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Sunday, May 31, 2020

Throwback Post: A Woman's Beauty

I have been blogging for 12 years. The different posts along the way show how thoughts, beliefs and family have evolved. Sometimes, I chance across a past blogpost that speaks to my heart.

Click HERE for one.


Covid19 Inspired Strange Dishes

In the past, I would identify a dish and then shop for ingredients. Now, going shopping is such a hassle, with all that queuing and Check In and Check Out. I look at what ingredients I already have and make a dish. This has resulted in a few rather strange concoctions.

Tteok Lasagna

Korean Rice Cakes.

Fried in garlic.


Mixed in bolognaise sauce and topped with parmesan and mozzarella.

Result: Some sort of tteok lasagna.



Vietnamese Spring Roll Cashew Lasagna

Spring rolls. 

Smother spring rolls with cashew cream.

Top with parmesan and mozzarella. Bake.


Saturday, May 30, 2020

Leave Them Or Else!

Pistachio has been having a good go at my spectacles. He happily chewed 2 pairs into bits. It is a good thing that I had spares at home. Else, I would have to wait till goodness knows when to get new glasses. We decided to teach Pistachio a lesson in leaving my spectacles alone, with the help of Fullerton Bear.

Somebody should make pooping and peeing dog plushies to help dog parents teach toilet habits.




Don't Catch It If You Can

I found the following pictures on my Facebook feed. The original source is HERE.

I thought ventilation was like in the movies where doctors place something over your nose and mouth to give you more oxygen.

It turns out that Covid19 ventilation is far more invasive than I thought. The intubation is done under general anaesthesia. Once intubated you have to go 2 to 3 weeks without moving, often upside down (ventral decubitus) with a tube buried in the mouth to the trachea. The mechanical ventilator then dictates the rhythm of your breathing. You can't talk or eat or do anything without help. There is pain along with the intubation. So, you will need sedatives and painkillers. You will live in a sort of an artificial coma. In 20 days of this, a young patient experiences the loss of 40% muscle mass requiring rehabilitation of 6 to 12 months. There will be injury to your mouth and perhaps even vocal cords.

If it were not a medical procedure to save lives, this could well be some sort of medieval torture. This is why old people don't make it through.




Thursday, May 28, 2020

Figuring Out the Gill Mask

I am not sure why it is easier to breathe through The Gill. Is it because it forces us to aspirate through an area 1/6 the size of a surgical mask? Pressure is a function of force divided by area. Our lungs can only exert so much force. If lung force has to breathe through the whole surgical mask, the pressure of aspiration on each sq mm of mask is lesser. If lung force has to breathe through an area 1/6 of the whole surgical mask, the pressure of aspiration on each sq mm of mask is 6 times higher. 

Air is better aspirated through The Gill thus.

I am not sure of this, though. I will be checking with the sciencey folks on this.

For normal wear to places that are hot, humid, well-ventilated with good social distancing, I have replaced the surgical mask cut out with 4 ply nappy liner. I wash and dry the nappy liners first, though.

Postscript: The Son has pronounced my explanation above poppycock.


The Gill forces us to breathe through a smaller surface area.

The filter is protected by an outer shell with large holes.


1 nappy liner can make 8 4-ply nappy liner inserts for The Gill.

I have pre-cut surgical masks and nappy liners for the whole family. Surgical mask cut outs will be used in air-conditioned environments. Nappy liners will be used for hot, humid, uncrowded spaces.




Wednesday, May 27, 2020

Anyhow Garden

The garden has fed us well in the past 3 months. It has not only fed us. It has fed our neighbours too. I grow stuff that they don't grow so we end up doing some sort of barter. I specialise in leafy greens. I have a surplus of leafy greens which I exchange for papaya and soursop. 

This garden is quite amazing. It feeds me with food and I feed it with poop.

Garden greens.

Neighbour's papaya.

Powdered eggshell for fertilising.

Guava flowers.


Turmeric flower.

Vegetable Compost Bin

After a few months, the vegetable in the vermicompost bin becomes this black stuff. We fry it in a wok to sterilised before adding to the soil. This stuff is potent. Everything that it feeds grows lush, green and pest free.



Sunday, May 24, 2020

Our Milo Is Old Now


Milo is 11 years old. In human years, he is 77 years old. His snout has turned white. So too have his paws. Growths have appeared between his toes that he cannot stop gnawing at. So, we have had to fashion socks to prevent him from cannibalising his own paws. His skin allergies have gone from bad to worse. So, we have had to encase him in a raincoat to stop him from scratching himself to shreds. We have also put him on a food elimination diet of duck and sweet potato.

He is far less energetic these days, our Milo. When he tries to stand from a lying down position, his hindquarters tremble slightly with the effort. With less exercise and the same amount of food, he had also become rather portly. I gave instructions to halve his food portions. I was afraid that if he lost the use of his hind legs, none of us girls at home would have the strength to carry him out to poo.

Yet, Milo still looks at me with the eyes of a 2 year old child, simply trusting. The only time he ever gets upset with me is when I pet Pistachio before I pet him. When we come home, it is important to Milo that we greet and pet him first. It does not take much. He just wants a quick pat on the head, a loving look and a short greeting in my baby talk voice. Once that is done, he will happily let me cuddle Pistachio.

