Social Survey, which since 1972 has conducted scientific research on demographic behavior to monitor social change in the United States and compare it to other countries. The survey is funded by the Sociology Program of the National Science Foundation.

The highest scoring states in terms of racial bias were Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, West Virginia and Wyoming. The lowest were Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, California, Connecticut, Washington, D.C., Iowa, Massachusetts, North Dakota, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Utah, Washington and Wisconsin.

Knowledge is painful

2009-02-05T19:34:00.004+08:00

Some inspirations drawn from conversation with Prof Zhang Jie~

1)
Knowledge is painful -- both creating it and acquiring it.

Let's face it: most people dislike difficult stuffs, especially new things they do not understand. This is why studying, acquiring knowledge is so painful. It gets worse as you go up the education ladder.

Similarly, knowledge creation is painful. It is not uncommon to see a paper written 10 years ago published only now. That's why paper writing is not called 'search' but 'RE-search'. You have to write it, check through a few times and re-write it again. After that, when you send it for publication, they will check through and you may have to 're-search' and re-write a few more times before it is published. Knowledge creation is a long and painful process.

(Pretty logical explanation I would say, when we consider why many students hate studying. Of course, I don't deny that a rigid and competitive education system is partially at fault as well.)

2)
Those at the lower end of the knowledge chain gets paid more than those at the top of the knowledge chain.

This applies to every industry. Examples given are that of the dentist and the teacher.

The scientist creates the knowledge about extraction techniques and extraction equipments and passes it free of charge through journal articles. The dentist learns about it by reading the journal article online for free and acquire these new knowledge quickly. However, the scientist gets paid less than the dentist. The dentist is paid every time a patient visits and the dentist applies the new knowledge to extract the patient's tooth. However, the scientist is usually paid a smaller fixed salary. In fact, even though the scientist contributed to the knowledge creation process towards solving his own toothache problem, when he visits the dentist, he still has to pay!

The teacher in university teaches 4 modules or 500 students a year. In 10 years' time, he would have taught over 5000 students. However, the teacher's salary is a mere fraction of the earnings of these students. These students who can be working in any sector ranging from accounting to human resource management would be earning a higher income than the teacher because they are the ones providing the services directly to the consumers, even though they are applying knowledge acquired from the teacher!
(NOTE: TEACHER IS A NOBLE PROFESSION! =) )

(Since most of us would not be engaging in the knowledge creation process at the top, perhaps we can take some relief from this observation. Yes, we can still earn a decent living if not more. Poor teacher! =P )

Teach More, Learn More, less sleep and back and shoulder pain

2009-01-25T11:42:00.001+08:00

Insightful article I obtained from my teacher's facebook entry...

Don't read if you are rushed for time...

There are two interesting reports about Singapore’s students in Singapore’s main newspaper, the Straits Times, on 5 January 2009. The first report focuses on the sleeping patterns of Singapore’s teenagers. The second report is about the effect of heavy school bags that Singapore students carry to school.

The first report says that four in five of Singapore’s teenagers are not getting enough sleep. The average teenager is supposed to get more than eight to nine hours of sleep. According to the report half of those studied actually had only five to six hours of sleep.

Although the report did mention that one of the reasons for the lack of sleep among teenagers is because they chat online, it is also disturbing to read that many of these teenagers who lack sleep are high-achievers in school who believe that they can do without the recommended amount of sleep.

According to Dr Lim Li Ling, director of the Singapore General Hospital’s Sleep Disorder Unit:

“Some proudly let me know that they sleep only four hours a night. It’s not something they should feel proud about. It affects their brain potential - how much they can learn and consolidate.”

A study in the United States has shown that teenagers who are top students do even better with sufficient sleep. The report also says that the heavy school load and co-curricular activities are additional reasons for the teenagers’ lack of sleep.

We can infer from this report that the examination-centered Singapore school curriculum is clearly an important reason for this sleep deprivation with its long term health consequences. One also wonders about the mental health of these students.

The second report focuses on a study by Singapore’s Republic Polytechnic on the effect of a heavy school bags on Singapore’s students. The study done by Dr Michael Koh and Mr Tarkeshwar Singh of the Republic Polytechnic. They found that Singapore’s students tend to take shorter, quicker steps to offset the typically heavy loads that they carry to school. According to the report the changes in gait will not reduce the problems these students will face with regards to their posture, or their joints and ligaments which can lead to back and shoulder pains.

Another doctor, Dr Kevin Lim, an orthopaedic consultant at the KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital in Singapore, says that he treats up to five to ten children every week for such pains. The report says this is despite schools in Singapore now providing lockers for the students.

In case you are wondering why the locker solution has not worked, it is probably because parents and the schools themselves still insist that these students bring their text books and other accessories home so they can still use them for even more studying back home. One solution to this problem is to buy extra copies of text books; one set for home use and one set for the school. Quite a few parents have resorted to this which explains the perennial shortage of text books even before the new school calendar begins. But this applies only to those parents who can afford two sets of books!

The other reason is that for each subject there is usually a text book, activity or work book, plus the books for writing. Seldom is the student told which of these books are required for the next day of school. In fact, many teachers just insist that students bring all their books for the subjects. Multiply the number of books for each subject by the number of subjects each day (which is at least four each day). That will give you an idea of the load. Don’t forget also the stacks of printed notes and worksheets given to the students by the teachers. This is how Singapore students do well in examinations and TIMSS!

When schools in the neighboring countries like Indonesia, Vietnam and China seek the Singapore school model for themselves, I wonder how many of these schools go beyond Singapore school’s excellent examinations performance and TIMSS results when they choose the Singapore school model? What price are parents in these countries willing to pay for “educational” success with their children’s long term health? It is clear from these two reports that the Singapore education system breeds success at the expense of the students’ health. This is a natural effect of the schools’ heavy load and the pressure to excel in the high stakes examinations.

