8 km run at ECP with new running partner 30 June 2018

I managed to do an 8 km run today. All in all I was really happy that Filipe joined me on this, as I have barely 6 weeks to register a decent time at the Army Half Marathon during the 3rd week of August.

My Front 4 (hand timed,Garmin monitored) was a massive 24 mins, 56.2 secs or averaging about 6 minutes 14 secs. I am very pleased with this time. My best Front 4 km was 25 mins 31 seconds and this is a new personal best (PB) for Yours Truly.  

We reached the first 4 km near the changing rooms just before the East Coast Seafood Centre and had a short drink.

My Back 4 km was also very decent, clocking 25 mins 43 seconds or 6 minutes 25 seconds per km. Very decent considering I was hitting about 28 minutes on the Back 4 my last time I ran 2 weeks ago.

So all in all, providing that my Anterior Crucia Ligament holds, I hope to be back into full fitness soon !

Niccolo Machiavelli - the Prince

This is a very insightful book for anyone who has an interest in how people in positions of power get there and more importantly, stay there. One of the key takeaways of this book is that the prince will need to be 2 faced ; for he has to govern according to many different circumstances under his rule. Many times he has to be strong like the Lion and Fight when necessary, sometimes he has to make a Great Escape and oftentimes he has to play the Victim ; to be one and neglect the other 2 could be disastrous.  

Now not many people can be both as strong willed and unyielding as a Lion, nor can a Lion turn into a Fox who is always on the lookout for some opportunity to come in unannounced and take the prize hens or geese. 

However, the prince needs to be both ; my view is that for a company, sometimes the Prince can only do 1 version of the persona well, such as the Lion and leave the Fox to his trusted henchman or henchwoman and vice versa. So in my playbook, I should establish a Tag Team of players who alternate between Fight, Flight, Seize Opportunities or even Do nothing. 

Such is today's dealings in the very disruptive  world where no technology and application is safe from imitators, bigger and more savvy competitors as well as identity thieves. 

Fortune favours the brave ; well think and analyse each step then go against the playbook. 

  

One Final Hurrah ; 15 more good years

To regain my run pace of 6 : 30 per km for 10 km ; My mid term goal by August 

Today I just made a new running buddy, so I am now again motivated to start regular running at my usual haunts such as East Coast Park and Bukit Batok area (the stadium track is under repair) so I will give myself these targets : 

By end 2018 ; weight : 73 kg (after meal) ; currently : 75.5 kg

Run Pace : 6 : 30 min / km for 10 km

Length : 21 km or 2 hr : 20 mins

This is my Final Hurrah, as I feel Father Time is catching up and I need to maximise all my remaining good years (no more than 15) to building my health and stamina.

E 250 7 G Tronics My Review

This is the 2nd E Class that I have driven ; the first was the E 230 7 G Tronics 2008 model, which I had from 2012 till 2018, a full 6 years.

Mercedes has outdone itself once again, this is the 2014 model, and I took possession of this car 2nd hand (one previous owner) at the start of this year. My assessment these 6 months : par excellence.

The E 250 is frankly a joy to drive. it has 7 gears, uses the paddle shift gear handle (on the right hand side just like you would for your indicator light on the left hand side), is beautiful to look at, and at 207 BHP Turbo V 6 engine,is a beast on the road.

Acceleration is truly specacular and few cars except for the sports cars can match this beast. It also provides for very smooth gear changes as the responsiveness is so minute.

The 6 months since I took possession of this work of engineering art, I have had only 1 problem which was the standby battery for the start - stop ECO standby feature. This means that the car which is driven and come to a stop at any traffic lights or is at a standstill will turn off the engine rather than idle and waste petrol. This feature takes some getting used to as the start and stop on and off of the engine does give it a little less smooth takeoff, but the plus point is that the petrol I use is so low, I sometimes only need to pump petrol perhaps once every 8 - 10 days instead of the usual 5 days. 

Of course mileage does play a part in petrol consumption, but this feature is really about saving consumable costs like petrol and I am all for it. The previous E 230 had a more 'classic' look (I wouldn't mind getting a vintage E 230 down the road) but this E250 has kept me pretty happy.

Proximity left and right indicators at the front dashboard can be a hassle as even a motorcycle or scooter which weaves in and out near your car while stationary would give a loud beeping sound. Why do you need to have this alarm when your car is stationary, and the vehicle in concern is moving at practically 5 km/hr and no threat to damage to the car ?? The front vehicle proximity warning light is also another needless add on in my opinion.

