Author: CheckW

This was the week where the S’pore parliament sat in for their first session after elections on 10 Jul. There were a lot of first-timer politicians. A record 10 opposition party members were voted in, plus 2 additional NMP (Nominated Member of Parliament). It was a lively debate indeed and I would like to highlight some topics this week.

The PM did well with a good speech on Covid19, lessons learnt and its impact on S’pore, ending it on an emotional note. It was his mention of the word “Free Rider” on voters choosing the opposition that got everyone flustered. The new Leader of the Opposition took offence and started a mini-debate on it.

For the rest of the week, there were more heated debates and the issue of minimum wage came up in the speech of opposition member Jamus. Then the normally quiet senior minister Tharman came out of the blue to forcefully give a sharp rebuttal. “No one has a monopoly on compassion.”

If this was just a peek at what is to come for future parliamentary sessions, then we are in for exciting times. I look forward to greater debates and discussions on national topics, hopefully in a non-partisan way but for the good of the nation.

The other topic that stood out for me was on foreigners working in the country. It was argued by the opposition that there is not enough transparency on the actual numbers, that the authorities were too lax in allowing too many foreigners into the country that resulted in many locals being overlooked in the job market. This is a very sore point, especially in the Covid19 environment where more job loses are to be expected. Firms that were biased against locals had been flagged but not exposed and is that effective?

The general perception is that PR (Permanent Resident) status, a step before getting full citizenship by non-locals, is too easy to obtain. They last for 5 years and could be renewed indefinitely. Many foreigners take up PR because of the many advantages it offers. Some with no intention to eventually become citizens. Citizens question why PRs have so many of the rights which a local has, but need not work for it (eg. National Service, highly subsidized school fees). If getting PR is so easy, wouldn’t locals become second class citizens in their own country?

Most job statistics lump citizens and PRs in the same category, further infuriating voters. PMET job losses are also increasing as the call to protect citizens grew louder. The authorities had claimed that PR quotas had been reduced over recent years, but citizens are still questioning if this is still too many. The government reasoned that S’pore is a global financial centre and hence it needs to attract foreign talents and global companies to want to locate here.

Many have argued that the CECA agreement with India had unfairly punished S’pore workers, especially the PMET segment. Being a small nation compared to a much large one will make things loop sided. This will definitely be a topic on further discussions in parliament.

IMHO, I believe that the issue is that we do not allow duo passports – once you get S’pore citizenship, you have to give up your existing citizenship. Those from developed countries (eg US, EU, UK) may not want to give up their passports for a S’pore one as they can legally have duo citizenship in their home countries. So if they get PR, they may not want to proceed to citizenship. But the opposite is true for developing countries like India and ASEAN, where they are more likely to convert from PR to citizenship because of the attractiveness of our citizenship versus their countries. Hence the weakness of the PR process is exploited by a lot of foreigners.

I do believe that PR requirements should be tightened further. Renewal of PR status every 5 years should get progressively harder. If a PR renews more than 3 times (ie 15 years), it may indicate that there is no intention for them to be citizens eventually. It is still too easy to get PR status and the benefits are too similar to citizens, thereby angering locals who continue to lose jobs and get replaced by more foreigners/PRs. There should be more segregation of benefits and differences between citizens/PR and they should not be counted together in job statistics.

From my personal experience, I had lost 2 jobs over the last 8 years and the replacements were foreigners. While I have moved on from these unfortunate personal setbacks, I cannot help but think if this is happening too frequently over the last 10 years to other S’poreans. In these 1 in 100 years Covid19 shock to the economy, shouldn’t the scale tip more in favour of citizens rather than foreign talents?

This is not an easy discussion. As a small country, locals may lack the global/regional experience to take up such a role. Getting the confidence of MNC companies to invest in S’pore is one other consideration. There is a fine line between being open to the world and getting more protectionistic. Look at America and MAGA, aiming at China for all its woes. Protectionism is already happening to other countries.

