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Monday, March 23, 2009
Masochist holiday
8:45 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong, published in ST life! on March 21, 2009Thinking of taking a holiday in Singapore but fear there won't be enough suffering?
Well, worry no more. (Unless, of course, you happen to enjoy worrying, in which case you can worry all you want. Whatever floats your boat. I'm not here to judge.)
We will be the first to admit that Singapore has long neglected your specific demographic. In the past, the country had very little to offer people like you who demand a certain amount of pain and suffering on their vacations.
You will be glad to know that much has changed. In recent months, numerous existing attractions have been retrofitted to cater to your specific tastes. We did a detailed study and invested some effort into this project and I am sure you will like what you see.
Where we could not have the attraction to directly inflict pain on you, we inflicted pain on the attraction so that you can be reminded of pain.
We have spared no expense for the sake of your displeasure.
While we cannot list all of the different attractions here, we've picked just a few painful highlights.
Enjoy, or rather, don't enjoy your stay!
Shopping
Do you find that your shopping experience lacks pushing, shoving and people ramming into you with trolleys loaded with television sets?
Want a shopping trip where you can get good bargains and yet at the same time be exposed to risk of death by suffocation?
Then you absolutely cannot miss one of Singapore's IT fairs.
At every fair, nearly the entire male population crams into a few convention centre floors and proceeds to buy flatscreen TVs like they (the TVs, not the men) are curry puffs.
IT vendor: Hello uncle, would you like to buy a TV? There's a promotion.
Man: Sure, I'll take five. And don't call me uncle.
If you think crowds are painful, wait till you try a crowd where every other person is pushing a trolley with a giant TV in it.
You may never want to go back to normal shopping again.
Eating
Singapore has long been known for its great dining experiences. It is known for having good food at clean hawker centres at very reasonable prices.
Understandably, you masochistic tourists stayed away.
However, thanks to the innovative efforts of one seafood stall at Newton Hawker Centre, Singapore now has a dining experience it is proud to offer to visitors like you.
You will still get a taste of Singapore food but with the added satisfaction of feeling completely ripped off at the end.
Enjoy the thrill of being presented with a gigantic bill at the end of your meal. A single tiger prawn can cost as much as $30. A meal for six will cost more than that TV set you got rammed with at the IT fair.
For a little added bonus, try querying the bill. Then just sit back and soak in some fear as some burly men appear to persuade you to pay.
When you finally cave in and pay up, make sure you don't pay with exact change, then watch helplessly as the stall owner who presented you with the large bill thinks you want to give him a tip.
It's this sort of dining experience that prompted one masochist to say: 'Die, die must try'.
Water sports
After you've done all the shopping and eating, how about some outdoor activity to burn off those calories?
For you the masochist, we offer an exciting water rescue that combines physical pain of injury with the emotional pain of feeling unappreciated.
The day starts with a stroll along the Singapore River near the Merlion. If you are lucky, someone who cannot swim will fall into the water. You then dive into the water to perform a heroic rescue.
In the process, you are likely to suffer scrapes and bruises bad enough to warrant a trip to hospital.
Sounds good so far? It gets better.
Not only are you wet and injured for doing a good thing, you will also be out of pocket to the tune of $90. Yes, as a special treat for tourists like you, you will be made to pay your hospital bill.
During the trip, be sure to have your picture taken with the Merlion statue.
It became an iconic symbol for pain after a lightning strike left a large hole in its head.
Amazing views
After all that excitement, it's time to wind down with a relaxing ride on the world's largest observation wheel, the Singapore Flyer. Such wheels may be commonplace these days, but none offers the kind of torture we do.
As with the water rescue, timing is crucial here. While the wheel will operate normally most times (it has to cater to normal tourists too), it will occasionally break down.
When it does, you can look forward to up to six hours stuck in a small enclosed capsule at over 100m in the air.
This is especially recommended for claustrophobic masochists who fear heights.
For the ultimate experience though, make sure to drink a lot of water just before you get on and don't take any plastic bags with you.
Somewhere around the third hour, you'll be a big hit with the rest of the passengers.
These are but a few of the many wonderful experiences just waiting to be enjoyed. And we're coming up with new ways to hurt you all the time.
So what are you waiting for? Contact your travel agent today.
merlion vs the people
8:40 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong, published in ST Life! March 14, 2009
Your Honour, my client, Mr Merlion (the plaintiff), does with much regret hereby bring about a suit of damages against the people of Singapore (the defendant). The plaintiff requests compensation for personal injury, property damage and mental suffering as a direct result of the defendant's neglect, exploitation and scurrilous acts of defamation. Mr Merlion states that on multiple occasions spanning nearly four decades, Singapore and its people did scandalise his good name, exploit his image for selfish personal gains while, at the same time, neglecting to take proper steps to care for his welfare. And while Mr Merlion says he has suffered in silence for the greater good, the events of the past week have pushed him over the edge. It was the proverbial straw that broke the Merlion's head. On Saturday, Feb 28, 2009, my client was subjected to a fierce, near-fatal attack that left him with a gaping hole at the rear of his head, as well as a severe concussion. Since then, my client complains of frequent dizzy spells, making it difficult for him to perform optimally in his current employment. He rightly fears that in this harsh economic climate, his reduced capacity could lead to a loss of income. Further to the serious injuries to his head, his home - a humble platform - has also suffered damage when pieces of his head fell onto it. Now, while many have tried to write off the lightning strike as an unfortunate act of nature, Mr Merlion asserts that such an accident could have, indeed should have, been foreseen and prevented. Your Honour, it is only through clear neglect on the part of the defendant that such an accident was even allowed to happen. It is common knowledge that the right thing to do in a storm is to make yourself as small as possible so as not to present yourself as a target. Yet my client was sited - against his will, might I add - in an open space where he is the tallest thing around, no doubt an accident waiting to happen. There is no evidence of due diligence here. The buildings with lightning conductors are too far away to offer protection and my client was not fitted with a lightning rod of his own. No study of lightning strikes in the area was conducted even with the knowledge that Singapore has one of the highest rates of lightning activity in the world. Despite all this, a request by my client for an indoors location was dismissed out of hand. Further, Mr Merlion was forced to vomit water in perpetuity, making him more conductive and therefore more vulnerable to a lightning strike. I will speak more on this later when I outline the case for defamation. Your Honour, in the wake of the attack, the defendant has shown little remorse. In fact, on Internet chatboards and in the newspapers, they have made jokes about my client, completely disregarding his feelings. Some had the nerve to suggest that the broken pieces of my client's skull structure be sold as souvenirs. No one bothered to so much as send a get-well card. The situation has left Mr Merlion in depression. It is a little-known fact that he has often had to cry himself to sleep. But as I had alluded to earlier, the lightning strike is but the breaking point, the culmination of years of abuse. I am sure it is obvious to Your Honour that there is no creature, living, extinct or mythical, that could exist while constantly vomiting. How could it eat? Where is all the puke coming from? Yet, this has been how the defendant has portrayed my client to the world. It is a gross (Hah!) misrepresentation of my client's upstanding reputation and clear injurious defamation. To exacerbate the assault, the defendant has fabricated and distributed through gift shops a plastic toilet paper-holder in my client's likeness, where toilet paper is pulled out of the mouth. I submit to the Courts one such toilet paper-holder marked Exhibit A. Your Honour, is there a more obvious insult? Separately, in June of 2008, the defendant did allow one Muhammad Hafiz Tahir to use my client's likeness to design the ugliest dress in Miss Universe pageant history. This led to more mocking of my client, more depression and more tears. Your Honour, this sort of abuse cannot continue. While I leave it to Your Honour to determine the just amount of compensation, I must remind the Court that you have before you an opportunity. This is an opportunity to send a clear signal to national icons everywhere that they do not have to put up with abuse, to show them that they are equal under the law, that even half-fish, half-lions have rights, have needs, have feelings. I trust Your Honour will do the right thing. Monday, February 23, 2009
lovey dovey
3:00 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! Published Feb 21, 2009
For the first time in five years, Valentine’s Day this year fell on a weekend. Bummer.
Weekend Valentines are always a big problem for guys, because it forces us to crack our heads over a tricky philosophical question: When do you send the flowers?
Some of you may not be able to see how this could be such a difficult problem.
Just give the flowers on Valentine’s Day, right? I mean you are meeting the person for an overpriced dinner on that day itself. Why not just bring along the overpriced flowers?
Surely, if you were going to someone’s birthday dinner, you’d bring the gift instead of giving it the day before or the day after?
This may have been true for Feb 14 decades ago but recent Valentine’s Days have become far less straightforward. Back then, the only complaint was that the day had become too commercial.
These days, there are V-day politics to worry about.
You see, some time back – I don’t know exactly when – Valentine’s Day stopped being a day to celebrate love between two people. Now, it’s a competition.
The message guys try to communicate to girls on V-day is not: “Hey honey, I love you.”
Rather, it is: “Hey honey, I love you more than the other fellow over there loves his girlfriend/wife/mistress.”
Of course, they don’t say it like that. What they say is: “Dearest Darling Princess Sugar Baby,
“Happy Valentine’s Day. To me, you are like the charger to my Samsung Omnia mobile phone. We were made for each other. Other chargers I have tried, but none was compatible with me.
“Nokia, even chargers for other Samsung phones, just didn’t fit. They didn’t have that thin flat metal bit with the four holes. Only you do. Without you, I feel powerless.
“Luv, your snookums.”
They write out this stuff, the cornier the better, and have it printed in the papers in a 4cm by 4cm box accompanied by maybe a few hundred other similar messages. (“Baby, you are the cashcard to my In-car Unit. Together we can go places.”)
This means that unless the author of the message goes and circles his message with a red pen in advance, his DPSB (Darling Princess Sugar Baby) may not necessarily notice it.
Boy: “DPSB, I really love you, you know?”
DPSB (being coy): “Really? Prove it.”
Boy: “Go and look in the papers today. It’s on page four of the special Valentine’s section, near the bottom right hand corner, I think about the third column from the right.”
