ON BEING REMEMBERED

Watched Night of the Museum 2 last week, it was a nice movie. Really enjoyed it. However, there is this one particular phrase in the movie that struck me. It is the one uttered by the “animated wax replica” of General Custer near the end of the movie. To paraphrase what “General Custer” in the movie said, “I am remembered by that one failure that I made”. And that one failure he mentioned refers to his ill – fated “Battle of Little Bighorn” or more famously, “Custer’s Last Stand” (see Wikipedia for the details). The phrase struck me because it reminded me that history is not solely about the record of great deeds, of towering success, of stunning victory. In fact, more often than not, history records failure with more lucidity than success and General Custer doesn’t enjoy the singular distinction of being a great failure. There are many more failures like him that littered the pages of history. The reason for this is because history is the collective memory of a people, of a nation, of a race, of a civilization. It is not just about names , dates, and places of famous people, place or events. It is about past experiences engraved in the collective memory of a people. It is from this collective memory that we seek success by trying to emulate acts of great personalities and at the same time, avoid the costly mistakes of historical failures. There is however, something in common that successful great men in history and those men deemed as historical failures shared and that is they have ambitions and they have the audacity to realize such ambition. Many have ambitions but few possessed the audacity to achieve it and the few who dared to live up their dreams, some end up a success while others failed either due to an act of nature or to their own blunder but in spite of that, we “remembered” all of them equally. It is due to this reasoning that I came to the conclusion that “being audacious has its rewards; you either end up as a monumental success or an epic failure; either way, you’ll be remembered.” But of course, being remembered for as a success is way better than being remembered for as a failure.

THE GREAT BOOK BLOCKADE OF 2009: MY VIEW

There is a huge uproar that is been going on for the last 3 weeks or so if one has been following Philippine based blogs. And recently, that “outrage” has even spread to mainstream media with several high profile columnists/journalists expressing their “indignation” on the matter. The heart of issue is about the taxation of imported books to the country which ultimately led to what Robin Hemley, an expatriate in the Philippines described as “The Great Book Blockade of 2009”. The whole brouhaha started when a book importer ordered a huge shipment of the popular Twilight novels of Stephanie Meyers (ostensibly to satisfy Filipino booklovers craving for vampire romance) and once that shipment arrived to the country, Customs led by a certain Rene Agulan refused to let the cargo out of the port not unless the book importer paid the “proper” custom duties on the shipment to which the importer initially refused citing the Florence Agreement. The Florence Agreement is an international treaty signed in 1952 by 98 countries around the world of which the Philippines is one of the signatories. The treaty’s objective is to promote international understanding by allowing the free circulation of educational, cultural, and scientific books. The means to promote such free circulation is through the removal of custom fees among the signatories of the treaty. It is because of that, no Philippine book importer had paid any custom duties for the last 57 years until that incident. The particular enterprising custom officer, Rene Agulan’s stated reason for his stance is that the Twilight novels were neither educational nor cultural and certainly it ain’t scientific at all hence, that particular importer had to pay custom duties somewhere between 1 – 5%. Because of the mounting storage costs of the withheld cargo, the particular book importer relented and paid the said duties. That act of “kowtowing” to the rapacious appetite of government for money (of which the government is perennially short of it due to ….) has set off a “bad” precedent. Every imported book shipment since then were levied a custom duties of 1 – 5%. This naturally raised a howl of protest from all the book importers, who refused to pay and sought out government explanation on the matter. What transpired was something of a tragic comedy. Sought for explanation, a wisecracked Department of Finance (the supervising government body of the Customs Bureau) undersecretary Espele Sales, who is also probably an expert grammar professor, cited a passage of the enabling law, R.A. 8047 to defend government’s action. According to her, the law provided for “the tax and duty-free importation of books or raw materials to be used in book publishing”. Because of a “missing” or “vanished” comma right after the word books, our creative undersecretary interpreted the passage as to mean only “books used as raw materials in book publishing” are exempt from paying taxes. Every other else is subject to tax. Geez! She must be a pretty darn good grammar expert! I mean for the past 57 years, nobody got the “interpretation” of the law right until she came along (incidentally, if you have to get a good lawyer, get Espele Sales because she could help you to walk free of bloody murder by simply reviewing the incriminating affidavits for grammatical error or typographical errors which thus void its usefulness as an incriminating evidence). Anyway, because of the tiff between the book importers and the Tax agency, it was alleged that for two months, no new books has entered the Philippines (and hence the term, “The Great Book Blockade of 2009). It is no wonder that I felt that there is a dearth of new titles in the shelves the past few months. Anyway, like all issues in this country, this particular issue has also 2 opposite sides/opinions. On one side, there are those who