Taking It to the Next Level - within reason

Ever increasing demands for the ultimate dish is always the next one

      Our previous Prime Minister Mr. Lee Kwan Yew once put it to his citizens that life is a marathon, a never ending run with no finish line. Yes, I agree with that but only partially. At this stage in life, I find myself running an uphill marathon, an uphill climb with no end in sight.

      We always want to better our last act, improve on the bottom line year after year. Perhaps that is why perfectionists are such unhappy people, as they know they will have to go downhill after a certain time.

     I believe that we have to find a balance between what is set out as an ambitious goal and what can realistically be achieved given the limited resources one has. Look at Singapore's football team, almost 20 years ago, we were minnows only playing and achieving Malaysia cup success. Now 20 years later, we are the AFP Asian Football Suzuki Cup Champions for 4 times, the most in South East Asia. But, our FIFA ranking is a paltry 144 and we have never really improved much since the 1990s. 

     Singapore football is still outside the top 10 in Asia with Japan, S Korea, China, Qatar, Oman, Jordan,  S. Arabia, Australia and New Zealand streets ahead of us. Our foreign talent programme has failed, we have not even made in to the quarterfinals of the Asian Football Cup!

    Perhaps thats where the study of sport which we have had a first mover advantage. Take Shooting, Sailing, Table Tennis, Badminton, and even Swimming. We are nearing World Standard.

   Taking it to the next level is where we see where we can make a tremendous improvment in a short span of time with the same amount of investment, that is where we have improved so much in the last 20 years for the above 5 sports so far,

   Football, the Contact Sports, Rugby, Tennis, Squash, Athletics, well lets take a reality check.

Can I do 2 marathons this year ??

                                                                           Am I Nuts ??

The CEO of the company Creative Technology, Mr. Sim Hong Woo always empahsised the need for having a Big Hairy Audacious Goal, or BHAG. So I am stating this very clear in my blog for all to see, I want to run 2 full marathons this year. I have signed up for the Bangkok marathon in mid November - 3 months away and the Singapore marathon in early December or 3 and a half months away.

There is no time left to lose, as I embark on the business vision set out by me earlier this year, and we are well on the way to attaining it, I have decided to go 1 better ; every year I run 1 marathon, and as time is not on my side, I decided to up the game and go 1 better. I have decided to run 2 marathons - in good time too.

Now, that having said and put in print, all I need to do is practice day and night, and we will see at the end of the year.

Seize the Day. 

Time's Up for Fandi

        The recent poor run of results by the Lions XII or the Singapore National team is really not acceptable. Led by our most successful footballer in the 80s, Fandi Ahmad, the former Champions had a miserable run ending at 8th place this last season and are on the verge of being knocked out of the Malaysia Cup and the recent loss to Johor Darul Haxim is the final nail on the coffin. Its time to look for a new football coach, this close season. Sorry Mr. Ahmad, you have had 1 season and it was dismal. Just a year ago, we were Champions. 

      I had previously thought of giving Fandi another season, but in reality, while he has been Singapore's best footballing son achieving great success as a player, he is not even close as a good manager for the National Team. Perhaps his tactics and motivational skills are not in the same league as his predecessor, Sundramoorthy, but Singapore has lost several skilful players to the Thai and Indonesian leagues. 

    Our S League has never progressed beyond the South East Asian stages, as has been our football teams, so a real shakeup is necessary.

Who me ?  Yes You ! 

   

Excuse Me, are you a Toilet Cleaner ??

 
                                                       
     I will reveal a hitherto secret, I am the family's Sunday toilet cleaner. True many people will shake their heads and say this is no big deal, there are millions of families all over the world who do without a maid. I say, agreed, but this is Singapore, the city where there are more rich millionaires and billionaires per capita, and there are easily 30 - 40% of families who are dependent on their maids, and for generations and decades since the early 70s.
I won't want to get into an argument with readers about the merits of not having a maid and all that.

    The fact is that every Sunday, the maid, takes a day off and I have assumed the role of toilet cleaner to clean the 3 toilets. It is something which I have been doing for the last couple of years and I gave it some thought on why I do it.

     I run a small business in Singapore with sales territories into South East Asia.
It has been tough going the last 1 and a half years, but with a lot of determination, effort,focus and cost management, things are looking much better since the middle of this year. I had made a lot of sacrifices both personal and professional and I am determined to make good in an ever changing industry. We added product lines, provided more diverse services, pushed sales efforts everywhere and reached into our mental and emotional reserves to see through a very difficult period. We are not out of the woods yet, but the silver lining or the golden hue on the horizon is beckoning. 