DPSB (searching): “Where?”
Boy: “It’s there, look carefully.”
DPSB: “WHERE?”
Or at least that’s how I imagine it goes. Of course, being able to read the loving message is only part of the fun. There is also joy to be had knowing your ad – the biggest, most colourful one on the page – is there for all the world to see.
(The world: “WHERE?”)
But before I get any letters from angry readers, let me say in all sincerity to the minority who have purely non-competitive reasons for writing those messages: I’m not talking about you.
V-day is not just a love message competition, of course. There are also simultaneous contests to see who can buy the best dinner, get the biggest bouquet or come up with the craziest, grandest romantic gesture. For example, this year’s winner is the polytechnic student who set up a candlelight dinner for his girlfriend at the beach.
Such is the nature of modern Valentine’s Day and everybody knows it. Guys try to one-up the next guy. Girls hope their guy will one-up the next guy so they can one-up the next girl.
Which brings us back to the question of when to give flowers when Valentine’s Day falls on a weekend.
The problem with giving it to her on the day itself is that she will not be at work.
And if you have bought a gigantic bouquet of roses, a large number of possible friends she can one-up will be blissfully ignorant of your gesture.
Perhaps she could lug the thing into the office on Monday or you could somehow arrange to meet up with friends earlier on Valentine’s Day before you go for dinner. But this would be too obvious and not in the spirit of the competition.
One of the quirks of this contest is that although everybody knows they are competing, they must pretend that they are not, that they don’t care what anyone else thinks apart from their loved one.
So what to do? One good option would be to send it to her workplace on Friday, one day early. The ulterior motives are only mildly obvious and everybody still gets to be impressed.
But then what do you do on the day itself? Buy another one or show up emptyhanded and let everybody else in the restaurant trump you?
It’s really a challenging question. I mulled over the pros and the cons for a long time. In fact, I got so caught up thinking about it that I did not have time to send any bouquets.
So I wrote this column instead. Sorry DPSB. Your snookums.
Doesn't work without page 12
2:57 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! Published Feb 2, 2009
Come closer, I am going to let you in on a little secret.
On page 12 of this section, there is a small picture taken on the red carpet of a recent awards show. If you were to look carefully at this picture, you will see clearly in the background, the exposed breast of supermodel Gisele Bundchen as she suffers a wardrobe malfunction.
It’s not easy to spot but it’s there all right. It’s there.
But now that you know, can you do me a favour and not go look for it straightaway. Please hold out till at least the end of this column.
Hello? Are you still reading? You are holding out, right? Good.
As you can probably already tell, today’s topic is a little bit risque and not suitable for younger readers.
But I felt a need to do my share of public education on an important condition you may be suffering from.
So, at this point, you younger readers should go on and flip ahead, but not to page 12, so that us grown-ups can have a little private talk.
To be absolutely safe, I have decided to substitute one noun with the safer word: prawn.
Today, I want to draw your attention to the very real and very serious problem of Internet prawn addiction.
I became aware of this problem recently, thanks to an article making the rounds on the Internet called The 10 Steps To Prawn Addiction: Where Are You?
In it, the writer describes a little experiment he did, where he asked 96 regular prawn users to see how long they could go without looking at prawn pictures on the Internet.
A participant dropped out when he “intentionally clicked on and ogled the prawn”. If a subject simply accidentally glimpsed some prawn spam, it was still okay.
After two weeks, the writer collected the results and what he found out was shocking.
More than half the respondents gave up in under a week. About 20 per cent failed after two days.
I know what you are thinking. Pathetic, right? They cannot even last a few days without looking at prawns. They are so addicted.
Like you, I was convinced I could do better, so I decided to personally take the prawn-quitting test.
I mean, there is no way I was addicted to it. I could just give up looking at prawn pictures any time I wanted. In fact, I am not even a regular prawn user to start with. I am king of my castle, I am master of my domain, I am, I am... a loser who dropped out after just five days.
It was not my fault. It was Zhang Ziyi’s. Let me explain by giving you an account of the week.
Day 1-2: Just as I had expected, there was very little problem at all. Sure, there is always this extra temptation to do something you are explicitly (hah) not supposed to do, but so far it is a breeze. Prawns ogled: 0
Day 3: Oh no. News broke today of Zhang Ziyi being caught topless on a beach by the paparazzi. Instantly, my considerate friends, unaware of my new quest, forward me copies of all the pictures. I force myself not to look. But how can I not look? It’s Zhang Ziyi.
Okay, maybe I’ll peek at one. I won’t ogle. And it’ll just be one.
Prawns peeked at but not ogled: 3
Day 4: She is haunting my mailbox. I find my mouse hovering over the offending mail from time to time, not wanting to open it, but somehow unable to make myself delete it either. Surely I cannot drop out after five days.
Is this right? I think my hands are getting clammy and I may be developing a flu. Just what I need, prawn-withdrawal flu.
Prawns ogled: 0 but barely hanging in there.
Day 5: 81 prawns ogled. I caved in. I may be an Internet prawn addict.
Okay, before you judge me, hear me out. The way I see it is that I had no choice but to drop out. It was my job.
No, seriously.
Here is a big-time movie star caught in the buff on the beach. The first time it has happened to an Asian star. This is big news.
As a journalist, it is my duty to remain informed. Everybody else has seen them. I should too. Giving in is not a sign of my lack of willpower. It is just me being professional. So there.
At any rate, I would not be so smug if I were you. How do you know you would have lasted longer?
How many of you have gone to check out the non-existent page 12 picture of Gisele Bundchen?
Girlfriend retrenchment
2:55 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! - published Jan 24, 2009
Dear girlfriend,
As you know, we are in the middle of the worst economic crisis to face this generation. Companies and individuals all over the world are forced to deal with drastic revenue shortfalls, salary cuts and – most painful of all – retrenchments.
I, your boyfriend (henceforth referred to as the management), being a member of the above-mentioned world in dire crisis, am no different.
Consequently, it is with deep regret and great sadness that the management informs you that the position you currently occupy has become redundant.
Effective immediately, we are terminating all non-essential staff to ensure the long-term financial viability of the management’s bank account.
In light of the organisation having no actual staff – we don’t even have a cat – yours was the only name on the list.
Rest assured, if we did have a cat, we would seriously consider laying the cat off first.
This was not a decision that was arrived at lightly and was made at great personal cost to the management. For example, the management realises we will now have to watch TV alone.
The management also sought the counsel of numerous consultants to help cope with budgetary cutbacks.
We had reason to be optimistic that these measures would work and did not issue an earlier statement so as not to alarm stakeholders unnecessarily.
We were afraid, rightly, that you would get upset and throw things.
The management tried our best to follow the tripartite guidelines on managing excess manpower, but please understand that it is difficult to offer someone in your position a shorter work week or alternative work arrangements.
The following cost-cutting measures were actioned in the period from September to January:
1. Dietary sustenance
You will note how for New Year’s Eve dinner and your recent birthday, the management elected to cook dinner for you instead of taking you out to a nice restaurant as has been the policy in previous years.
Corporate communications billed the shift as a bid to inject some “old-school romance” into the relationship.
But let’s face it, fried rice, luncheon meat and canned soup is not exactly romantic, no matter how you rebrand it.
Still, management wanted to cut cost but did not want to be accused of being cheap. A public relations campaign was prudent and necessary.
2. Public transport cuts
Perhaps you have noticed how the management has started taking fewer cabs. We are sure you did.
The management remembers the face you made when we suggested you take the bus home yourself after dinner. Perhaps it did not help that the management burnt the fried rice.
Needless to say, the management noted your lack of cooperation when it came time to appraise staff.
3. Gratuity
The less said about the Christmas gift exchange fiasco, the better.
The management lists it here simply as a matter of record.
Despite the management’s best efforts, we failed to stem the tide of red ink.
With Valentine’s Day now around the corner and no foreseeable improvement in rice frying ability, it was decided that swift action needed to be taken.
As a retrenched girlfriend, you will be afforded certain rights and allowances under the terms of the collective agreement.
If you have less than one year of creditable service, you will be allowed to keep whatever books and CDs that may have been left at your house.
This is except the two Britney Spears ones. The management is hanging on to those.
If you have more than one year of service, you will be afforded all the rights of those with less than one year of service plus a gift of your choice.
The value of this gift will be determined by using the formula $15 x years of service + cube root of pi, integrated over the limit of zero to infinity.
Please fill in the attached form with your years of service, choice of gift and calculation of gift value. Feel free to use the margins for your working.
Once again, the management deeply regrets this course of action but circumstances have painted us into a financial corner.
However, should an opening appear in a similar position within the next year, the management assures you that you will be considered for reinstatement.
Should you decline the offer, no further offers will be made.
We thank you for your years of good service and wish you the best of luck in your future endeavours.
Sincerely,
Your boyfriend (aka the management)
Dear boyfriend,
I received your letter. Just what gave you the impression you played the role of “management” in this relationship?
Consider yourself terminated.
Sincerely,
The Ex-girlfriend (aka the real management)
P.S. I’m keeping the Britney Spears CDs.
baiting twilight fans
2:52 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! Published Jan 10, 2009
What with the raging economic crisis, war in the Middle East and floods in the region, I thought this week I would tell you about a movie I watched last weekend.
The movie is called Twilight, which is based on a book written by a woman named Stephenie Meyer.
Both book and movie have proved to be huge hits here and around the world, for reasons not completely clear to me.
Let me first be clear that I was completely against watching this movie. I wanted to watch Ip Man, but I was outvoted, then dragged kicking and complaining into the cinema.
Anyway, you know how it is sometimes when you are really sceptical about something, but later find out that it’s actually really good? Twilight is not one of those cases.
All it did was reinforce a long-standing hunch I had: Women are capable of taking the fun out of everything.
This is especially true of things which guys enjoy a lot, such as video games, comics and, of course, football. Put the wrong sort of woman into the mix and you may find every ounce of fun squeezed out of it.