Overall though, the vet believes he is in good shape for an 11 yr old dog. His bark remains thunderous. Milo's bark has alerted us to many a shady figure lurking in the shadows in the dead of the night. A few times, there were strange men standing out in the street at about 3 am. Once, the police came and arrested someone who was hiding in the park nearby.

To all who are not family, Milo is a scary dog. Yet, he has been nothing but gentle with me. No one is allowed near his bones but Milo brings his bones to me and stuffs them under my thigh. I don't quite know why he does that. Is it a love gift? Or does he do it because I am the Alpha Bitch of the family and he knows that his bones are safe with me?



Saturday, May 23, 2020

Disturbing C-Drama

There is C-Drama and there is C-Drama. Yanxi Palace was extraordinarily entertaining. The twists and turns kept The Husband and me glued to our chairs. The Daughter dissed me for watching junk. I dissed her for watching smut. Then, we had a nice bitch fight about whose tastes were more refined.

The truth is, we’re both bad. C-Drama isn’t the most refined entertainment there is, but then, neither is Community on Netflix.

So far, I have watched...
- Yanxi Palace (3 times)
- Love and Eternity (3 times)
- Nirvana in Fire 2 (3 times)
- Princess Silver (once)
- The New Shanghai Bund (once)
- Ashes of Love (3 times)

Today, I started watching, “The General and I.” I always start the series with the last episode. This is because it makes me very upset to watch sad endings. If the ending is sad, I don’t want to get attached to the characters. Yay! “The General and I” ends happily, with the male lead and the female lead happily married to each other, and ruling as King and Queen.

So, I settled in to enjoy my junk.

By episode 2, I was seriously disturbed. The male lead, a General of the opposing forces, takes the female lead into custody, forcibly kisses her within a few days of meeting her and then forces her to marry him. Wah! This kind of courtship ritual is freaky! My skin crawled so badly that I stopped at Episode 3. There is such a thing as Too Persistent and Come On Too Strong. Part of me worries. What if young persons watching it learn that it is ok to be forcibly kissed (can still live happily ever after) or to kiss people forcibly (and still live happily after). If it is a son, he can end up with molest charges. If it is a daughter, I think I will set upon the kisser with my garden shears.

Shhhh... don’t tell The Daughter what I watched this day! I will never hear the end of it!




Friday, May 22, 2020

A Review of Different Mask Types

I have been obsessed with reusable masks. Every new design inspires in me, instant craving. I want that. I need that. I must have that. I have built up an impressive collection of reusable masks. I am still missing the anti-bacterial ones that the government is distributing. I can't wait to add that to my reusable mask collection. Maybe one day, I can open a mask museum.

For what it's worth, here is my review of all the different mask types.

This is the Gill Mask. This provides surgical mask level protection but makes 1 surgical mask go a long way. I can cut 6 rectangles from 1 surgical mask to fit the filter window. The mask is comfortable. It is quite easy to breathe in it. The silicon piece is easy to wash and to dry. It can be worn around the head or hooked to the ears. Each rectangular cut out piece can last 2 whole days of wear. This means that 1 surgical mask can last 12 days of wear.

This is a reusable cloth pocket for a surgical mask. You insert the surgical mask into the cloth pocket and wear the whole pocket on your face. It provides surgical mask level protection and each surgical mask can last The Husband 5 whole days of work, if I change the reusable cloth sleeve daily. It is harder to breathe with this compared to wearing the surgical mask on its own. 

This is a reusable cloth sleeve. Slip it over the surgical mask and then, use the surgical mask's own ear loops to wear onto your face. I dislike this design because it interferes with the fit of the surgical mask. I also have to iron the sleeve to make it fit the surgical mask better. Too much trouble!

I got these for $2 a piece. I love the flowers on them but because of the 3 layers of cloth, these masks trap heat and moisture. They can get wet and uncomfortable from prolonged wear. I wear these the most often to Chong Pang Market because I don't stay long there and I like that these can be washed very frequently.  I quite like these because they smell nice after being washed and sunned. These do not provide protection that is anywhere close to surgical mask levels. So, I only use them in hot and humid conditions where aerosol spread is most unlikely, and I change them out every hour.

The Totobobo mask does not mould well to my face. The filters are also expensive. These are designed for larger particulate matter so are better for haze than for viral matter. I am not sure how easy it is to breathe in these because I have never been able to get them to fit my face properly.

These are N95 masks with an option for a battery operated ventilator attachment. Even with the ventilator, it is quite hard to breathe in these. For high viral load situations, I have them just in case we need to go to the hospital or the doctor's clinic. In those situations, I will also wear a face shield.

This is the 3M half faced respirator. It can be fitted with different types of filter pads made for different types of hazardous conditions. However, these only filter out particulate matter of 0.3 microns and above. Viral particles can be 0.06 microns in diameter. So, this mask is good for the haze but it is not good for viral matter. It makes me look really sexy to outer space aliens too! It is very easy to breathe in this because the design has an easy breathe vent which expels air. If you are sick, this mask would not protect others from you.

The Braised Pork Boys Loyalty Program

You know how SIA has those different lounges? There is the SilverKris Lounge, the KrisFlyer Lounge blah blah blah... I have never figured out how those lounges work. Sometimes, The Husband says it is ok to go. Other times, we have to hang around in the cafes and shops instead. The lounges are the perquisites of the SIA Loyalty Program.