Lastly, one wonders about the state of the teachers in Singapore’s schools. With the teaching and preparation that they have to do to meet the targets set for the high stakes examinations , the large class sizes and the accompanying heavy marking load, we wonder about the state of physical and mental health these teachers are in. So much for the “Teach Less, Learn More” (TLLM) initiative of the Ministry of Education (MOE).

Job Credits

2009-01-22T23:00:00.003+08:00

For the past decade, the government has emphasized creative thinking in schools, today it has walk the talk by introducing a new measure known as "Job Credits" in its latest budget to fight the recession.

Job Credits is set to become the new buzzword in economics in a few years' time. This innovative measure introduces a fresh approach to retaining jobs in an economy and is an out-of-the-box measure never before implemented by any country. The idea is that the government would hand out "credits" or rebates to companies and the size of the 'credit' would depend on the number of workers the firm employs. For each worker employed, the firm gets a 12% rebate on the wage of the worker. The credits would be handed out every 3 months or 4 times a year. This innovative approach contributes directly to the government's aim of protecting the jobs of Singaporeans.

I must say that this time round I am impressed by the quality of the solution conceived by the budget team. It's something that is simple, to the point and effective in achieving its objective.

An Economy of Faith and Trust

2009-01-17T12:35:00.000+08:00

Got this from my lecturer.

Quoted from http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/16/opinion/16brooks.html?_r=1&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink&pagewanted=print.

Once there was just Newtonian physics and the world seemed neat and mechanical. Then quantum physics came along and revealed that deep down things are much weirder than they seem. Something similar is now happening with public policy.

Once, classical economics dominated policy thinking. The classical models presumed a certain sort of orderly human makeup. Inside each person, reason rides the passions the way a rider sits atop a horse. Sometimes people do stupid things, but generally the rider makes deliberative decisions, and the market rewards rational behavior.

Markets tend toward efficiency. People respond in pretty straightforward ways to incentives. The invisible hand forms a spontaneous, dynamic order. Economic behavior can be accurately predicted through elegant models.

This view explains a lot, but not the current financial crisis — how so many people could be so stupid, incompetent and self-destructive all at once. The crisis has delivered a blow to classical economics and taken a body of psychological work that was at the edge of public policy thought and brought it front and center.

In this new body of thought, you get a very different picture of human nature. Reason is not like a rider atop a horse. Instead, each person’s mind contains a panoply of instincts, strategies, intuitions, emotions, memories and habits, which vie for supremacy. An irregular, idiosyncratic and largely unconscious process determines which of these internal players gets to control behavior at any instant. Context — which stimulus triggers which response — matters a lot.

This mental chaos explains how people can respond so quickly and intuitively to so many different circumstances. But it also entails a decision-making process that is more complicated and messy than previously thought.

For example, we don’t perceive circumstances objectively. We pick out those bits of data that make us feel good because they confirm our prejudices. As Andrew Lo of M.I.T. has demonstrated, if stock traders make a series of apparently good picks, the dopamine released into their brains creates a stupor that causes them to underperceive danger ahead.

Biases abound. People who’ve been told to think of a high number will subsequently bid much more for an item than people who’ve been told to think of a low number. As Jonah Lehrer writes in his forthcoming book, “How We Decide,” there are certain circumstances (often when there are many options) in which gut instincts lead to the best decisions, while there are other circumstances (sometimes when there are a few options) when calm deliberation is best.

Most important, people seek relationships more than money. If behaving a certain way helps a stock trader or a regulator fit in with his crowd, he’s likely to keep doing it without too much rigorous self-examination.

A thousand mental shortcomings contributed to the financial meltdown. Republicans have tried to explain it by pointing to irresponsible policies at Fannie Mae. But that only explains a piece of what’s happening.

This crisis represents a flaw in the classical economic model and its belief in efficient markets. Republicans haven’t begun to grapple with the consequences.

For years, Republicans have been trying to create a large investor class with policies like private Social Security accounts, medical savings accounts and education vouchers. These policies were based on the belief that investors are careful, rational actors who make optimal decisions. There was little allowance made for the frailty of the decision-making process, let alone the mass delusions that led to the current crack-up.

Democrats also have an unfaced crisis. Democratic discussions of the stimulus package also rest on a mechanical, dehumanized view of the economy. You pump in a certain amount of money and “the economy” spits out a certain number of jobs. Democratic economists issue highly specific accounts of multiplier effects — whether a dollar of spending creates $1.20 or $1.40 of economic activity.

But an economy is a society of trust and faith. A recession is a mental event, and every recession has its own unique spirit. This recession was caused by deep imbalances and is propelled by a cascade of fundamental insecurities. You can pump hundreds of billions into the banks, but insecure bankers still won’t lend. You can run up gigantic deficits, hire road builders and reduce the unemployment rate from 8 percent to 7 percent, but insecure people will still not spend and invest.

The economic spirit of a people cannot be manipulated in as simple-minded a fashion as the Keynesian mechanists imagine. Right now political and economic confidence levels are running in opposite directions. Politically, we’re in a season of optimism, but despite a trillion spent and a trillion more about to be, the economic spirit cowers.

Mechanistic thinkers on the right and left pose as rigorous empiricists. But empiricism built on an inaccurate view of human nature is just a prison.

List of Anime to watch

2009-01-16T18:02:00.002+08:00

Recommended by Wen Cen...

Full Metal Panic

Full Metal Panic Fumoffa

Full Metal Panic The Second Raid

Ruronin Kenshin

Flame of Recca

Okiku Furikabutte

El Hazard

Evangelion

Gintama

Office Politik

2009-01-14T19:41:00.004+08:00

It is with sadness that i realize that office politics exists in every work environment. As long as you work in an office, you cannot escape from it.

Recently, I thought that I had found an ideal working environment where there is no office politics and colleagues help one another out. I was wrong. Every moment we are watched and observed by others in the office. Regardless of whether we like it or not, we are constantly being monitored by others. Consciously or sub-consciously, judgements are being passed.