Twilight seems like the result of taking the uber-cool subject of bloodsucking super vampires and turning the whole thing over to someone’s 13-year-old sister.
Let me give you a quick rundown of the plot.
The story revolves around a vampire named Ed and his human biology lab partner Bella.
The two fall in love (duh) despite Ed’s initial attempts to stay away from her by skipping bio lab. This cunning plan did not work because he – and remember this is a vampire talking – “did not have the strength” to stay away from her.
Bella, in turn, is not turned off by this rakishly good-looking albeit very pale lab partner. In fact, she is intrigued by him, perhaps because she knows he is rich, can read minds, has superhuman strength, yet goes to high school.
He tells her his secret, but she still loves him and everything is just fine and dandy until a game of baseball when an evil vampire looks at her the wrong way.
Then some other stuff happens which I won’t spoil for you, assuming you still want to watch it after reading this.
In short, Twilight is Dracula meets Sweet Valley High meets a lobotomy.
I mean I can understand there being some romance, but it should be more the “you wronged my loved one, I will now avenge her with all the powers of darkness” sort of romance. And not the “Oh, I’m in pain because I want you but I can’t have you” sort.
Vampires do not yearn. When a vampire wants a girl, he transforms into a bat, flies over there, bites her and she’s his. He does not need to call his victim to arrange a meeting in a ballet studio. (This also happens in the film although not with the handsome vampire but with a plaid-wearing redneck vampire.)
And another thing: Vampires are nocturnal creatures. When sunlight touches their skin, they burn and slowly start to disintegrate or something close to that. They do not – and this is Twilight’s biggest insult – sparkle like diamonds in the sun. Do not confuse a legendary icon of horror with My Little Pony.
Also, given a choice, nobody who is immortal and has superhuman powers would spend his time repeating high school.
What is this fascination with high school? It seems every other show on TV is set in high school and women – even those who left high school a long, long time ago – simply love it. How else do you explain 90210, Gossip Girl and One Tree Hill?
Most of their feature actors, who are in their mid- to late 20s, are too old to be in high school unless they have been forced to repeat. Perhaps they are also vampires.
But back to Twilight. It is common knowledge that vampires do need sleep. They sleep in coffins in the basement of spooky castles. They do not lounge around multi-million-dollar designer homes listening to an extensive CD collection.
And finally, vampires wear a black cape, not a trendy sweater-pants ensemble. Even Sesame Street got this right. Fashion is not a vampire’s concern. A vampire’s concern is not having to scrub blood stains out of cream slacks.
So, yeah, thanks for ruining vampires for me. I’m going to let this one go but please, I beg you, leave all the other horror icons such as werewolves, Frankenstein and zombies alone.
I mean, who knows what will happen if we leave this unchecked.
One day in the future, kids will grow up thinking a werewolf is this guy who turns into a Pomeranian during a full moon and rides around in a socialite’s handbag, pooping diamonds and eating canapes, but not too many, in case his human form gets fat and he won’t be popular in the high school which he just moved to where everybody is so much richer than him, including this girl he really likes, who seems a bit mean but is actually just misunderstood.
And we certainly wouldn’t want that. It would make werewolf movies really unfun, and we need all the fun we can get, what with this economic crisis, war in the Middle East and floods in the region.
Looking forward to the new year
2:50 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! Published Dec 27, 2008
Unless you have been unconscious or living on a different planet for the past few months, you will know that there isn’t a lot of optimism floating around for next year.
Ever since the United States financial system went down the toilet in September, everyone from politicians, economists and fengshui masters to hairdressers and taxi drivers have been busy predicting that tough times are afoot.
The description of choice at the moment is “a looming cloud”.
To be specific, the looming cloud of crisis threatens to rain down on the carpark of economy, kicking up the dirt of pay cuts onto the newly washed cars of a comfortable, though not lavish, lifestyle.
Or something like that.
This has put a real damper on moods at a time when people are supposed to be happy and festive.
Fortunately, I see a silver lining to it.
I mean, you know what people are always saying about clouds.
If you look at a cloud in a certain way, in just the right light, you will be able to see the shape of a fluffy bunny, a fluffy whale or, frequently in my case, candy floss.
But that’s okay. Even if it’s candy floss, it’s a happy thing.
I am often cheered by the sight of candy floss. It’s one of those foods consumed only on happy occasions such as a day at the theme park.
You don’t get candy floss at funerals or in a parliamentary sitting.
So that’s what I’ve decided will be my aim today. I will try and find that fluffy bunny/whale/candy floss so that everyone can step into the new year with confidence, secure in the knowledge that my metaphors don’t always make sense.
Perhaps you think it is an impossible task to pick a bright spot out amid all this gloom. It’s not.
I assure you there are many happy things to look forward to – meaningful, significant things, things that are in no way diminished by the fact that I’m stalling for time because I can’t think of any.
Okay, I’ve got one.
Flying cars.
I’m not saying we will definitely have flying cars next year but at least we will be one year closer to having them.
Am I cheating with this item? Sure. But are flying cars something we all can look forward to? Of course!
I mean, if you are the sort of person who cannot get excited about zooming around in the air like the Jetsons, then, no offence, but you may be afraid of heights.
I cannot think of any downside to flying cars and the sooner carmakers get their act together on this, the better.
The big three US carmakers (Motto: You wouldn’t buy our cars, so we’re taking your money anyway) have already missed the hybrid-car boat.
If they want to be competitive and justify their multi-billion-dollar bailouts, then flying cars may just be the reform they need.
Speaking of reforms, the second thing to look forward to is a hippie lifestyle.
Boy, if I had a dollar for every time I heard someone say they want to break free from the binds of capitalist materialism and get back to the basics, I would be very wealthy indeed.
I certainly wouldn’t be thinking about breaking free from the binds of capitalist materialism.
However, as I am currently far from rich, I’ve decided to try and give a positive spin to a year when some people will be forcibly relieved from the oppressive chains of a steady income.
A hippie lifestyle is not so bad. It may not be the most hygienic but it’s easier on the environment. That’s the best I can do on this.
The third item on my list is domestic tourism.
When was the last time you visited the Singapore Zoo or the Night Safari or the giant Merlion on Sentosa that shoots lasers from its eyes?
I realise I will need to cut back on holidays next year.
There certainly won’t be any epic ones that require thousand-dollar flights to a different continent.
No, it’ll probably be a chance to get to know Singapore and its attractions better.
I mean, what good is an expensive long-haul flight anyway?
If I wanted to sit in an enclosed space for hours on end, I could just go on the Singapore Flyer. Who knows, I might even get to go abseiling for free (Rim shot).
The last thing on my fluffy bunny list is gorillas.
I have often said that gorillas do not get the widespread attention they deserve.
I believe their problem is a lack of cuteness and the fact that they look like King Kong.
That’s why they are always playing bridesmaid to pandas as far as endangered furry animals are concerned.
It is a sad fact of life that looks do matter.
Hopefully, all that will change next year. As you would probably know if gorillas had been cuter, 2009 has been declared the year of the gorilla in a United Nations effort to raise money for the primates threatened with extinction from disease, hunting and deforestation.
This doesn’t actually mean it is any easier to go and see gorillas – unless that flying-car technology works out – but hopefully, it means they will get their share of the spotlight this year.
So there you go, flying cars, a hippie lifestyle, domestic tourism and gorillas. I feel happier already.
All I need now is some candy floss.
Happy New Year.
Exercise is bad fo you
2:47 PM
Taken from Life! - published Dec 13, 2008
As I’m writing this, my skin is peeling from sunburn, my entire lower body is sore, and I now associate all stairs with blinding pain. Owwww.
I blame it all on Christmas.
Every year about this time, I start thinking about the turkey, log cakes and cookies I will inevitably be shovelling down my pipe over the coming weeks.
Already being somewhat overweight, this makes me mildly, just mildly, guilty. And so in a peace offering to my weighing scale and waistline, I tend to embark on a little pre-festive season weight loss.
The way it works is, I trim down a little before the real eating begins and then after the feasting is over, I’m back to status quo.
At least that’s how it’s supposed to work. In practice, no weight is ever lost. It doesn’t really matter what I do, the numbers don’t go down. I’m starting to think I was sold a defective scale whose needle only moves in one direction.
But none of this has stopped me from trying.
My preferred method of failing to lose weight is exercise. I’ve tried dieting before but it saps my will to live.
So anyway, for reasons that are now completely alien to me, I decided that this year’s pre-Christmas exercise regime should involve climbing an Andean mountain while on holiday.
Sounds impressive right?
Well, it only sounds that way. In the name of full disclosure, I should tell you that the mountain I chose isn’t exactly Everest-standard. It’s more like a tougher Bukit Timah Hill.
The peak of the mountain is 2,800m above sea-level although I needed to personally climb only the last 300m. A train and bus got me the rest of the way.
Also, there are little steps (Owww) carved into most of the slope, so I didn’t need any specialised equipment.
It also meant that I met a 73-year-old man scaling the same mountain.
Still, for someone whose last great ascent was when the escalator in the MRT station broke down, it was quite a feat.
I was so tired and hungry after the three hours it took to get up and get down that I walked straight off the mountain into a buffet restaurant.
And how much weight did I lose amid all this exertion?
Nothing, nada, not a single lousy gram. In fact, if my stupid scale is to be believed, I actually put on weight.
Yes, I took on the greatest physical challenge of my life to try and make room for more turkey and I actually made less room.
All of this leads me to the point of discussion I want to raise today: Exercise – what good is it?
My sojourn up and down the slopes in Peru, and the week of rehabilitation after has confirmed a niggling suspicion I had about exercise.
Not only is it completely useless, it is actually bad for you. (Or maybe it’s just bad for me.)
That exercise is useless is a well-established fact. In fact, anything you do cannot be considered exercise unless it is useless.
Take cycling for example. This is only counted as exercise when you don’t go anywhere. Riding a stationery bike is exercise, as is doing laps in a park because you start and end in the same place.