doubted the very existence of a “blockade”. They argued that books never “disappeared” from the shelves at all during the tiff, which is quite true, a dearth of new titles maybe but disappearance? So where is the blockade? Furthermore, these people argued that 1 – 5% tax is “minimal” and that the “ridiculous” book prices are more of the book sellers doing. On the other side, some people are indignant; indignant of the government’s insatiable demand for “blood”, sucking every penny out of people’s pocket just to line theirs. The more statesman – ly of them argued that the government’s action are in contravention of the government’s lofty goal of uplifting the people’s literacy. By restricting the free circulation of books, we defeat the policy of expanding knowledge and literacy. Furthermore, the action amounts to a censorship and is an assault to the people’s freedom. Also, the government’s unilateral action has reneged it’s commitment to the spirit of the Florence Agreement to which it is a signatory. As such, it sends a “wrong” signal to the world that the Philippines government is whimsical when it comes to policy adherence and applications. Well, that’s in a nutshell, what the whole Great Book Blockade of 2009 is all about. So what do I think about the whole enchilada? Well, personally, I’m against the imposition of the duties on imported books (even though I’m not really a fan of vampire fiction) and my reason isn’t those lofty ideals of freedom but something more “grounded”. You see Philippine books are pretty expensive! I should know because I’m a book lover, I like reading books and I also collect books (to date, my Anobii account listed 271 books and I not only buy books from the local stores but also during my foreign trips). A “really good (imported) book” in the Philippines, hard bound, excellent paper quality written by a noted author can command a price of upwards 2000 pesos. The paperback edition of such book with nice paper quality sells at around Php1500 to Php2000. A “good book” (one in which the author is not that popular) with a nice paper quality typically sells around Php1000 – 1500. Between Php800 – Php1000 are the “downsized” version of a typically good book or the so – called mass paperback copies. Below Php500 are books whose printed pages are of newsprint quality. By comparison, in China, a paperback edition book with nice paper quality costs around Php300 – 400 (converted already) tops. As a matter of fact, last December, during my vacation in China, I’ve bought 7 books for 341 RMB or roughly Php2500 total. Imagine 7 books for the price of 2 or maybe even 1 bought in the Philippines (the books I’ve bought in China are scholarly works on Chinese History). Now that is expensive. It is due to this high price of books that book buying and collecting is fast becoming an expensive “hobby” of the “well – to – do”. A “financially struggling” individual can’t “afford” to read and collect books even if he loves books. It is for this reason that an imposition of a few percentage points of custom duties on the cost of books would only make books more expensive and the matter worse. However, it won’t be that bad if we have a “functioning” public library system instead of a pathetic one that we have now. In other countries I’ve been to, the public library system was so well – managed and well – endowed that people actually flock to it and literally crammed it. An example would be the Hong Kong Central Library, right across Victoria Park in Hong Kong, one of my favorite places. The Hong Kong Central Library is huge, 8 floors tall like a shopping mall but instead of merchandise on its shelves, it’s all books. The place is so popular with the locals that every seat in the place is taken and one literally has to sit on the floor in corner with his back against the wall just to be able to enjoy his reading. You can’t find those here in the Philippines. Without an “effective” public library system and with books getting expensive, how do you expect Filipinos who want to read to be able to read? One Anobii member used to say that “a room without books is like a person without his soul”. Perhaps not everybody would agree with his view but I think everybody could agree with me when I say that “you are what you read or didn’t read”. So, ever wonder why our country is like this?

FILM REVIEW: STAR TREK (XI) 2009: BOLD REIMAGINING; RADICAL RETCONNING

Spoiler Alert: This article contains some spoilers of the movie. If you wanted to be surprise, don’t read this article.

“Space……… the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship, Enterprise. It’s continuing mission to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilization, to boldly go where no man has gone before!” – Opening line of the Star Trek: The Next Generation series.

As a trekkie, I’ve been waiting to see this movie for a long time now. Correction, I’ve been dying to watch this movie for ages already ever since Paramount pictures began showing trailers and teasers of the movie sometime last year (or was it the year before?). And on the opening day (May 8), I finally get to relieved my frenzied anticipation and thankfully, the weather cooperated (it was raining heavily the day before; a storm was coming to town then). And thankfully, the movie didn’t disappoint and honestly, I was pleasantly surprised on how the movie is done. It is somewhat different from what I would expect because the movie contravened established Star Trek conventions or more appropriately, TRADITIONS. Despite that, it was a great movie and I like it. In my assessment, I would give it a 4 out of a rating of 5. The 2009 Star Trek film is the eleventh film in the Star Trek movie franchise and chronologically the first film or a prequel to the 10 films before it but probably, this film may not even be considered a prequel at all given it’s radical retconning (as in total revision of the story line to the extent that it stray away from the storyline’s continuity) but an “alternate” franchise altogether.