When you think all went well and you have a rare harmonious working relationship with your colleague, your boss informs you that one of your colleagues has 'commented' that you are chatting with people more than you should; that you should probably work harder because everyone else is working hard.

It gets depressing. It is one fact of life that you thought you have heard about and accepted. Sadly, acceptance only comes about when you have experienced it yourself.

The need to portray that you are always working hard during office hours is ever present. The constant need to maintain a certain image is always there. The constant need to cover your back is always there. Now i understand why people say that you wear a mask to work every day. Everyone does... It's hard to forge close friendship in an office. That's why secondary school and junior college school days are memorable.

Uncle Sam is watching......

人生

2009-01-14T19:38:00.001+08:00

Got this from My Paper...

生活中有问题是好事，因为不再有问题的人生，就是停滞不前的人生。

EASY AND DIFFICULT

2009-01-01T23:06:00.002+08:00

Easy is to get a place is someone’s address book.
Difficult is to get a place in someone’s heart.

Easy is to judge the mistakes of others.
Difficult is to recognize our own mistakes.

Easy is to talk without thinking.
Difficult is to refrain the tongue.

Easy is to hurt someone who loves us.
Difficult is to heal the wound…

Easy is to forgive others.
Difficult is to ask for forgiveness.

Easy is to set rules.
Difficult is to follow them…

Easy is to dream every night.
Difficult is to fight for a dream…

Easy is to show victory.
Difficult is to assume defeat with dignity…

Easy is to admire a full moon.
Difficult to see the other side…

Easy is to stumble with a stone.
Difficult is to get up…

Easy is to enjoy life every day.
Difficult to give its real value…

Easy is to pray every night.
Difficult is to find God in small things…

Easy is to promise something to someone.
Difficult is to fulfill that promise…

Easy is to say we love.
Difficult is to show it every day…

Easy is to criticize others.
Difficult is to improve oneself…

Easy is to make mistakes.
Difficult is to learn from them…

Easy is to weep for a lost love.
Difficult is to take care of it so not to lose it.

Easy is to think about improving.
Difficult is to stop thinking it and put it into action…

Easy is to think bad of others.
Difficult is to give them the benefit of the doubt…

Easy is to receive.
Difficult is to give.

Easy to read this.
Difficult to follow.

Easy is keep the friendship with words.
Difficult is to keep it with meanings.

Bad Relief Teaching Experience

2009-01-01T10:20:00.006+08:00

Someone asked why I had joined teaching. I did not join because I had some wonderful or memorable relief teaching experience. In fact, I had quite a negative experience while relief teaching.

I ORD-ed in March, so I wasn't able to get any long term relief teaching assignment. I got placed in the reserve list. Only if a teacher was on MC, would I get a call in the morning to go do relief teaching. It was that ad-hoc.

I got called up to do relief teaching at a neighbourhood secondary school in the west. The first class was a Normal (Academic) Sec 2 class. They were supposed to have Arts lesson, so I brought them to the Arts room. A guy and a girl started to quarrel. The guy called the girl a pig and the girl was unhappy. She went to the sink and filled a container with water. She went on to splash the water at the guy. But the water did not hit the guy; instead it landed on me who was trying to break up the fight. I remarked: "So you are happy now?" Then the two of them went back to their seats and the class was quiet for the next two period. Well~ At least they were quiet. Small sacrifice on my part -- my shirt was totally wet.

After that, I went to stand in for a Sec 3 Express class. They were very noisy and I had no way of making them silent. A girl came up to me and asked: "Teacher, can i stamp you?" She was holding a stamp in her hand. You know, the type that teachers used to stamp stars on our assignments when we were young. The ink stamp. Of course, I replied: "No, you can't." Then i went to do my rounds in the class to ask them to lower their volume. The girl followed behind and stamped me on my back.

"What are you doing!"

I was irritated.

"Stamping you lor!" she replied calmly.

I didn't know whether to laugh or to cry.

Yup~ Just two of the more memorable traumatic experiences I had while relief teaching.

Quote from Sister Francoise

2008-12-27T10:07:00.000+08:00

有花自然香。

How scary...

2008-12-16T19:08:00.001+08:00

Quoted from: http://singcitizen.com/portal/2002/08/

Reminds me of my slightly traumatic experience while relief teaching in 2005...

The day starts at 7.20am. It is the morning assembly and some students are fidgeting while the flag raising ceremony is being observed. The vice-principal has noticed this and makes a point to speak on this after the ceremony. A routine hair-and-attire check is carried out before the students can sit on the parade square for the morning reading session.
Some students start to talk among themselves and the teacher makes them stand up and keep standing. Some others forget to bring their reading material or are lost in their thoughts. The teacher attends to them.

At 7.50am, the teacher follows the class to the classroom where the morning greetings are exchanged and the students settle into their chairs. The first lesson of the day starts. It’s Monday today - a lucky day for teachers because the students are too tired from a weekend of play to fool around. They need some hours to wake out of their lethargy. By mid-morning the teacher’s luck will wear off as the students resume their normal self. Some students are lost in dreamland but as long they they do not disturb the peace in the class, the teacher keeps mum.

It’s only the first period and the students are already taking turns to go to the toilet. They like to go in groups but are restricted to only two students at any one time. The teacher passes to each of them an EXCUSE card which they clip to their shirt pocket.
It’s been ten minutes and these students have yet to return from the toilet. Some others want to visit the toilet but the teacher says to wait till the earlier two return. They finally return five minutes later. Their hair is gelled into spikes which vaguely resemble durian spikes but black ones lah. The teacher has no time to deal with their spiky hairdo as the teacher needs to rush to the next class - there are four consecutive classroom periods before the teacher gets to rest.