Petunia belongs to the Braised Pork Boys' Herbal Tea Loyalty programme. My long and deliberate campaign to get on the good side of those men has paid off during Covid19. The fellow outside sees me from afar, knows my order and yells loudly, "å¤§å§ę„äŗ†" whereupon the fellow within immediately starts preparing my order. I wave happily at them, turn around and then scamper off to get teh si kosong. By the time I am back, my order is ready.

In normal times, the queue at the braised pork stall can stretch for 30 minutes. I hate waiting. So, I went on a charm offensive. I tried to give the braised pork boys all sorts of stuff. I soon found out how hard they were to please. The most expensive pineapple tarts in Singapore were judged, "a bit sour." Home made banana cake was judged, "too sweet... we don't like sweet." Avocados were described as "we don't know how to eat these." Home made chocolate truffles were "too bitter."

Wah... super hard to please.

It is not surprising that these men have discerning palates. All good hawkers do. They are food professionals, after all. They did not like the food I gave them but they did honour the heart that went with the gift. They still accepted the gifts even if they thought my gifts not very nice.

Then, I found things that they really liked:
- home brewed herbal tea
- home grown organic vegetables.

Wah! It is not easy to get on their loyalty programme leh... Herbal tea needs to be brewed overnight in the thermal pot. Organic vegetables are even more expensive in time and effort. I don't mind though. In normal times, not having to queue means that I save 30 minutes a day. In times of Covid19, I appreciate not having to wait for my order even more.

Best of all, it is not the sort of impersonal loyalty programme Ć  la SIA, circumscribed by calculated rules. These men really do want to be kind to me, personally. Best of all, these men are always polite and respectful.

There are 2 stalls that I never buy from at that foodcourt. One stall owner ran his fat finger left and right along my palm. Another person came up too close behind me once. Autistic people are sensitive to touch. My hair stands now, every time I see these 2.





Thursday, May 21, 2020

Circuit Breaker: A Time for Families

I know that coming out of their Wuhan lockdown, many families started divorce proceedings. I know also that incidents of family violence have gone up during the Circuit Breaker period. People who don't get along have nowhere to go to get away from each other.

The news has been very negative about the Circuit Breaker's impact on families.

Since I do parent coaching, I have a privileged view of the internal dynamics of many families. After reading so much bad news about fighting families, I thought that I would have to brace myself for SOS calls from many people.

The first 2 weeks, this was true. People were settling into new routines and fearful of what it would be like to do Home Based Learning. Once I had coached them on a few strategies, things settled down.

As weeks flowed into months, families began to enjoy each other. Husbands and wives had more time together. Parents had more time for children. Typically, the fulltime working mom comes home after a long day, tired and frazzled. She is in a hurry to get HW done and the children to bed. A mom like this, is a task-focused one. Children don't feel loved. They feel pushed and prodded and forced. Even the Stay-At-Home moms get tired and frazzled, coordinating volunteer work, CCA schedules, dropping and picking up different kids at different times. Normal life is so busy. People are short on time. There are always things to get done quickly. No mom has time to enjoy the children.

During the Circuit Breaker, Moms played football with their sons. Moms and Dads went jogging behind the bicycles of their children. Moms, Dads and children cooked up a storm in the kitchens. People cuddled each other, read books together, watched movies together. Mothers explained to me that they hoped their children would remember how happy the family was during the Circuit Breaker.

Children acted up less. They were less tired out by endless waiting around in school, and listening to teachers. The autistic children were calm, and learnt better, because they no longer had to deal with hours of sensory onslaught and the need to process social information. 

The Daughter and I work from home. The Daughter is always busy. Her day is filled with back-to-back conference calls and Zoom meetings. The rest of her day is filled with preparing for those meetings or following up on those meetings. However, she no longer commutes to work, saving her 2 hrs a day. She can sleep more. Her skin has begun to glow in the way it has not glowed since she started work. Once in a while, she takes a break and we get to chat in a way that we have not chatted since she was in preschool.

I think the message is not enough said that the Circuit Breaker is something to be thankful for. It is not the Circuit Breaker that causes family violence. That propensity for family violence pre-existed the Circuit Breaker. The Circuit Breaker simply makes it impossible for families to ignore pre-existing issues. For normal families, the Circuit Breaker is a time together to be treasured and savoured.

The Circuit Breaker reduces money all round. Jobs are lost. Salaries are cut. However, it gives an abundance of another resource - time. It is again, a choice, what we choose to do with that time. So, let's not buy in to the idea that the Circuit Breaker is a miserable time. Let's make lemonade when life gives us lemons.

If GDP had a component measuring strength of family relationships, I think we would see it go up. This is something to be thankful for. The strength and resilience of a nation sits on a foundation of family strength and unity.







Wednesday, May 20, 2020

Autistic Pride and a Cat Book

I think it is important for autistic adults to model for autistic youths and children:
- Self-acceptance.
- Pride in being autistic.
- Coping strategies.

I also think it is important for autistic adults to bridge the communication gap between autistic children and their neurotypical parents (or parent). This prevents a lot of parent stress and childhood pain. It increases levels of happiness in families. There is less yelling, less fighting, less judging and more love.

