I had a very interesting experience at Mandeville today. Our annual ABRSM violin exams are about a month away, and this is the month where there are all sorts of “technique” or “masterclass” sessions for the students to attend.

Detour: I personally feel that the technique classes are not really necessary (they cost extra and are mandatory for all exam-takers) and what was taught in this group lesson should have been covered by students’ respective teachers in the first place. But oh well, I’ve gotten used to the high cost of going to a music school and it doesn’t mean I’ll put up with it forever.

What was interesting tonight was when some of the kids played the A:3 piece from the Grade 4 syllabus – Foulis’ Allegro ma non troppo: 3rd movt from Sonata No. 5 in A – they played it rather lifelessly and a bit out of tune.

Now this was a piece I veered away from, because one look at it with its many trills and other ornaments, playing it during an exam was asking for trouble. The kids played it  with little interest, and the teacher asked them: “Do you like this piece?”.

The kids looked glum and shook their heads, and the teacher tried to console them by saying: “Perhaps your teacher thinks that the piece is good for you. But if you don’t like the piece, it’s very obvious from the way you play it!”

This scenario presents the crux of the problem with music lessons for kids. A lot of parents always wring their hands in despair – Should I send my children to music school? Should they take exams every year? What if I can’t keep up with other parents who have children graduating from Grade 8 piano when they’re only 12?

You can probably guess my position on this – stop trying to keep up with the Joneses.

I’ve been blessed with the unique perspective of being a parent who has to go through all these motions that the kids do, because I signed up for violin lessons as an adult.

Often I sympathize with my classmates (all below 12) because most of the kids don’t want to be in the class, and some of the stuff they have to learn is really not easy, even for adults. I envy the kids who are naturally musical and have perfect pitch, but these are rare occurrences. Most kids really find music class to be a chore, even if they don’t say it out loud.

Here’s some things we parents all need to think about before we put our kids in any music class.

1. Why take music lessons?

If you ask a parent this and ask him/her to think hard about it, they may not be able to come up with an answer they fully understand.

The common answers are probably “So my son can play music!” “So they can pick up a useful skill!” “So they might know if one day they can be a professional musician!”

The answers are all valid, but really, what is the value of a musical education? First and foremost, I believe it is for a person to appreciate music, more than just to play it well. One can always appreciate music by listening to it, but I think there comes a point where you want to be able to engage with the music as well, and that’s when the education begins. For me, it was wanting to engage, and also fueled by my desire to learn a new skill/hobby.

Most kids are forced into music classes without even knowing why, and some end up hating the instruments that they are imposed with. If a child loathes going for classes, then all is lost.

You might say, “But kids hate going to school too! So it’s the same thing when they go for music class. They’ll appreciate it later”.

Now general education is mandatory, and in SG, it’s actually against the law to stop your kids from going to school. Yet to compare music lessons to going to primary school is comparing apples and oranges. Everyone needs to learn their ABCs and Math to survive in the world, but music is not mandatory.

Music, like art, is rooted in appreciation first and foremost. Most people know that they might not be great artists or musicians, but at least they can enjoy great pieces.

Now if you know you can’t be an F1 driver, would you keep telling yourself that you should work towards it? It’s the same with music – many parents believe that their kids can become great, successful people in life if they happened to go for music classes, but appreciation does not necessarily lead to any other tangible result save for a happy spirit.

It’ll be awesome if all schools had music appreciation classes (in ACJS, we did) but you know the SG education system – if it can’t be tested, let’s not bother with it.

2. Why take music exams?

The most remarkable thing about going to a music school is how everything seems to be centred around taking exams. For example, for the past five months, I’ve been playing little apart from my three ABRSM exam pieces and scales/arpeggios.

It’s not a bad thing you know.

I’ve been taking lessons for nearly a decade (with a 3-year break in between to look after Isabel when she was born), and this G4 exam is only my second. I realized that I had to take the exam in order to benchmark my skill level, rather than playing “for leisure” all the time.

Doing the latter meant that I had little discipline to get certain techniques right, or even learn my scales. I wasn’t progressing at the rate that I was satisfied with.

The upcoming practical exam also encouraged me to take up a crash course in music theory, because I didn’t understand what my teacher was referring to when it came to dominant sevens, minor relative scales or clashing chords. The music theory classes are painful (so much homework!), but I truly appreciate them.

Yet so many parents make their children take exams because they think it’s the be all and end all of music education. For goodness sake, wake up your idea lah, if your kids have so many exams at school, why stress them further with annual music exams?

The most important thing is for kids to progress in music at their own pace, and as agreed with their music teacher. Music exams are a form of benchmarking current skill and experience levels, NOT simply a process that everyone has to go through at a fixed time schedule.