If you were to ride a bike to work, you would be achieving something useful and it is no longer considered exercise. It’s just a mode of transportation. The same goes for running.
Running on a treadmill or around MacRitchie Reservoir is exercise, but running away from a tiger is not.
Seasoned exercisers know this and therefore will happily drive the 1km to the gym to run 2km on the treadmill. (This is assuming they are not injured. More on this point later.)
Apart from daily activities rendered useless by exercise. there are numerous inherently useless activities that are also counted. These are things like push-ups, sit-ups and chin-ups which also accomplish nothing and cannot be applied to normal non-exercise life.
In real life, getting out of bed requires only sitting up once (plus a lot of stretching and rolling around). You won’t be required to do it 20 times in quick succession.
So sure, it’s useless, but does it cause any actual damage? I had a lot of time to think about this while lying down trying to recover from my bout of high-altitude exercise and I’m forced to say: Yes, it is.
Without doing any research I would say exercise is a leading cause of injuries.
Just look at ailments like athlete’s foot and tennis elbow. These are far more likely to strike people who exercise. I’m yet to see anyone suffer from lazybone’s back or couch potato’s bottom.
Also, professional footballers these days seem to have knee operations more frequently than some people change underwear.
Now that I think about it, I personally have a long history of associating injury with exercise. The one and only time I tried rock climbing, I had a piercing pain in both my forearms leaving me unable to hold a pen for days.
The day after I tried pilates, I suffered from a 24-hour stomach ache, only without the diarrhoea.
Right after I ran 12km in the army half-marathon a few years back, I had lunch, went home and slept for 14 hours. I suspect I suffered a concussion.
Clearly there is mounting evidence for my claim that exercise causes harm. Of course, if you don’t believe me and would rather listen to doctors and medical experts that have spent years studying this and didn’t make it up on the spot, then fine. I’m not going to try and stop you.
Go ahead and cycle, or jog or maybe run up and down some stairs. (Owwww)
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Cheapo
7:56 PM
Taken from ST Life! - published Nov, 15, 2008
If you are like me, then lately you would probably find yourself having more and more meals that feature cold dishes, dishes that have large infestations of mushrooms/fungus and various foods that can best be described as braised.
Yup, it’s wedding season again and this year, I am recommending that you eat sparingly.
Banquet food has been shown by fictional scientists to affect the brain.
After three bowls of braised ee-fu noodles with mushrooms, you start to get woozy and to have peculiar thoughts.
“This tastes quite good,” you say to yourself. “But I don’t want to keep paying upwards of $100 a meal to eat it while making small talk with strangers.
“If only there was a way to gather my friends and family and have them all chip in to the...”
Next thing you know, you’re proposing.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying it’s necessarily a bad thing. It’s just expensive. And times are bad.
But if you want to go ahead and do it anyway, I am here to offer some helpful hints on how to cut corners on your special day.
One main source of marriage spending for men is, of course, the diamond engagement ring.
For reasons no one has ever explained, this ring is the one gift where it is perfectly acceptable for the recipient to know how much it costs.
Every woman I know who has been proposed to knows exactly how big the rock is and how much her fiance paid for it.
Why? Is it purely to show off? It’s sort of like boasting about the amount of downpayment you put on a house, the only difference being a house often lasts longer than marriages.
As far as I’m concerned, the higher the downpayment you have to put on something, the less the seller trusts you to actually buy it.
Okay, so Tip #1: If you want to get away with buying a cheaper ring, try reciting the previous two paragraphs out loud to your girlfriend.
If a cheaper ring is still too expensive, you may want to consider Tip #2: The family heirloom gambit.
This is a simple two-step trick.
Step 1: Look for your mother or grandmother
Step 2: Ask her to give you her engagement ring.
If your girlfriend asks why you are proposing to her with a ring that’s old, a bit rusty and engraved with the words “John and Martha forever”, you simply have to tell her that it is a “family heirloom”.
Be sure to stress how much sentimental value it has and how your mother/grandmother would part with it only for someone truly special.
The major benefit of this method is that it costs nothing.
If she doesn’t fall for any of the above measures and you are forced to fork out several months’ salary for a ring, the least you can do is to insure the ring against an aborted wedding.
This can be done with a carefully worded message engraved on it.
What you want to remember here is Tip #3: The engraving on the ring should include your name but not hers.
What John did with Martha’s ring was only half right. Because his name is on it, Martha would not be inclined to keep the ring if the wedding was called off. But he can’t jolly well give it to another woman.
A better version would be simply “John loves You” or “John and You forever”.
This ring, after it’s thrown in his face, can be recycled for future proposals.
The other major expense in any given wedding is the banquet.
The best way to save money, short of cooking everything yourself is Tip #4: Buy a second-hand banquet.
Thanks to a friend who recently called off his wedding at the last minute, I discovered that there is a burgeoning second-hand banquet market out there.
At any given time, there seems to be dozens of people who have decided either not to get married or can’t make it on that date.
So they list their banquets on the Internet and you can pick one up at a steep discount – provided, that is, you are not picky about minor details such as the date of the dinner and what’s on the menu.
This may be a hardsell to your fiancee, but you can try the fengshui argument.
You: “Honey, I think Nov28 is an excellent date to get married.”
Fiancee: “WHAT? That’s tomorrow!”
You: “My geomancer said it’s auspicious”.
Of course, instead of a last-minute wedding, you can pick a time frame and then hope a second-hand slot opens up.
You: “Hi, I’m getting married. Here’s your invite.”
Guest: “Congratulations! When is it?”
You: “October-ish. Maybe November. I’m not sure yet. I have my eye on this couple’s banquet. Their engagement looks shaky. Apparently he gave her a cheap ring and called it a family heirloom.”
So there you go, some simple, easy-to-do tips to save thousands upon thousands of dollars on your wedding.
Here’s hoping you have a good one. I got you a wedding gift. And I had it engraved too.
It says : “Jeremy congratulates You.” financial crisis 2
7:53 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - published Nov 1, 2008
With the global financial crisis showing no signs of ending, I thought I should continue my research into stocks and shares, so that you too can continue to get half-baked financial information.
I’ll have you know that half-baked financial information is very fashionable these days. Many successful bankers and traders have only the vaguest idea what they are doing.
Go ahead and ask one what a credit default swop is.
Sure, all this confusion and mis-information may be how we got into this mess in the first place, but darn it, if they didn’t make a lot of money along the way.
So if you too want to make a lot of money, you have to expect a certain level of confusion.
Confused yet? No? Well, then you are in good hands.
In my last column, I provided a rough, bare-bones guide to buying stocks.
No doubt, those of you who followed my advice are now basking in wealth (provided you were already wealthy to start with), or hiding from your loan shark.
This time around, I thought I would go more in depth into the world of trading in stocks and shares, starting with a story about my personal experience.
About a week ago, after the stock market caved in, I said to myself: “Jeremy, now would be a good time to nip in and pick up some blue chips at bargain prices.”
Of course, I had no idea why I said that to myself. I don’t even know what a blue chip is.
But no matter, the point I was making to myself, is that I should go ahead and buy some stocks while they are cheap.
This is also the approach I take when buying toilet paper.
If I’m in a supermarket and I see some toilet paper on sale, I have to buy it. I buy it even if I know that I have something like 24 spare rolls at home.
There’s no such thing as too much toilet paper. You never know when you are going to have a toilet paper emergency.
For example, let’s say you’ve been invited to a Halloween party at the last minute and you haven’t had time to get a costume. What do you do?
One good option would be to go dressed as an Egyptian mummy. You can just pop into any costume store and get one at the last minute. It’s a very common costume. No sense going to a party wrapped in toilet paper.
Still, you’ll be glad you had the extra rolls if you eat some bad prawns at the party and get a bad case of the trots.
Anyway, moving on. As I was trying to pick which stock to buy, I realised that all the criteria I used for selecting toilet paper – number of plies, whether there are pictures of seashells, how soft it is when you squeeze – were not directly transferable to selecting stocks.
I’m told that a 4-ply share is not necessarily a better buy than a 2-ply share.
Instead, I’m supposed to consider things like earnings per share, par value and cashflow. There was also a mention of risk appetite, but who can eat at a time like this.
While I was thinking about all this financial stuff, one day passed and share prices suddenly shot up. The sale at the stock exchange had ended and I had missed the boat. So I was sad.
While I was being sad, another day passed and the stock market suddenly crashed again. So I quickly started reading up on companies again, which took time, and prices shot up again, and I got sad again.
The wild mood fluctuations had me confused. I couldn’t understand what was causing them. For a while, I was convinced the whole movement of the markets was handled by a gerbil.
Every trading day, some workers would activate the SGX Stock Market Gerbil. They would sprinkle some gerbil nibblets over a calculator and let it go. Whichever numbers it steps on, that will be the percentage increase or decrease.
Of course, I eventually realised that this cannot be right. It probably has more to do with bulls and bears which traders are always talking about, although I’m not sure how either animal might operate a calculator.
Anyway, it became obvious to me that I do not know enough about stocks and shares to make informed decisions. So I went and did some research which I will now present to you.
STOCKS 101: When people are buying and selling stocks and shares, what they are trading is essentially pieces of paper that say they own a small proportion of a company.
Although, in practice , this is not exactly true. Just because you own shares in say, Coca-Cola, it doesn’t mean you can walk into a 7-Eleven anytime and take one bottle for free.
No, in practice, all you really own is a piece of paper saying you own a share. This piece of paper is worth something only in as much as somebody else is willing to pay you money for it.
Most investors are very aware that their entire business is set up on the exchange of little bits of paper, so they tend to behave like nervous little gerbils.
The slightest provocation – like if someone mentions the word “recession” – will send investors scampering under the nearest fridge, driving markets down.
It’s not a perfect system, but it can be a way to make money if you buy prudently, invest in the long term and have the right risk appetite.
Otherwise, you may be better off using your money on a different kind of paper.
I recommend the 4-ply.