Let me give you an example. For 11 years a pair of parents fought with their child to prevent her from chewing her hair. The autistic child had a long history of chewing her hair. Whenever the parents managed to stop a habit, it would somehow surface somewhere else. When she stopped chewing her hair, she would peel the skin off the ends of her fingers. When the parents put a stop to that, she went onto biting her nails. For 11 years, the child was nagged, scolded, screamed at and punished for these.

I too was severely punished for doing such things. My parents believed that daughters should be taught to sit properly, walk properly and hold oneself still. My parents said that girls had to be ē«Æåŗ„. Yet, there I was, shaking my leg, peeling at my fingernails, touching my forehead incessantly. Discipline was harsh. One minute I was peeling at my fingernails, and the next minute, hard knuckles descended upon my head, or a hard slap came from nowhere to land on my ear, sending my head reeling for a while.

I explained that many things in the neurotypical world make an autistic person anxious:
- smells
- sounds
- mysterious facial expressions
- unwelcome touch
- aggressive tones of voice

So, many autistic people stim. After all that whacking by my parents, I settled on a stim that I could get away with. I twirled the ends of my hair. The more anxious I am, the more furiously I will twirl the ends of my hair. When I started work, I had short hair. Twirling the ends of short hair was very obvious to others. So, I grew very long waist length hair which I can twirl unobtrusively with my fingers at waist level. I sometimes found, after an exam, that my hair had developed a knot at its end that I had to cut away.

I advised the parents to give their daughter something to stim with. There are stimming toys available and there is even chewelry. Chewelry are chewies that you can wear so that those who stim by chewing things, can have something to chew. Simply by explaining the child's needs to the parents, I have saved the child a lot of pain. I have also saved parents a lot of stress.

Autistic adults have a RESPONSIBILITY to represent the needs of autistic children. We need to defend the rights of autistic children to be honoured for their strengths and understood for their weaknesses. Autistic adults have a responsibility to be proud of their autism in the same way PRC people are proud of being Chinese, and Indians are proud of being Indian, and Singaporeans are proud of being Singaporean.

To that end, Kathy Hoopman wrote a lovely book entitled, "All Cats Have Asperger Syndrome." Asperger Syndrome was the old term for ASD Level 1. I vote this my 2020 favourite book.







Monday, May 18, 2020

Changed My Mind!

In 2013, I posted this: HERE.

Today, after 7 years, I realised that it was drivel. I used to be so naive, thinking that I was doing work silently, quietly, lovingly and I told myself I did not need people to appreciate as long as God did. What rubbish! If you content yourself with being invisible, people really begin to think that you do nothing and are nothing.

Mothers, like all other people, need appreciation and encouragement. What invisible women!? I don't wanna be invisible. I want my kids and husband to appreciate me.

In 2018, I experienced a nervous breakdown from having been invisible too long. Since then, I make sure I am appreciated and recognised. Else, whatever I am doing for you, won't be done and I will disappear for real.

I CANNOT believe that I was once sooooooo stupid! What an idiot!


Government Must Learn From Stupid People

On Friday 15 May 2020, the Yale-NUS College-based student organisation Community for Advocacy and Political Education (Cape) and the Singapore Policy Journal, a student-run journal at the Harvard Kennedy School, hosted an online panellist discussion. Two of the things that was said in that panellist discussion resonated with me.

A certain Mr. Sadasivan commented the following:

1 ----- More fundamentally, the Government needs to come to terms with the fact that it “really does not have the monopoly of wisdom”.

2 ----- “We are not saying that the people in Government are not smart,” he said. “No matter how smart you are, no matter which best universities you go to, all of those things don’t count because of the complexity of the kind of problems we are going to be facing.

Without prejudice to the Singapore government, out there in the trenches trying to protect everyone of us, from the most undeserving lout to the most charitable billionaire, I really want to say that it...

a ----- It should not act as it it had the monopoly of wisdom.

b ----- Because we live in unprecedented times.

In the age of LKY, the pace of creative destruction was nowhere as frenetic as it is today. Amazon kicked Walmart out of the ballpark even though the executive teams in Walmart were staffed by some of the smartest and best educated people around. It was not stupidity that put Kodak, Blockbuster and Sears out of business. It was the inability to see and then fully embrace a new current reality.

Anyone who has ever lead a big organisation knows that the organisation has a mentality of its own. When a business is built around brick and mortar shops providing videotapes and DVDs for rental to the neighbourhood, every single cog in that machine is focused on making that business run. Every cog includes the top management, CEO and direct reports and everyone down the line. All within the organisation are locked in by the mores and practices of the organisation.

This is ok in bygone eras of slow change. Generations of carpenters inherit their skills from their forefathers. With these skills, come a consistent set of values. Carpentry has not changed for centuries. Hence, it is safe to learn the same skills and values of one's forefathers. In today's world where there is technological disruption everywhere:

- NTUC vs Redmart
- ComfortDelgro taxis vs Grab
- Amazon vs Borders Books

The world has moved beyond your ken every 3 years or so. The pace of creative destruction gets exponentially faster. A ruler of India asked the inventor of the chess game what reward he wanted for inventing the game of chess. He asked for a single grain of rice on the first square of the chess board, and then two on the second one, and four on the third one, doubling on each subsequent square of the chess board. The final tally was 18,446,744,073,709,551,615 grains of rice. At 0.029g per grain of rice, this amounted to half a trillion tonnes of rice.

