Little Entrepreneurs of China

We have heard of Little Emperors before. These refer to the children of parents who live in China. These children are typically pampered because, for many couples, that's the only child that the State will ever allow them to have.

Now, we hear that children as young as 5 years old in China are taking MBA (or Early MBA as they are called) type classes to master business at a very very young age. Modules on economics and business sense are covered in these courses. And the place most prevalent with these classes? Unsurprising, it is Shanghai.

My worry is that parents are placing the cart before the horse. Not in terms of skills, for we know how gifted some children are, but in terms of ethics and values. If so much of a child's time is spent 'educating' them on the technical aspects of life that they neglect values and society, morality and ethics, etc., we might end up seeing very wealthy, perhaps 'successful' individuals, but individuals who may not understand how to do the right thing the right way. Worst still, we might end up seeing more psyschiatric cases given the early onset of stress so typical in the business world of dog-eat-dog. Ultimately, society is going to suffer. Worst, if children are not taught how to value and respect their elders, etc., the parents who so eagerly send their children to such classes may end up reaping the effects of their neglect in critical aspects of a child's upbringing.

Triumph of the mob over democracy

Mr Thaksin Shinawatra announced his resignation as Thailand's Prime Minister yesterday. Ironically, his TRT party won Thailand's snap elections held on 2 April 2006, but it proved to be a hollow one given that three of the main opposition parties boycotted the elections. So here, we see the triumph of mob pressure over the democratic process. Things are never going to be the same in Thailand anymore. I think that Thailand, economically, socially and politically, will enter into a period of uncertainty. I don't think there is a political figure at the moment that can take over Thai politics the way Thaksin has. If so, people would not have had to march and live on the streets of Bangkok for over three weeks now.

Sondhi, Chamlong and others are good protest organisers, but they have yet to prove themselves in ruling a country and bringing prosperity to that country. So far, their loose alliance is based on a common aim to unseat Thaksin. Beyond that, their agendas are quite different and will most likely conflict with one another's. That the opposition parties had to ride on the coat-tails of the protesting Thai public speaks volumes about their credibility, or lack of it. So if the opposition today sanctions protest of the type seen in Bangkok over the last 3 weeks, then when and if they become the ruling party and form the government, they in turn must also sanction any opposition to their rule in like fashion.

The democratic process is a severely wounded animal in Thailand. We do not know if it will ever recover.

New Yahoo UI

Yahoo is upgrading its User Interface - you know - the page you get when you url into www.yahoo.com. My homepage is set to yahoo.com. When I was surfing the web last Saturday, I hit on the new Yahoo.com interface and was asked to evaluate and provide feedback. Since then, the old Yahoo.com has been restored.

Its a pity I didn't take a snapshot of the new UI. It's more organised (anything other than the present UI must be more organised!). It has three panes across the screen, with all the Yahoo services (such as 360, Auto, Finance, Games, Geocities, etc. grouped in a vertical directory list on the left side. Mail, My Yahoo, Messenger, etc. are also grouped together in a box on the right, although Mail is also located at the top banner location, signifying perhaps that Yahoo Mail is the most popular link on Yahoo's homepage.

There are a lot more UI changes, but I cannot remember them all. It's looking more like My Yahoo! UI, but I am sure there will be more changes I will not have seen. Users who saw the experimental UI were invited to leave comments on improving the interface. I am not sure if Yahoo plans to make the UI user-configurable, like My Yahoo, or Google (www.google.com/ig). I have a feeling that it won't be user-definable, or at least not as extensible as the two.

I believe in...

It is sad to read that an Afghan national, a Mr Abdul Rahman, is facing the death penalty because he chose to become a Christian 16 years ago. The strength of his beliefs is evidenced by his willingless to face death rather than renounce the religion which he has come to accept. Unfortunately, Afghan Muslims do not see it this way. They see it as a case of apostasy, as if race or nationality has anything to do with religion.

Islam practices proselytising their religion. It welcomes one and all into their religious fold, even if this involves (as it must, unless that person has no prior religious beliefs) the convert renouncing his/her former religion. I wonder if they do not see the conflict and contradiction in their stance? But of course, Islamic Extremism is again rearing its ugly head, but judging from the recent past, it is unlikely that moderate Muslims will come to the rescue of their fellow national, even in a matter of life and death.