This week’s sharp drop in the stock market was also a wake up call to the froftiness of the lofty valuations of tech equities due to central bank liquidity in response to Covid19. We are entering Q4 flu season and the virus is still amongst us. My UK trip is just 2 weeks away…

It was GOP’s turn after DNC’s 4 days of their online convention last week. To be fair to them, I tried to watch as much as possible of the RNC event this week to be as objective as possible to hear the other side of the story.

Certain themes emerged over the 4 days as they targeted certain segments of the voters. Firstly, they aimed for their conservatives base with pro-life and religious freedom messages. Then there was a number of black speakers to appeal to the non-white population. Lastly, it was the promise of law and order against rioters.

Of course, Biden and Democrat bashing was also fair game. They had multiple over the top warnings that Biden was a socialist and wants to take away their guns and health care plan, bring chaos and rioting to the cities. They mentioned that DNC had a very negative doom and gloom image last week while they now predominantly project an image of fear if the other side takes over. They claimed that the work is not done yet and it requires 4 more years. Strangely, most of the speakers talk as if the pandemic was over and used the past tense.

Meanwhile, as the event unfolded, other major news was also happening around America. Bannon got arrested for fraud charges, 2 hurricanes barrelled towards the Gulf of Mexico, another unarmed black man was shot while a white 17-year-old militia vigilante shot and killed 2 unarmed protestors.

Then there was the Falwells and pool boy scandal that erupted on Sunday. The prominent evangelical icon confessed that his wife had an affair with a younger man and decided to resign from his post. Further sordid details emerged later in the week from the pool boy that it was an arrangement that Falwell like to watch his wife having sex with another man.

What was interesting was that his strong endorsement of Trump in 2016 helped to sway many religious conservative voters to support his presidency. Even more strange was the fact that Trump’s fixer and lawyer Michael Cohen, since jailed, had revealed that he helped Falwell use various means to cover up some incriminating photos in 2015 for them. So did this favour resulted in Falwell’s endorsement of Trump to help swing a majority of conservatives to his side?

For a while now, I was trying to understand why the conservatives and GOP were supporting a candidate that had no morals, lies repeatedly, have zero empathy for anyone other than himself, besides being racist and sexist. That goes against all basic religious beliefs. Does the end justify the means? If Trump achieves their aims, should they ignore all his human deficiencies? Also, GOP was traditionally against increasing deficits but Trump had managed to balloon it by giving a tax cut to the rich the moment he took on the presidency.

As a Gen X Asian with moderate views leaning towards the more conservative side, perhaps I can understand their concerns about the threats the RNC conservatives have seen over the Obama years. They might have felt that aggressive LGBT views had been forced down their throats together with issues like pro-abortion and limitations to their 1st amendment rights to carry arms. To make these items mainstream and acceptable to the general population is a red line they do not want to cross.

What I question is their means to an end reasoning. Is it right to ignore an amoral president who cheats and lie as long as you get what you want? Aren’t the basic framework of your religious beliefs compromised? If a thief manages to sell you an item stolen from elsewhere at a much lower price, is that acceptable? It is a dilemma which I have been questioning myself.

I have a friend that was very pro-Trump and much more in tune with the Man upstairs than me. He even bought a MAGA cap… But recently, he quantifies that he is a Trump observer and not a supporter anymore.

Honestly, I really don’t think any American news media, or any others in the world including BBC, can be trusted for an unbiased take on all subjects. This is especially true for the coverage of their own home-based news. All have a motive to capture as many eyeballs as possible and tend to present a side that achieves this aim. So if it is on American related news like the elections, they have a tendency to push their narratives. Fox for Trump/GOP, CNN/MSNBC for Biden.

So my same friend suggested, which I support, that one has to have a balanced diet of watching the same news from around the world to get a more unbiased view. For example, one should watch reporting of US elections from sources like Russian, Chinese and Middle East sources to get a flavour of the real scoop on the situation. Conversely, if I want S’pore news, I should check out the BBC and America for their reports on us. But sometimes this fails if the world is on the other side of the targeted country, for example, the current favourite past time of China-bashing nowadays.