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Monday, March 23, 2009
Masochist holiday
8:45 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong, published in ST life! on March 21, 2009Thinking of taking a holiday in Singapore but fear there won't be enough suffering?
Well, worry no more. (Unless, of course, you happen to enjoy worrying, in which case you can worry all you want. Whatever floats your boat. I'm not here to judge.)
We will be the first to admit that Singapore has long neglected your specific demographic. In the past, the country had very little to offer people like you who demand a certain amount of pain and suffering on their vacations.
You will be glad to know that much has changed. In recent months, numerous existing attractions have been retrofitted to cater to your specific tastes. We did a detailed study and invested some effort into this project and I am sure you will like what you see.
Where we could not have the attraction to directly inflict pain on you, we inflicted pain on the attraction so that you can be reminded of pain.
We have spared no expense for the sake of your displeasure.
While we cannot list all of the different attractions here, we've picked just a few painful highlights.
Enjoy, or rather, don't enjoy your stay!
Shopping
Do you find that your shopping experience lacks pushing, shoving and people ramming into you with trolleys loaded with television sets?
Want a shopping trip where you can get good bargains and yet at the same time be exposed to risk of death by suffocation?
Then you absolutely cannot miss one of Singapore's IT fairs.
At every fair, nearly the entire male population crams into a few convention centre floors and proceeds to buy flatscreen TVs like they (the TVs, not the men) are curry puffs.
IT vendor: Hello uncle, would you like to buy a TV? There's a promotion.
Man: Sure, I'll take five. And don't call me uncle.
If you think crowds are painful, wait till you try a crowd where every other person is pushing a trolley with a giant TV in it.
You may never want to go back to normal shopping again.
Eating
Singapore has long been known for its great dining experiences. It is known for having good food at clean hawker centres at very reasonable prices.
Understandably, you masochistic tourists stayed away.
However, thanks to the innovative efforts of one seafood stall at Newton Hawker Centre, Singapore now has a dining experience it is proud to offer to visitors like you.
You will still get a taste of Singapore food but with the added satisfaction of feeling completely ripped off at the end.
Enjoy the thrill of being presented with a gigantic bill at the end of your meal. A single tiger prawn can cost as much as $30. A meal for six will cost more than that TV set you got rammed with at the IT fair.
For a little added bonus, try querying the bill. Then just sit back and soak in some fear as some burly men appear to persuade you to pay.
When you finally cave in and pay up, make sure you don't pay with exact change, then watch helplessly as the stall owner who presented you with the large bill thinks you want to give him a tip.
It's this sort of dining experience that prompted one masochist to say: 'Die, die must try'.
Water sports
After you've done all the shopping and eating, how about some outdoor activity to burn off those calories?
For you the masochist, we offer an exciting water rescue that combines physical pain of injury with the emotional pain of feeling unappreciated.
The day starts with a stroll along the Singapore River near the Merlion. If you are lucky, someone who cannot swim will fall into the water. You then dive into the water to perform a heroic rescue.
In the process, you are likely to suffer scrapes and bruises bad enough to warrant a trip to hospital.
Sounds good so far? It gets better.
Not only are you wet and injured for doing a good thing, you will also be out of pocket to the tune of $90. Yes, as a special treat for tourists like you, you will be made to pay your hospital bill.
During the trip, be sure to have your picture taken with the Merlion statue.
It became an iconic symbol for pain after a lightning strike left a large hole in its head.
Amazing views
After all that excitement, it's time to wind down with a relaxing ride on the world's largest observation wheel, the Singapore Flyer. Such wheels may be commonplace these days, but none offers the kind of torture we do.
As with the water rescue, timing is crucial here. While the wheel will operate normally most times (it has to cater to normal tourists too), it will occasionally break down.
When it does, you can look forward to up to six hours stuck in a small enclosed capsule at over 100m in the air.
This is especially recommended for claustrophobic masochists who fear heights.
For the ultimate experience though, make sure to drink a lot of water just before you get on and don't take any plastic bags with you.
Somewhere around the third hour, you'll be a big hit with the rest of the passengers.
These are but a few of the many wonderful experiences just waiting to be enjoyed. And we're coming up with new ways to hurt you all the time.
So what are you waiting for? Contact your travel agent today.
merlion vs the people
8:40 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong, published in ST Life! March 14, 2009
Your Honour, my client, Mr Merlion (the plaintiff), does with much regret hereby bring about a suit of damages against the people of Singapore (the defendant). The plaintiff requests compensation for personal injury, property damage and mental suffering as a direct result of the defendant's neglect, exploitation and scurrilous acts of defamation. Mr Merlion states that on multiple occasions spanning nearly four decades, Singapore and its people did scandalise his good name, exploit his image for selfish personal gains while, at the same time, neglecting to take proper steps to care for his welfare. And while Mr Merlion says he has suffered in silence for the greater good, the events of the past week have pushed him over the edge. It was the proverbial straw that broke the Merlion's head. On Saturday, Feb 28, 2009, my client was subjected to a fierce, near-fatal attack that left him with a gaping hole at the rear of his head, as well as a severe concussion. Since then, my client complains of frequent dizzy spells, making it difficult for him to perform optimally in his current employment. He rightly fears that in this harsh economic climate, his reduced capacity could lead to a loss of income. Further to the serious injuries to his head, his home - a humble platform - has also suffered damage when pieces of his head fell onto it. Now, while many have tried to write off the lightning strike as an unfortunate act of nature, Mr Merlion asserts that such an accident could have, indeed should have, been foreseen and prevented. Your Honour, it is only through clear neglect on the part of the defendant that such an accident was even allowed to happen. It is common knowledge that the right thing to do in a storm is to make yourself as small as possible so as not to present yourself as a target. Yet my client was sited - against his will, might I add - in an open space where he is the tallest thing around, no doubt an accident waiting to happen. There is no evidence of due diligence here. The buildings with lightning conductors are too far away to offer protection and my client was not fitted with a lightning rod of his own. No study of lightning strikes in the area was conducted even with the knowledge that Singapore has one of the highest rates of lightning activity in the world. Despite all this, a request by my client for an indoors location was dismissed out of hand. Further, Mr Merlion was forced to vomit water in perpetuity, making him more conductive and therefore more vulnerable to a lightning strike. I will speak more on this later when I outline the case for defamation. Your Honour, in the wake of the attack, the defendant has shown little remorse. In fact, on Internet chatboards and in the newspapers, they have made jokes about my client, completely disregarding his feelings. Some had the nerve to suggest that the broken pieces of my client's skull structure be sold as souvenirs. No one bothered to so much as send a get-well card. The situation has left Mr Merlion in depression. It is a little-known fact that he has often had to cry himself to sleep. But as I had alluded to earlier, the lightning strike is but the breaking point, the culmination of years of abuse. I am sure it is obvious to Your Honour that there is no creature, living, extinct or mythical, that could exist while constantly vomiting. How could it eat? Where is all the puke coming from? Yet, this has been how the defendant has portrayed my client to the world. It is a gross (Hah!) misrepresentation of my client's upstanding reputation and clear injurious defamation. To exacerbate the assault, the defendant has fabricated and distributed through gift shops a plastic toilet paper-holder in my client's likeness, where toilet paper is pulled out of the mouth. I submit to the Courts one such toilet paper-holder marked Exhibit A. Your Honour, is there a more obvious insult? Separately, in June of 2008, the defendant did allow one Muhammad Hafiz Tahir to use my client's likeness to design the ugliest dress in Miss Universe pageant history. This led to more mocking of my client, more depression and more tears. Your Honour, this sort of abuse cannot continue. While I leave it to Your Honour to determine the just amount of compensation, I must remind the Court that you have before you an opportunity. This is an opportunity to send a clear signal to national icons everywhere that they do not have to put up with abuse, to show them that they are equal under the law, that even half-fish, half-lions have rights, have needs, have feelings. I trust Your Honour will do the right thing. Monday, February 23, 2009
lovey dovey
3:00 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! Published Feb 21, 2009
For the first time in five years, Valentine’s Day this year fell on a weekend. Bummer.
Weekend Valentines are always a big problem for guys, because it forces us to crack our heads over a tricky philosophical question: When do you send the flowers?
Some of you may not be able to see how this could be such a difficult problem.
Just give the flowers on Valentine’s Day, right? I mean you are meeting the person for an overpriced dinner on that day itself. Why not just bring along the overpriced flowers?
Surely, if you were going to someone’s birthday dinner, you’d bring the gift instead of giving it the day before or the day after?
This may have been true for Feb 14 decades ago but recent Valentine’s Days have become far less straightforward. Back then, the only complaint was that the day had become too commercial.
These days, there are V-day politics to worry about.
You see, some time back – I don’t know exactly when – Valentine’s Day stopped being a day to celebrate love between two people. Now, it’s a competition.
The message guys try to communicate to girls on V-day is not: “Hey honey, I love you.”
Rather, it is: “Hey honey, I love you more than the other fellow over there loves his girlfriend/wife/mistress.”
Of course, they don’t say it like that. What they say is: “Dearest Darling Princess Sugar Baby,
“Happy Valentine’s Day. To me, you are like the charger to my Samsung Omnia mobile phone. We were made for each other. Other chargers I have tried, but none was compatible with me.
“Nokia, even chargers for other Samsung phones, just didn’t fit. They didn’t have that thin flat metal bit with the four holes. Only you do. Without you, I feel powerless.
“Luv, your snookums.”
They write out this stuff, the cornier the better, and have it printed in the papers in a 4cm by 4cm box accompanied by maybe a few hundred other similar messages. (“Baby, you are the cashcard to my In-car Unit. Together we can go places.”)
This means that unless the author of the message goes and circles his message with a red pen in advance, his DPSB (Darling Princess Sugar Baby) may not necessarily notice it.
Boy: “DPSB, I really love you, you know?”
DPSB (being coy): “Really? Prove it.”
Boy: “Go and look in the papers today. It’s on page four of the special Valentine’s section, near the bottom right hand corner, I think about the third column from the right.”