I stress on the word, "exponential" in exponentially faster.

No matter how smart our government and we do have a very smart government (supported by very smart civil servants with the best education from Princeton, Harvard, Cornell, Beida, Stanford, Cambridge and Oxford... you name any top university in the world, and our civil service has young people graduated from there).... it cannot keep up with the exponential pace of creative destruction. We all are held prisoner by our own personal experience, and no matter how smart we are, we only live one life and cannot see things from mental perspectives that we have not ourselves experienced.

When I was in university, computing labs were powered by 2m tall mainframe computers that took up an entire room and still had less computing power than my iMac. There was no internet. When I started work, video conferencing cost $3000 an hour. Now, Zoom is free. The Husband and I lived in different towns 800km apart. I would wait every Saturday evening at 9pm at the coin phone at the ground floor of my apartment block for him to call from the coin phone at the ground floor of his apartment block. It cost quite a lot to make these intercity calls. Today, I call on Telegram for free anywhere that there is wifi.

Along with this technological change comes a set of new values, new ways of doing things, new habits. Gone are the days when the world moved slowly enough for the government to accumulate wisdom, drill and then implement.

The price organisations like Kodak, Blockbuster and Sears paid was to go from hero to zero.

One of the reasons why Singapore failed to manage Covid19 as well as Taiwan was that we allowed our thinking to be locked in by SARS and by what experts said. We failed to use common sense and to open our eyes to the current reality and see the current reality. SARS training and preparation was the backbone of our strength of response. SARS training and preparation was also the cause of our failure to respond.

I think we have come to a stage in the evolution of humanity and thus governance where we cannot expect our leaders to know it all. We must expect our leaders to have the data processing capability to take in views and see current reality and to develop solutions on the fly.

To be fair, once the worker dorms exploded in Covid19, our government did develop solutions on the fly. Our government did move swiftly and think clearly. Our government did use the top class brains that it possesses. Yet, that was because when push came to shove, the current generation of Ministers have humility.

I am so proud of them.





Opportunity for Singapore

Whether Trump or Biden wins the US elections, the US will not be kindly predisposed towards China. On the US side,

- it sticks in their craws to know that China is one of their largest creditors

- there is baggage related to industrial espionage (a large part of China's rise was fueled by technological advances that originated from the US)

- there is a lot of bitterness about China's protectionist policies

In recent months, it has become clear that China is clearly superior in healthcare and governance. The US, who thought it was the best in everything, and saw China as a poor cousin, now sees itself impoverished vis-a-vis a poor cousin turned wealthy. Worse, the US believes that China (the poor cousin) became wealth by exploiting/cheating the US.

Hurt and offended, the US is spitefully striking back. Many American MNCs are thinking of moving their manufacturing operations out of China. In the next 2 to 3 years, the lingering spectre of Covid19 will effectively mean that there will be retrenchments from the tourism sector.

Singapore should aggressively lobby for the American MNCs to move operations to Singapore. We can allow some deflation. People will accept it in a Covid19 world. This will make our wages more competitive. At the same time, we have a workforce that is still a very manufacturing economy one because our education system (despite its best efforts to become otherwise) still emphasizes conformity to Standard Operating Procedure.

We have a ready workforce to staff these newly moved in manufacturing operations, that will tide our unemployed workers over the worst of the Covid19.

Sunday, May 17, 2020

The Perplexing USD

In 2008, the US sub-prime crisis precipitated the global financial crisis. To prevent a deflationary spiral, the US govt along with most other governments took steps to expand money supplies. In a deflationary spiral lower wages and higher unemployment will lead to a decline in global consumption. At that time, governments also enacted large fiscal stimulus packages, by borrowing and spending money it created out of thin air. Such government spending and borrowing offset the reduction in private sector demand caused by the global financial crisis.

Instead of a deflationary spiral, the world went into more of an inflationary spiral. Wages rose. Homes became more expensive. HDB flats began to sell for SGD1 million and above. However, the expanded money supply did not distribute itself fairly. The money flowed disproportionately to the rich. The poor did not get much of it. Income inequality no longer was a simple Gini coefficient. It became a hard reality of life for many people on the wrong side of the wealth divide. The things they needed to buy became more and more expensive. Yet, their wages did not increase. Meanwhile, the rich people became even richer than before.

Today, in 2020, the US government is again creating money out of thin air to support the US economy through Covid19. The US Fed can indeed create money "out of thin air." It can do so with a few keystrokes on a computer, when transacting in open market operations. That's when the Fed buys an asset from a financial institution and pays for it with money it simply creates out of nothing - not even thin air.

One would expect such actions to lead to hyperinflation. Yet, since 2008 till now, there has been moderate inflation and a relatively strong economic recovery.

I watched Trump's recent fiscal stimulus packages with a mixture of awe and horror. I was awed that it could be done this way. I was horrified at the potential consequences. I expected that the USD would be devalued against all other world currencies. Strangely, that has not happened. Strangely, the USD strengthened against the SGD.