Plot
The movie is some sort of a biopic of Star Trek: The Original Series’ leading characters, most notably that of Captain James Tiberius Kirk and Captain Spock (although at the movie they haven’t earn their command stripes yet). It tells a little back story of their youth, their first mission on board the newly built Constitution class, USS Enterprise and how they eventually rise to their respective position at the ship and finally becoming the legend that we all knew. The main plot line of the movie revolves around the revenge of a future Romulan by the name of Nero against the future Spock in particular and Vulcan and the Federation in general. The plot started during the late 24th century when a giant star near Romulus, the homeworld of the Romulan Star Empire went supernova, which threatened to totally annihilate Romulus itself. The 24th century Spock (played by Leonard Nimoy, the “original” Spock) then working as Federation ambassador to Romulus frantically devised means to saved Romulus from certain destruction. He along with several Vulcan scientists were able to develop “red matter”, an unstable compound that when reacted with matter would induce the formation of a singularity, a “gravity well”, a.k.a. “black hole”. However, Spock’s effort went for naught as he wasn’t able to deliver the red matter on time to save Romulus from complete destruction. In spite of that, Spock still pressed on with his mission intent to stop the spread of the energy shockwave resulting from the collapse of the supernova and thus destroy other planets in the neighboring star system. As he was approaching his target, a marauder ship, an advance, heavily armed Romulan mining ship commanded by Nero, who happened to be on a mission outside of Romulus before its destruction and who had lost everything with the destruction of Romulus appeared. Hellbent on revenge, Nero pursued to destroy Spock but instead was “sucked” into the time – space fissure created by the black hole, as a result from the detonation of the red matter by Spock. The result was to “throwback” the marauder nearly 129 years (or was it 150 years?) into the past. The time – space fissure created an electrical storm phenomena in space during the early 23rd century that attracted the attention of the Federation vessel, USS Kelvin, whose first officer, Lt. George Kirk was the father of our hero, Capt. James Kirk. A battle ensued between the marauder and the USS Kelvin resulting into the self sacrifice of Lt. George Kirk by ramming the Kelvin into the marauder in order to save the lives of escaped survivors of the Kelvin. It so happened that one of the escaped survivors happened to be George’s wife who at that time is pregnant and in labor. And in a dramatic coincidence, she gave birth to our hero, the future Capt James Tiberius Kirk, while the baby’s father is in his last few seconds of his kamikaze run. For the next 25 years, our heroes (James Kirk and the younger version of Spock played by Zachary Quinto) grew up while the marauder and it’s captain, Nero planned their revenge. Nero eventually got hold of the future Spock and the red matter, both came into the fissure a few seconds after the marauder but only emerged after 25 years of the appearance of the marauder in the past. With the possession of the red matter, Nero finally set in motion his revenge, complete destroying Vulcan and is in the process of destroying Earth when he was eventually defeated by Kirk, the younger Spock and the crew of the USS Enterprise in a dramatic battle. The movie concluded with a meeting between the future Spock and the younger Spock and the beginning of the legendary 5 year voyage of the starship Enterprise as depicted in the Original Series.
Critique
Script
One of the obvious “loop hole” of the film’s script is the numerous “continuity error” that punctuated all throughout. There are about a dozen of them that a not – so – fanatical trekkie like me could find and expose. Such blatant “mutilation” of canonical rules would for a “traditionalists” trekkie, who uphold trekkie canons as bible truth, be considered as “blasphemous” if not an outright “sacrilege”. However, all of this are neatly “smoothen over” (and ultimately assuage the hard core trekkie’s indignation) by the most convenient of all the plot devices available to a science fiction film, that is TIME TRAVEL and it’s PARADOXES. Personally, I find the script is cleverly done. For one, by retconning the storyline, writers had the creative freedom to come up with an entertaining piece without being bogged down by numerous conflicting canonical conventions. There are many films (Star Wars the prequel trilogy) and TV series prequels (Star Trek: Enterprise series is one such case) that got mired in negative reviews simply because the writers are trying to be faithful to the establish canons. As such, in an effort to create a plausible back story to an established canons, some of the plots are deemed illogical while others are seen as somewhat “forced fitted” into the story line. I simply couldn’t imagine how the film would look like if the writers followed the established canons to the letter. Probably, it would not be as entertaining as this movie. However, some errors do occur in the script. Foremost among them is the part wherein the Romulan captain Nero stopped an attack once he discovered that the ship he is on the verge of destroying is actually the USS Enterprise. And he was able to do so by “reading” the markings USS Enterprise off the ship’s hull. Imagine an alien who could read English! For obvious reasons that Earth based movie goers couldn’t understand a word of the Romulan language, the conversation even among the alien Romulans are uttered in Federation Standard a.k.a. American English in trekkie universe (the classic explanation according to a trekkie lore as to why Romulans or for that matter any alien race “seemed to speak” Federation Standard is because they are fitted with a device called a Universal Translator) but to have a Romulan read Federation Standard?! Unless, Federation Standard is part of the core curriculum of school aged Romulan in the late 24th century, the writers must have seriously erred in the script and at critical juncture!
