Sight to Insight

These past few weeks have been wonderful, as I managed to catch up with friends to bring memories out of the mind, to refresh those moments. Now, several of them have decided to retire from the corporate world to concentrate on what they have always wanted to do or to reduce the stress level that has affected their health. Whatever the reasons might be, the key point is still doing what brings happiness to our existence. Living a good life is a simple philosophy that one can develop for oneself. There is no magic, no necessity for a guru to tell you nor the requirement of big wealth, as the "poor" bankers will want to tell you. After the sub-prime crisis emanating out of the USA, many are now more realistic about growth and investment returns. It is exactly the desire to live within our means and the reality of impermanence that brings us back to the fundamental of wanting to live a good life. In the sharing of information, I found these two websites as being really useful to...

I have known this saying for over forty years now and it still remains as true as it was then. Why this title? I had lunch with a group of good buddies, all over fifties at Sushi Teh, at the former Big Splash at East Coast Park, Singapore. The discussions were over multiple topics and boisterous for each one of them. They ranged from living in Australia versus in Singapore, racism, globalization, money to Facebook. There will never be enough boredom when we get together, where laughter rang out loud, and each one contributing their experience. Time did pass, and two hours whizzed by without me noticing. If I had not gone to this lunch, I would have missed the fun and the laughter. The two hours will still go by and I could be sitting by twittering my fingers and getting precious little done. The lesson is when you feel like doing something, do it. The worst sin is to think too much over the consequence or what else could I do, if I had not done that. Such "academic excellence...

Getting out of the house in Singapore is a must to destress and refill the oxygen in my lungs. With the economic crisis like a meteorite striking a big hole in my pocket, I discovered good events happening in Singapore which are free. This Sunday, November 9, 2008 has the West Winds performing at the Esplanade for free! The family arrived just in time to get into the Gallery of Esplanade, which is behind the band. I have no idea before this event and I am glad we went. It was a 60 minutes spectacular performance by a group of mostly young people; playing Indiana Jones and Out of Africa; just to name a few. http://www.esplanade.com/whats_on/programme_info/big_screen_hits/index.jsp The hall was filled with people from all walks of life. The young folks were absolutely thrilled by the encore, which was from High School Musical, which is the current hot movie. My kid, Claudine knows the tune well, and so do I, because I am hearing it so often from her handphone. http://wasbe.com/conference...

Last week, a colleague in his late thirties came by at my desk and asked whether investing in properties can be taken as a mean of diversification of financial planning. My response is "it depends" as decisions on allocation of our money depends on our objective as well as our risk profile. In recent days in Singapore, the big "talk about" is on the returns on CPF (Central Provident Fund); which is a sort of forced savings for employees to manage their retirement. One does not need to know the details; other than whether the returns is good enough as one reaches the draw down age of 62, which will soon be 67. We do not need to dwell in the mechanics other than it is a financial planning tool for a source of income at a certain age. There are many financial planning portals and more than enough articles to keep you educated. What I want to write here is different because I will not concentrate on the mechanics, but rather on the attitude towards living a fruitful and...