The teacher goes into the next class - a secondary four normal academic class. It’s prelim exam this week and some of the students are not at all bothered about the exam. It takes some work before the teacher can get the students to become quiet. There are four repeat students in the class and they are the ones who talk and talk and talk, taking no notice of the teacher. The teacher gives them a pep talk but to no avail. The teacher gets the foursome to stand in the corridor so the class will be quieter. At the end of the two-period lesson, the teacher collects the written work - only about 20 students hand in the work out of a class of 40. The teacher makes it a point to talk to the class’s form teacher about the students’ lackadaisical attitude.

The fourth period is spent in a secondary 3 normal technical class. It’s only mid-morning and the students in this class are restless. Some of them walk around the class much to the chagrin of the teacher who has some trouble keeping a rein on them. Others chat loudly; some shout across the room to other classmates. A few have removed rubber tube protectors from their chairs and are playing with them. One uses these tubes to drum on the desk. The teacher has been spending the last three periods in other normal academic classes and needs to conserve some strength for the rest of the morning so the teacher leaves them alone. There’s too many of these hyperactive chaps for the teacher to handle. It’s a normal technical class, the teacher thinks aloud - no point getting the vice-principal or principal to cane them. They have been caned many times already and think of it as only a slight itch. It always happens that these students are back to their usual nonsense within fifteen minutes of the caning. The period ends.

Ah! A free period at last! Back to the air-conditioned Staff Room to grab a bite and a much needed rest.

The sixth and seventh periods are spent in a secondary 4 normal academic class. A student takes a pot shot at the teacher using a paper bullet. The teacher - alert from years of teaching in a normal academic class - sees him in the act but pretends not to notice. The boy hurls another paper bullet at the back of the teacher; his classmates laugh. The boy basks in the limelight and takes another potshot but the teacher has decided enough is enough and turns around in time to catch the student in the act. The teacher tells the class chairman to keep the class quiet. The teacher tells the culprit to follow along to the principal’s office. The boy pleads ignorance of what he has done. The principal listens to the teacher’s and the boy’s accounts and then canes the boy after he finally admits to the misdeed. The teacher returns to the class to continue the lesson.

It’s the eighth period of the day and this period is spent in a secondary 3 express class but this class is the tail end of the express classes in the school. The students are rowdy and inattentive. Several shoot paper bullets at one another. This year, paper bullets seem to be in vogue at school, along with spiky hairdo and The Dog pencil cases. The teacher is too tired out to go after the errant students. The teacher informs the form teacher about the paper-bullet problem back at the Staff Room when the period ends.

The ninth period is a free period. The teacher is in the Teachers’ Rest Room reading the newspapers. A teacher comes up to him saying a parent is outside wishing to speak to him. The teacher goes out into the corridor. The parents of the student whom the teacher had sent for caning are there with the student. The father of the boy says his son has been suspended from school for a day and wishes to find out what has happened. The teacher asks the boy to speak first. The boy says he actually was aiming at his classmates but the paper bullet missed its mark and hit the teacher. The boy says he shot at his classmates because they had shot at him. The teacher tells his side of the story. The teacher had seen the boy shoot paper bullets at the teacher but didn’t want to blow up the matter.
However, the boy was apparently enjoying the attention of his classmates and the teacher had to catch him red-handed. Luckily, the boy’s father is supportive of the teacher and rebukes his son for his errant behaviour. The teacher tells the boy’s parents not to worry as the teacher will speak to the principal the next day if the principal wants to take further action.

The eleventh period is spent in the school hall. It’s Monday assembly. The students are treated to a mime display by a professional drama group. The teacher is a form teacher to a secondary 1 express class and sits next to the class in the hall. The express class is a world away from the normal academic classes the teacher has been to today. Unfortunately the teacher doesn’t have any periods with this class.

The afternoon is spent marking the students’ written work and planning the next day’s work.

A fresh reminder of the challenges I would have to face soon...

冯校长的名言

2008-12-15T21:17:00.001+08:00

取自： http://dxcchdbk.blog.sohu.com/21779677.html

100年后，我今天驾了一辆什么样的车，住什么样的屋子，银行里有多少钱，已不再重要，只是，世界可能因为我曾经对一个孩子的生命很重要，而变得美丽。

Imperial Scholars Street

2008-11-16T02:18:00.003+08:00

Read(past tense) this funny story by the MM on why Suzhou was chosen to build a joint-venture industrial park....

China had an egalitarian society for many dynasties. Anyone could become a xiucai,ie a scholar, if he studied hard and passed his exams. Many imperial scholars, zhuang4 yuan1, came from the lower strata of society, many were sons of farmers for instance. Once a person became a zhuang yuan, he was highly valued and usually the Emperor was more than happy to marry his daughter off to him.

When these scholars retired, they usually went to enjoy their retirement years in the South where the climate was milder and cooler. One popular destination was Suzhou. As the years went by, more and more former imperial scholars settled and raised their families in Suzhou, so much so that there was a zhuang yuan jie, ie Imperial Scholar Street, in Suzhou. The offspring of these people had good backgrounds and a conducive environment to pursue their studies, hence more and more imperial scholars emerged in Suzhou.

Now, while we have the technology, these people are smart and learn fast. Hence they make good partners.

Now we know why Suzhou was chosen!

Competitive S'pore, competitive parents

2008-11-14T01:17:00.008+08:00

Was talking to my secondary school teacher Ms Chow many weeks back. She shared with me her experience in teaching at a neighbourhood school.

It appears that the class she taught had 5 attention-deficit students. I asked if it was MOE's policy and whether famous schools such as RI would have attention-deficit students in each class as well, her answer was no. The parents chose to enrol them in a normal school. She commented that these students would be able to learn better at a pace more suited to their abilities if they had gone to a special school instead of a normal school. The reason is that they are constantly unable to catch up with the materials presented in class and some of them had really weird habits that would distract the rest of the class. For instance, she had this student who would stand up in the middle of lesson and just walk up to her and go in circles around her. At the same time mumbling "Ms Chow... Ms Chow... Ms Chow..." He's just so weird...the way i see it.