Directing and Special Effects
For science fiction movies like Star Trek, special effects played a very prominent role in the movie if not for much of it. Personally, I think JJ Abrams did a good job with the film direction. If you are familiar with the battle scenes of the previous Star Trek movies, the battle scenes in this movie are much more “clear cut”. The battle scenes of the last few movies in the franchise use CGI effects. It is very fast paced and quite short such that it literally “finishes” in just a blink of the eye. The relative shortness and fast pace of the battle action doesn’t leave a lasting imprint on the mind. The battle scenes in the current film however are more clear cut and “realistic”. The style of which reminiscences that of another sci – fi series, the new Battlestar Galactica (the 2008 version). Furthermore, the design of the Constitution class, USS Enterprise is more swanky, more sleek than the Original Series era starship, which is quite “geometric” in appearance. The internal design of the ship is also much different from the previous incarnations of the USS Enterprise starship in that the inside previous starships are literally more spacious with little “protrusions” of pipes and metals. The only thing that one can see inside the “old” Enterprises in their various incarnations is the desks containing the computers complete with view screens. In this latest version of the starship Enterprise, the internal layout is more cluttered with the engineering room looked more like a pipe maze. Overall, the feeling is that the ship’s internal layout resembled more of a submarine or an aircraft carrier layout than the “regular” starship layout of the trekkie universe.
Characters and Actors
One of the most impressive things about the latest Star Trek movie is the degree of imitation by the current crop of actors to the original cast members. In particular, Karl Urban’s portrayal of the irascible Dr Leonard McCoy was such an “exact” replica of the speech, the accent, the mannerism as well as the irascible character to the “real” McCoy portrayed by DeForest Kelley that one would think that Karl Urban is a younger clone of DeForest Kelley. Other actors too are equally “faithful” in their imitation at varying degree. Such “faithful” rendition of the original characters allows trekkies to easily accept these new actors in their roles because for the longest time possible, most trekkies didn’t even dare to imagine somebody else would be playing the parts of the original actors in the roles that the latter are typecast into. Accent apparently played a large role in the maintenance of this “imitation”. For example, Montgomery Scott, the Enterprise chief of engineering is played by James Doohan in the Original Series had a heavy Scottish accent and Simon Pegg, the current “Scotty” also exhibit such heavy Scottish accent (complete with the character’s condescending attitude). Pavel Chekov is another case. The character in the Original Series played by Walter Koenig has a distinct Russian accent and Anton Yelchin, a Russian with also a distinct Russian accent currently portrays the role of Chekov in the movie. The movie however is not a simple “imitation” exercise by the current actors of the original casts. They are also given some creative license to develop the characters. The most readily seen example is the portrayal of Kirk by Chris Pine and Spock by Zachary Quinto vis – a – vis to William Shatner’s portrayal of Captain Kirk and Leonard Nimoy as Spock in the Original Series. Shatner’s Kirk is decisive, arrogant, and bold. These are the same qualities that Chris Pine was able to elucidate in his rendition of Captain Kirk. However, Shatner’s Kirk is cool and calculating, more of a risk – taking explorer rather than a gung – ho, swashbuckling adventurer that Pines’ portrayal seemed to suggest. Furthermore, Pines’ Kirk seemed to be more like a James Dean type of rebellious bad boy than the more “gentlemanly” officer image of Shatner’s portrayal. Probably, the script called for such a portrayal since this version of Captain Kirk does have a stormy childhood. However, still, I would prefer a more “gentlemanly officer” type of Kirk even if it has some sprinkle of James Dean in it. Spock on the other hand as portrayed by Leonard Nimoy is an expressionless being trying hard to get in touch with his “human” side and for that, Nimoy’s Spock is the “model” Vulcan for which all subsequent Vulcan portrayals are based in the Star Trek universe. Zachary Quinto’s Spock conversely looked more like a human trying hard to be a Vulcan. Again, this maybe what the script calls for, to accentuate and ultimately explore the inner struggle of Spock between his “humanity” and his Vulcan lineage. Well, I just kind of that felt that it was quite odd for a “model” Vulcan to suffer identity crisis and trying hard to be a Vulcan. Anyway, despite that probable script’s attempt at ‘reinvention of the characters”, I felt Zachary Quinto’s take on Spock is done pretty well. I mean it is hard to portray a Vulcan especially their ubiquitous hand greeting signal. As for Chris Pines portrayal, I think he has to be more “mature” in his portrayal relying less on physical brawn. Other than that, I think he does well. There is another thing I’ve noticed in this current group of actors. They seemed to be more “cheery” when compared to the original casts. I mean Kirk is the quintessential leader and he almost always maintained that “coolness”, which William Kirk played to perfection. Nimoy’s Spock is ever expressionless and DeForest Kelley’s McCoy is the usual irascible self while George Takei’s Hikaru Sulu wears a long face that seemed to suggest a calculating and scheming personality. In short, the original casts’ portrayal seemed to be more “stoic”. Conversely, the current actors seemed to wear a smile constantly even if they’re serious and thus, they seemed more “cheery”.