This is so very sad.

Netherlands, here we come

The Netherlands is now screening potential immigrants with pictures of homosexual men kissing and topless female bathing (See Today, 14 March 2006, page 14). With the runnaway success of Brokeback Mountain (and the many copy-cat pictures that typically follow a proven formula in the months to come), as well as the ever popular bare-breasted female form, I'd expect to see a bee-line, especially men, for Dutch citizenship!

Ironically the Dutch are adopting this strategy to try to keep people out of their country. You'd wonder what warped sense of logic this is, until you also read that scenes of crime-ridden ghettos are shown along with these titilating video scenes. Dutch Immigration authorities hope that this will evoke horrors and extreme discomfort and thereby discourage would-be immigrants. Usually, nations want to project a rosy image of their country, the attractions and its pleasant people to demonstrate the beauty and successes of their country. Here, the Dutch are doing the opposite. I say again, what a warp sense of logic.

Of course, there are those who speculate that the Dutch wants to keep out purantical people, especially extremist Muslims, from their country. I think they have learnt a lesson from their neighbours, the Danes, about people who would break windows and demonstrate on the streets just because of a couple of cartoons in the newspapers. Well, this is certainly a novel solution, though I don't know if it will lead to another round of demonstrations or stampede for the doors to the country!

Polarising Positions

A Debate is defined as

A formal, public political discussion involving two or more candidates for office. In a debate, candidates state and defend their positions on major issues.

The political situation in Thailand continues unabated, with the opposition forces that are arrayed against Thaksin's government adamant that nothing but a public debate will do to resolve the situation. A debate will not resolve anything. If nothing, it will serve to polarise the parties even further in this political quarrel and make the situation even worse than today. So it is disingenuos for the opposition to insist that a public debate will resolve the situation. The opposition hopes to push Thaksin to the edge of the cliff and thereby score points, if not effect an coup. Clearly, they are not prepared to meet Thaksin halfway and negotiate a settlement to their differences. They just want to win at all costs.

Of course, they don't trust Thaksin in a closed-door negotiation, which is what Thaksin offers, but I suggest that that is the only peaceful way forward. If they think that Thaksin will 'do them in' in close-door pow-wows, then they lack confidence in themselves and in the validity of their positions. Lest readers of this blog think that I am pro-Thaksin, let me clarify that I am for the rule of law. That rule of law says that any political legitimacy can only be obtained through the ballot box. Any injustice can only be righted through the court of law. Circumventing these internationally accepted norms is to invite ridicule from the international community.

There is a Chinese saying, jia chou bu ke wai yang, meaning, settle your family's differences internally or behind closed doors. Thailand should do that today.

Nuclear Terrorists

I think terrorists today, with their penchant for making and exploding bombs, would love it if they have an atom bomb in their hands. It'll be equivalent to seventh heaven for them - the ultimate possession of ultimate power to wipe out the mother of all infidels that walk the earth. If they can blow up such as bomb in the White House, a la Independence Day style, no less, it will certainly promote them to the highest seats in heaven. Immortality of the highest order awaits them, and their names will perpetuate forever. I do not doubt that this course - Martyrdom 101, is being taught somewhere in the world today, and that Iran presents the best opportunity now to getting their hands on an actual atomic bomb.

What does Iran wants with nuclear energy anyway? Nuclear energy presents a lot of problems in the long run, least of which is the disposal of spent nuclear fuel. It also poses a danger to the people and the environment. It wouldn't be pleasant if there is a nuclear meltdown, to put it mildly. Look at Chernobyl. On the other hand, Iran is blessed with the world's 2nd largest proven reserves of oil under its soil today.

So what's the rationale? Has Iran got too much money in the bank? It doesn't know how else to deploy its brilliant scientists and engineers? Then why doesn't Iran do some good by donating some of it to poverty stricken parts of the world where people, especially children, are dying of poverty, hunger and disease, where people suffer from natural disasters? Why doesn't its brilliant people spend time researching and finding cures for diseases that plague the planet? Don't tell me that only 'westerners' are capable of charity?