Politics is and will always be dirty. One can play by perceived gentlemen rules or take a gloves-off no-holds-barred approach. The next remaining 65 days till the 03 Nov date will be an interesting time where the mother of all elections will be fought online, on TV and on all social media mediums. Compromise and constructive discussion is not an option anymore. It’s either you are for me or you are my enemy. SAD!

Politically, things are really hotting up in the US as elections are less than 80 days away. The main highlight for me this week was watching the 4 days DNC convention. Each and every day of the DNC convention was a pleasant surprise as the message unfolded.

Though I am not a citizen and cannot vote, I am intrigued by the ongoing battle between the 2 main parties for the hearts of their citizens. My friends and I all agree that Americans are hypocrites in general though. They can do unto others what others cannot do unto them. They want to sell their brand of democracy to countries and do not mind using various means to achieve their aims. Supporting oppositions, selling arms and trying to look righteous at the same time is a way of life for them.

Being number one for a long time has made most of them out of touch with the rest of the world with an America knows best attitude which can be very condescending at times. When threatened with a rising power like China, they display double standards which are clear for all to see. You are either with me or you are against me.

Trump has brought out the worst in this behaviour over the last 4 years, using his position as a bully pulpit and giving the finger to everyone. He is an equal opportunity tyrant/idiot, attacking friends and enemies alike and degrading the office of the presidency by setting never before seen historically low benchmarks. Most of what he does will put a common man into jail, except that he protects himself with presidential privileges.

So this week’s DNC 4 nights of online presentations were like a breath of fresh air. It shows that there is hope for the future after the nightmare they have been in. It was a tour de force of multiple participants who stood up and explained why America can do better for their love ones and their children.

They had multiple GOP members and common folks vouching for Biden plus well known artistes too. There were heartwarming stories of grandpa Biden who went out of his way to connect with people, to empathise with their pain and sufferings. It was a huge contrast to Trump who never shows any empathy for anyone except himself and lies constantly. Americans just want to return to normalcy and see a president that fights for the people and not try to personally profit from the role of the highest office in the country. He has successfully debased this position to new lows every time he personally attacks an individual or company who criticized him.

The GOP/RNC event will be next week and it is likely that they will adopt an aggressive attack on Biden. They would threaten that Biden represents a lawless society if he is elected with many doom and gloom scenarios added in for effect. Funnily, they do not have any plans to show for what they want to do in the next 4 years, other than more big picture empty promises. Healthcare alternative? We will have a big plan coming next month… More tax cuts? Sure! Screw the deficit.

Biden, on the other hand, had already laid out his action plans on a number of major topics on his website. The DNC event had hiccups but it was otherwise a well organized first time for such a big virtual convention. The message was to look to the future and to undo all the damage done over the last 4 years.

Teflon Trump is still fighting back, even after a bombshell bipartisan report on the Russian interference came out, Bannon was arrested and an ex-White House official came out to do a tell-all on TV. I am really amazed at his diehard supporters. No amount of evidence can convince them that Trump is not their QAnon conspiracy saviour. Good luck to America if he wins again. They really deserve him.

It was a quiet week for me. I had a long overdued lunch with my sisters on Mon and 2 more lunches with good friends on Tue and Wed. Time passed slowly but nothing much was done, other than watching more youtube videos and preparing for my upcoming UK trip which will happen in a month’s time.

That’s what Trump was feeling this week when she was nominated as Biden’s VP pick. If only he knew Malay…

This was the biggest news in the media for the whole of this week. It made everyone seat up in their armchairs. The first speech Biden and Kamala had together was only 35 minutes long, but it reminded me of LKY. The points were forceful and direct as she was introduced to the world.