    So, just as in cleaning toilets, as the boss of a company, I need to clean sxxx from time to time, though it is not of my own doing, but the very fact that I am prepared to roll up my sleeves and get down and dirty and not run from the mess, is something inbuilt in me.
I will not give up, I will clean up the mess made by other people, and make sure we can all have clean toilets for our daily business. Many people will not stoop beneath themselves and run away from it, saying it is other people's jobs. Not me. 

   So to the Toilet Cleaners everywhere, I salute your dedicated efforts, many times it is a dirty job, but never will I look down on it, as I know, in my small way, what it takes to be a leader, to clear the crap from the WC or the dirt from the floor. Similarly speaking, for the company, only after the crap and obstacles are cleared, can we make the orders smooth flowing and we can then move on to the big leagues.

  Seize the Day     

ECP Run 22 Aug 2014 - Refelctions

      The Run today of almost 10km was in one word ; difficult. I had started at the Ski 360 centre at  Beach Food court or the East Coast Seafood Center at roughly 10.40 am, heading East towards Changi I started on a leisurely pace of almost 7 min per km. The weather was hot (33 deg C in the shade) and humid (easily 85% rH), there were no other runners as far as I could see running in my direction, who would be crazy enough to tackle a run, at this time of day, or as they say, Only Mad Dogs and Englishmen. I must be a Mad Dog then. 

     Reaching the halfway mark at the Safra Resort and Country Club, I did not bother to stop and returned back in the sweltering heat. I felt sluggish, and as was my goal, I wanted to lose 5 kg by the end of this year, I pressed on. 

    Finally, reaching the Ski 360 after 1 hour and 10 minutes, I took time off to stop and look at the beach. Finally. it was a perfect day, hot, slightly windy and devoid of the thronging masses of people. I stopped at a park bench, and did some light stretching. In the disatance was a family of 4, the Dad with his 2 kids by the Breakwater and the Mum (more logical and practical one) sitting in the shade at the Park. It was an idyllic scene. The ships in the background, the family just looking at the scene and the wind and the lapping waves.

   For those precious 30 minutes, I felt so at peace, no pressure, no deadlines,nothing.  It was a surreal feeling. 

Effectively manage and control your blood sugar - All Natural Ingredients

                                                     Proviva G with Probiotics and Prebiotics 

     The product above is the latest revolutionary product using Pre and Priobiotics to enhance the effectiveness of the already effective natural herbs and vegetables using a breakthrough process of fermentation. Proviva G is already in the market for over 3  years and the results speak for themselves.Fermentg specifice plants known for healing such as bittergourd and horse radish tree, with probiotics strengthened with a prebiotic protective 'case' of oligosaccharides, the natural ingredients of bittergourd,and horse radish tree and quickly absorbed in the bloodstream from the small intestine and the results are quite amazing. 

    Of course, the results will vary from person to person, but a clinical trial conducted several years ago in a hospital setting showed very good control of the HbA1C levels of those who took Proviva G for their blood glucose control. 

     I have been taking this health supplement to control my cholesterol level as the supplement can also control triglycerides and LDL (low density lipoprotein) and so far so good. There was a clinical study done several years ago by a hospital, whereby there were a total of 166 patients with diabetes Type 2 volunteering. 3 groups were formed among the 166 and they were given the following dose :

a) Blue band - patients given metformine (oral diabetes medication) 
b) Red band - patients injected with insulin 
c) Green band - patients taking Proviva G exclusively

    
After just 1 month, the results of the patients in the Green Band improved to the Ideal range, after taking just 2 capsules of Proviva G a day for 30 days (1 month). Continuing the oral dosage of Proviva G assured them of the good health and results, as can be seen from the chart above. 


Sales can be done online at www.proviva-g.com (for Proviva G) and www.proviva-l.com (for Proviva L) and also through local distributors and stockists in Singapore, Australia and Europe. 

Herb Supplements to control blood sugar levels

a Made in Singapore product 

     Recently this year, World Health Organization made a startling assertion, based on current humans consumption of calories, the sugar intake must be 'halved' to prevent a pandemic of blood sugar diseases like diabetes and other related diseases. This is meant to cause alarm, but in the world we live today, everything has a 'cure' so why waste too much news space and get people all a tizzy in changing their food and dietary habits which have built literally trillions of dollars of revenue for the fast food, health, medicine and pharmaceutical industries. 

    I'm doing my small part in wanting to alleviate one of the world's critical diseases and one of them is diabetes.  A small one person study (by yours truly) recently had me walking and checking about 20 health food and pharmaceutical shops in Chinatown for herb based supplements to alleviate and control blood sugar.  

