Modern Slave Masters

For the past decade or so, we have been sucked in by a catch phrase “Share Economy” – first with Uber in more affluent West, followed by Grab in Singapore and Malaysia, and what have you in China and Indonesia, then we have on-line food delivery start=ups like Food Panda, Roo, etc existence of which are now being threatened by Grab Food and Uber Food, etc. We also had bike sharing providers in Singapore, China and many other countries. I was living in Singapore when the bike sharing rushed in. It is nice to ride a bike in Amsterdam. But in Singapore where the weather is so humid. They soon folded up. You don’t need to be a top analyst to see that the concept was not going to work in Singapore or Kuala Lumpur or Jakarta or Bangkok!

I don’t believe the promoters had suffered much. Where did their money came from? OPM, or other people’s money. I am sure most of them had helped themselves with huge salaries and benefits. There is a great deal of musical-chair mentality and gambling appetite in venture capitalists’ mind with their deep war chests, money in the first place is also not theirs. If you erased the halo from a saint’s picture, would he look very different from his compatriots of his era? Recently a senior analyst in an international investment bank was caught not knowing the ABCs of Economics and another wannabe from one of our local stock broking firms was literally was uttering rubbish in The Sun. Ah, the world is full of emperors who do not know they are going around without clothes!

The world is an unfair place to live in. However, I see that people in Grab Food or Uber Food are becoming the modern-day slave masters. My heart sank each time I saw one of their drivers weaving in and out of the chaotic traffic we have in the Klang Valley. They had to work their butts out, not to mention having to endure high humidity or thunderstorms and the high chances of meeting accidents; yet a big percentage of their fees go to the company. They only have two fairly short windows during a day to earn their living.

Uber and Grab et al are talking about raking in (or hundreds of) billions when they go public. They should spare a thought to these motorcyclists who help me to create the mirage.

I couldn’t help admiring the nobility of Sunway Group’s Jeffrey Cheah. Sure, he wants his businesses to make him good money. There is one exception: His education arm. He could have it floated and enjoy the hundreds of millions (or even billions) from the market value this business of his can command in the local bourse. But he is steadfastly sticking to his principle. He is a man with a strong sense of social responsibility.

A Great Outcome?

Firefly flight from Subang aborts landing at Seletar Airport

I am a subscriber of Singapore Straits Times and a regular user of Firefly. When this headline came out in its on-line edition yesterday, I naturally took an interest and read it.

Apparently, because of bad weather, the pilots decided to play safe and divert the aircraft to land at Senai Airport. I understand the landing approach is from the southern Johor. It reminds me of Kai Tak when the plane is directly over Pasir Gudang. You could almost touch the roofs of the buildings there! 

I couldn’t help extending it to my chat groups, though not without a little comment: Thanks to our Anthony Loke…

Firefly used to fly from Subang Airport to Changi Airport until a couple of months ago, when Singapore decided to ask it to land at Seletar Airport instead. I welcome the move, since it is a point-to-point service. All hell broke loose when the Harapan came into power. Sovereignty became the primary concern. The management of Firefly, which was all ready to accept Singapore’s decision, found itself in a limbo. All its services to Singapore had to be suspended. The profit contribution from them came to a complete halt. (Firefly charges quite exorbitantly for these routes, especially the Subang-Singapore leg.) Since I stay in Saujana Resort, catching a flight from KLIA to-fro Singapore became a dreadful routine. Many a time it takes almost two hours just to reach home. To add insult to injury, many a time coupon taxis are also not available, even though I was happy to pay the premium fare.

Being a Malaysian, it is only incumbent that I should support our government’s decision. But in my mind, we were simply not very ready. Yes, we all know the Singapore government people can be a very kneah-su (afraid to lose) lot, but they certainly do their homework before they talk or act. At least two incidents instantly flashed through my mind when this sovereignty issue surfaced: (a) MH370; wasn’t it picked up by our radar before it went missing? (b) Someone was hit when a flight landed at Subang in the wee hours of one morning recently? Can we manage things well ourselves? We sure can, but our easy-going and somewhat complacent nature must go in these things.