The fact that her parents were new immigrants from India and Jamaica was an irony not lost for many in the current anti-immigrant sentiment of MAGA. The people in Chennai India are now celebrating the emergence of another prominent relative – her mum’s hometown.

She proceeded to tear the orange one a new asshole by pointedly stating the failures of his non-leadership, being unqualified for the most important job on the planet. She has been demonstrating her past prosecutor experience in California over the last 12 months to deadly effect. I pity Pence when they will have the VP debate. She will have him for breakfast…

She ticked so many boxes for the Democrats. A first time that a VP is a woman, coloured and of Asia background. America is made up of immigrants and this is a more realistic representation of the population of America now. She is the American dream come true for most people. It is about time women have more representation in politics as they carry 50% of the world.

Coming from a family of 4 sisters and a strong mother, I cannot agree more with the choice. Look at all the countries with successful Covid19 responses – HK, NZ, Germany. All women leaders. They bring about a level headed sensibility and pragmatism which the world sorely needs nowadays. Men just have too much testosterone and ego to be more nurturing and protective of others.

The Trump team was totally unprepared for this as the next 48 hours showed. They probably thought it would be Susan Rice and they can use the Bengahzi stuff on her. But all he could say was that Kamala is nasty. He has a thing for strong women, especially those of colour. It has been demonstrated time and again that when faced with a strong women opponent, he will denigrate her with name-calling and personal attacks like a school bully. A president that makes name-calling a norm (Sleepy Joe, Crazy Pelosi etc etc) is really not presidential at all.

With only 83 days left to the elections, the Trump “take no prisoners” strategy is to try to cripple the elections instead. GOP has been unusually quiet all this while, as the White House goes off the rails. Firstly, to try to delay the elections, then to sign useless executive orders before threatening to withhold funding for the Post Office to oppose/cripple mail-in ballots.

The craziness is getting crazier as they grapple with straws to get re-elected by all means. Putin must be wondering if he should still support a puppet that is going rogue soon. Meanwhile, China-bashing is a favourite past time to divert attention away from home ground distractions like the runaway pandemic disaster.

This is looking to be building up to the Mother of all Elections, a grand F&*k-Up of a Sh*tshow in the making where chaos will reign from Nov for weeks. And then he might not leave the White House claiming a rigged election result. This reality show is better than any Netflix thriller series. So much material, so little time left…

It was a quiet week for me. Managed to finally get back my car from the workshop. Quite pleased with the additional work done to spruce up my 10 year old car. Had 2 Zoom calls with the consultancy group I had joined. One was a townhall to showcase group strategy and new products. The other was a feedback session on the project which we had just completed, to set exam questions for a national financial certification entity. It was good to see a familiar face from uni days in this call and reconnect with her again after all these years. Just a month away from my UK trip with older son to Oxford.

It is less than 100 days to the US elections. Trump has official targeted China as the scapegoat for all things that had turned bad for America into the final days of the election campaign. Sadly, the voice of reason in American politics had turned silent.

The direct attack of a government against a social media app like TikTok is laughable at times as most users are teenagers trying to gain screen time with dance moves. Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat are similar apps which have gained worldwide adoption. Should they be banned too by other countries?

Lee Kai-Fu, the well known AI expert who was the head of Google China, sums it up well. For companies wanting to come to China, they have to abide by the rules and regulations stated by the country before deciding if they like to invest in the country. If the rules change and the company is not comfortable (like Google China had done), it then reserves the right to shut down, close its operations and leave the country.

America has done neither for TikTok. It just decided overnight that the app should be banned without specific charges directed at it, other than saying it is to protect Americans. Trump’s revenge on the Tulsa TikTok attack? It is never a good sign when a country directs its powers on an individual company (Huawei and now TikTok) to destroy it, rather than to diplomatically work with the country to resolve their differences.

China on its part had changed a lot and gained self-confidence on itself in the last few years. Its strategic moves have rubbed others the wrong way as it showed its arrogance as a rising star to the world. Their wolf warriors diplomatic corps, while being the best and are very smart, are not the experienced diplomatic types who will stand down when the reputation of the motherland is at stake.