Overall, as I said, the movie is a 4/5 in my book and it is one of the few movies that I deemed as worth watching the second time around, which I did last Sunday by the way (I’ll probably go for a third one soon).
P.S. To better understand the terminology of trekkie “speaks”, please refer to Memory Alpha, a Star Trek Wiki hosted by Wikipedia, http://memory-alpha.org

THE WORLD ECONOMY, 2010 –

Note: This is just an opinion of mine and not based on some economic model, nor is it based on any factual data or figures. Furthermore, I’m no economist, just a regular businessman. I don’t have a degree in Economics either, just plain old fashion common sense.

A few weeks back, my eyes caught on an intriguing title of a magazine cover (either TIME, Newsweek, or Fortune, can’t remember). The catchy title goes like, “Cheap Oil Forever” or something to that effect. Anyway, I was so “stimulated” by the catchy front title that I proceeded to read that particular article on the magazine right on the spot at the bookstore. The central claim of the bold statement is based on a comparison of the oil price behavior made in the previous price cycle during the 1980s oil shock and the current price cycle. According to the article, both cycles though different in their peak prices exhibit similar behavior and from the comparative analysis, the author concluded that the current price cycle has already seen its peak and already went pass of it and the ensuing price trend would only see prices going down if not stabilizing. In short, oil prices is not likely to “skyrocket” in the short term foreseeable future much unlike the price fluctuation seen in the last two years or so. Wow! This is really a bold statement, indeed! Just last week (I think), the IEA, the rich western countries’ energy advisory group, projected a shortage of crude oil production capacity as early as 2011! With shortage as the logic goes, oil prices would revisit that unbelievable price tag of $147 a barrel in the next two years. That assertion though of IEA is hinge upon the complete economic recovery of the US and the OECD economies (the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the organization for advance economies mainly western countries) by 2011. Contradicting? Yes, absolutely! That the price of oil would buck the established historical trend is both “seemingly anomalous” and unnerving. However, the assertion of full economic recovery by 2011 though is not without basis. The news for the past month or so on the economic front is somewhat optimistic with American authorities claiming to see the “green shoots” of economic recovery based on encouraging economic data so far at hand. In addition to that, China’s economy is coping pretty well with the crisis and it’s export shows signs of improvements as of late. All this fueled market rallies around the globe, reacting in a way that suggests that the end (to the free fall of asset prices and to economic contraction) is already here and that we have already “bottomed out”. The most optimistic in fact, believed that there is nowhere to go from here but up. Pardon me for being a killjoy but I’m still unconvinced that this is the case especially the latter (that there is no way to go but up) though I don’t deny the fact that we had already turned the corner and “bottomed out” but recovery? I felt that assessment is too early to call (and I’m not alone in that assessment). Also last week, the former NEDA director, Cielito Habito, wrote in his column in the Philippine Daily Inquirer about the future economic prospect. Specifically, there is a debate whether economic growth pattern from 2010 onwards would be an “L” (sudden contraction of the economy as seen in 2008 followed by a prolonged recession or at least, an extended period of lethargic growth in the short term), a “V” (a sharp rebound; a momentary “dip” on the economic growth rate followed by an unusually strong recovery), or a “U” (a sudden contraction of the economy followed by a slow recovery). And this is the reason why the magazine article is such a “bold statement” because it presupposes that the global economy will experience a slow recovery or a “U” if not an extended recession, an “L” which goes against the recent raft of evidence of economic optimism. The recent market’s reaction on the other hand assumes a “V” shaped recovery if not at least a short “U” type of recovery. As I explicitly said, I don’t believe that a “V” shaped rebound is in the offing but a prolonged recession (the “L”) seemed to be contrary to what is happening around. Instead, I believe (as a growing number of analysts and economists do) that the world economy will experience a “U” shaped recovery if not an extended period of lethargic growth (or a modified “L”) in the short term. And I had my reasons for believing