The issue of attention-deficit students not getting the best education suited for them is a very real issue in her school for every class had a few such students. And it is the parents who made the decision to put them in normal schools, for pragmatic reasons. These include the loss of 'face' as the Chinese calls it, imagine telling your relative your child is in a special school, how would your relative think of your child? Especially in this competitive Singaporean society where parents are willing to sacrifice hours to do voluntary work just to get their children into "good" schools such as Nanyang Primary.

The other issue was that parents are scared that their children would lose out if they went to special schools because
1) they would learn slower than their peers
2) in the future when they seek jobs, it would be reflected in their resume that they went to a special school -- this is a potential turnoff for employers
3) the children may develop an inferiority complex and find it difficult to integrate into society in the future.

Hence, nowadays teachers at normal neighbourhood schools also have to handle the added pressure of devising a way to teach these students without somehow holding back the normal students. This certainly makes work tougher.

Well, my personal take is that it is actually for the good of the child, if he has been identified to be attention-deficit, to send him to a special school. The curriculum there has been specially tailored made to suit his needs. It is added pressure for the child if he constantly falls behind in normal school and has to play catch up all the time. And when he doesn't perform well, this translates to additional pressure for the teachers and the parents as well. However, i might not be in the best position to comment since i'm not a parent yet. Perhaps my viewpoint might take 180 degree turn when i do become a parent and understand the various societal stress one has to take in that role.

High school musical

2008-11-13T23:22:00.004+08:00

This is good...

Quoted from talking cock.com
http://www.talkingcock.com/html/article.php?sid=2668

University donations

2008-11-13T02:04:00.002+08:00

The next topic my prof touched on was about university culture.
He graduated from University of Chicago and contrast his undergraduate experience against the one we have at NUS.

A few months back, the Straits Times ran an article on the amount of donation local universities get from alumni. Interestingly, only a mere (get this!) 1% of the alumni donated to the university. My professor was not the least surprised. The question he asked was short and concise -- So, after 3 years in NUS, what do you think you have gotten out of your university experience? Well, seriously not much. And certainly not something you would brag to your friend about when you graduate. Now contrast that to your friends who received an university education in US universities. You can be sure that they can't wait to tell you what an awesome experience they had there. Well well, no surprise why graduates simply discard that letter asking for donation from local universities straight into the trash bin. The only time the school remembers about the student as an individual is when they are asking for donation. On the other hand, my prof immediately flashes out his cheque book when someone from University of Chicago approaches him for donation.

His exact comments were: "Here, take this and do for others what you have done for me!" It was obvious that his experience at University of Chicago had left an impact on him.

Another matter that he took issue with was the system of grading in NUS. He commented that giving someone a B- when he has worked hard, but simply hasn't understood the materials well enough isn't the best way to encourage someone to work harder. He used the module i was taking as an example. In the class, there are 25 students. There are 3 truly exceptional ones, who are a cut above the rest. Meanwhile, the rest are equally good and hard working. Now with the bell curve, 8 of them are definitely going to get a B- for the module, even though they have worked hard. And my prof is sad over this. He said that if he had the chance to really spend time with the student one-on-one for one whole semester and get them to read certain important publications to get them on track in terms of information and some fundamental knowledge on religions and customs, ie the subject matters, he is sure these students would be able to perform as well as those at the top of the class. The issue is: Singaporean students do not have the culture of meeting their prof every week for consultation, in fact, those who do go for consultation are in the minority! Of course, class size is another matter too. In US, size of the class is usually smaller. Hence, sadly, as much as he knows these students are no less bright than any other he came across, he would have to hand out a B-; after telling them repeatedly "i know you have the potential and you can definitely do well if you work harder". Makes him sound like a hypocrite when there is little he can do since the school imbued him with limited discretionary powers.

And while we as undergraduate complained about the heavy workload, the fact of the matter is that we are spending more time doing unnecessary stuffs rather than truly rigorous academic work. In other words, there is definitely a better way to do things and learn more. He cited the honours thesis proposals he received from honours students over the years. According to him, these are students he has seen over the years and are certainly as bright as any he had ever seen. However, when they reached year 4 and submitted their thesis proposals, my prof was appalled by the lack of depth in their argument. Having taught them over the years and knowing that they are capable of more, he was convinced that it couldn't have been the student who was at fault. He concluded that there were inherent problems in our education system that led to this issue occurring year after year. (And him being disappointed year after year, with what was not been done for the students)

However, it looks like things is going to stay this way for quite some time. Changes doesn't seem to be heading our way.

Singapore education system

2008-11-13T01:41:00.002+08:00

Had a good chat with my history prof on fri.
(Or rather had a good time listening to him voice his opinions)

He commented that if he had been brought up in Singapore, he would probably be selling chicken rice right now; instead of being a history professor at the university. The reason he stated was the rigid and highly stratified education system in Singapore. It is a system that has little tolerance for failure and severely skewed towards academic results.

Since primary school, the people are classified into different types based solely on academic ability. There are the pri 4 streaming, the PSLE, the O level, the A level etc. By the time one reaches university, he would have gone through no less than 4 stages of streaming and classification. Even then, these so-called 'talents' are also differentiated.

The true cream of the crop gets picked up by the government and sent abroad to prestigious universities such as Princeton, Harvard, Yale and Imperial College to name a few. Then, the second best are in USP and the likes in NUS and other local universities. Next, there are those could make it to local universities. Finally, the rest would have either self-finance and go to SIM or less well-known universities abroad.

According to what he said, his attention wasn't focused on his studies until he reached high school, equivalent to JC over here. As such, he didn't exactly score too well when he was in Middle School, ie Secondary school. Now, if we translate that to the Singapore education system, it probably meant that he would have to go to an ITE at the end of sec sch and his path in life pretty much decided there and then. Becoming a professor is almost impossible. But luckily, he was born in the US and he was thankful that the US education system was much more tolerant and allowed him the time and space to pursue his dream when he regained his interest in studies in high school.