This cumulation of tension has now blown up to a new level of animosity this week as Trump escalates it by many notches. It wants to target Wechat and others too. China is now the favourite bogeyman for American politics and everyone seems to be united against this common foe.

Will China retaliate or stay silent? It is a tough choice as the American elections are so near. Hit too hard and the new president might continue the pressure. Not responding will also anger its citizens. There is also the ongoing tariff war which complicates matters. China looks like it is adopting a tit-for-tat strategy with a matching response, being careful not to escalate the matter further.

China is playing the long game by waiting out the next 90 days to get further clarity on whether it should play hardball. The Chinese are very patient and they measure historical cycles in 100 years tenors. I read that they see China history hitting rock bottom in 1940 during WWII and so they expect to peak in 2040. This is 30 years for now and a generation away. They have been preparing for this. One Belt One Road is one such long game strategy they are executing.

With their population size, they are now preparing to turn inwards as a strategic move to shelter themselves from the protectionistic state where all countries are heading towards because of Covid19. They aim to support their domestic markets and not rely too heavily on exports into the near future. Tech advances like AI will also allow them to improve productivity by leaps and bounce.

On the personal front this week, I started with a very lovely dinner with a core group of guys I have known since uni days. We have grown old together over the past 30 years, seen each other gotten married and raised our families together. We celebrated with some very nice vintage whisky – Glenfarcas 1987. The 33 years old drink was smooth and easy to drink. It went well with the seafood and the Alaskan crab 🙂

I had another regular lunch with a group of close ex-colleagues on Wed. The food business venture which I had been talking to them about for the last 1 year is finally looking to take up some form and shape as we are seriously considering it now. The last person still working is considering it as his plan B as the banking sector looks to deteriorate further like the rest of the jobs markets due to the Covid19 situation.

It is a simple concept of introducing fine Japanese meats at a more affordable price to the affluent mass middle class in S’pore. There seems to be a niche where we can profit from. More work needs to be done and we have assigned each other with tasks to complete before we meet up again next week to recce some possible shophouses in Joo Chiat as the next step.

My car is in the final stage of repairs after the accident more than 1.5 weeks ago. I was to pick it up on Fri but it was delayed. They kindly provided me with another courtesy car for the long weekend ahead into National Day celebrations tomorrow… Majulah Singapura!!

Another 5 more weeks to my UK adventure with son to start his 3 years uni there…

The week for me started with a bang, literally… And then it is off to the next project of preparing a new adventure overseas.

On Sunday evening, I had a car accident. A moment of personal misjudgement was all it took for it to happen. I have had only a handful of car mishaps over my 33 years of driving career, though the last few were the other parties’ fault.

This one was different as I had stopped on the leftmost side of the junction and started moving, thinking that the light turned green. I had mistakenly seen the lights of the next junction which was very near and not the one I was in. I moved ahead and something immediately banged into the left side of my car.

A food delivery person on a motorcycle had hit my car. I immediately stopped in the middle of the junction and got out to see what had happened. The front of his motorcycle was severely damaged and he was lying on the road. Luckily, a Cisco car was just behind and they came out to help. 2 ladies crossing the street were also offering to help and call for an ambulance.

Soon the traffic police came over and he took over the situation. He directed the traffic and co-ordinated the steps required. The motorcyclist felt head pains and hence the ambulance people had to put him on a stretcher to put him into the ambulance. The wheel on my car was dented and I needed a tow truck for it.

We immediately went to the required police station to make a police report to the investigating officer. I was still shell shocked by then and everything seems to be like a slow-moving movie. I told my wife that perhaps it gets harder for me to deal with stress as I get older.

I count my blessings that my wife was not injured as the impact was on her side. That it could have been worse if it was a car instead of a motorcycle. I prayed that the person would be alright as they sent him to the A&E ward of SGH. I called the relative using the number he had given me to inform his brother in law of the accident.