so. The current economic malady was borne out of the financial meltdown in the US brought about by the overextended debt burden of the typical American household. The debt situation was in turn derived from Americans assuming the mantle of being the “global consumer of the last resort” or being the “consumer of the world” for the last decade or so. This unflattering mantle came about during the last decade of the previous century with the internet boom. As we all know, the Americans have this 301k pension fund, which are heavily invested in securities and with the booming stock market, the value of their future “savings” correspondingly ballooned. Couple this “boom” with easing government restriction on the use of pension fund savings, the average American felt that they are “rich” even if their so – called wealth are in papers only. This “boom” wealth has drastically altered the American psyche and underpinned much of their consequent spending spree. You see, an average person would save a portion of their income as an insurance against future needs but with an extraordinary gain in their “creditable savings” due to the internet boom, most Americans believed that setting aside cash for future needs is no longer necessary and that future pensions and future income streams is as good a substitute to savings. As such, Americans began to spend and spend and spend even more. The internet bubble burst before the turn of the century didn’t give much of a dent on American propensity to spend because the government’s aggressive monetary policies and easing fiscal policies enabled the securities market to continue rolling on. As such, this created an illusion that “good times are here to stay” fueling even more spending spree. Eventually, a point came when this unrelenting spending spree gave rise to a voracious demand for resources that stretch global supply capacities to its limits and by the law of supply and demand, when supply dwindles and demand increases exponentially, exorbitant price increase inevitably follows. Inflation is the end result and we see the $147 a barrel crude oil in the market. As inflation began to bite into the income of the average individual by reducing their buying power, the inflation looks set to spiral out of control and governments worldwide began to drastically change course on their monetary policy from free – wheeling credit to one of restriction. This in turn took the wind out of financial markets resulting into a series of events that led to the current state of things. The current “Great Recession” differs from the previous recession episodes of the 90s and the early part of decade of the 21st century in that American savings are seriously affected. Previously, American savings are “protected” through government’s aggressive monetary policies but the financial meltdown has practically wiped out American savings. This could be gleaned from the news that people are coming out of their retirements to work for a living. And this is exactly my point as to why the current “Great Recession” would drag a bit longer or that recovery would be weak and slow. Americans can no longer spend. They don’t have money to spend. They need to rebuild their savings that they’ve lost. And as Americans were the “consumer of the last resort” or the “consumer of the world” with the American economy contributing a hefty share to the global economy, good times won’t be back for the rest of the world for quite some time. That however, wasn’t the “shocking” part of my “intuitive” assessment. I believed that the current crisis has “shocked” the Americans back to their senses (the common one). From a propensity to spend unleashed in the 90s to a propensity to save, Americans found out that there is no real substitute to savings than putting aside a portion of the hard earned cash in the bank and get this. No amount of government intervention would make people spend again, well, not at least the type of spending that we seen in the last few years. Remember, Economics is not a mathematical science but rather a social science that studies a person’s behavior in allocating resources or in layman’s term, how people spend their money. When people collectively became frugal because they felt they don’t have financial security to spend, no amount of government intervention would force people to spend. They would just save whatever money is thrown at their way. Not even disincentive to save such as zero interest rate on deposits or penalty on savings would force a change in behavior. People would just dug a hole in their backyard and bury their cash. With a much reduced spending resulting into a much reduced overall demand, economic growth would be stagnant, lethargic. The only time would economic growth return to “normalcy” is when spending goes back to “normal” and that can only happen if Americans manages to rebuild their savings or more specifically, when the Americans felt that they are financially secure enough to spend, which could take some time under a “favorable’ economic condition. Just exactly how long would this take? Well, if the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis is any gauge since the severity of the 1997 debacle is as catastrophic to Asian as the current crisis now hounding the Americans, it took some economies several years to recover. Of course, the stronger ones