Now selling chicken rice and teaching history at a world renowned university are worlds apart, what does this tell us about our education system? What about the many could-have-beens that have been buried by the education system?

Game without Nash eqm

2008-11-03T19:54:00.002+08:00

Take a 2 person and 2 choice game.

Rule of the game:

A coin is tossed.

For Person A, he can call head (H) or tail (T).
If Person B calls the same, ie HH or TT, then A gets $1.
If A calls H and B calls T, then A loses $1.

The reverse is true for B.
In other words, if B calls H and A calls H, then B loses $1.
But if B calls T and A calls H, then B gets $1.

The game is played infinite number of times.
Interestingly, the following result is observed...

When A calls H and B calls H, A gains $1 and A continues to call H.
But B loses $1 and will switch to T.

Once B switches his choice, A realizes that he is losing money, so he will switch to T too.

They can keep playing and continue switching but neither party will gain or lose!

Well~ I thought this is an amazing game. No winner or loser and no Nash equilibrium!

Coca Cola Story

2008-10-21T20:24:00.001+08:00

One of my favourite stories from one of my favourite Professors...

You take $1 and you slot it into a vending machine,
You press the right buttons,
A Coca Cola comes out.

You take the same $1,
You throw it out of the window,
You wait for 1 hours, 2 hours, 3 hours...
Nothing happens!

You must know what result you want to get! Then you can get the result~

Moral of the story:
Begin with the end in mind.
The method comes naturally thereafter.

Financial illiteracy

2008-10-18T01:09:00.004+08:00

The recent subprime mortage crisis has finally hit home and hit hard on the heartlanders. MAS estimated that around 10,000 Singaporeans are affected by the collapse of Lehman Brothers and may end up losing their hard-earned savings amounting to around 0.5 billion dollars in total.

In the recent gathering over at Hong Lim Park, many told a depressing tale. Most of these heartlanders who have invested in the minibonds in their 60s. They had invested their hard-earned savings; some as much as $100,000 to $200,000, after getting assurance from the relationship officers in local banks that minibonds were low-risk yet offered returns of 5% or more, which is a lot higher than the amount they are getting from putting their money in fixed deposits. Many of them could not read English and never fully understand what kind of product they were investing their money into. They trusted what the bank officers said and took the minibond to be simply another kind of 'fixed deposit' (the bond period was 5 years), which was low risk but could earn them higher returns of 5%. With Lehman Brothers filing for bankruptcy, there is a possibility that these investors could lose all their hard-earned savings. It's worthy to note that most of them were extremely low-risk investors. Capital preservation was of paramount important to them and they only agreed after repeated assurance from bank officers that their capital is protected. For many of them, it was the sum of money they had saved for retirement. Now they can forget about retiring~

Amazingly, as an Economic major, I have never been taught how to read a financial product throughout my 4 years in University! I can barely imagine how the aunties and uncles, most of them uneducated, were to make sense of what SWAP, bonds, minibonds and structured deposits were! Yet, it is amazing how these structured products were a huge sellout! Think about the thousands who bought the minibonds. Something doesn't quite fit right here. Of course, i know relationship officers and financial planners go through a lot of courses and as such i shall not question their professionalism. But seriously, if the potential investors cannot understand what the whole product is about, how are they supposed to invest in them? I was watching this tv news report in which the reporter got a copy of the minibond agreement. Yes the details were inside but it was not reader friendly at all! Any layman who looks at it will not be able to make good sense out of what the agreement talks about. In short, the whole thing was just too technical and too confusing, even for some of the financial consultants the reporter interviewed! It's such a complex product!

However, sadly, this is not the only structured product in the market. When we invest our money in something other than deposits, i wonder how many of us really know what we are investing into? My guess is not a lot, in fact, only a small proportion of the population who has studied in the relevant courses. Other than blaming the bank officers who made such products simpler than they were, and in some sense, making the product into something they were not, perhaps we should also acknowledge our serious financial illiteracy for it's our financial illiteracy that will cost us in the long run.

Simple rule: If you can't understand it, don't touch it.

Insights from Financial Planning talk by Mr Tan Kin Lian

2008-10-18T00:16:00.003+08:00

- Buy Term Life Insurance for 25 years, after which your children would have grown up.
Beyond that, you can pretty much rely on your savings. Major illnesses are covered by Medishield.

- Watch out for this product (not available in SGP yet): Decreasing Term Life Insurance, useful because it cuts your sum insured as you get older and thus your premium. May sound counter-intuitive but explanation given by Mr Tan was surprisingly logical. An insight that would only occur to us when we reach his age. ie. By then we are not that far away from death and our children no longer needs to be taken care of by us.

- Preferably, accumulate 0.5 million SGD , before accounting for depreciation and inflation, by the time you retire, usually around 65. This works out to about $1000 per month assuming you start work at 25. This will be your rainy day fund.

- Life insurance amount should be at least equal to 5 years of earnings. ie If you earn $2500 per month, $2500 x 12 x 5 = $150,000. More if you can afford and of course more if you earn more.
That way, your family can still function even without you around.

- Go for what you can afford. Forget about the $1 million life insurance your agent told you about. If you are just earning $2,000 a month or less, align your expectations accordingly. Never let the premium become a source of financial burden. It's meant to provide protection, NOT undue stress unnecessarily.

Finally, the one i liked best:

-Once you are very old, say 70+ or 80, medical insurance become way too expensive and are really not necessary anymore. For one, you have medishield. Then again, let's say you are down with some critical illness say cancer. Would you want to go for an operation that cost $250,000 yet the success rate is not 100%. Many old people would rather die in the arms of their loved ones at home than on the operating theatre or on the hospital bed. By then, it's just watching the days go by. 一天过一天。Why would you want to get a health insurance when you are not even planning to go for any major operations in the first place? Minor specialist treatments costing between a few hundreds to a few thousands can easily be taken out of your rainy day funds which have already been consciously built up.