DPSB (searching): “Where?”
Boy: “It’s there, look carefully.”
DPSB: “WHERE?”
Or at least that’s how I imagine it goes. Of course, being able to read the loving message is only part of the fun. There is also joy to be had knowing your ad – the biggest, most colourful one on the page – is there for all the world to see.
(The world: “WHERE?”)
But before I get any letters from angry readers, let me say in all sincerity to the minority who have purely non-competitive reasons for writing those messages: I’m not talking about you.
V-day is not just a love message competition, of course. There are also simultaneous contests to see who can buy the best dinner, get the biggest bouquet or come up with the craziest, grandest romantic gesture. For example, this year’s winner is the polytechnic student who set up a candlelight dinner for his girlfriend at the beach.
Such is the nature of modern Valentine’s Day and everybody knows it. Guys try to one-up the next guy. Girls hope their guy will one-up the next guy so they can one-up the next girl.
Which brings us back to the question of when to give flowers when Valentine’s Day falls on a weekend.
The problem with giving it to her on the day itself is that she will not be at work.
And if you have bought a gigantic bouquet of roses, a large number of possible friends she can one-up will be blissfully ignorant of your gesture.
Perhaps she could lug the thing into the office on Monday or you could somehow arrange to meet up with friends earlier on Valentine’s Day before you go for dinner. But this would be too obvious and not in the spirit of the competition.
One of the quirks of this contest is that although everybody knows they are competing, they must pretend that they are not, that they don’t care what anyone else thinks apart from their loved one.
So what to do? One good option would be to send it to her workplace on Friday, one day early. The ulterior motives are only mildly obvious and everybody still gets to be impressed.
But then what do you do on the day itself? Buy another one or show up emptyhanded and let everybody else in the restaurant trump you?
It’s really a challenging question. I mulled over the pros and the cons for a long time. In fact, I got so caught up thinking about it that I did not have time to send any bouquets.
So I wrote this column instead. Sorry DPSB. Your snookums.
Doesn't work without page 12
2:57 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! Published Feb 2, 2009
Come closer, I am going to let you in on a little secret.
On page 12 of this section, there is a small picture taken on the red carpet of a recent awards show. If you were to look carefully at this picture, you will see clearly in the background, the exposed breast of supermodel Gisele Bundchen as she suffers a wardrobe malfunction.
It’s not easy to spot but it’s there all right. It’s there.
But now that you know, can you do me a favour and not go look for it straightaway. Please hold out till at least the end of this column.
Hello? Are you still reading? You are holding out, right? Good.
As you can probably already tell, today’s topic is a little bit risque and not suitable for younger readers.
But I felt a need to do my share of public education on an important condition you may be suffering from.
So, at this point, you younger readers should go on and flip ahead, but not to page 12, so that us grown-ups can have a little private talk.
To be absolutely safe, I have decided to substitute one noun with the safer word: prawn.
Today, I want to draw your attention to the very real and very serious problem of Internet prawn addiction.
I became aware of this problem recently, thanks to an article making the rounds on the Internet called The 10 Steps To Prawn Addiction: Where Are You?
In it, the writer describes a little experiment he did, where he asked 96 regular prawn users to see how long they could go without looking at prawn pictures on the Internet.
A participant dropped out when he “intentionally clicked on and ogled the prawn”. If a subject simply accidentally glimpsed some prawn spam, it was still okay.
After two weeks, the writer collected the results and what he found out was shocking.
More than half the respondents gave up in under a week. About 20 per cent failed after two days.
I know what you are thinking. Pathetic, right? They cannot even last a few days without looking at prawns. They are so addicted.
Like you, I was convinced I could do better, so I decided to personally take the prawn-quitting test.
I mean, there is no way I was addicted to it. I could just give up looking at prawn pictures any time I wanted. In fact, I am not even a regular prawn user to start with. I am king of my castle, I am master of my domain, I am, I am... a loser who dropped out after just five days.
It was not my fault. It was Zhang Ziyi’s. Let me explain by giving you an account of the week.
Day 1-2: Just as I had expected, there was very little problem at all. Sure, there is always this extra temptation to do something you are explicitly (hah) not supposed to do, but so far it is a breeze. Prawns ogled: 0
Day 3: Oh no. News broke today of Zhang Ziyi being caught topless on a beach by the paparazzi. Instantly, my considerate friends, unaware of my new quest, forward me copies of all the pictures. I force myself not to look. But how can I not look? It’s Zhang Ziyi.
Okay, maybe I’ll peek at one. I won’t ogle. And it’ll just be one.
Prawns peeked at but not ogled: 3
Day 4: She is haunting my mailbox. I find my mouse hovering over the offending mail from time to time, not wanting to open it, but somehow unable to make myself delete it either. Surely I cannot drop out after five days.
Is this right? I think my hands are getting clammy and I may be developing a flu. Just what I need, prawn-withdrawal flu.
Prawns ogled: 0 but barely hanging in there.
Day 5: 81 prawns ogled. I caved in. I may be an Internet prawn addict.
Okay, before you judge me, hear me out. The way I see it is that I had no choice but to drop out. It was my job.
No, seriously.
Here is a big-time movie star caught in the buff on the beach. The first time it has happened to an Asian star. This is big news.
As a journalist, it is my duty to remain informed. Everybody else has seen them. I should too. Giving in is not a sign of my lack of willpower. It is just me being professional. So there.
At any rate, I would not be so smug if I were you. How do you know you would have lasted longer?
How many of you have gone to check out the non-existent page 12 picture of Gisele Bundchen?
Girlfriend retrenchment
2:55 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! - published Jan 24, 2009
Dear girlfriend,
As you know, we are in the middle of the worst economic crisis to face this generation. Companies and individuals all over the world are forced to deal with drastic revenue shortfalls, salary cuts and – most painful of all – retrenchments.
I, your boyfriend (henceforth referred to as the management), being a member of the above-mentioned world in dire crisis, am no different.
Consequently, it is with deep regret and great sadness that the management informs you that the position you currently occupy has become redundant.
Effective immediately, we are terminating all non-essential staff to ensure the long-term financial viability of the management’s bank account.
In light of the organisation having no actual staff – we don’t even have a cat – yours was the only name on the list.
Rest assured, if we did have a cat, we would seriously consider laying the cat off first.
This was not a decision that was arrived at lightly and was made at great personal cost to the management. For example, the management realises we will now have to watch TV alone.
The management also sought the counsel of numerous consultants to help cope with budgetary cutbacks.
We had reason to be optimistic that these measures would work and did not issue an earlier statement so as not to alarm stakeholders unnecessarily.
We were afraid, rightly, that you would get upset and throw things.
The management tried our best to follow the tripartite guidelines on managing excess manpower, but please understand that it is difficult to offer someone in your position a shorter work week or alternative work arrangements.
The following cost-cutting measures were actioned in the period from September to January:
1. Dietary sustenance
You will note how for New Year’s Eve dinner and your recent birthday, the management elected to cook dinner for you instead of taking you out to a nice restaurant as has been the policy in previous years.
Corporate communications billed the shift as a bid to inject some “old-school romance” into the relationship.
But let’s face it, fried rice, luncheon meat and canned soup is not exactly romantic, no matter how you rebrand it.
Still, management wanted to cut cost but did not want to be accused of being cheap. A public relations campaign was prudent and necessary.
2. Public transport cuts
Perhaps you have noticed how the management has started taking fewer cabs. We are sure you did.
The management remembers the face you made when we suggested you take the bus home yourself after dinner. Perhaps it did not help that the management burnt the fried rice.
Needless to say, the management noted your lack of cooperation when it came time to appraise staff.
3. Gratuity
The less said about the Christmas gift exchange fiasco, the better.
The management lists it here simply as a matter of record.
Despite the management’s best efforts, we failed to stem the tide of red ink.
With Valentine’s Day now around the corner and no foreseeable improvement in rice frying ability, it was decided that swift action needed to be taken.
As a retrenched girlfriend, you will be afforded certain rights and allowances under the terms of the collective agreement.
If you have less than one year of creditable service, you will be allowed to keep whatever books and CDs that may have been left at your house.
This is except the two Britney Spears ones. The management is hanging on to those.
If you have more than one year of service, you will be afforded all the rights of those with less than one year of service plus a gift of your choice.
The value of this gift will be determined by using the formula $15 x years of service + cube root of pi, integrated over the limit of zero to infinity.
Please fill in the attached form with your years of service, choice of gift and calculation of gift value. Feel free to use the margins for your working.
Once again, the management deeply regrets this course of action but circumstances have painted us into a financial corner.
However, should an opening appear in a similar position within the next year, the management assures you that you will be considered for reinstatement.
Should you decline the offer, no further offers will be made.
We thank you for your years of good service and wish you the best of luck in your future endeavours.
Sincerely,
Your boyfriend (aka the management)
Dear boyfriend,
I received your letter. Just what gave you the impression you played the role of “management” in this relationship?
Consider yourself terminated.
Sincerely,
The Ex-girlfriend (aka the real management)
P.S. I’m keeping the Britney Spears CDs.
baiting twilight fans
2:52 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! Published Jan 10, 2009
What with the raging economic crisis, war in the Middle East and floods in the region, I thought this week I would tell you about a movie I watched last weekend.
The movie is called Twilight, which is based on a book written by a woman named Stephenie Meyer.
Both book and movie have proved to be huge hits here and around the world, for reasons not completely clear to me.
Let me first be clear that I was completely against watching this movie. I wanted to watch Ip Man, but I was outvoted, then dragged kicking and complaining into the cinema.
Anyway, you know how it is sometimes when you are really sceptical about something, but later find out that it’s actually really good? Twilight is not one of those cases.
All it did was reinforce a long-standing hunch I had: Women are capable of taking the fun out of everything.
This is especially true of things which guys enjoy a lot, such as video games, comics and, of course, football. Put the wrong sort of woman into the mix and you may find every ounce of fun squeezed out of it.