The reading lights on left, right and back are neat, as is the blue infinity light whenever you open any of the side doors to indicate to oncoming traffic about the open door.

The auto closing trunk is cool, but again, another useless feature.         

I truly enjoy the ride ; I've had a total of 8 cars and this definately ranks at No. 1  

Mental Illness - very difficult to manage especially for the super successful

Anthony Bourdain, passed away on 8th June, in an apparent suicide 

Fame is a double edged sword, many times merciless and unforgiving. Those who pursue money, power and wealth will undoubtedly be thrust into the limelight. This post highlights just 2 extremely successful people, Anthony Bourdain and Ms Kate Spade and tries to figure out what made them do what they did. Super successful people normally have  tremendous drive, are very resilient and super focussed. However, the brain is an extremely complex organ which needes its fair share of down time, fun and games and challenges. 

Emotions will ultimately get the better of many human beings, we are human after all and while there may be support in the form of friends, family and their life partner, it is always the state of mind which needs to be in the right frame for anything. Someone very close to me, once had a mental meltdown and he could not accept the consequence of failure. I also had my crisis in my work life and I was not myself - I felt powerless and feared the inevitable - of financial, emotional and even health dwindling and ultimately left with nothing but an empty shell.

It worked out well for both him and me, although these episodes in life are decades apart. 

Religion, is the great game changer. Belief in God or Faith and falling back on His wonderful works for each and every one of us, and accepting that many times things do not go the way it was planned to be. I believe this gives us Hope. Once we have Hope, we can then find a way out even from the darkest of days. 

Kate Spade of the namesake bag fame passed away early June 2018 from suicide

Mental Illness or feeling down,can set in at any time, at any age and even several times in a persons life. Some people experience extreme mood swings and will need to take medication or seek psychiatric help on certain occasions and other occasions, psychological treatments. 

While the supporting industry for mental illness is in place for many decades, the stigma associated to mental illness is still very pronounced. Especially so where everyone places a premium to 'face' or the perception that a person is doing well in the many spheres of life.

No one wants to be called a 'wacko' or a 'mental case'. Outliers in our society can be very very successful in their own fields. Let me just name 10 greats who struggled with mental illness and tremendous self doubt whom society shunned and only after their passing did society wake up and discover and honour their true greatness.

  1. Beethoven
  2. Vincent van Gogh
  3. Michael Jackson
  4. Antoni Gaudi
  5. Karl Marx
  6. Robin Williams
  7. Rosa Parks
  8. Kurt Cobain / Chester Beddingfield
  9. Abraham Lincoln
10. Charles Darwin


  

Income Inequality ; longer lives and Money (or lack of)

The fact of income inequality is staring at us in the face. We live in the post 2008 great (American) recession where virtually every job is now potentially replaceable by Artificial Intelligence (AI), and the supposed Singapore dream of 5 Cs (I hate reference to this as this is actually all based on materialism) is getting harder and harder to achieve.

The new reality is disruption, from jobs to business opportunities to Governments, every country is facing a new reality of unhappy voters who have grouses mainly due to Government debt, income inequality and longer working lives. I did not sign up for this !

In the 20th century, the primary goal of parents in Singapore was to get their children a better life, and that meant education, at least to the highest potential, when their lives were either disrupted by  the 2nd world war, then post war poverty, the breakway from Malaysia, and the threat of civil unrest due to lack of jobs, poverty, communist factions in our country and even racial unrest (Confrontation). 

Thanks to the late LKY, a great statesman and leader, we have overcome all of that and within 1 generation (about 25 years), have become a First World Country having many firsts.

The suits and their money 

Since 2015, and the last election, there have been voices of many who are disheartened by the plight of many ordinary Singaporeans whose lives have been 'left behind' by the mad rush of the new disruptive work which has unsettled many people in their 40s, 50s and beyond. Gone are the supposedly stable jobs created in the 80s and early 90s by manufacturing ; gone are the dot com and post 2000s semiconductor jobs. In its place is the new scarcer jobs in R & D, pharmaceuticals, life sciences and Fintech (Financial Technology) ; Many of these back-room work is done by the supposed 'foreign talents' who are working longer hours, for cheaper pay and complain less.

What then for the 3rd  and 4th Generation of Singaporeans, the Millenials (born in 90s and early 2000s and Gen Xers born after that) ? Education while still important is NOT  the primary factor for success. On top of that, there is the Income Inequality which is all apparent between the Haves and and the Have Nots. The Haves are : The 1st and 2nd Generation who have invested in private properties have suddenly got cash windfalls from en-bloc sales, the foreign investors turned Singapore PRs and new citizens who have made their monies in other countries and of course the highly paid ministers of the ruling Government.  These are the 5 to (max) 10%.