So, when Firefly resumed its service to Singapore, albeit via Seletar now, I became one of its earliest customers, even though it only flew two flights a day. (I see that it has returned to full service now.) I now only need two hours, besides the flying time, to reach my Singapore destination from my Subang home. And people operating Subang must visit Seletar to see for themselves how they run the airport there.

When I found Hanna Yeoh singing high praises to Anthony Loke in her Facebook posting for the resumption of the service, I asked myself: Is she doing a Trump victory fun?

Most of our ministers are first timers; they are anxious to prove that they can deliver more than their predecessors. Some, and their political officers, are pretty bright – Tony Pua, Ong Kian Ming, Liew Chin Tong, Theresa Kok, Hannah Yeoh, and Yeo Bee Yin, just to name a few.   Few have serious political baggage, but by virtue of the fact they came from parties which hitherto have not been wholehearted regarded as mainstream, few have the knowledge and network to make them effective in a short span of exposure, despite their good work attitude. There is a huge pool of talents whom they can tap for ideas, knowledge and connections in the country; they should take the initiative to reach out. This huge pool is unlikely to offer themselves if they are not asked – for fear of associating themselves with DAP, which has unfortunately been viewed as anti-establishment before GE14. Now that it is a part of the government, it should rebrand itself somewhat.

Poslaju

I had a document to be sent to Singapore. There is a Poslaju counter at Tesco in Ara Damansara, which is just across Saujana Resort where my apartment is. I thought it is very convenient for me to use the service.

How much would it cost me?

After putting the envelope on the weighing machine, the man at the counter advised that it would cost me sixty plus ringgit. I can’t remember the exact figure. My immediate reaction to him was: “Gila!-kah?” (Is this madness?). Realizing that he was just doing his job, I felt a little bad with this outburst of mine. Fortunately, it was more of an exclamation than a rebuke.

The half-A4 envelope contained only three sheets of paper. Before the privatization madness, it would probably cost me less than a ringgit to have it posted to Singapore. I was happy to pay some premium for the “laju” (fast) service. But sixty-plus ringgit? Where is the sense of proportions? A rip-off business mentality indeed!

To rub salt into the wound, Poslaju gave me another bout of fits when I reached home.

On my gate, there was a notice from Poslaju advising me to collect a parcel from their head office in Shah Alam, since there was no one at home to receive it. They didn’t even bother to check if there was anyone at home! It is simply common sense for anyone to do it if they want to be in logistics business. Poslaju must be thinking they are different!

Would I use Poslaju if I have alternatives?

Story of Yanxi Palace

I don’t usually watch dramas; there are simply too many episodes in every one of them. I do join my wife in watching the Korean varieties from time to time. South Korea’s drama industry is now a phenomenon. Millions are glued to TV and smartphones day in and day out because of it. Its formula is quite different from the others.

Bollywood’s appeal does not quite go beyond people of South Asian origin or descent. There is plenty of “lovers chasing each other from tree to tree” or “head and body twist-dancing” scenes from start to finish. The Chinese varieties tend to recast historical episodes. You know the story’s outcome, but you watch it to curse the villains who are usually being portrayed to be more evil than the truth. Intrigues that are scripted are often quite shallow or even childish. And the acting, especially on the part of the actresses, is often pretentiously irritating. I always believe what we see shapes the way we behave. And you can see such portrayed behaviours cascading down to Indian and Chinese societies.

There is also much behavioural silliness in Korean dramas. But their story lines are quite gripping. You don’t quite know what will come up next. But the quality of acting, especially by the lead actors or actresses, is certainly higher than that you find in Chinese movies and dramas.

It appears that Chinese movie and drama makers have taken note and are now trying to emulate the Korean. The Story of the Yanxi Palace is a case in point.