You’re not a lesser person if you haven’t gone for Grade XX by age YY you know!

3. What instrument to learn first?

Without hesitation, I’d tell you that kids should learn the piano first. Till today, I only know the violin and I’ve suffered for it – a lot of music theory is best taught using the piano. And I often have trouble reading the bass clef because the violin only needs the treble clef!

Scales are also easier to learn on the piano. If your piano is properly tuned, hitting the right keys always produces the right tones. On a violin, I wouldn’t know better because it’s all about the right finger position. So as a beginner, I could play a scale out of tune and not even know it until someone points it out.

Furthermore, in higher music education, violin students are required to know how to play the piano. At least that’s what my teacher had to go through.

4. Who’s teaching the class?

Parents always fret over this – is the teacher good or lousy?

I think it’s near impossible to tell unless the parent happens to be a musician in the first place. It’s not just about how nice or patient the teacher is – the ability to impart the right set of skills is paramount.

For example, my first violin teacher was really quite inadequate. He was exam-focused, and never ensured that I got my fundamentals of tone and fingering right. Till today, under my current teacher, I’m still fixing a lot of bad playing habits that were not corrected under the previous teacher and were allowed to become entrenched in my overall technique.

Goy often points out that there are many kids who don’t bend their fingers right when playing the piano, and that results in poor tone especially on high-end pianos. Again, it’s due to poor teaching techniques. But how can other parents possibly tell?

This is where I really have no proper advice to dish out. I’m fortunate to have married a wife with a music diploma, and to be also going through the same music education process myself. We can probably tell a lousy music teacher from a mile away.

What should really ring your alarm bells though, is when a teacher is not interested in helping your child improve his fundamentals, but simply doing enough to pass the exam.

Some teachers lack passion, and are in it only for the salary, and this is common across any sort of education. Your challenge as a parent is whether you’re able to detect these sort of teachers early on.

5. Is my child talented? 

Let’s face it, a normal kid with 1000 hours of practice could never best a musical genius with less playing time. Practice makes perfect but everyone has different aptitude and skills.

If your kid tries his best and still doesn’t do well in music, just move on and find out where his talent really lies. I personally believe everyone is talented in at least one thing – it’s just a matter of whether they’re given the opportunity to discover, and then develop it. Forcing them to continue music when their bandwidth or skill limits have been busted is not only unhelpful, it generates genuine resentment in the child.

That said, I really wish I was a musical genius instead of some adult with hands that are not long enough to play with ease .  

Related posts:

1. Leave the kids alone
2. MTVs and the death of music
3. Our new piano

Hong Kong will always have a special place in my heart, because every time I visit this chaotic city, it has been for significant milestone events in my life, and usually with people that I love and cherish.

Every time I come back, I find that I have changed once again as a person, and the life that I was leading when I last visited, always seems so distant and faint as the future ignites before me.

How did it start?

In 1994, when we were 17, we came to HK as the ACJC Dragonboat team to participate in the annual dragonboat races. We not only won the student category, we qualified for the national finals and came in 2nd after the HK Police team (or was it the firemen team?).

We were young, strong, and largely immature about everything we believed we were wise about. I only knew the concept of winning gloriously, but not knowing humility in victory. We would win the race like heroes, but come back and be humiliated by our uncaring teacher-supervisors in front of the school assembly for our youthful mischief and rebelliousness.

But we’ve since forgotten all the unhappiness, because what a time it was, with friends like Derek Cher (God bless his soul), Weizheng, Pok Eu Jin, Ronald, Ben Lim, Naveen, Zhenyao, Jerry, Andrew Lim and Teong and so many others who remain great friends till today.

In 1997 or 1998, a few of the Dragons like Pok, Ronald, Derek and me came up to HK to gallivant after completing our NS stint. I had just become a Christian and was struggling to understand my faith and what I had to do, and I remember having long and serious conversations with Pok and Ronald on theology and humanity, young as we were. Derek, on the other hand, was obsessed with finding a particular shirt from G2000 or Benetton, and we must have visited every outlet in town. We also had long debates on whether to visit Lantau Island, and we never did.

In 2000, I was starting out in photojournalism, bursting with incredible passion for photography. In fit of madness, I told myself that I would stop using the crappy Nikons that SPH made me use, and that I would outfit myself with the best Canon lenses I needed to be successful in my photojournalism career. I did a quick trip to HK, met up with photo.net friends like Bill Akata and Lee Hoyin, and they accompanied me to buy Canon L lenses at Man Shing in Mong Kok.