recover first while countries like the Philippine took practically a decade to get out of the rut. And the Asian economies were able to get out of the crisis because of “favorable” conditions. I mean the American economy then is on a bull run and China is equally bullish back then. As of now, there is no economy that is going to pull the world out of the rut. Many pundits are saying that China would save the world economy as its economic stimulus plan is deemed a success and that its domestic consumption is rising. China, however though the world’s third largest economy is far from being the “consumer of the world”. This is because their per capita income (the average income of their citizen) is below par. As such, present global economic recovery could take a much longer time. Speaking of China, the tremendous economic growth of this export juggernaut the past decade has partly contributed to the rising price of commodities of which crude oil count amongst it. What would happen to the crude oil prices if the US economy were to hobble along in a slow recovery while Asia, mainly China’s economy is bustling? Would the scenario of a $147 a barrel oil come back? Well, for one, China’s economy and to a certain extent, Asia’s economies are not as badly affected as that of the US and Europe in this current crisis, which could allow them to recover faster economically compared to the US and Europe and as such, Asian economies could provide some solid demand for commodities like crude oil in the near future and thus, provide support for prices. However, Asian economies and China in particular though big as they are, are merely a fraction of the size of the US economy. Therefore, it is inconceivable that they would be able to absorb the demand slack from the US and thus, tighten supplies and stoke debilitating price increases but nevertheless price increases attributable to China and Asia in general are to be expected. What is more worrisome is the current stimulus package being implemented by the US. The flooding of dollars in the world market serves as a volatile fuel ready to ignite a hyper – inflation in the coming years. This is because prior to the current crisis, the American dollar is trending lower vis – a – vis to the other major currencies around the world such as the Yen and the Euro. In layman’s term, the American dollar is devaluating in the global currency market before 2008. It is due to the crisis that the trend is reverse since the Dollar is the global currency of choice and American Treasuries are a safe haven for Dollar investments. However, as the crisis bottoms out, money would begin to flow out from the low yielding American treasuries and into other markets which offers better yield. Furthermore, recent pronunciations of American policy makers doesn’t really encourage holding onto the Dollar. I mean phrases like “Rebalancing the economies” sounded more like Americans should “sell more and buy less” (which translates to America should export more and import less). Less spending, lower overall demand also support US policy makers’ Dollar depreciation tact. On top of that, we have the flooding of Dollars in the international market. All this doesn’t really augur well with the value of the Dollar. As the value of the Dollar depreciates, prices would correspondingly increase since commodity prices selling in the international are produce locally (as in their respective countries) and as such are priced in local currencies (all production costs are valued in their respective local currency and not in US dollar) and with the fall of the Dollar and the corresponding increase in the value of their local currencies. It would require more dollars to buy the same amount of item even if the value of that item doesn’t change at all in terms of the local currencies. In short, prices would increase and in our case, the prices of crude oil would certainly “jump”. The only question is at what magnitude? This in turn depends on the strength of the underlying demand and the extent of the depreciation of the Dollar. That is a bad news for Dollar and other dollar – linked economies (countries whose currencies are closely peg to the dollar) as they not only have to grapple with slow growth but also with inflationary pressure (for non – dollar linked economies, the net effect could be zero if their currencies correspondingly appreciate against the dollar). This would turn provoke a policy response from the US FED in the form of raising interest rates in order to “mop up” excess dollar liquidity. The net effect would be further slowing of the economic growth and recovery as the economy is starved out of cash in circulation as people prefer to keep their money in banks and earn high interests. With that, we would end up with a classic case of stagflation, stagnant growth and high inflation (if the inflation didn’t subside fast enough), which is about the next worst economic state, next to Depression and /or the Great Recession (another way to “appreciate” what “stagflation” is, is to relate it to income; in stagflation, your income doesn’t improve at all but the cost of living would tremendously increase). Then again, it may not happen since demand may not be present to support stratospheric crude oil prices. But then again, who knows and that is why the “bold statement” magazine article pique my interest.