I was puzzled and then I woke up this morning and had a moment of epiphany. The USD is a global currency. When the US creates money out of thin air, liquidity flows into every other country in the world. This is why Singapore has become so expensive since 2008. US  tech companies hold virtual global monopolies - Facebook, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Apple. We spend money there that flows straight back to the US.

If the US continues to make money out of thin air, it is not just the US alone that will enter hyperinflation. It is the whole world. Unless we take steps now to decouple ourselves from the US.

In the years to come, some American CEOs will become even richer. The world's poor will become even poorer. For the first time I understood that...
- Trump's ungodly decisions affect my life
- the world is going from ungodly living to even more ungodly living
- I need to somehow find a way to swim in the opposite direction, when managing my finances.

There are a few countries that are swimming in the other direction. No one envies them now but perhaps, we soon will. Japan has been experiencing deflationary prices for 2 decades now. Things are getting cheaper there. Taiwan has been quietly and silently stuck for decades. Wages there do not rise. Prices do not rise. People there live well and eat well. They are happy.

Really... why do we always need growth and inflation in a country? Why can't we simply live the good life, eat enough, rest enough, work enough without the constant need for seeing growth? In truth, when you sell your house 10 years later for double the value, it is not growth, it is inflation. Inflation and "growth" leads to greed and dissatisfaction. This is exacerbated by the way the extra liquidity is distributed more to the rich and less to the poor.

Proverbs 22:16
Whoever oppresses the poor to increase his own wealth, or gives to the rich, will only come to poverty.

... and this is what Trump is doing. However, I fear that Trump is doing it to the whole world, not just to the Americans.

Uncertain Future
I now fear the future. With the kind of actions the US is taking, will we see a collapse in fiat currency? Will we see a period of global hyperinflation followed by wars and revolutions, only to settle back into a new world order.

Scary thoughts.





Friday, May 15, 2020

Cold Brewed Tea

I have never had cold brewed tea before. I did not even know tea could be cold brewed. So, when The Daughter gave me a box of TEABOX teas, I went ahead and poured boiling water onto the leaves. It tasted ok, like normal Lipton tea. I was disappointed because these teas are, apparently, quite dear. I thought it was a rip off and told The Daughter so.

The Daughter then started a cold brew of the remaining 3 portions of tea leaves in the packet. The same tea leaves produced a very different flavour profile. The cold brew tasted sparkling clear with notes of pear that seemed to linger around my head for a while before dissipating.

Hot water destroyed the delicate flavours.

I am going to try cold brewing other stuff now: fruit teas, tisanes, coffee and even the normal supermarket teas. It is even easier to make cold brewed tea than hot brewed tea. No need to boil water. No need to use a thermometer to make sure the water is not too hot. No need to set a timer so that the tea won't over steep and become bitter. Cold brewed tea also contains much less caffeine than hot brewed tea.

Just pour cold filtered water onto the tea leaves and then put the whole thing in the fridge for 24 to 48 hours. Since the steeping takes so long, it is best to brew many cups at once.

Funny that there is no čŒ¶é“ that cold brews tea. It really tastes very nice when cold brewed! čŒ¶é“ (whether Japanese or Chinese) always involved a lot of elaborate dos and donts and musts and hows. Cold brewed tea is fuss free and delicious! 


Thursday, May 14, 2020

Motion Detection Lights

I did not have the foresight to install lights into some of the cupboards. Sometimes, in the larger and deeper ones, it is hard to find things. I did install some battery operated lights which tended to run out of battery because people switched them on and did not switch them off. So, The Daughter found me some motion detector rechargeable lights.

There is a metal pad that you mount onto the flat surface. The light itself has a magnet. You can remove the light periodically to charge like a phone.



Wednesday, May 13, 2020

Face Shield



Apparently, the MOH website advisory allows the use of face shields or masks. So, I got me a face shield to protect my eyes. I think I will wear face shield AND mask. On drizzly days, I won't need an umbrella!

Postscript:
This hat provides a good head sauna. My chin was dripping by the time I got home! Phew!


Tuesday, May 12, 2020

Physical Exercise Cures Cabin Fever



It hit me when one of my favourite Mom clients reported lethargy and frustration. The children were lethargic and frustrated. She was lethargic and frustrated. This Mommy is one of the sweetest that I know. Even though some things I ask of her, are a stretch for her, she always tries her best and we have been able to get very good outcomes with her children. She is Mrs Joan Foo on this testimonial page.

Over text messaging, I somehow could sense that things were teetering on edge at home. At risk was the calm atmosphere of contentment that I had taught her to create and maintain at home.

Our bodies are meant to move. Typically, we move around when we leave the house. Even walking through the grocery store or walking out to lunch at work is movement. Physical exercise creates small amounts of dopamine, which lift mood and create a sense of well-being and contentment.

In addition, physical exercise strengthens immunity. See HERE.

During the circuit breaker, people stay home and move a lot less. If you simply let it happen and do not artificially introduce indoor cardio exercise to your day, you will go into depression.

Our family enjoys the Body Combat workout on this site - HERE. I suggested it to my client mommy and she loves it. She had previously tried a kiddy workout which her kids found childish. This workout appealed to her boys because it made them feel grownup and macho. This workout makes me feel badass. I begin to have of delusions of being Zhang Weili - HERE.