Iran has stated openly that it wants to destroy Israel. So far, all conventional forces thrown at Israel by the Arab countries have been rebuffed successfully by Israel. It doesn't take a person with a PhD to figure how a nuclear bomb can advance an age-old ambition - the destruction of the State of Israel - an aim which has been publicly stated by the President of Iran.

Restless in Thailand

The political unrest in Thailand over Thaksin Shinawatra's position as PM is growing worse by the day. Opposition parties claim than the Thai people want Thaksin to step down as premier. Of course, this will pave the way for one of its own to be the next PM.

Now, anybody linked to Thaksin is bad news. These include his erstwhile business partners and political supporters, which can be found among large corporations such as Nestle. Even Singapore companies, like Thai Danu Bank, owned by Singapore's DBS Bank are not spared as the Thai opposition drum up support to boycott these businesses. Singapore's Temasek Holdings, the company that bought a large swat of Shin Corp - the very transaction that precipitated this crisis - must be squirming in its seat. Its analyst who proposed this acquisition could never have expected the strength of emotion it has stirred up.

These are heady days in Bangkok. The Thai King is very upset. Businesses are being disrupted. The nation's economic productivity is sliding downhill as more and more people persist in being in the streets rather than being in the office. Slowly, but surely, the situation makes it more certain that the Thai military will step in to put a stop to all these nonsense.

As a neutral observer, I can't fault Thaksin's bid to restore order through the ballot box once more, but the opposition refuses to play this democratic game. They know that they cannot unseat Thaksin, but they forget that this is the only democratically valid way to remove him from power, if not today, then next year, if the reasons warrant it. Ironically, the mass demonstrations taking place incessantly is proving to be demo-cratic - it is the oppression of the few noisy ones against the many silent ones, quite the opposite from Philippines' People Power demonstrations last decade that toppled the dictator, Ferdinand Marcos.

It is sad to see that a country cannot resolve its political differences through the ballot box, but only through threats and boycotts of parties that provides employment to the Thai worker, no less. I wonder who these opposition political parties stand for? Certainly not the workers, not the farmers, not the poorer Thais in other parts of Thailand and certainly not their King. There is only one party they are interested in: themselves.

After the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997, Thailand had pulled itself back to becoming a dynamic and fast growing economy, challenging its Asean partners, particularly Malaysia and Singapore in many areas. Will this Thailand Political Crisis signal the end of its economic resurgence? One can only wait and see.

Finger pointing

Well, it was bound to happen. Some Iraqis and most likely many Muslims around the world now blame the Americans for the destruction of one of Islam's holiest shrines - the Shia al-Askari shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad. They say the Americans are at fault for this latest act of terror because they brought terrorists and terrorism into Iraq. Two men, reportedly of the Sunni branch of Islam, were the 'terrorists' that blew up the mosque, triggering anger and retailiation again Sunni mosques in Baghdad.

I think this penchant for blaming Americans for anything and everything gives the lie to the credibility of such claims. Once a black cat is called a white cat and a grey cat in the same breadth, you know that its not the colour of the cat that is the issue. The problem most likely lies in self-denial - a refusal to identify the real problem and conveniently pushing the blame to someone/something else. This does great injustice to the intelligence of Muslims the world over, but what can you do when these intelligent and moderate Muslims do not stand up to refute foolish remarks? This is nothing new, and until the moderate and sensible Muslims wrest the agenda back from the extremists, the world will increasingly view Islam as a trenchant, aggressive, unreasonable religion mired in the middle ages.

The Press goes Dick...err... Duck Hunting

I am amazed at the American's penchant for hyping everything up. I am no political pundit, and I may not fully understand the American psyche surrounding the accidental shooting of Vice-President Cheney's hunting partner, but to berate Mr Cheney, and President Bush and the White House for not telling the world (read the American Press) about that incident immediately, if not earlier, is incomprehensible, at least to a non-American.