At that time, Canon L lenses were 20-25% cheaper in HK and the savings paid for the trip. I still own those lenses, but the burning passion was lost somewhere along the way. I since learned not to make a particular passion my whole job, but to leverage on it instead.

In 2004, my boss Ooi Boon nominated me for the Local Journalist award in the Society of Publishers of Asia annual ceremony, and to all our surprise, I actually clinched it for the regional photojournalism work I had done in Vietnam, Thailand, and Singapore. SOPA is based in HK and so I came up to collect my prize in a nice ballroom ceremony along with other SPH journalists.

I was halfway through my SPH scholarship stint and this win was a huge encouragement to continue investing in a media career, but deep in my heart, I knew I didn’t really want to be a journalist in the long term. I struggled with this until 2007 when I finally left SPH and found greater happiness in Microsoft.

What was really great about this particular trip was that I listened to Faye Wong day and night, and fell in love with her music, albeit a decade too late (she was semi-retired by then).

I can’t place the exact date, but it was also around this period that I brought Goy to HK to go on a big foodie tour, and we had this ridiculously expensive crab that was so not worth the money (or wait for the dish to arrive). There were other agendas on our mind as well  

And after a hiatus of about 5 years, I’m back in Hong Kong again with my Microsoft team for our annual kickoff. Here, I learned of the new role I have at work – I’m going to focus on driving the PC peripherals business in Singapore, a great development opportunity after having done marcoms and PR in the region for the past 3 years.

What made the trip really fun was some of the spare time spent walking around Mongkok with my room mate David Tse, who shares my love for toys, gadgets and our focus on our families. And of course, all the great friends I’ve made within our SEA and Korea team are here too.

I can tell you it’s hard to find so many capable, experienced and good-natured people in the same room, and for that I give thanks.

I may not stay in Hong Kong, but as I look back on the past 16 years, HK has uniquely marked how I’ve changed in my outlook on life and work, on eternity and God. Like how a parent would mark the height of his child on a wall, HK has marked how my life has shifted like tectonic plates. 

But some things never change – the wanton mee is always so fresh, and I always make a pilgrimage to Victoria’s Peak and relive those days of 1994 when we were so young and free of worldly worries.

We were AC Dragons and we would win the biggest race of our lives, only to learn later that it was far easier than everything else that was to come.

Below: Other pictures I took with my trusty Oly Pen during a morning solitary walk on 14 July 2010. As a photojournalist, I used to enjoy long solitary walks with my camera bag. Now older, wiser, and in better mastery of my craft, I steadfastly follow the Zen of photography and take pictures only when the scene calls for it.

Related posts:

1. King Kong
2. Chapter 4: Life’s really a game of chess
3. Bush – Uncurious Intellectually

When it comes to work, we Christians struggle daily with the secular world.

The morals defined by the world often conflict directly with what God tells us to do. We work hard to pay the bills, but face the temptation to love money more than God. We take pride in the quality of our work, and it is hard to remember that it is not us who make great things happen, but God.

I am thankful that I’ve grown up going through various difficult experiences that taught me certain principles to live by, and the same principles are verbalized in the Bible.

Here is one Bible paragraph that over time, I’ve gradually structured my life around because it’s so easy to follow.

It comes from the book of Ecclesiastes, which deals with the philosophical dilemmas that people face daily – Why is life so unfair? Why do evil people prosper? What’s the point of working hard?

I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live. That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil—this is the gift of God. (Ecc 3:12-13)

This para is both profound and simple in its directive.

Happiness reigns supreme, and people will define happiness in their own ways. The temptation to be happy for one’s selfish sake or egoistic gain is cancelled out by the call to “do good”.

Doing good is self explanatory – it calls for team work, going the extra mile, and being a good guy on the job. I can be a real tough cookie on the job who takes no crap from anyone, but are my intentions noble and for a positive outcome? I have to keep asking myself that.

And doing good calls for one not to play dirty politics, to be clear and transparent at all times.

Why do people play politics? When I was 25, I coined this theory when chatting with my uni lecturer Constance Chay: “People who are not competent enough, play politics”.

These days, I add another sentence: “People play politics when they’re not working hard enough”.

You get the gist.

Back to the verse, some people might mistake “To eat and drink” as to justify being a glutton or alcoholic, but what God is really saying here is to enjoy one’s food, not overdo it. Unfortunately, it does make one overweight when he/she enjoys their food and drink too much.

And a very important thing is to “find satisfaction" in his toil”. People talk about job satisfaction, but why do they stay on in jobs that make them unhappy and resentful? God knows we become restless and bored, and job satisfaction is always critical.

