Turn a Hypocritical CSR to Genuine One

This is posted about two months ago: Michael Porter talked about how we can genuinely and effectively carry out CSR. The good news (and the key message) is that CSR is not in conflict with profitability, rather, they support each other.

Retreat goes Online

Firstly, our family duties often prevent us from being absent from home for several days. Secondly, we might not be able to find a suitable teacher. Note that I avoided saying “good” teacher because different people find some teachers more helpful than others. One very important factor for learning in spiritual development is the language. For instance, most English-speaking people have problem understanding translated texts/speeches, and vice-versa.

Time has changed. Now you can go online for retreats. I have been following the US medication community for some years now. One of my favorite teachers and authors Sharon Salzberg is leading an online retreat.

If you haven’t got chance to go for retreat, maybe you can give it a try, here.

My 2009 in Review

Here is my personal list of happenings:

• Did sizable management consulting engagements with a multinational company and a local conglomerate. Finally made full use of what I learnt in MBA and PhD. Learned a lot too, especially the human side of a consulting project.
• Did a business intelligence project with a large local company. Learned quite a bit of T-SQL and ASP.NET.
• Completed a statistical library product and sold a couple of copies online.
• Continue to build community in UPSR-TODAY.com
• Started a bookshop, both online and physical
• Developed a courseware on studying skills
• Started developing a workshop for business partnering with software consortium of Penang
• Learned to play chess (so that my son can’t beat me that easily)
• Has a big gathering (20 year anniversary) for a group of Buddhist friends who went to Air Jernih for community service.
• Read quite a few books. Lost count of it.
• Many other small things which didn’t succeed, too trivial, too confidential, or too embarrass to list.

Also, this year, I bade fare well to my late father.

Bye 2009.

May year 2010 be a fulfilling year for me and everyone.

My Favorite Restaurant Coming to Changi Airport

I have tried Ananda Bhavan in Penang Little India, Sungai Petani, and Tanjung Bungah. They have never failed to impress me. Especially the one in LIttle India – where there are two shops, one serving pure vegetarian food – really delights me.

As I walk around Changi Airport Terminal 2 two days ago, there is this sign:

Seems like the shop is expanding fast – outside Malaysia now. I think they deserve to be so successful. If you have tried their food, don’t wait, go try it asap.

Singapore National Museum Goes High Tech

Every time Malaysians visit Singapore, they can’t help returning home with many “ideas for improvement” for their home land. This trip is no exception for me.

I had an exceptionally good experience this time at Singapore National Museum. This time, it introduced a personal digital companion (as they call it). As you move around sections in the museum, you just punch in the number indicated on the floor. You will get detailed explanation on what you are seeing. Here is how the “companion” looks like:

It is multilingual, with a version for children.

I’ve never enjoyed a museum that much. Thanks for making this works.

Take Two

A common scene of a public toilet

(1) Malaysia:

    A desk collecting money from you for using the toilet.

(2) Singapore:

    No desk in front of the toilet. Inside the toilet:

Logical and Illogical Logics

There are always two sides of a coin. Take logic. It helps us to understand many things. On the other hand, people can twist and turn it to serve their purpose.

The following is a case of "logical thinking", which shows over-generalization of "pattern" without validation:

Fact 1. The Japanese eat very little fat
and suffer  fewer heart attacks than Americans.

Fact 2. The Mexicans eat a lot of  fat
and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.

Fact 3. The Chinese drink very little red wine
and suffer fewer heart attacks than  Americans.

Fact 4. The  Italians drink a lot of red wine
and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.

Fact 5. The Germans  drink a lot of beers and eat lots of  sausages and fats  and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.

CONCLUSION: Eat and drink what you like. Speaking English is apparently what kills you.

I know you don’t buy the conclusion here, simply because the conclusion is quite far off. But how about the false logical assertions that is more subtle and believable?

Like: “All good students go for tuition. If you don’t take tuition, you will lose out.” or, “We need a lot of protein for growth, therefore we must eat meat.” Recently I heard there was a so-called health expert going around to promote Vitamin-C as solution to all sorts of illnesses. This guy can put up a lot of “evidence” to support this points.

Our world is full of all kinds of assertions. It is not so easy to differentiate fads from facts. With the advances in marketing and selling, anything can be packaged so that you buy their stories. Packaging essentially show you something and hide from you something – to get you to buy their ideas or products.

Without critical minds, we will just get sucked into the zeitgeist, or the prevailing belief of the time.

The solution is: think twice, think through, get second opinion and don’t get emotional.