Sunday, May 10, 2020

Keeping The Brain Young


Knitting is not an easy activity for an autistic person. The need to control one's attention is required to  properly knit. Having poor executive function, my mind tends to drift even when I am watching TV, let alone when repetitively twirling yarn around knitting needles.

Since I am bad at it, I wanted to master it. I want to spend the rest of my life learning to do what I know I cannot do - whether it be knitting or EQ. Maybe, by age 90, I will be normal. Perhaps, it is a vain hope but well... what have I to lose? Stitch by stitch, situation by situation, person by person, I can accumulate know-how. Wherever I land in 20 years will already be better than now, no?

That was what I told The Son when I prepared him for PSLE. Just take it one step at a time. Wherever you land, will be already a better place.

Chong Pang Market was a challenge. It has become manageable. My ethnographic interest in hawker interactions have taught me so much. Knitting was really hard too. I sometimes unravelled a piece up to 5 times before I got right. I dropped stitches, miscounted, made front pieces that did not line up with back pieces. Once, the 2 sleeves were of different dimensions. It took me 1 year to finish the back piece of The Husband's grey sweater above -  ONLY the back piece. This yarn is pure cashmere wool. One cone of it costs $45 and one cone makes exactly the back piece. The front piece will need another cone of $45. The sleeves will be another $67.50. This sweater will cost $157.50 and 2 years of work. It had to be perfect because the wool was so dear. So, re-started the back piece about 3 times.

Once I have mastered this knit, I will buy yarn that is a mix of cashmere and silk, to make shawls and scarves for us girls in the family.

I do think I can better control my attentional focus, now.

Apparently, knitting engages several of the brain’s lobes — the frontal lobe (which guides rewards processing, attention and planning), the parietal lobe (which handles sensory information and spatial navigation), the occipital lobe (which processes visual information), the temporal lobe (which is involved in storing memories and interpreting language and meaning) and the cerebellum (which coordinates precision and timing of movement). Calling on all of these brain regions stimulates neural connections and keeps the connections working quickly and efficiently. The more we use these connections as we age, the more they will stay intact and preserve our brain’s function.

In other words, learning to do what I find difficult will keep my brain young. One must not only look after the external physical body. It is important to care for the internal physical body too.

So, bit by bit.... little by little, I shall become good at all the stuff I am bad at:
- Chinese
- knitting
- EQ


Saturday, May 9, 2020

My Family Is Mad

It all started when The Daughter showed us her vegetarian bowl from Tanuki Raw. It looked like meat. It tasted like meat. It was not meat. It was Impossible Burger mince. If you do not know what is Impossible Meat, click HERE.

The Husband mused, "Wow! Are their shares worth buying?" Apparently, their shares are not publicly listed. So, if you are not Bill Gates, you don't get to invest in them. We did find that Beyond Burger is publicly listed. A closer look revealed that its Earnings Per Share = minus 16 c. It is a loss making company.

The Daughter then mused, "If you really want to invest, you might look into the company researching lab-grown meat. It should taste like real meat, and is real meat - just lab-grown."

I offered that lab-grown meat does not taste like real meat because real meat has muscle to give it bite and texture. Lab-grown meat tastes like mush. So then, my entire family started imagining lab-grown cows with everything cow-ish, but without a head, exercising on a treadmill. Then, there was robust debate on how important it was to not have the lab-grown cow look too much like a cow because then it would be hard to say it is not a real cow. Then, someone said that it made no sense to have the whole cow because you don't need the innards and such... so, why not just pass electrical current through the slab of lab-grown meat to stimulate it to grow muscle.

By this time, I was pretty grossed out already... but the worst was yet to come.

Sometime ago, we came across this article on ethical cannibalism - HERE. If one really wants to eat meat without harming other beings, the most logical thing to do is to eat one's own meat. Hence, the term, ethical cannibalism. If labs can grow cow meat, then it can grow human meat. She said, "Would people eat their own meat?"

The Husband and I protested vigorously, "No... don't bring that up again. Just don't."

The Daughter persisted, maintaining that it was the ethical thing to do. If you want meat, then eat your own meat. Then, The Son said that he would not mind. Meat is meat. Even if it is human and comes from your own leg, it is still meat. The Daughter explained how community gardens are now springing up all over Singapore where people grow their own produce, and harvest to eat. Building from that, a good business idea would be to set up facilities in every neighbourhood that would culture and grow every individual's own human meat, using cells from that individual's body, for self-consumption."

It gets worse. After some joking around about hyopothetical discussions where families try to decide exactly whose meat tastes better and should be cooked that evening, The Husband said that it was just far more economical a business idea to collect individuals' own dead skin cells and make delicious food from that.

At this point, The Son protested, disgusted. The Husband pushed his point. Plants do it all the time. They shed leaves that turn into compost and then the plants absorb nutrients from the compost. The Son demurred. The Son maintained that a more accurate parallel would be to collect dead skin cells, hair and nail keratin, grow mushrooms and eat those mushrooms.

My family is mad.






Friday, May 8, 2020

American Vs Chinese Entertainment

I grew up at a time when China was closed to the world. My exposure to Chinese culture came in the form of Singapore Broadcasting Corporation series and shows such as Jack Neo's ꐞē¬‘č”ŒåŠØ. See an example below. Note how the individual in green appears on screen digging his nose. It is supposed to get laughs.