Twilight seems like the result of taking the uber-cool subject of bloodsucking super vampires and turning the whole thing over to someone’s 13-year-old sister.
Let me give you a quick rundown of the plot.
The story revolves around a vampire named Ed and his human biology lab partner Bella.
The two fall in love (duh) despite Ed’s initial attempts to stay away from her by skipping bio lab. This cunning plan did not work because he – and remember this is a vampire talking – “did not have the strength” to stay away from her.
Bella, in turn, is not turned off by this rakishly good-looking albeit very pale lab partner. In fact, she is intrigued by him, perhaps because she knows he is rich, can read minds, has superhuman strength, yet goes to high school.
He tells her his secret, but she still loves him and everything is just fine and dandy until a game of baseball when an evil vampire looks at her the wrong way.
Then some other stuff happens which I won’t spoil for you, assuming you still want to watch it after reading this.
In short, Twilight is Dracula meets Sweet Valley High meets a lobotomy.
I mean I can understand there being some romance, but it should be more the “you wronged my loved one, I will now avenge her with all the powers of darkness” sort of romance. And not the “Oh, I’m in pain because I want you but I can’t have you” sort.
Vampires do not yearn. When a vampire wants a girl, he transforms into a bat, flies over there, bites her and she’s his. He does not need to call his victim to arrange a meeting in a ballet studio. (This also happens in the film although not with the handsome vampire but with a plaid-wearing redneck vampire.)
And another thing: Vampires are nocturnal creatures. When sunlight touches their skin, they burn and slowly start to disintegrate or something close to that. They do not – and this is Twilight’s biggest insult – sparkle like diamonds in the sun. Do not confuse a legendary icon of horror with My Little Pony.
Also, given a choice, nobody who is immortal and has superhuman powers would spend his time repeating high school.
What is this fascination with high school? It seems every other show on TV is set in high school and women – even those who left high school a long, long time ago – simply love it. How else do you explain 90210, Gossip Girl and One Tree Hill?
Most of their feature actors, who are in their mid- to late 20s, are too old to be in high school unless they have been forced to repeat. Perhaps they are also vampires.
But back to Twilight. It is common knowledge that vampires do need sleep. They sleep in coffins in the basement of spooky castles. They do not lounge around multi-million-dollar designer homes listening to an extensive CD collection.
And finally, vampires wear a black cape, not a trendy sweater-pants ensemble. Even Sesame Street got this right. Fashion is not a vampire’s concern. A vampire’s concern is not having to scrub blood stains out of cream slacks.
So, yeah, thanks for ruining vampires for me. I’m going to let this one go but please, I beg you, leave all the other horror icons such as werewolves, Frankenstein and zombies alone.
I mean, who knows what will happen if we leave this unchecked.
One day in the future, kids will grow up thinking a werewolf is this guy who turns into a Pomeranian during a full moon and rides around in a socialite’s handbag, pooping diamonds and eating canapes, but not too many, in case his human form gets fat and he won’t be popular in the high school which he just moved to where everybody is so much richer than him, including this girl he really likes, who seems a bit mean but is actually just misunderstood.
And we certainly wouldn’t want that. It would make werewolf movies really unfun, and we need all the fun we can get, what with this economic crisis, war in the Middle East and floods in the region.
Looking forward to the new year
2:50 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - taken from ST Life! Published Dec 27, 2008
Unless you have been unconscious or living on a different planet for the past few months, you will know that there isn’t a lot of optimism floating around for next year.
Ever since the United States financial system went down the toilet in September, everyone from politicians, economists and fengshui masters to hairdressers and taxi drivers have been busy predicting that tough times are afoot.
The description of choice at the moment is “a looming cloud”.
To be specific, the looming cloud of crisis threatens to rain down on the carpark of economy, kicking up the dirt of pay cuts onto the newly washed cars of a comfortable, though not lavish, lifestyle.
Or something like that.
This has put a real damper on moods at a time when people are supposed to be happy and festive.
Fortunately, I see a silver lining to it.
I mean, you know what people are always saying about clouds.
If you look at a cloud in a certain way, in just the right light, you will be able to see the shape of a fluffy bunny, a fluffy whale or, frequently in my case, candy floss.
But that’s okay. Even if it’s candy floss, it’s a happy thing.
I am often cheered by the sight of candy floss. It’s one of those foods consumed only on happy occasions such as a day at the theme park.
You don’t get candy floss at funerals or in a parliamentary sitting.
So that’s what I’ve decided will be my aim today. I will try and find that fluffy bunny/whale/candy floss so that everyone can step into the new year with confidence, secure in the knowledge that my metaphors don’t always make sense.
Perhaps you think it is an impossible task to pick a bright spot out amid all this gloom. It’s not.
I assure you there are many happy things to look forward to – meaningful, significant things, things that are in no way diminished by the fact that I’m stalling for time because I can’t think of any.
Okay, I’ve got one.
Flying cars.
I’m not saying we will definitely have flying cars next year but at least we will be one year closer to having them.
Am I cheating with this item? Sure. But are flying cars something we all can look forward to? Of course!
I mean, if you are the sort of person who cannot get excited about zooming around in the air like the Jetsons, then, no offence, but you may be afraid of heights.
I cannot think of any downside to flying cars and the sooner carmakers get their act together on this, the better.
The big three US carmakers (Motto: You wouldn’t buy our cars, so we’re taking your money anyway) have already missed the hybrid-car boat.
If they want to be competitive and justify their multi-billion-dollar bailouts, then flying cars may just be the reform they need.
Speaking of reforms, the second thing to look forward to is a hippie lifestyle.
Boy, if I had a dollar for every time I heard someone say they want to break free from the binds of capitalist materialism and get back to the basics, I would be very wealthy indeed.
I certainly wouldn’t be thinking about breaking free from the binds of capitalist materialism.
However, as I am currently far from rich, I’ve decided to try and give a positive spin to a year when some people will be forcibly relieved from the oppressive chains of a steady income.
A hippie lifestyle is not so bad. It may not be the most hygienic but it’s easier on the environment. That’s the best I can do on this.
The third item on my list is domestic tourism.
When was the last time you visited the Singapore Zoo or the Night Safari or the giant Merlion on Sentosa that shoots lasers from its eyes?
I realise I will need to cut back on holidays next year.
There certainly won’t be any epic ones that require thousand-dollar flights to a different continent.
No, it’ll probably be a chance to get to know Singapore and its attractions better.
I mean, what good is an expensive long-haul flight anyway?
If I wanted to sit in an enclosed space for hours on end, I could just go on the Singapore Flyer. Who knows, I might even get to go abseiling for free (Rim shot).
The last thing on my fluffy bunny list is gorillas.
I have often said that gorillas do not get the widespread attention they deserve.
I believe their problem is a lack of cuteness and the fact that they look like King Kong.
That’s why they are always playing bridesmaid to pandas as far as endangered furry animals are concerned.
It is a sad fact of life that looks do matter.
Hopefully, all that will change next year. As you would probably know if gorillas had been cuter, 2009 has been declared the year of the gorilla in a United Nations effort to raise money for the primates threatened with extinction from disease, hunting and deforestation.
This doesn’t actually mean it is any easier to go and see gorillas – unless that flying-car technology works out – but hopefully, it means they will get their share of the spotlight this year.
So there you go, flying cars, a hippie lifestyle, domestic tourism and gorillas. I feel happier already.
All I need now is some candy floss.
Happy New Year.
Exercise is bad fo you
2:47 PM
Taken from Life! - published Dec 13, 2008
As I’m writing this, my skin is peeling from sunburn, my entire lower body is sore, and I now associate all stairs with blinding pain. Owwww.
I blame it all on Christmas.
Every year about this time, I start thinking about the turkey, log cakes and cookies I will inevitably be shovelling down my pipe over the coming weeks.
Already being somewhat overweight, this makes me mildly, just mildly, guilty. And so in a peace offering to my weighing scale and waistline, I tend to embark on a little pre-festive season weight loss.
The way it works is, I trim down a little before the real eating begins and then after the feasting is over, I’m back to status quo.
At least that’s how it’s supposed to work. In practice, no weight is ever lost. It doesn’t really matter what I do, the numbers don’t go down. I’m starting to think I was sold a defective scale whose needle only moves in one direction.
But none of this has stopped me from trying.
My preferred method of failing to lose weight is exercise. I’ve tried dieting before but it saps my will to live.
So anyway, for reasons that are now completely alien to me, I decided that this year’s pre-Christmas exercise regime should involve climbing an Andean mountain while on holiday.
Sounds impressive right?
Well, it only sounds that way. In the name of full disclosure, I should tell you that the mountain I chose isn’t exactly Everest-standard. It’s more like a tougher Bukit Timah Hill.
The peak of the mountain is 2,800m above sea-level although I needed to personally climb only the last 300m. A train and bus got me the rest of the way.
Also, there are little steps (Owww) carved into most of the slope, so I didn’t need any specialised equipment.
It also meant that I met a 73-year-old man scaling the same mountain.
Still, for someone whose last great ascent was when the escalator in the MRT station broke down, it was quite a feat.
I was so tired and hungry after the three hours it took to get up and get down that I walked straight off the mountain into a buffet restaurant.
And how much weight did I lose amid all this exertion?
Nothing, nada, not a single lousy gram. In fact, if my stupid scale is to be believed, I actually put on weight.
Yes, I took on the greatest physical challenge of my life to try and make room for more turkey and I actually made less room.
All of this leads me to the point of discussion I want to raise today: Exercise – what good is it?
My sojourn up and down the slopes in Peru, and the week of rehabilitation after has confirmed a niggling suspicion I had about exercise.
Not only is it completely useless, it is actually bad for you. (Or maybe it’s just bad for me.)
That exercise is useless is a well-established fact. In fact, anything you do cannot be considered exercise unless it is useless.
Take cycling for example. This is only counted as exercise when you don’t go anywhere. Riding a stationery bike is exercise, as is doing laps in a park because you start and end in the same place.