But only to a certain point.

Created by Yu Zheng, Story of Yanxi Palace (延禧攻略) apparently has been streamed billions of times by worldwide audiences. No doubt the cast is huge and their costumes stunning, I am the producers still have some way to go before they can be seen to be at par with the Koreans. The scenes are pretty linear, and the intrigues challenge one’s intellectuality. The acting of the female cast is, for want of a better description, still very Chinese actress-like.

I couldn’t go beyond the 7^th episode.

I have always been branded a China- and Chinese-basher. But my mission is to help improve Chinese-ness, albeit in a small way.

Customers Can Wait

We decided to change some of our curtains in our apartment.

I googled for information.

From its website, Baagus Curtains look impressive. I called and a lady said I had to visit the showroom at One City at USJ.

One City is a huge complex. But somehow it looks very disorderly. The signage at the entrance was already damaged; yet no one saw fit to have it repaired.

Baagus occupies a number of shop lots. But wait a minute; it was totally unmanned when we arrived at 11:30 this morning. A note was pinned on the door; I telephone one of the numbers stated.

Sorry, we are having a meeting at our head office. I will only be in the showroom at 2pm.

What? A one-lady show?

Maybe its business motto is: Customers can wait!

How Dumb Some of Sales People Can Be

My wife had been using the iPad I bought for her. I had programmed it under my App Store/iCloud account. She thought it was a nuisance to see all the photos that were meant for me appearing in her Photos app. I decided to reset the iPad to only run on her own account. I thought I could use iTunes to transfer the photos that she wanted to keep back to her iPad after the reset. But I just couldn’t find a way through iTunes. I decided to download all the photos that she wanted into a thumb drive and wait to find a way to reload them to her iPad.

I googled but none of the suggestions appeared workable. However, I did learn that a device called i-usb-storer could do the job.

I visited a couple of shops that sold computer stuff; none had heard of it. I thought the shops at Digital Mall at Petaling Jaya’s Section 14 might be able to help. Again, few knew what I was talking but one was kind enough to refer me to All IT Hypermarket on the third floor. None of the salesmen could help. But I actually saw one there, but the salesman insisted it was not meant for the purpose I had in mind. Yes, it could download photos from iPad/iPhone and upload them to my PC, but not the other way around, he insisted. Nonetheless, he was at least kind enough to tell me there was an Apple store on the ground floor; it might carry what I wanted.

The Apple store was helpful enough to tell me that there were in fact a few devices in the market that could perform the task and one of them was the SanDisk IXpand drive. Unfortunately, they did not carry any stock. I suppose I could pick up in Singapore then.

At the Jaya Shopping Centre where I had parked my car, I saw a temporary mart offering all sorts of IT stuff. I asked one of the sales persons there.

No problem; use this.

He showed me a SanDisk IXpand.

It was exactly the same one I saw at All IT Hypermarket!

How dumb some of sales people can be!

Turning 70, Time to do Social Work!

I have turned 70; it is time for me to do social work. It is now my pleasure to extend FREE advisory service (also as an effort to keep me mentally and physically robust!) to those in need in areas like:

• ·        Personal/Career Improvement and Development
• ·        Business and Corporate Development
• ·        Knowledge and Thought-Leadership Pursuits
• ·        Networks and Connections

My career spanned more than 45 years and covered several industries. Started with the Malaysian Industrial Development Authority, I went on to hold senior operational and/or policy positions in organisations like the Agriculture Bank of Malaysia, Genting, Guthrie, the Low Yat Group, and the IMC Pan-Asia Group. Though my first degree is in Engineering, I have also taught diploma-in-management and MBA classes and authored/co-authored books principally on strategy.

I am now a Board member of a Singapore-based foundation, the director of vineyard cum cattle farm in in Victoria, Australia and an adviser to an energy company.

All are welcome. Anyone needing help can me at yblim.celebrating70@gmail.com. I have started a mailbox specifically for this!