I cannot laugh. I get irritated. I found all these Chinese language shows very vulgar, and stressful in their vulgarity. I hated the way these people talked aggressively in jest. I don't get the jest. I get high anxiety from their fake aggression. I get disgusted by the exuberant display of bodily functions. There was absolutely no subtlety in the acting, nor the humour.

I am Chinese but I concluded that Chinese speaking folks were vulgar and low brow.


At that time, I had the privilege of reading in French and English. I read up on England's history and France's history. I enjoyed British humour and French humour. See below Tom Lehrer's song on nuclear war.


Then, China opened up. It became possible to access really high quality entertainment. Compare the following comedic skit with Jack Neo's skit herein above.


With Netflix, we are also getting a taste of the entertainment fare currently popular in the USA. I came to the realisation that a lot of American productions also reference body parts and body functions. Even Ronnie Chieng (originally from Malaysia) is bending to the pressure to be vulgar.

Why? Why? Why?

I cancelled Netflix. 

The thing is, what we see on Netflix is not necessarily indicative of the American people. To have popular appeal, shows must needs appeal to the lowest common denominator. In every country, there is a lowest common denominator. 

The Americans I know don't spout vulgarity with every sentence. In the past, French movies screened at the Alliance FranƧaise had explicit nude scenes and sex scenes. One might think that French people tend to licentiousness. Yet, some of the French families I came to know in France were very conservative.

It is just such a pity that America now has a President who also appeals to the lowest common denominator of people. His vocabulary is limited to "great" and "not nice." He speaks like an American teenager who works part-time at the dollar store in small town America, and believes that bleach should be injected into the human body. I suppose he got voted in because he appealed to the lowest common denominator in the USA.

The upshot of all this is that Petunia can now read Chinese! I can also understand spoken Chinese a lot better. When time permits, I will learn Chinese calligraphy. So fun! So much I don't know! So much to learn and discover for the next 20 years!




Thursday, May 7, 2020

Mommarchy Coupons

Our home is run along the principles of a mommarchy. That is to say, I am a mommarch, a mother who holds absolute and non-negotiable power over her subjects. That is to say, 2 children. Do bear in mind that a mommarchy is not the exercise of power in perpetuum. Once the children have a means of independent income, one gives up power.

So, I suppose, I exercised power for 18 years. For many of those years, I slowly yielded power to my subjects (i.e., children), teaching them judgment, equipping them with skills to earn a good living and be good people, allowing them gradually greater and greater degrees of freedom. My 2 children grew up and took power. Happily, the transition of power was largely smooth... except for that moment when The Daughter wanted to spend 6 months in Israel during the 2014 war. There was rebellion then, and the rebel won.

For a while now, my kingdom has had no more subjects. So, I got me a dog. Now, I am mommarch over a kingdom with one dog. I am trying to get Pistachio to understand that he must give me a gift for Mother's Day. I don't think he quite gets the notion yet.

Mother's Day is in 3 days. I spent about 30 minutes crying over all the gifts from the past years. My favourite are the mommarchy coupons below. I have a whole booklet of them. I announced to my children this morning that I want to be buried with these coupons.







Wednesday, May 6, 2020

Masks: Not A Good Idea

It is not a good idea to require hawkers to wear surgical masks all the time. They work in very hot conditions. It could literally be fatal. See HERE for a news story on 2 boys who died of cardiac arrest from running in face masks.


Mother's Day Gifts Through The Years










I used to get home made Mother's Day gifts. Now, I only get store bought because the children have grown up and have demanding jobs. I was not able to find one of my favourite gifts. I guess it was so special that I kept it somewhere so safe that I cannot find it again. It was a booklet of coupons that I could use to get kisses and such. I have never used any of the coupons. Why use a coupon when you can just demand kisses, and get them?

Here is this year's store bought gift (a pair of icy variety white jadeite earrings with high translucency). I know right... even though it is the most expensive of the whole lot, it is still of lesser value than those featured above.

In my worldview, there is nothing more honourable than to be a Mama or a Papa. I always address my clients as Mama So&So or Papa So&So. It is a term of greater respect than merely Mr. or Mrs.




Tuesday, May 5, 2020

Of Sneezes, Tanks and the Spanish Flu

Remove Mask To Sneeze

Once a week, at Chong Pang Market, I see 1 person remove her mask to sneeze. On 2 occasions, the person removed her mask, turned and sneezed behind her. I pity those people standing within 6 metres behind her, because the aerosol droplets from a sneeze does travel that far. On 1 occasion, the person removed her mask and sneezed right in front of her.

They would rather let others breathe in their droplets of snot, than dirty their own masks. I think there might be a need to educate people to keep their masks on when sneezing.

I am beginning to think it might be a good idea to go out wearing an oxygen tank, and a full faced scuba mask.




Centenarians with Spanish Flu

There aren't many left who were alive during the Spanish flu. All are centenarians. However, in view of the fact that Covid19 tends to be lethal for elderly folks, it is amazing that centenarians seem to breeze through their infection without much problems. On wonders whether having survived the Spanish Flu confers any protection from Covid19.

Was the Spanish Flu a coronavirus, too?