Look, as far as I know through the press (no less), it was an accident, and the first order of things under this circumstance is to see to it that Mr Whittington gets immediate medical attention. I do not see how getting the immediate attention of the press can help, at all. I have a feeling that the Press feels slighted, and is therefore now crying like a baby, but dressing it all up as an issue of accountability and relating to this to the 'typical' way that the Bush White House treats the world. If nothing, I must give credit to these Americans for the very imaginative way in which they are able to add 1 to 1, getting 2.5 as the result, and feeling very smug about it. Simply amazing.

Love and the Valentine

Well, Valentine's day is over. During the days leading up to this day when love is celebrated, there were the usual commercials and print articles in flashy magazines that reminded one and all of this special and important occasion, to buy that bouquet of flowers, or diamond or book a romantic dinner or better still, that romantic tour for two. All of these make one feel that ignoring the occasion is nothing short of sinful.

So everyone must find someone or something (the Cat or the Dog) to love on this occasion. I am no exception, except that after ten years of marriage, I don't bother about what the commercials suggest I do. I simply gave my wife a kiss on the cheeks. Now, some cynical women would point to me and say, "That's how men behave - once they've got what they want, they hang the conquest out to dry", or something to that effect.

Has romance gone out the window for me? I don't think so. I'd rather think that romance has matured. Nowadays, we appreciate each other for who and what we are. After being together for over 10 years, I know how very different my wife and I are. She is a nocturnal creature, if I may call it that, whereas I am exactly the opposite, sleeping before 11 am most evenings. She loves to shop and buy things, usually ending up with almost nothing in her bank account at the end of the month. I sustain that bank account through my thrift. She is almost always late, I pride myself on being punctual, and suffer the agony of spending half my life waiting for her. So do I still love my wife? You'd better not bet against it.

In fact, I have grown very fond of her in spite of all these differences, and yes, annoyances. Of course, there are similarities in our outlook on life, and all that goes with it. So, no, its not the flowers or dinners that will sustain a marriage or love for one another, it's letting your feelings for each other, good or bad, age with time, like fine wine - bitter at times, but capable of the most unusual sweetness.

A farce and a tragedy

Muslim demonstrations continue unabated around the world over the 'Prophet Cartoon' incident. Now we know the extent Muslims would go to protect their religion and their Prophet. Unfortunately, even before a single 'perpetrator' of these cartoon images is punished, at least 3 Muslims have died as a result of the protests.

In their haste to burn down a KFC restaurant, movie theatres and offices in Peshawar, Pakistan, 3 people, one of which was a 8 year old boy, were killed. All 3 were Pakistanis (and most likely, Muslims). Additionally, 48 people were reportedly injured. This is a tragedy. Did these people have to die? and who caused these deaths? I am sure some would say that westerners are ultimately to blame, conveniently explaining away the fact that Muslims are inadvertently killing Muslims. Is this the way that Muslims revere their Prophet - by destroying things indiscrimately, ignorantly and hurting his followers in the process? I say indiscrimate because KFC has nothing to do with Denmark in the first place!

It is deeply worrying that we have potentially thousands of Muslims in the world today that will commit acts of destruction at a whim, irrespective of what the truth may be.

IE7 on Blog

I am composing this blog entry in the Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 (Preview Release) environment and browser. So far, the experience has been mixed. Right after the install, I did some IE7 preconfiguration before I testdrived the searching. Then I loaded Blogger.com in a tab (yes, IE7 has tab-browsing now), and guess what? IE7 crashed, which triggered Dr Watson. Well, this is why IE7 is still in Beta release. I will soldier on.

I have been on IE7 for the last 2 hours. Other than the initial crash, IE7 has been humming along, and I am enjoying testdriving some of the new features. What's new? Well, Microsoft's website has a tour on this, but I'll just summarise some of them here:

1. Tab browsing - finally, it has caught-up with Firefox and the rest of the world.


2. You can lay out all the various pages opened in the tabs into a page - ala Powerpoint style. This is great when you want to jump to a particular tab without having to guess which tab the content is in that you want to open.


