Quotable Quotes: "Businessmen, do more good by creating jobs and wealth through investment, 'not by being Santa Claus" - Carlos Slim on charity

Carlos Slim, the Mexican tycoon who in 2009 became the richest man in the world overtaking Bill Gates, US with USD53.5b fortune.

Interesting to hear this from somebody who through his 2 foundations, has invested some US$10 billion in health, education, justice and sports projects in Mexico and Latin America. This reminds of an old Chinese proverbs that says “Give a man a fish and you fee him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”

Quotatable Quotes: "The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge" - Bertrand Russell

I can’t remember already how I was introduced to this great author whose words helped shaped my life over the course of the last 20 over years. This quote has somewhat became my motto in life.

Fengshui & Christianity

What is the link between Fengshui & Christianity?

Had a very interesting conversation with a Christian colleague the other day on the topic of Fengshui. So happen that our company, an international firm is to move our office to a location next month and our top management had engaged a fengshui master to ensure that we had the right seating arrangement to ensure “prosperity” for the firm!

This colleague friend of mine made a very interesting comment that “only people who have no confidence had to rely on the “unknown” for faith”. I would not fault her on this statement as the effectiveness of fengshui cannot be proven with our knowledge of science. However, I couldn’t help wondering why as a Christian she herself so willingly put her faith in a “belief” that also cannot be proven by science! In fact, my understanding has been that science has repeatedly contradicted some of the facts regarding their beliefs.

Haunted by Kindness!?

It was a terrible day for me yesterday. I received an unexpected call from my HR manager regarding the routine checks they do for new hires. They were alarmed because they found my name listed in an outstanding writ of summon (filed almost 2 years ago). It was something that I wasn’t aware of myself, neither do I know the person who had filed the lawsuit but after some investigation, I managed to trace it to my brother who is a small time businessman. Apparently, the person was his client who had some business dispute with him and he filed the writ summon on all directors and shareholders of my brother’s company, and I being a small shareholder is also being implicated.

The irony is that the reason I am a shareholder of my brother’s company is because our family supported him in his business venture, and out of gratitude, he has given some small shares to all in the family. It has been years and we have not bothered about the business, neither have we benefited from it monetary wise. So it was really unfortunate that his kindness has such an unexpected consequence.

Whatever the outcome it is, I will blame nobody…..my brother has given me the shares out of gratitude and harm is last thing he has in mind, the client cannot entirely be blamed because he is only fighting for his interest (will not judge on him since I do not know who is right and who is wrong in this business dispute) but in this case, because of his act, he has harmed somebody that he has never met before and has no feud with……and the thing is that he is not even aware of it.

Lost & Found

Today I found back an old friend whom I have lost touch for more than 10 years on face book. Isn’t that amazing!

However, my topic is not about losing and finding a friend……….but while updating her on my recent developments tonight, it strikes me that this is probably the most appropriate description for what I have been through the last one year.

In 2009, I lost my job due to the financial crisis but I found back a few pieces of my life. The 6 months of freedom from the rat race had brought me back to those days when I had a lot more curiosity and aspiration for the non-materialistic pursuits in life. I actually had time to venture out of my comfort zone to join a humanitarian group to travel to Thai borders and Myanmar to do some voluntary work. Even if it was just 2 weeks in total i.e. 3.846154% of a year, it was a good start and more than what I had done for over the last 30+ years! Hopefully, this is not the peak….should it be so…then it will be really regretful.

Another good friend that found the way back into my life is Mr. Reflection. Most urban dwellers in this city is so busy chasing the corporate ladder, that they have little time to reflect on their life and what is happening around the world. I started this blog especially for this good friend of mine, because I think this is one way to make him stay.

I am not sure whether I found the 3^rd and last piece yet…..because I am honestly abit reluctant to face this old friend. It must have more than 20 over years ago when I had this ambitious goal of finding some light in the world of religion. My plan was to study and understand some of major religion to eventually decide on which is the most worthwhile following. However, the search ended after a rather frustrating encounter with a particular religious group. I am somebody who believes that Faith can come only after Enlightenment (i.e. that my doubts can be clarified rationally), else it would just be Blind Faith. Therefore, since I was unable to complete my task (as a student, there were easily more pressing task to focus on…..such as your examinations!), I decided that the best religion for me is none. All these years, I have been avoiding this friend as much I can but various encounters in 2009 seem to draw me closer to him. Is it time to complete the unfinished task? It is a huge task……..

Retrenchment

Looking back at the year of 2009….. this year has indeed been a rather unusual year for me. I became one of the victims of the US financial tsunami despite the fact that my employer was deemed as one of the financial players that have emerged rather relatively unscratched. Nevertheless, the whole industry was affected and if profit cannot be achieved through revenue, the only other alternative is to cut cost. Thus, it didn’t surprise me when I was called into the room to receive the pink slip. While it wasn’t a great feeling, but the whole episode wasn’t as bad as I would have experienced. The most challenging part of dealing with retrenchment was probably breaking the news to the family. Relief comes after this, and on the second day I was already up drafting a to-do-list containing things that I had always wanted to do but never had the time to do. After assessing the economic situation, I estimated that my break is likely to be at least 6 months, and thus have plenty of time to work on these things. One thing that I was determined to do is, not to regret for passing by the opportunity of living a life other than pursuing career and money. So it turns out, my prediction was spot-on and market started improving after a few months and 6 months on I was back – well rested and ready to embark on a new journey! Most important of all, I am happy to say that I have not lived the 6 months in vain.

The End & The Beginning.....

Today is the last day of 2009, which marks the end of the year. Had the idea of starting a new blog to share some thoughts on various issues for quite a while, but never got to doing it......partly because I couldn't decide on what topic to start my blog with....until an incident this afternoon that gave me some inspiration.

Somebody asked me a question today, what is your new year's resolution? I thought over for a while before replying, I have none. In fact, I couldn't remember when I stopped having a new year's resolution, but it must have been the time when I decided that you do not need a new year to start thinking of what new resolution is needed to be made. Any day is a good day to reassess yourself and make a resolution to do something.

Today is good day to start.....