If you were to ride a bike to work, you would be achieving something useful and it is no longer considered exercise. It’s just a mode of transportation. The same goes for running.
Running on a treadmill or around MacRitchie Reservoir is exercise, but running away from a tiger is not.
Seasoned exercisers know this and therefore will happily drive the 1km to the gym to run 2km on the treadmill. (This is assuming they are not injured. More on this point later.)
Apart from daily activities rendered useless by exercise. there are numerous inherently useless activities that are also counted. These are things like push-ups, sit-ups and chin-ups which also accomplish nothing and cannot be applied to normal non-exercise life.
In real life, getting out of bed requires only sitting up once (plus a lot of stretching and rolling around). You won’t be required to do it 20 times in quick succession.
So sure, it’s useless, but does it cause any actual damage? I had a lot of time to think about this while lying down trying to recover from my bout of high-altitude exercise and I’m forced to say: Yes, it is.
Without doing any research I would say exercise is a leading cause of injuries.
Just look at ailments like athlete’s foot and tennis elbow. These are far more likely to strike people who exercise. I’m yet to see anyone suffer from lazybone’s back or couch potato’s bottom.
Also, professional footballers these days seem to have knee operations more frequently than some people change underwear.
Now that I think about it, I personally have a long history of associating injury with exercise. The one and only time I tried rock climbing, I had a piercing pain in both my forearms leaving me unable to hold a pen for days.
The day after I tried pilates, I suffered from a 24-hour stomach ache, only without the diarrhoea.
Right after I ran 12km in the army half-marathon a few years back, I had lunch, went home and slept for 14 hours. I suspect I suffered a concussion.
Clearly there is mounting evidence for my claim that exercise causes harm. Of course, if you don’t believe me and would rather listen to doctors and medical experts that have spent years studying this and didn’t make it up on the spot, then fine. I’m not going to try and stop you.
Go ahead and cycle, or jog or maybe run up and down some stairs. (Owwww)
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Cheapo
7:56 PM
Taken from ST Life! - published Nov, 15, 2008
If you are like me, then lately you would probably find yourself having more and more meals that feature cold dishes, dishes that have large infestations of mushrooms/fungus and various foods that can best be described as braised.
Yup, it’s wedding season again and this year, I am recommending that you eat sparingly.
Banquet food has been shown by fictional scientists to affect the brain.
After three bowls of braised ee-fu noodles with mushrooms, you start to get woozy and to have peculiar thoughts.
“This tastes quite good,” you say to yourself. “But I don’t want to keep paying upwards of $100 a meal to eat it while making small talk with strangers.
“If only there was a way to gather my friends and family and have them all chip in to the...”
Next thing you know, you’re proposing.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying it’s necessarily a bad thing. It’s just expensive. And times are bad.
But if you want to go ahead and do it anyway, I am here to offer some helpful hints on how to cut corners on your special day.
One main source of marriage spending for men is, of course, the diamond engagement ring.
For reasons no one has ever explained, this ring is the one gift where it is perfectly acceptable for the recipient to know how much it costs.
Every woman I know who has been proposed to knows exactly how big the rock is and how much her fiance paid for it.
Why? Is it purely to show off? It’s sort of like boasting about the amount of downpayment you put on a house, the only difference being a house often lasts longer than marriages.
As far as I’m concerned, the higher the downpayment you have to put on something, the less the seller trusts you to actually buy it.
Okay, so Tip #1: If you want to get away with buying a cheaper ring, try reciting the previous two paragraphs out loud to your girlfriend.
If a cheaper ring is still too expensive, you may want to consider Tip #2: The family heirloom gambit.
This is a simple two-step trick.
Step 1: Look for your mother or grandmother
Step 2: Ask her to give you her engagement ring.
If your girlfriend asks why you are proposing to her with a ring that’s old, a bit rusty and engraved with the words “John and Martha forever”, you simply have to tell her that it is a “family heirloom”.
Be sure to stress how much sentimental value it has and how your mother/grandmother would part with it only for someone truly special.
The major benefit of this method is that it costs nothing.
If she doesn’t fall for any of the above measures and you are forced to fork out several months’ salary for a ring, the least you can do is to insure the ring against an aborted wedding.
This can be done with a carefully worded message engraved on it.
What you want to remember here is Tip #3: The engraving on the ring should include your name but not hers.
What John did with Martha’s ring was only half right. Because his name is on it, Martha would not be inclined to keep the ring if the wedding was called off. But he can’t jolly well give it to another woman.
A better version would be simply “John loves You” or “John and You forever”.
This ring, after it’s thrown in his face, can be recycled for future proposals.
The other major expense in any given wedding is the banquet.
The best way to save money, short of cooking everything yourself is Tip #4: Buy a second-hand banquet.
Thanks to a friend who recently called off his wedding at the last minute, I discovered that there is a burgeoning second-hand banquet market out there.
At any given time, there seems to be dozens of people who have decided either not to get married or can’t make it on that date.
So they list their banquets on the Internet and you can pick one up at a steep discount – provided, that is, you are not picky about minor details such as the date of the dinner and what’s on the menu.
This may be a hardsell to your fiancee, but you can try the fengshui argument.
You: “Honey, I think Nov28 is an excellent date to get married.”
Fiancee: “WHAT? That’s tomorrow!”
You: “My geomancer said it’s auspicious”.
Of course, instead of a last-minute wedding, you can pick a time frame and then hope a second-hand slot opens up.
You: “Hi, I’m getting married. Here’s your invite.”
Guest: “Congratulations! When is it?”
You: “October-ish. Maybe November. I’m not sure yet. I have my eye on this couple’s banquet. Their engagement looks shaky. Apparently he gave her a cheap ring and called it a family heirloom.”
So there you go, some simple, easy-to-do tips to save thousands upon thousands of dollars on your wedding.
Here’s hoping you have a good one. I got you a wedding gift. And I had it engraved too.
It says : “Jeremy congratulates You.” financial crisis 2
7:53 PM
By Jeremy Au Yong - published Nov 1, 2008
With the global financial crisis showing no signs of ending, I thought I should continue my research into stocks and shares, so that you too can continue to get half-baked financial information.
I’ll have you know that half-baked financial information is very fashionable these days. Many successful bankers and traders have only the vaguest idea what they are doing.
Go ahead and ask one what a credit default swop is.
Sure, all this confusion and mis-information may be how we got into this mess in the first place, but darn it, if they didn’t make a lot of money along the way.
So if you too want to make a lot of money, you have to expect a certain level of confusion.
Confused yet? No? Well, then you are in good hands.
In my last column, I provided a rough, bare-bones guide to buying stocks.
No doubt, those of you who followed my advice are now basking in wealth (provided you were already wealthy to start with), or hiding from your loan shark.
This time around, I thought I would go more in depth into the world of trading in stocks and shares, starting with a story about my personal experience.
About a week ago, after the stock market caved in, I said to myself: “Jeremy, now would be a good time to nip in and pick up some blue chips at bargain prices.”
Of course, I had no idea why I said that to myself. I don’t even know what a blue chip is.
But no matter, the point I was making to myself, is that I should go ahead and buy some stocks while they are cheap.
This is also the approach I take when buying toilet paper.
If I’m in a supermarket and I see some toilet paper on sale, I have to buy it. I buy it even if I know that I have something like 24 spare rolls at home.
There’s no such thing as too much toilet paper. You never know when you are going to have a toilet paper emergency.
For example, let’s say you’ve been invited to a Halloween party at the last minute and you haven’t had time to get a costume. What do you do?
One good option would be to go dressed as an Egyptian mummy. You can just pop into any costume store and get one at the last minute. It’s a very common costume. No sense going to a party wrapped in toilet paper.
Still, you’ll be glad you had the extra rolls if you eat some bad prawns at the party and get a bad case of the trots.
Anyway, moving on. As I was trying to pick which stock to buy, I realised that all the criteria I used for selecting toilet paper – number of plies, whether there are pictures of seashells, how soft it is when you squeeze – were not directly transferable to selecting stocks.
I’m told that a 4-ply share is not necessarily a better buy than a 2-ply share.
Instead, I’m supposed to consider things like earnings per share, par value and cashflow. There was also a mention of risk appetite, but who can eat at a time like this.
While I was thinking about all this financial stuff, one day passed and share prices suddenly shot up. The sale at the stock exchange had ended and I had missed the boat. So I was sad.
While I was being sad, another day passed and the stock market suddenly crashed again. So I quickly started reading up on companies again, which took time, and prices shot up again, and I got sad again.
The wild mood fluctuations had me confused. I couldn’t understand what was causing them. For a while, I was convinced the whole movement of the markets was handled by a gerbil.
Every trading day, some workers would activate the SGX Stock Market Gerbil. They would sprinkle some gerbil nibblets over a calculator and let it go. Whichever numbers it steps on, that will be the percentage increase or decrease.
Of course, I eventually realised that this cannot be right. It probably has more to do with bulls and bears which traders are always talking about, although I’m not sure how either animal might operate a calculator.
Anyway, it became obvious to me that I do not know enough about stocks and shares to make informed decisions. So I went and did some research which I will now present to you.
STOCKS 101: When people are buying and selling stocks and shares, what they are trading is essentially pieces of paper that say they own a small proportion of a company.
Although, in practice , this is not exactly true. Just because you own shares in say, Coca-Cola, it doesn’t mean you can walk into a 7-Eleven anytime and take one bottle for free.
No, in practice, all you really own is a piece of paper saying you own a share. This piece of paper is worth something only in as much as somebody else is willing to pay you money for it.
Most investors are very aware that their entire business is set up on the exchange of little bits of paper, so they tend to behave like nervous little gerbils.
The slightest provocation – like if someone mentions the word “recession” – will send investors scampering under the nearest fridge, driving markets down.
It’s not a perfect system, but it can be a way to make money if you buy prudently, invest in the long term and have the right risk appetite.
Otherwise, you may be better off using your money on a different kind of paper.
I recommend the 4-ply.
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