Over the past decade, I’ve encouraged many people to leave their unhappy job state, but very few actually do anything to improve their situation. It could be that I’m a really lousy persuader, but it’s more like that people are inert and prefer to remain in their “comfort” zone, nevermind that they’re not really comfortable at all.

To the man who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind. (Ecc 2:26)

You know, a lot of people don’t appreciate the value of wisdom, knowledge or happiness.

There is no price to pay for any of these, really, but people often put a price tag to it. The most uneducated person can be the wisest, the quietest man be endowed with reams of knowledge from observation and the person with the least wealth can be the happiest.

Yet we often see around us, people who chase the same three things, but bark up the wrong tree because they don’t know God gives all these for free to those who fear and love Him.

I spend a lot of my time seeking those three things, because when you have all three, you lack nothing.

How about money like the new mega-churches of today like to preach in their “health and wealth” doctrine? Where does money come into this?

My brothers and sisters, common sense will tell us that if you possess wisdom, knowledge and happiness, you will have enough money to get by.

God provides, and I’m so thankful for Him.

Related posts:

1. For those weary of work….
2. On work, people, and the universe
3. A decade’s work – Part 1

However, as I thought over this, I decided that there’s nothing like a blog, especially one that I’ve been maintaining regularly for five years and is the latest and most successful incarnation of a homepage that struggled to keep alive since 1997.

This is where I keep my main thoughts in full, rather than sporadic thought outbursts on Facebook. People shouldn’t underestimate the importance of writing down your thoughts in long paragraphs rather than short 140 character drizzles (eg. Twitter, which I personally think is a huge time-suck and useful for few things apart from live updates of important events).

Yet at the same time, my FB status updates also represent who I am too! My friends who have known me since primary school, will be instantly familiar with the type of status updates I put up, and we all enjoy knowing that deep inside, we haven’t really changed our personalities since our classroom days while everything else has changed or moved on. If you string FB status updates together for a particular person, you’ll see his mind laid out in a rather coherent manner, strange as it may sound.

So moving forward, I’ll try this – compile my key FB thoughts (ie. status updates) of the week here, and if time permist, some ramblings on things that need to be expounded further.

Hope it works out for my faithful blog readers who might feel that they have been abandoned in the past few months. Thanks for reading

Facebook thoughts of the week.

- Dear City Harvest folks, I don’t think Sun Ho is doing that well as a pop star to afford a $28k/mth Hollywood mansion. Do a search online for her lah, see who else besides you raving SG fans talk about her. In the words of Mr T….

- I am Votoms Scopedog

- Ian Tan is enjoying using the Windows Classic (ie. Win 95) theme on Windows 7. So retro lah!

- Jesus said you cannot serve both God and Money together (Matt 6:24). Is that so difficult to understand, you so-called believers?

- Succumbing to nostalgia via hobby model kits – Macross Super Strike Valkyrie, VOTOMS Scopedog robot and Star Wars TIE Interceptor! Now where to find time to build all these babies?

- Ian Tan and Jay Eom are salivating over Hasegawa and Bandai porn in the office. You know, hot naked plastic model kits of Macross and such.

- Gundam RX-78-2 construction…100% complete. Christened alongside a new Sparmax air compressor and double-action airgun.

- If you want professional results, plan like a professional.

Facebook video of the week

Isaac attempts to play a piano piece (Dixieland Jam) while Isabel provides an impromptu dance accompaniment. As usual, Isabel did not tell Isaac what she intended to do.

Related posts:

1. Some recent ramblings on Facebook
2. I hate Facebook requests
3. The struggle back to blogging

The Canon IXUS 300HS, taken with my Canon EOS 5D. It feels good to take a nice product shot.

Canon’s wildly popular IXUS range has been stuck in a rut for several years in terms of design and features. Was I glad when they recently announced that they’d be launching the IXUS 300HS/IXY 30 with the same 10MP sensor from the S90 camera. The latter is the mediocre attempt to counter the wild success of the Panasonic LX-3 (which sports a much better zoom lens, but weaker image sensor) and the price has dropped quickly in recent months (whereas other strong models hardly see price drops).

But back to the 300 HS, which sports an incredibly sexy update to the iconic IXUS design – this time inspired by sports cars like the Ferrari instead of the endless recycling of the original industrial look with sharp edges.

The original 1996 film-based IXUS.

Yes, the 300 HS is a fingerprint magnet and some people might think the glossy coating is a bit too beng. And some of its small parts are really quite plasticky (eg. zoom dial and back scrolling wheel).