3. IE7 can monitor phishing sites. This is good news for those of us who do our banking online.


4. There are more browsing 'real estate' because IE7 has re-arranged and compacted the top of the brower's menu bar.


5. Browser zooming. You can now tell IE7 to zoom in to a page, so that you see more of the details in that page. This is great when you want to zoom into graphics and pictures.


6. Automatic opening of all links in your Favourites folder just by clicking on the green arrow to the right of the Favourites entry. You want to be careful about this. If you have many links in a category, you're in for one looong wait.

On the whole, IE7 is interesting, if only because of the novelty factor.

Explosive media

In the current controversy over the cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, no newspaper, whether online or print media, dares to reprint any of the twelve caricatures of the prophet Mohammad published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten last September. This is sensible self-censorship.

But the story is quite different on the rest of the internet. There, it has been shown that you cannot censor anything. Just as sex, violence, hate, etc., you cannot take away views against a religion nor the cartoons depicting that religion in a way that is considered offensive to adherents of that religion. Ironically, it is the traditional mass media that cannot be free (lest they want their offices to be bombed or burnt).

Some of the digitized images of these 'Prophet cartoons' in question have made their way into personal blogs all over the blog community on the internet. Being digital, they can be copied and tranmitted without any restriction whatsoever, spreading the very cartoons that the Muslim community views as sacrilegious.

This demonstrates the unstoppable power of the internet media, and some would say, free speech. The more one does not want something to be shown or said, the more it will be shown and said. Suppose one had ignored those 12 cartoons in the first place, it wouldn't now be spreading throughout the internet for many more people to see. Unfortunately, the irony is lost on the people demonstrating, rampaging and destroying property in the name of Islam and their Prophet.

I hope that, at the end of the day, goodwill and good sense prevails. Otherwise, this might turn into a religous war - and I mean, a real war.

Peace passes on

One of the ways you bring about change is, you must change yourself so that you're prepared to lead people in the direction they should go. If your emotions are as bad as those you're fighting, even if your cause is just, you disqualify yourself from being effective. Correta Scott King

So admonished the widow of the American Civil Rights leader, Dr Martin Luther King. Mrs King died on Monday, 30th January 2006, and the world is poorer for an eloquent advocate of non-violence in achieving one's goals. In this age of chronic violence, perpetuated by Muslim extremists, governments (there are 2 now that espouse violence) and hate groups all over the world, Mr and Mrs King's stance opposing violence as a means to an end is becoming rare.

At this point, people should revisit the effectiveness of non-violence as a force that ultimately brought some measure of reconciliation to the American people. Violence only begets more violence. It is my hope that in the new year, it will decrease.

But alas, Muslim's are reported to be rampaging in the Palestinian Territories over a series of Dutch originated cartoons that depict the Prophet Mohammad in a manner that they find offensive. This brings to mind the Rushdie incident some years ago. Yes, such illustrations may be insensitive and offensive, but violence will not gain them any sympathy. Some may even begin to think that Islam is a religion of violence, such is the manner that its adherents behave at any and every perceived offence to their religion. (See Newspaper apologises to Muslims)

If an alien were to visit planet earth today and observed events on earth these past few years, I would not be surprised that the conclusion it will draw is Islam is a violent religion. I think Muslims who are against violence and believe the alien's views to be mistaken should emerge from the shadows and take a strong stance against violence, much as the Kings did half a century ago.

Turning guns into ploughshares?

The Hamas' surprise victory in the Palestinian Elections may yet be a good thing. For one, it demonstrated that the democratic process is alive and well in the relatively young self-governing Palestinian Authority. This gives legitimacy and credibility to the Hamas as the people's representatives. Therefore, the Hamas must, by reason of choice, form a government that represent these people.

Of course, many peace-loving countries are alarmed because the Hamas has openly advocated violence as a means towards their ends. They have yet to renounced their stated objectives of destroying Israel - the second time within the last year that an elected government has come to power with such bald aggression (the other being Iran).

On the other hand, the world can now deal with a duly elected government, not merely a terrorist group. This can be more straightforward. With the weight of a nation on its shoulders, it is, hopefully, now less likely for the Hamas government to behave purely as a terrorist organisation. If it wants to take its place in the nations of the world, it has to follow the rules of international relations and civil behaviour set down by these nations (and these are not just the Western powers).