That night, the accident kept on playing in my mind. I woke up many times in cold sweat as I replayed the whole accident in my memory. I could not understand why I could have made such a simple error in judgement.

The next morning, I had to go to the repair workshop which the car was towed to, to do the accident paperwork for the insurance claims. I had just renewed the COE for another 10 years for my old car the week before and purchased the road tax and car insurance for another year. Talk about timing…

I went with my younger son to help him bring his things to his new hostel for the beginning of his term in NUS before heading to the workshop. The repair workshop was very efficient as they deal mainly with road accident cases. I called the relative of the accident victim shortly after to enquire about his condition. His sister told me that the doctors had checked on his condition and he was discharged the same night as they felt that he was alright. I felt a sense of relief that he had no serious injury. It is now up to the police to investigate the accident and come up with the report to determine the penalties which I would be given.

Because of Covid19, nations have closed their borders and the whole world stopped moving for months. The after-effects of this once in 100 years event were unprecedented. Millions became unemployed overnight and food supply chains severely tested in this highly interconnected global network. It was every nation for itself and protectionism reared its ugly head. Each country became a case study on what to do or not do during a pandemic. Countries which were initially successful in curbing the virus succumbed to the subsequent waves as it moved from East to West and then back again.

Testing is still the only sure way of slowing down the virus and contact tracing the next step. But in our porous borders, it was inevitable that the virus would return again. The only end game solution will be the development of a vaccine for everyone on planet Earth. A number of firms are racing towards this and there are at least 24 such groups that are currently during vaccine research around the world.

My older son was supposed to start his university course in Oxford in Oct. The school had confirmed his position and he is expected to be there for the school term opening. At the moment, the UK has mandated that a 14 days quarantine period is required for all new overseas visitors from outside the EU.

His college had offered to provide a quarantine service plus meals to him in his dormitory. I will be accompanying him there to help him with the luggage load and to ensure that he settles down well. My wife is working full time now, hence it is not practical for her to join us as we will also need to be quarantined for another 14 days when we are back in S’pore. That would be a total of 28 days quarantine required, which will hinder her work as a country manager.

The situation in the UK is still very fluid at the moment. It had a very bad 1st wave when the PM refused to acknowledge the virus until he got it himself. The irony… Trying very hard to fight it now, it had recently imposed an immediate restriction on Spain when the cases there surged. A lot of British holidaymakers there were affected. Unbelievable that they are still having holidays in a pandemic…

Anyway, I had to start planning for my UK trip now. I have booked a service apartment about 4 km from central Oxford for 2 weeks for the quarantine and then another 2 weeks in the city centre where I will help my son settle down before heading home to another 2 weeks quarantine at a government selected hotel.

The upside to the trip? The top vaccine contender at the moment is actually located in Oxford! We just have to be extra careful when we are there and wear our masks diligently. Though we know more about the virus than 6 months ago, we are nowhere near the finishing line yet. 2020 is certainly turning out to be an annus horribilis of sorts as we cross into Aug today.

We started the week with more positive news of Covid19 vaccine research advancement. The top 2 candidates hogged the limelight as more details come out.

Moderna (MRNA) and AstraZeneca (AZN) were the leading firms in the search for the vaccine and fast-tracking into the next phase of testing. They have also started to prepare the manufacturing of billions/millions of doses and nations like the USA are already paying them for advance orders.

While they may not be perfect vaccines without any side effects, it is still better than having nothing at the moment. Testing is good but the high probability of subsequent reinfection waves make continuous testing ineffective eventually. Anthony Fauci believes that any new vaccine should be implemented as soon as possible as it will prevent more deaths.

There seems to be at least 24 such companies who are racing to develop a vaccine around the world. Hopefully, we should get a breakthrough soon as the best minds in the medical world are laser-focused on this issue. China and S’pore also are in the midst of their development too.