The Have Nots are the rank and file people who slog day in and day out and hold up the economy. The teachers, military people, the many thousands of housing, insurance agents who try their hardest to make a sale in this tepid economy. The former PMETs who were retrenched in the last 5 - 10 years who now struggle to make a living as first UBER, then GRAB car drivers, the security guards and the numerous people who live day by the eking out an existence doing whatever it takes to survive. They form easily the 90%. 

We do not have the slums but the struggle is daily 

The daily life is getting harder. Fewer people want or need to drive cars (most expensive place in the world to purchase a car, thanks to this system implemented 28 years ago called the Certificate of Entitlement or COE which people through their car agents have to bid for this piece of paper which entitles them to buy a new car ). Currently it stands at 38,000 and added to the additional registration fee of another 30,000 to 50,000, a simple Toyota Corolla Altis will cost approximately S$ 90,000 or US$ 65,000. Roughly 3 times that of this same car in the USA !

On top of that there is the ERP or Electronic Road Pricing which taxes road users based on location and overuse. Hence every day inside the Central Business District, there is taxes of easily S$ 3 for cars to drive through the roads for work. Hence many people either give up or don't own cars and thus take the public transport.

Public transport is actually very efficient, and economical too. So the plus point is that the connectivity for most office workers inside the CBD or even outside where many IT or industrial estates (Alexandra Business Park or Changi Business Park) is pretty OK ; but I am one of the privileged guys who drives to work. The morning crush hour is no fun as trains are packed and the MRT breakdowns are a major cause of complaints and anger ever so often when they breakdown.

So public housing, or HDB prices are still affordable for new flats. The only downside is that it is 99 years leasehold, while there will be price increases during the growth years, the reality is that resale flats in mature estates on the whole in Singapore has been going downhill for almost 5 quarters or 1 year and 3 months. This reflects the sentiment that the economy is not doing very well. 

Coupled that with the news that the car COE prices have been sliding for the last 2 - 3 years and you get the picture that all is not well in the heartlands. PMETs have to resort to driving GRAB cars, young Singaporeans have to be Food Panda and UBER Eats delivery men and the women have to be nursing assistants or tutors. At least we are still vibrant enough where our able bodied young men and women are working in the Digital Economy of today in Singapore. There are millions of displaced Fillipino, Thai, Chinese, Indian, Bangladesh, Vietnamese men and women all over Asia. doing the hardest of jobs.  

Of course if the young man or woman was a scholar, or high scoring individual from the top 3 Universities things are better. But then again, the Government's drive to attract so many foreign students from China, India and the West has raised the bar so high that our poor Singaopore sons and daughters are losing out in terms of higher education locally and job prospects. 

Fertility rate is at an all time low. Meaning people are not replacing themselves, for many reasons I gather, one big factor is economic and the stressful life here does not engender young people to get married, get a flat and have kids. It takes 2 working professionals jobs to just about manage an HDB flat, possibly a 2nd hand car and the rest of the earnings go to tuition, day care, the maid, groceries and the occasional dining out. 

Most of the young people take out their hard earned CPF savings for the housing and the risk awaiting many people upon reaching 55 or 62 is that there is hardly any money left as it is all gone into the housing ; so what awaits many Baby Boomers (those born from 1950 to 1975 or so) is practically nothing. That being the case, Singapore will be facing a situation where many people are 'downgrading' their homes once they realise that they are living longer (our life expectancy is at least 82 years or longer) and have no more disposable income to live even the simplest of lives. Coupled with more and more silver haired Singaporeans, there will be even more demands to the Govenment, from these educated old folk (I am on the cusp of it, maybe in about 9 years time - it is a sobering thought) to provide for their Golden Years. No Government can just abandon the people who have put their entire lives contributing to the well being of our nation.

While it is well and good to be mobile and have a cup of Kopi at the void deck ; having friends is all important, and the occasional trips abroad to Asia, Australasia, Europe and US is the icing on the cake ; IF we can afford them. Many people still cannot due to dwindling savings and the ever rising costs of living. 

Tough times here. And getting tougher. The people in power, or the 4G need to understand this.   

Awakening the locked memories

this is very interesting, I had a nap in the afternoon and woke up with a Clementi tune in my head, I have not played any of Clementi's sonatinas in almost 45 years ! It must be some 'unlocking' of the RAM (random access memories) in my brain which brings the song to the forefront of my conciousness.