I thought this was really insightful. What he said made sense. When you turn old, your mindset about life will take a drastic turn. Many things become transient. Not withstanding that the risk of operation increases proportionate to age. Of course, there will be people who argue that we should seek to live a longer life so that we can do more fulfilling things; we can still contribute to the society. I don't deny that. But if we were really sincere about doing these, we should have started when we were young and well. Not wait till we are old and frail. No time is an excuse. It's the heart that wants to do something that counts. Just some personal thoughts~

Some useful websites for financial planning

2008-10-18T00:14:00.001+08:00

www.askdrmoney.com

www.tankinlian.com

www.tankinlian.blogspot.com

The last one had been quite popular since the Lehman Brothers Minibond issue.

When outstanding is just average

2008-10-14T00:29:00.003+08:00

Check this out! Elite college = scholar factory? Haha~ Now i DO agree that there is a Singaporean culture somewhere ingrained in us.

http://www.straitstimes.com/Free/Story/STIStory_216917.html

Perfect scores, perfect students

2008-10-14T00:17:00.001+08:00

Woo... I like this... Says quite a lot about our education system which has zero tolerance for failure. What kind of values are we imparting to our children?

http://diodati.omniscientx.com/2008/03/15/perfect-scores-perfect-students-a-perfect-storm-for-future-failure/

Good advice from YN

2008-10-13T21:45:00.001+08:00

For those of us who are stressed out by school or work, there are 2 things that matters most in this world:
1) Life
2) Sanity

And we should strive not to lose either in our pursuit of goals.

Jiayou x3!!!

2008-10-04T20:11:00.001+08:00

Nice quote for those of you still having exams or work stress:

If you are going through hell, keep going.

~ Winston Churchill

Alexander Graham Bell

2008-10-04T20:08:00.001+08:00

When one door closes another door opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door, that we do not see the ones which open for us.

~Alexander Graham Bell

Pasar Malam Theory

2008-10-02T01:16:00.002+08:00

Was watching Women on Top hosted by Quan Yifeng, one guy interviewed gave this interesting theory about how Singaporean guys are still 'hot' even when they get older...

His Pasar Malam theory about S'porean guys:

Some Singaporean guys are like the bags in pasar malam, going at 3 for $10. Singaporean women won't give two hoots about them because they are not designer goods. However, these bags have something important about them-- they are made in Singapore. When we take these 'bags' and put them on sale in other markets such as China and Vietnam, their prices skyrocket. Why? Because there are 4 things inside the bag...

1) CPF
2) PR/ Citizenship or citizen rights
3) HDB Flat
4) Baby Bonus

Hence, these 'bags' are in popular demand abroad.

Quote from Warren Buffett

2008-08-22T23:36:00.002+08:00

Inspiring Quote from Warren Edward Buffett:

You only have to do a very few things right in your life so long as you don't do too many things wrong.

小和尚与老和尚

2008-08-11T01:24:00.002+08:00

Got this from Jacky Wu...

有一天，小和尚与老和尚一同出差，路经一条河。这时，有位貌美的姑娘要过河，又不想弄湿脚，就请老和尚背她过河。老和尚一言不发，背她过河。小和尚看了，百思不得其解。

过了几天，小和尚终于按捺不住，开口问老和尚：“师傅，几天前那位姑娘。。。”
老和尚看了看小和尚，说到：“我早已将那姑娘放下，你怎么还将她放在心中？”

启发：放下，释然。

记忆

2008-07-15T11:34:00.003+08:00

一个人一个世界。X亿个人X亿个世界。

1天24小时。1小时60分钟。1分钟60秒。

1年365天。24个年头

12，614，400分钟

756，864，000秒。

缓缓人生路，一步一脚印。

每分每秒都可能欣喜若狂，或痛彻心扉。喜悲至极就在
那一分、那一秒、那一刻。

欲归不能。欲舍不可。

不论悲喜终归为该世界添上一笔，使其缤纷。

而此世界仅存于你；专属你独一无二的世界。纵使拥有金山银山也无法修饰，或重新打造。却又是他人要盗也盗不走的。

世界上最珍贵的东西——记忆

何谓人生？

无非一连串记忆绘制的动画片。

Quote from DHTKWG

2008-06-22T16:15:00.005+08:00

Me: People change after they have girlfriends.

DG: No~ I'm still perfectly abnormal.

=P

Count your blessings

2008-06-03T10:11:00.002+08:00

I was watching the news last night and the Indonesian authority predicted that there might be floods in Jakarta in the coming weeks. This reminded me of an incident which occurred when i was in Jakarta a few years ago. I was on the bus when we passed by a huge water body on my right. I commented to my friend that it was a beautiful lake. Immediately after commenting, a thought struck my mind. It may not be a lake after all! Having read about some parts of Jakarta being flooded earlier that day in the newspaper, i considered the possibility that it could be a low-lying area that was simply flooded! It was a daunting thought. Think about all those people who turned homeless due to the flood. That's why we should count our blessing that we are living in Singapore. Floods are a thing of the past for our government has an efficient drainage system in place. At least not those floods that go to two or three storeys high.

Maid? Made?

2008-06-01T16:02:00.006+08:00

Someone related an incident which set me thinking about a relatively current issue in Singapore -- the presence of maids in our society. (To be politically correct, lest someone accuses me of being racist) Ermz... i mean domestic helpers. Let me provide some background before i give my five-cent worth.

This particular domestic helper is from Indonesia and has been working at my friend's house for 5 1/2 years. Since i visit my friend quite often, she (the domestic helper) is not just some stranger, but someone i know personally. I have never chatted with her, so i cannot claim to know her well. However, she has always been polite and hardworking and always offered me food and water whenever i visit my friend. Hence it came as a surprise to me when my friend mentioned to me that she had been caught stealing money and had been sent back to Indonesia. I mean stealing was the last thing on my mind and it was something that i never thought she would do.