I am hopeful that we should be able to see some positive results by early Sep. As an investment punt, I had also decided to place some small buy orders for MRNA and AZN stocks this week. The orders were filled as there was a pullback from their recent highs.

The tech stocks seemed to be taking a rest this week as America fired off another shot to further escalate the USA-China tension. They announced the closing of China’s consulate in Houston within 3 days for spying charges on vaccine research. China retaliated yesterday by closing America’s consulate in Chengdu.

Trump’s henchmen like Pompeo are now outright calling the Chinese Communist Party a threat to the free world and asking allies to team up to fight against them. This irony is not lost to many observers. While America is against others who are actively trying to interfere with its domestic politics, it sees no issue when it tries to interfere with the domestic politics of other countries. The hypocrisy and double standards are too apparent. They have been doing it for years to interfere in many countries for “greater good”. Now they want to stifle the advancement of its closest competitor in order to remain at number one in the world.

To be fair, China has done things which are not appropriate too. But there are avenues to address them. Targeting specific companies like Huawei and escalating trade tensions while in a pandemic is not a smart move. Political overtones into the Nov elections and getting a convenient scapegoat for all its shortfalls is really a pathetic Trump move.

On the personal front this week, I completed my first chiropractic session on Mon after receiving the X-ray results of my spine ($150). It was not as bad as I feared and trial session at $38 also included consultancy sessions and some alignment and cracking of my spine. I should continue to do more stretching exercises to maintain a correct spinal posture.

I also had a call with a fresh undergrad I met last Oct for the mentorship program who had reached out to me again for advice on her career. I gave her some pointers and shared my work experience with her, helping her to refocus on exactly what she wanted to do and if getting into the financial sector suits her. Her Linkedin profile was also not ideal and I suggested that she brush up on it.

I finally had the Zoom reunion call with my junior college classmates on Thurs night. It had been 36 years since we left campus. There were 8 of us and we had a good catch up on what each of us had been doing since leaving school, our families and what we are doing now. It was nostalgic to see that all of us have grown into uncles with less hair and rounder bodies. Most still look the same after all these years though. All 8 of us were male as we could not seem to invite any of the ladies to join us 🙁

How time flies and our lives have passed by from young adults of 18 to uncles of 54 now. We joked about the things we had done then in school. One mentioned past stories of himself which we had a good laugh over the situations he experienced then. 1.5 hours passed by quickly and it was soon time to call it a night after reminiscing of the times long ago where we were still young and innocent. We are all into the 2nd part of our halftimes now…

With Covid19, all vacation plans for this year had to be scrapped. The airlines and tourism industries have been hit extremely hard as business falls to near zero. No countries want overseas visitors to infect the population again, even though we know more about the virus now. Having 14 days of quarantine procedure is the norm the moment one lands in a foreign country.

I am in the midst of preparing for a UK trip in Sep now. My older son will be starting his university term in Oxford. We plan to reach the city by mid-Sep to start our separate 14 days quarantines in 2 locations – he will do his in Keble college campus quarters while I do mine in a rented apartment. I will then stay another 2 weeks there to make sure he has settled in, before coming back home for another 14 days quarantine in S’pore. Hopefully, things will change in the next 2 months but for now, that is the plan.

It has been 5 months since I started my weekly blog tracking of Covid19 and here we are in week 20. The world has become unrecognizable since then as everyone grapple with one turmoil after another which had turned all our lives upside down.

Who would have thought that the world had to come to a stop for a few months? If you had told me that last Dec, I would say that you are crazy. Full lockdown and wear masks everywhere? Madness!

I remembered the moment I had my “OH, SHIT!” reaction very clearly… It was our last overseas vacation in Feb. We were on a mountain top overlooking Wellington, New Zealand. The guide pointed to the port and said that all activities have come to a halt. They could not cut any more wooden logs from the forest because there is no space left in the harbour to store them. None of the ships could transport them overseas as all were full of cargo with nowhere to go. The whole supply chain had stopped dead in its tracks. And that was slowly happening in every port around the world.