Yet if you hold one in your hands, believe you me, you’ll like it. The fun and sleek look grows on you quickly and this camera has all the necessary features – HD video, strong low light performance with a 28mm zoom lens that offers f2.0 at that focal length, 16:9 native sensor and great Canon image colors. And phew, it’s 10MP instead of some 15MP monster, meaning the image noise will be well controlled.

So after being torn between the red and white design (dammit, I love the yellow the most but it’s not in Singapore), I chose Ferrari Red. This is to replace Goy’s aging IXUS. It’s a bit pricey at $599, but there aren’t any nicer cameras in its class.

And I do like the designer pouch too (which is a little too tight for the camera though).

Check out the Japanese print ads below. I wish they used them in SG, but they didn’t.

Related posts:

1. Return of the Big G
2. First new Canon lens in 6 years
3. A botched blow job

I had an interesting online conversation with a journo today who’s thinking of finding a new job but believes he is “mono-skilled”. That causes him to believe that it’s hard for him to write his CV, or find interested recruiters.

Thankfully, that’s not true at all, even as many journos continue to subscribe to that belief. Those who don’t, have obviously moved on to other fields (and sometimes returned to editorial when they realized where their heart lay).

Now as my friends will know, I’ve been encouraging journos to try other jobs even when I was still a journo at SPH. I still do, not because I want the newspaper to lose good people, but because I think everyone deserves a chance to check out the world for him/herself. How do you know journalism is the perfect job for you until you’ve tried other jobs?

It’s an irony you know – scribes who write about everything under the sun, are often themselves not exposed to every other thing under the sun when it comes to a career.

It doesn’t help when I know there are some editors who having failed or been unhappy at other jobs in the past, try to convince young journos that journalism is truly the best career on earth.

Seriously, it’s not for everyone lah. There are journalists, and there is everyone else.

Now back to my point about being mono-skilled, or “I only know how to write, so how?”

I’ve often told fellow journos that they’re fools if they think being able to write is their only marketable asset. Their real strengths lie in several areas (and I’m referring to good journos here, others need not apply)

• Listening and collecting vast amounts of data in a resourceful manner
• Analysing the data from different points of view
• Solving or find possible solutions to difficult problems objectively.
• Verbalizing the above in a simple manner that many people can understand and apply their thoughts to.
• Realizing all the above in a ridiculously short period of time (aka Deadline)

You know, the skills above are what most people outside of journalism use as well. 

Whether you’re a financial analyst, a florist, a cook or a CEO, how you use the above skills in varying degrees determine how far you go in life.

(I exclude Acts Of God here).

So to clarify, I think there are two types of skills we need to think about. I have my own definitions here:

Technical skills developed over time – aka writing, violin, cooking, photography, gardening, financial analysis, selling services and so on. You can pick up these skills anytime via courses or books or apprenticeship. Many people are technically mono-skilled, some are dual-skilled, and very few are good at several technical skills.

Soft skills that enhance the technical skills that allows one to work in different scenarios – data collection and analysis, team co-ord and management, and clear communication. Sometimes, being able to bullshit is an important soft skill too. You can’t learn any of these soft skills in formal courses, but they’re developed over time either by circumstances, trial and error, mentorship or self-observation. Sometimes, they’re nothing more than “social skills” or inter-personal skills.

I’d like to think that everyone has a mix of technical skills and soft skills. The question is how we develop both “skill trees” to meet our desires?

For example, let’s take my own career path. I consider my real technical skill to be photography, not writing or marketing as most people would believe it to be. Yet when I quit photography 2003, I let my photography skills languish at a certain level and never worked on it again. It’s a pity to some, but I decided it was not my path and turned it back into a hobby instead.

I’m reasonably proficient at writing and that’s seen me through my SPH editorial career and the early phase of my Microsoft career. However, under the guidance of my boss Ben in MS, I’ve come to appreciate it’s the soft skills that truly open up different career options in one’s life, especially within the same company.

It’s how one earns the trust, the respect and the support of others that allows one to bust the limits of their technical skill and allow one to grasp new challenges and overcome them.

Yet I still continue to develop new technical skills – like learning how to manage spreadsheets and long rows of numbers, how to organize big-scale events and so on. PR was one technical skill I didn’t spend too long learning though – I simply thought to myself how I disliked the actions of lousy PR people when I was in the media, avoided their mistakes, and repeated methods of the ones I liked.

I sometimes lament to my friends – I’m a turning into Jack of All Trades, and Master Of None. But then I think to myself – do I really want to be known for doing one thing really well? What if I were a photographer and digicams got so smart they made me uncompetitive in the market? (Never say never). What else could I fall back on? What did I not try out when I had the energy and the passion to?

That’s also one of the reasons why I pursue so many hobbies – I want to know, can I be good at that one other thing? When I was young, I couldn’t afford these hobbies, but now that I can, why deny myself?