  This product is made in Singapore (see pictures), costs $ 50 for 2 bottles for roughly 10 - 15 days of bitter gourd and cordycepts extracts. The upside is that while it may control the blood sugar, the costs of managing taking this supplements is surely not cheap. For the proper control of blood sugar, one has to take 9 supplements (tablets) of 3 each, 3 times daily. So the patient has to take 3 in the morning, 3 after lunch and 3 in the evening. The compliance of intake is one critical aspect of keeping the disease under control. 

Secondly, based on 90 capsules per bottle, that means 10 (for 9 capsules dosage per day) to 15 (for 6 capsules per day dosage) days for $50. To effectively control the blood glucose, the patient has to spend $ 100 (for 6 per day) to $150 per month for these natural supplements. 

In my next post I have just the solution. Effective and Price Competitive.   

Goodbye Mr. Williams ; We will never know the real you

                                                           Robin Williams 1953 - 2014 

     Many of my family and friends of my generation, those born in 60s and 70s will surely recall Robin Williams from the sensitive but madcap Mork (Nano Nano) and Mindy with his co-host Pam Dawber.

     During our formative years of the early 80s, the satirical comedy Happy Days and later Mork and Mindy were really our weekly entertainment for many of us young adults. Robin's madcap and hundred miles a minute humour were sidesplittingly funny and his trademark handshake, or the one with the fingers outstretched and with the 3rd and 4th fingers apart was the 'cool' handshake of the era. We, the young adults of the early 80s had only TV, radio to entertain us. No internet, smart phones, cheap budget airlines to distract us from the humdrum of daily life.  

    I read so many tributes of his wacky zaniness in many magazines, tabloids and top news magazines like Time and Newsweek, as well as his great gift of making people laugh. He was a comic genius who was so troubled by his mortality and falling off into obscurity that he took his own life. He fell into drug and alcohol abuse and was in and out of rehab a number of times. The very lure of the entertainment world with its monetary rewards and fame ultimately leads to many a diva, entertainer, movie, TV star to lose their sense of reality when their star fades in obscurity. Fitting back into society to be a 'nobody' is very scary and traumatic when earlier, every tweet, comment, and utterance is carried along by millions of 'followers', you dine in private jets, go to exclusive parties and live like oil rich princes. Money, the lavish life, the fans, the sense of being removed from reality. Many people just 'lose it'. The list of people who have had nervous breakdowns, taken drugs, taken their own lives in the entertainment world far outstrips those of us lesser mortals working 9 to 5 day jobs and struggling with our mortgage and kids education. 

We the nameless faceless people who form 99% of the society are the lucky ones. We have no massive expectations by ourselves, our managers, our fans and our family and friends to top the last selling CD or film which raked in mega millions. Success in itself is a double edged sword, it sits uncomfortably with the ordinary.  So the 64 million dollar question is this, can we deal with failure for multiple times, until we find success ? If we attain success too quickly and too huge, can we live with it ? Dare we ?   

   The tragedy of life is that it is too serious to be taken too seriously. Robin knew that only too well that he created all his alter personas to entertain all those around him. Many who knew him said he was actually ultra-shy and needed the zaniness as an outlet of his creativity which was nothing short of genius. 

   Goodbye my Captain. Nano Nano. The world is a sadder place without you.  

Lose 5 kg for good ; by end of this year

         Setting Yoyo diets are like any short term goals, once you achieve them, you revert back to your old ways and the results you have strived for so hard and so long all go to waste. However, this year, in the middle of nowhere, in August, I have decided that enough is enough, I am writing this down for everyone to see. But my immediate goal is to lose 5 kg, for the following reasons :

a) health
b) vanity
c) family

        Many of my peers are overweight, and as the 50s decade rears its ugly head, health issues will invariably crop up. I have been active in sports for the most part of my life, but the last couple of years, the weight gain has been due to bad dietary habits like snacking, the occasional drinks with friends, and lack of exercise.

       Metabolic syndrome is the onset of the most common lifestyle diseases such as diabetes, heart problems and gout, so I want to delay or even totally avoid these debilitating diseases with the correct attitude as well as strong minded will to lose weight.

     So from today 18th August, I have started on my fitness regimen. I will track

and keep myself updated weekly. Watch this space.

   For a start, I intend to skip the lunch meal and replace it with a short but fast run in the gym of 5km or longer everyday this week. If the lunch run is not done, then a run in the afternoon is a MUST. On top of that, I will intersperse the evening with a 10 - 20 lap swim for the days when my aching body (perhaps Wednesday and Friday) says STOP. 

So every week I will track my weight, and run history. 

     18th August - 76 kg