And here we are 5 months later. We now know how to handle Covid19 much better but yet the overall situation has not improved. Cases are still rising exponentially in many western countries and people are still stupidly fighting for their rights to not wear masks. Too much bad news all the time and little or no uplifting news. Super depressing…

This week though, there seems to be some light at the end of the tunnel. We started the week with the great news that there is some advancement in the development of Covid19 vaccines. Moderna is one such company that announced a successful phase 2 and moving into the final phase 3 by the end of the month. Another group in Oxford, UK had also announced successful vaccine trials at the same time. There is market talk too that China is also racing ahead on this effort. Many are optimistic that a successful vaccine would be found very soon.

Once that is done, it will still take a few months to ramp up production to produce the millions and billions of doses required for the world’s population. Bloomberg is tracking at least 140+ Covid19 initiatives happening around the world now. With the intense concentration of effort on a single subject, I believe that we should see some positive results soon.

The other positive outcome of this virus was the acceleration of the digitalization of eCommerce, epayments and etracking. China has been using QR codes successfully for almost everything over the last 6 years while the world refuses to adapt to it and continue to stick to physical cash. The virus has forced everyone to jump on this bandwagon asap.

Physical cash is dirty and may contain the virus. Handshakes are deemed toxic and any physical contact is taboo nowadays. Contact tracing is critical and we have to use QR codes to log into each location we visited as a national initiative to have a central record of our whereabouts. Everyone should be an expert on using QR codes by now. There is an infinite number of QR permutations that can be generated, so one can be created for everything.

Like China, the next stage of QR code usage will be cashless payments as one can use the mobile phone for all our daily activities. eWallet adoption will be a no brainer. Banks are already offering free instantaneous and real-time remittance services. Fintechs like YouTrip’s eWallet product will now get its turn to shine. The technology has always been here but it has taken the virus to push us all off the cliff to adapt to it.

On my personal front, it has been a week of individual wellness program of sorts for me. I had donated blood to the national Bloodbank for more than 25 times over my life since the first time during my army days. I had to stop for the last 2 years because of my monthly business trips to Yangon. Because of a malaria incident, I can only donate after 4 months after my last Yangon trip. Thanks to the virus and the lockdown period, the 4 months waiting period was completed.

I finally donated blood again on Tues after an absence of more than 2.5 years. The positive upside of donating is that the body will be pushed to re-generate and produce new blood as a pint of it has to be replaced. The next few days created a sharpness and clarity of mind for me – probably due to the production of new blood within my system LOL!

I had also decided to try my first chiropractic session this week after seeing so many alignment and bones cracking videos on FB and youtube. I wanted to address my back pains that may be due to old age and bad posturing. I discovered that there were many trial packages available for me to try before I commit to a package with a chiropractor. I also wanted to see if my wife’s company’s health package covers this too.

Did my first session on Wed at a place near my home. The doctor did a detailed analysis of my spine weaknesses and bad posture habits. It seems that my left side bears most of the bodyweight most of the time which had caused an unevenness of the loading on my spine in general. He recommended a spine X-ray which I took on Thurs and we will review it again next week. Also managed to do my first foot reflexology session after 5 months on Thurs and slept like a baby that night.

Finally, I had to spend a bomb again for my car expenses. The current car had served me well for the last 10 years and I had to get a new Certificate of Entitlement (COE) to allow me to keep it for another 10 years. As I had maintained it well and it is much cheaper than replacing it with another car, I decided to pay for a new 10 years COE. The expiry date of the old COE is today and I renewed it online on Wed. Together with the cost of a new annual car insurance and road tax, I spent a total of SGD 35,000 this week. It is a big hit for a semi-retired person like me to take but thankfully, I had a consultancy job last year which provided me with some income.

I predict that we will be in a better place in another 3 months as we learn more about Covid19 and how to conquer it. A vaccine should be found before year-end and we can try to return to the world we once knew less than 6 months ago.