I don’t need to be great at it, but I want to enjoy being good at the violin, graphic design, hobby kits, building PCs, riding a motorbike and so on. I take pleasure at trying and getting good at new things, instead of trying to be Number One at everything like my Gahmen often tells me to.

Now I digress, as usual.

People who insist on thinking they can do only one thing well, are condemned to doing that one thing well, both by their own mindset and how others perceive them. It’s easy to fall into that thinking as a media guy (journos and PR peeps included) because that’s how media companies often measure your worth.

But if you see yourself as being good at more than just your technical skill, you’d be surprised at the options that suddenly pop up in front of you.

So really, it’s okay to be mono-skilled, but that never stopped anyone.

Related posts:

1. A Decade’s Work – Part IV
2. The state of the PR industry
3. Being media-savvy

Now I’m not a hardcore collector due to the lack of space in my house, so I don’t buy any “fine art” grade of toys…I’m just happy to have commercial versions that you can find at Toys ‘R Us or mid-range versions at specialist stores like Simply Toys. Basically, I try not to spend above S$50 per toy lah, and I do share most of my toys with the kids.

With the Iron Man 2 movie, Hasbro has hit a home run with its commercial range of figurines that appeal more to adults than kids (IMO). I suspect they’re targeting parents rather than kids, since kids don’t really read Marvel comics these days.

Not only do the standard 3.75” toys (S$16.90 each) look great with nice detailing and colours, the 6” ones (War Machine and the Suitcase Armor Mark V) look outright awesome. There are bigger Hasbros but they aren’t really worth the money due to poor range of limb movements (ie. articulation)

The 6” War Machine is a Wal-Mart exclusive that costs about US$13, but because it’s not available here yet, I paid a premium of US$32 (S$45). But it’s the best Iron Man toy in the entire series right now. If you spot one, don’t think too hard, just grab it immediately.

The rest of the toys here are easily available at most kiddy toy shops. The Suitcase Armor is about S$30.

Related posts:

1. Iron Fist is my fave superhero
2. Spidey vs Venom Hero Squad!
3. New toys

That happens once in a while and I’m quite used to it.

But I just wanted to pen down some general observations about people that I’ve been thinking about. Largely just to fill the empty air for this month

- You can’t change a person’s personality.

Some of us are loudmouthed, some of us are reserved by nature. There’s no right or wrong character to be, and it’s really a combination of nature and nurture that makes us who we are.

But often, I see people who believe they can change someone else into a better person. Yes, that is possible until you seek to change the personality itself.

An unpassionate guy who does not take pride in his work will most likely remain that way no matter how people try to coach or mentor him. You can teach him to be more punctual, but you can’t teach him to be more passionate. Which brings me to another thought that passion cannot be taught or transferred, but are schools and companies trying to do that?

- Delusion is a comfort zone.

Sometimes we think “That guy is really living in his own world man! Why can’t he see reality?” I think we all say that sooner or later when perspectives don’t match. But what we don’t think about is – are some people more comfortable living in their own world?

Wait, why can’t we live in his delusion as well? What’s wrong with us anyway, always seeking to be so uncomfortable?

- Being respected is not everyone’s priority

That’s pretty self-explanatory I guess.

Related posts:

1. Rambling post on Christianity
2. Post seminar thoughts
3. Test post from Word 2010

Related posts:

1. A filler post
2. Rambling post on Christianity
3. Post seminar thoughts

Sometimes, print media doesn’t show a good comparison of intellectual debates when it occurs on different days. Most people who don’t read newspapers regularly would not have bothered about these two letters that appeared last Wed and today in the Straits Times, regarding the spike in COE (Certificate of Entitlement for vehicles) that saw the paper slips soaring to S$36,089 for cars above 1600cc.

That’s why I’ve pasted these two ST Forum letters together:

Mar 31, 2010 – COE price spike: Govt not entirely right

SECOND Minister for Transport Lim Hwee Hua’s view (‘COE spikes not due to formula change: Lim Hwee Hua’; Monday), that the Government’s new formula to determine the number of replacement COEs was unconnected to the surge in prices of certificates of entitlement in the latest exercise, bears scrutiny.

The change to the new formula coincided with the exercise. The Straits Times also indicated bigger-than-expected cuts in COE supply after the new formula was announced by Transport Minister Raymond Lim (‘Big drop in COEs ahead’, March 12).

While Mrs Lim is right in pointing out that the number of COEs allocated was a function of the number of cars deregistered, it is equally true that the function was changed. Certainly, other factors such as the economic recovery led to the price spike. But it is unfair to suggest that the Government was entirely not responsible.