Now, in case you are wondering whether the domestic helper had been mistreated, the answer is a firm no. I understand that the employer has always regarded her as part of his family and never mistreated her either physically or mentally. Proper rest days were given and salary paid on time. The family had been satisfied with the domestic helper's performance and never thought of finding a replacement. The dramatic twist took place a few months back. The employer had a practice of leaving his wallet on the study table. Since there is no outsider staying in his house, other than the domestic helper whom he treated as a family member too, i guess he probably felt safe to do so. I'm not sure about the exact date but starting from a few months ago, the employer realized that some cash had been consistently missing from his wallet. And it was usually $50 notes. This went on for a while and the employer decided that this cannot go on, so he decided to install a pin-hole camera in his room. And indeed, the next day, footage captured revealed that the domestic helper was the culprit.

Probably out of goodwill and her consistent good performance, the employer did not immediately accuse the domestic helper of theft, but asked her if her family in Indonesia was facing any type of financial difficulties and whether she was having any personal problem. The answer was negative. She acted as if nothing had happened. The employer had no choice but to refer her to the agency and confronted her in front of her agent with the footage and charges. She was given a chance to explain herself but failed to provide any satisfactory explanation. In fact, when they wanted her to cough out the money she had stolen so far, which had amounted to thousands of dollars then, she even pretended to faint. Well in the end, it was no happy ending -- she was returned the money and was sent back to Indonesia. Surprisingly, when she was taking back to the house to pack her stuff, the employer found that she had in her possession a MP3, a handphone and some accessories -- things that revealed her spendthrift nature.

The family was taken aback by the whole incident, so was I. How could a thrifty and diligent domestic helper have undergone such a massive transformation in such a short time? It was a thought-provoking incident which i could not make sense of. I went on to inquire whether there was any mistreatment or grudge of any sort, but no. If there had been any indication or signs that she was unhappy, but no either. If she had appeared unusual, out-of-sort or showed any sign of guilt, but the answer was still negative. However, there was one point raised which could possibly shed light on the incident. My friend commented that she had been hanging out with a group of Indonesian friends in her free time. It was possible that she had been influenced by them or even coaxed into stealing by them. Indeed, for a person who is far away from home, she has no home support to fall back on and is more easily influenced. I guess environment plays a big role in affecting a person's personality. Perhaps her friends had not been good company at all and being her only friends in Singapore, peer pressure and her friends' negative influence could have changed her from a simple person to what she is now.

Just an incident to demonstrate that people DO change and it is easy to succumb to pressure. One's environment determines one's behaviour. Choose who to hang around with wisely!

Quote from Dr Han

2008-04-21T20:10:00.004+08:00

"There are a lot of unexpected things waiting for you. Whenever you turn a corner of your life, something you had not expected is waiting for you."
"Those unexpected things make your life better or more interesting."

Haha~ How true!

A meaningful quote from Dr Han, my Econometrics II lecturer. Coincidentally, it fits the theme of my blog.

庆永

2007-05-26T20:41:00.000+08:00

庆贺生命的可贵，分秒必争
永求心灵之安宁，无愧天地

你就是你

An interpretation by one of my friends. Meaningful~ =)

Economics Jokes

2006-04-29T11:39:00.000+08:00

Explains why i like economics... =p

Unfunny Economists One-Liners!!!
(Mostly originals while a few are partial derivatives from jokes on the Net…)

1. Do not get into fights with economists. Beware of their invisible hand!
2. When you slip and fall down in the wet market, you know that the market is not in equilibrium.
3. We can assume anything under the sun and yet still get bad grades.
4. Economists have exotic taste. Their burgers come in all shapes and sizes (Hamburger Triangle). (From EC4351 Public Economics)
5. We can be classical economists and yet love rock music.
6. When you fall out of love, you know that it is just frictional and not structural (unemployment).
7. Do not marry economists. They promised you a lifetime but they only give you 2 periods. (From EC4102, Sinha Model)
8. Economists don’t like Lord of the Rings. They have Tobit, Logit, Probit but no Hobbit. (From EC3304 Econometrics II)
9. My JC Economics teacher is an agent. She always hides things from the principal. (From EC4321, Asymmetric Information)
10. If we eat too much, we say we are putting on weight. An economist would say endogenous growth. (EC4102 Macroeconomics III)
11. Econometrics is like a bikini. It shows what is important but hides what is vital.
12. Money makes better referee than humans do in a soccer match. They can be super neutral. (From EC4332 Money and Banking II)
13. Economists enjoy their lives. Chemists solve problems using experiments, physicians and mathematicians solve problems using Maths. Economists solve problems using models.
14. What motivates Solow to come up with his growth model? Because he is sick and tired of being so low.
15. I heard that the female economics lecturer is the hottest in Arts Faculty. All the students are lost in her curves (IS-LM).
16. My economics tutorials are in a steady state. They all get more and more disgusting at the same rate.
17. Why is literature a more power field as compared to economics? While economics have the invisible hand, literature has the invisible man!
18. There is a pile of shit on the floor outside LT14. No one takes ownership over it. Why? Because it’s so gross man! (EC4321, Grossman-Hart Formal Model of Ownership
19. Why economists never progress? It is because they like to do regression.
20. Which city do the economists like to live in? Elasti-city.
21. In order to profit maximize, Economists propose that everything should be Free of Charge. (FOC Condition)
22. What is economists’ favourite board game? Monopoly.

Enjoy! =)

Experience

2006-04-20T15:36:00.000+08:00

Sometimes in life
we can never learn lessons just by reading the textbooks
or just by people teaching us
some lessons are just meant
for you to find it out yourself
to actually experience it yourself
you may have to learn lessons through the hard way
but it's really worth it
it is only through the lessons that you experience
that you truly muture.

A truly meaning prose i got off my friend's blog...