But first, the Palestinians must resolve their domestic differences, and quickly at that. Otherwise, it cannot hope to move forward much further in its quest for peaceful home for its people, much less think of pushing a nation into the Mediterranean Sea.

Rise and fall of empires

I grew up in colonial Singapore in the 1960s and 70s. One of the things the British left behind in Singapore was a system of administration and civil works that exist to this day, albeit modified to suit the people and the times. They were the acknowledged masters and it is the pride of any family to have been able to send a child (or more) to Britain to obtain an education, particularly at its Universities. In fact, the nation's yardstick for academic achievement at the Secondary level, after 10 years of schooling, is the General Certificate in Education (GCE), which is a legacy of the British education system. To this day, we have retained this standard setting benchmark to measure the degree of literacy and academic achievements of our sons and daughters.

Alas, there are reports now that claims that half of all British workers can barely read and write, and that their skills are no better than a 11-year-old's (TODAY - Wed 25 Jan 06 page 17). What has happened to a country that successfully exported its education system but finds half its working adults untouched by that system? If they are working adults, then they cannot be too much younger than I am. Yet I remember the rigours of my own British-inspired education in Singapore. Clearly, the rote set in 15 to 25 years ago, all while Singapore was vigourously modelling itself on the British.

It is shocking and disappointing. Therein lies a warning - that when one has 'made it', the danger is to slacken and live on the legacy and hard work of others. Each generation must work hard, but they can only secure their own survival and success. Our sons and daughters may taste the fruits of the previous generation's toil, but they in turn must secure their and the generation after. So it must be, otherwise, like Rome and Greece, once the rote sets in, the empire will fall away and disappear, literally, into the sands of time.

Blogging has become mainstream

In concert with the evolution of blogging, it is interesting to note that Tim Berners-Lee, the father of the World-wide-web, has finally embraced blog technology and set up his own blog. Not that he hasn't used the web until now. He has published for well over 10 years on the web, particularly on W3C's website, but this is apparently his first blog (ad)venture. His blog is found on MIT's servers here.

I was a late adopter myself, having started only in 2005. It seems that blogging as a mainstream media has taken one more giant step with the coming on-board of Tim.

Welcome to the crowd.

Blogging evolution

One of the things about blogging, I discovered, is that it is far easier to do so when you have some photos to display. You can blog about the event's surrounding that photo and the meanings, if there are any. When I mention photos, I mean those that are taken personally, and not just a rip-off from some other website. But taking photos today is not difficult - digital cameras have found its outlet medium on the web. In fact, the next big thing that will take over from e-mail is the combination of digital camera and the weblog - the digitalcameraweblog, that it.

Today, blogging has gone beyond personal journals. Anything and everything that looks vaguely like a blog, or structured like one, is call a blog - never mind about its origin as a personal journal. So there are personal blogs, business blogs, sports blog, community blogs, and whatever else that people can think up. Even Content Management Systems Software are proud to claim that their software offer blog features, such as Mambo/Joomla.

Wounded Dove

Right now, Ariel Sharon lies in hospital, totally incapacitated by a severe stroke that likely means the end of his leadership of Israel. Just when the world is hoping for a lasting peace in the Middle East, at least between the Palestinians and the Israelis, with the unilateral withdrawal of the Israelis from the Gaza, the architect and leader of this process is now a step from death.

Who could have predicted this outcome? or hoped for it? There are, of course, some people, particularly Muslims around the world who may be celebrating the cruel fate that has befallen the man who did so much to foil Israel's 'enemies' in its bid to survive as an independent nation after 1948 half a century ago. Those who celebrate must feel vengeance obtained, but what matters, really, is what lies ahead. Sharon has shown the way towards peace with its neighbours. Let his erstwhile enemies put aside past animosity and meet him halfway. The tragedy is that few want to, or are able to make the journey to the middle.

I foresee a future where Israel will continue to war with its neighbours, unless someone can take over Sharon's agenda sooner rather than later.

Truly, it is man who plans and proposes, but God disposes.


Picture source: Wounded Dove