First, there is no objective, scientific way to determine whether the new formula could not have caused the sharp spike in COE prices. Second, the policy was formulated by the Government.

A more considered response – which acknowledges that the COE formula was one of several factors that led to the rise in COE prices – would have been more appropriate.

A more measured response would have encouraged public discourse rather than give the impression that public feedback was unnecessary because the Government is right.

Tan Jiaqi

Apr 4, 2010 – Old formula doesn’t mean more COEs

I REFER to Mr Tan Jiaqi’s letter, ‘COE price hike: Govt not entirely right’, on Wednesday.

Mr Tan asserts that the new formula for certificate of entitlement (COE) quota, which comes into effect this month, was one reason for the rise in COE prices in the recent bidding exercise last month.

Both the old and new COE formulas aim to replace deregistered vehicles through the COE supply. Under the old formula, the number of vehicles deregistered is based on projections derived from historical trends. The new methodology merely does away with the need to project deregistrations by basing the number of replacement COEs on the actual number of vehicles taken off the road in the most recent six-month period. In doing so, the new formula provides a COE supply that is more responsive to changes in vehicle deregistration patterns, and is not subject to errors in projection.

The change in formula in itself does not result in a significant change in COE quotas. If there is a trend of more vehicles being deregistered, then both the new and old formulas would provide for a higher COE quota. Likewise, if there are fewer vehicles being deregistered, the COE quota will fall regardless of the formula used.

The cut in the COE quota announced last month was a direct result of there being fewer vehicle registrations recently. It is wrong to conclude that if the Government had kept to the old formula, there would have been more COEs.

In its review of the COE formula, the Land Transport Authority sought the views of the various motor trading associations, which were generally supportive of the proposal. In deciding on the change, the Government took into account their feedback, to use a six-month recycling period to allow the industry time to adjust.

Phua Hooi Boon
Director (Land Transport Division)
Ministry of Transport

I highlighted the sentence above in red because anyone in Singapore who owns a car, or wants to own one, should rightly be astounded by Mr (or is it Ms? Not sure about gender here…you’d never know these days) Phua’s response.

Let’s get some facts clear:

1. The COE system was designed to control the number of cars on the roads in our tiny island. According to LTA’s website:

The Vehicle Quota System was implemented on 1 May 1990. Under this system, LTA determines the number of new vehicles allowed for registration while the market determines the price of owning a vehicle.

2. Over the years, the vehicle population has shot up faster than the network of roads can absorb. According to ST, from 2005 to 2008, Singapore’s vehicle population growth rate ranged from 3.8 per cent to 6.5 per cent – above the stipulated 3 per cent ceiling (see story below).

This has led to frequent traffic jams and congestion around many parts of the island during peak hours. Even during non-peak hours, a traffic accident on one highway like AYE can spread to other highways like PIE due to the small road network size, and width of the roads.

3. This is obviously because the car quota system hasn’t worked. Why hasn’t it worked? Because the old formula was based on projections (or rather, assumptions) of how many cars would be deregistered over a fixed period. This is obviously flawed because car purchases can shoot up due to introductions of new models alone, which is something the LTA doesn’t keep track of, or a booming economy.

4. The new formula is based on actual number of registrations and so would obviously work better to keep the car population in check because the trending can then be controlled by the Govt. rather than irrational market forces.

Thus, the change in formula is designed to drive a significant change in the COE quota – one that keeps our vehicle population growth in check.

So why is LTA not able to just admit that the old formula was wrong (ie. LTA was wrong)? Their mistakes and assumptions have led to really unpleasant traffic situations today. Look, the issue is not about COE pricing in itself – there’s really no other logical way to keep vehicle numbers down apart from making it unaffordable to most people.

Even if it costs $500,000 to own a Toyota Altis, the goal of the COE system would have been achieved if the car population was kept in check as a result (and even many rich guys and top civil servants have to squeeze in the MRT with us).

The issue is that LTA’s poorly thought-out policies created the traffic situation we’re in today – despite all the expensive implementations of ERP, COE and what not -  and yet they are quick to distance themselves from it when they are questioned by a diplomatically-written letter.

Or maybe they didn’t get the point of Tan Jiaqi’s original letter.

These days, the Govt is trying to reach out to more people using social media or new online platforms. I say that’s all a waste of time when you can’t even acknowledge the facts on a public issue and take responsibility for your older policies. It’s exasperating to read such official responses and that’s not the way to take constructive feedback from the public.

Anyway, thank goodness for straight-talking, intelligent journalists who tell it like it is. Have a read of Christopher Tan’s column from this week on the COE issue.

Mar 30, 2010 – Steep COE prices may not be the best way to keep cars off the road

By Christopher Tan
SENIOR CORRESPONDENT

IT IS easy to forget the core purpose of the certificate of entitlement (COE) system, with feelings boiling over following last week’s unprecedented increases in premiums.

The system, implemented in 1990, has one purpose and one purpose only: to control vehicle population growth so Singapore does not become a giant carpark.

The system has been fine-tuned over the years, with the latest tweak announced two weeks ago. With the change, the supply of COEs will be determined every six months, with each allotment determined largely by the number of vehicles taken off the road in the preceding six-month period.

The Government also took the opportunity to correct an oversupply of certificates that persisted in the previous system, which was based on forecast deregistration numbers.

The oversupply resulted in roads being noticeably crowded in recent years.

From 2005 to 2008, Singapore’s vehicle population growth rate ranged from 3.8 per cent to 6.5 per cent – above the stipulated 3 per cent ceiling.

The result? An almost 25 per cent increase in the vehicle population to more than 930,000 in the past five years.

The Land Transport Authority (LTA) has tried to remedy the oversupply by trimming recent COE supplies. Last September, it announced the supply from October to March this year would be 16 per cent smaller than the previous six-month period’s, which was itself 24 per cent down from the previous quota. This was on top of a halving of the allowable annual growth rate to 1.5 per cent.

It did not quite work. Last year, the vehicle population rose by 3.4 per cent – more than double the new cap.
Then came the sledgehammer two weeks ago. With the new supply formula, as well as the adjustment for oversupply, the new COE quota kicking in next month will be nearly 30 per cent smaller.

The surgery is the worst for the category of cars up to 1,600cc. This mainstay of car buyers will see a 40 per cent shrinkage.

The car market reacted to the new supply the way most “free” markets react in such situations. It panicked.

Frenzied bidding drove COE premiums through the roof at last week’s tender – the last before the new quota period. Car premiums ended about $10,000 higher. With speculators fuelling the frenzy, the Open category, which is a proxy for car buyers, chalked up the biggest gain of $14,000.

In percentage terms, the increases were the highest since the COE system began 20 years ago, barring the recoveries from isolated freak results. As a result, car prices soared – by more than $20,000 in some cases.

Such increases are, to say the least, undesirable. They are a shock to the system, and change overnight the landscape for car buyers and sellers alike. Other than the banks and finance companies, no one is happy. But if this is the price for maintaining a sustainable vehicle population and relatively unclogged roads, no thinking person will object.

But is COE the only tool to achieve this end? Obviously, it is not. We have electronic road pricing (ERP).
Introduced in 1998, ERP targets the real cause of congestion: indiscriminate car usage in high-density areas during peak hours.

Has ERP been utilised to its full potential? In my opinion, no.

More gantries can be erected and switched on. Rates can be higher. Better still, roll out the distance-based charging system the LTA has been studying for a decade now.

Admittedly, ERP may be more politically unpalatable than COE. The latter is often forgotten once the consumer pays for the car. In fact, even the recent price spikes will become “painless” when amortised over the years through monthly instalments.

ERP, on the other hand, is a daily reminder of the cost of driving a car. With every beep of the reader, every dollar amount flashed, the driver feels the pinch.

And so it should be. ERP is designed to remind drivers of their contribution to congestion. It works, too, judging by the cases of luxury cars stopping by road shoulders to wait for gantries to be switched off.

But it is not working well enough. On roads such as the Central Expressway, East Coast Parkway and Pan-Island Expressway, traffic is heavy even with ERP. Ditto the city centre.

In the case of the latter, there is another more effective tool to curb usage: parking charges. While city parking charges have gone back up to pre-recessionary levels, they are still relatively low compared with those in many developed cities.

With higher usage charges, Singapore can afford to have more people owning cars, a key aspiration in all affluent societies. When ERP was introduced, the Government released extra COEs into the system (that is, over and above the number of COEs pegged to vehicles taken off the road).

The same principle can apply again. Expand ERP and release more COEs. Otherwise, rising car prices will persuade more people to keep their current cars, which in turn will mean fewer deregistrations in the future.

And that can only mean continued COE quota contractions ahead.

With Singapore’s growing population, this could eventually lead to six-figure premiums, although industry players say that is unlikely now.

The last piece of the puzzle is, of course, a speedy, well-connected and comfortable public transport system. If people are to drive less into the city, they must have access to alternatives that are nearly as viable as the car.

Otherwise, they will continue to drive, and gripe about high charges.

christan@sph.com.sg

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2. Mr Lim goes under the gantries
3. Outrageous