P.S. I don’t want to be right this time around. I prefer to be proven wrong. After all, I’m just partially correct with my last assessment on China, see “The Coming Collapse?” 9/26/07 (ok, I’m probably way off the mark, which is a good thing). “ )

TRANSPLANTING BUSINESSES

There is this article written by Greg Macabenta that came out at today’s issue of the BusinessWorld (April 22, 2009, page 4/S1, “On transplanting a Business”). The article is about “transplanting” a successful “homegrown” (which in this case, the Philippines) business model to a foreign country, which in this article refers to the United States. Specifically, the authors warned about the mistaken notion that a proven business model could be replicated in another country and still be successful. This is because “foreign” consumers have a markedly different needs, wants, and taste compared to the “local” consumers, i.e., consumers from the home country that the business originated. As such, the author opined that most business going international usually took two routes. The first route is to play on the niche of a “natural consumer” group, specifically the immigrant group from same country as the business. The other route is to go mainstream, i.e., to sell to the general consumers of the host country not just to a specific group. Most “transplanted” businesses taking the first route would eventually take the second route in order to expand and break free from a limited market segment. Quite an interesting article actually since the author utilizes his own experience to write the article. I remember during my business school years when I’m taking up Global Marketing. The one and only commandment of Global Marketing is adaptation, i.e., a business’ product, brand, and marketing strategies must “adapt” to the local conditions of the host country. The notion that “one size fits all” is quite “blasphemous” (for wanting a better term) in Global Marketing because different people has different needs, wants and taste both individually and collectively as a national/racial/religious entity. However, there are some “high profile exceptions” to this “core truth” of Global Marketing as some brands seemed to defy this core logic. One such case is the Tokyo Disneyland theme park and to a lesser extent the Hong Kong Disneyland theme park. Disneyland is unabashly an American theme park and yet, it not only thrives in a thoroughly un – American environment. It is rather successful. Paradoxically, one other “foreign” Disneyland theme park is a colossal failure, that of Euro Disneyland in Paris, France and French culture is part of the greater Western culture of which the American culture also belong. Another exceptional case that defies the adaptation logic in Global Marketing is Coke. A Coke is a Coke and is still a Coke wherever you are around the globe, be it in China, in Europe, in the Philippines or in the US. McDonald’s would also fit the bill but it has since allowed “local” menu content (a form of adaptation) in countries like the Philippines where it is lagging in market share. Quite contradicting, indeed. On one hand, logic portends that adaptation must occur in order for a product or a business transplanted into a foreign soil to succeed while certain cases dramatically prove that it isn’t the case. And this is where messr Macabenta’s insightful article proved useful. While products and its marketing might not need to adapt in foreign lands, business strategies and certain aspects of the business operations do have to adapt. For one, a company’s business model or competitive edge may not be useful in a foreign land (and this is the limitation of Global Marketing since it only concerns marketing). For example, a company’s competitive edge in the local market may hinge on it’s taste, which in turn hinge on logistical support to ensure freshness as well as on adept sourcing capabilities and it’s knowledge of the local consumer’s taste. Granting that the taste is acceptable to the foreign consumers on the host countries, yet the logistical challenge to ensure product freshness as well as the sourcing of some ingredients which is not available in the host country might severely cripple the company’s ability to replicate it’s competitive edge in the host country and hence, necessitate changes in it’s business operations in order to sustain it’s “perceived” competitive strength (which the host country’s consumers may not appreciate at all especially if it involved added cost and therefore translate into higher prices) or all together create a new competitive strength based on “new realities”. Another example would be, if the company is hugely successful in it’s local market simply because it’s business model dictates that it had to deliver it’s products or services as fast as possible but in a foreign country, speed of delivery may not be the “deal clincher” especially if the mainstream competitors are delivering as fast as the company or that the consumers of the host country doesn’t particularly value speed of delivery and instead opt for something else like quality for instance, which thus turned the wildly successful business model simply a “local” phenomenon. Taking this as a cue, it would be safe to declare that there is no international company that haven’t “adapted” to the local conditions and still be successful. Coke for instance has a markedly different and yet successful distribution strategy in the Philippines compared to other countries like the US or in Hong Kong, or China but even so, Coke is still Coke nonetheless. In short, what messr Macabenta advocates about businesses going global is that it has to adapt to the local condition that it is “transplanting”. Moreover, I think this adaptation theory is not only applicable to businesses that is going global but may as well apply to businesses being put up in a foreign soil by immigrants using the business model develop from “home” (the country of origin). A case in point here is the delicacy shops in Chinatown (in Manila). Most of the delicacy stores in Chinatown are set – up immigrants and are highly focused on a very particular market segment, mainly fellow immigrants. These Chinese delis sell food stuffs from mushrooms (I knew of 3 or 4 kinds of “Chinese” mushrooms), Wooden Ear (木耳), Hopia, Tikoy, Scallops, Chinese candies (like White Rabbit), to the more “exotic” stuffs like Stuffed Pork Intestine Sausage and the likes. And just like what messr Macabenta observes, the market focus strategy on immigrants though hugely successful in the early stages of the business would eventually reach it’s limits in terms of number of clients. Furthermore, the clientele base, as observe by messr Macabenta would sooner or later diminish as second or even third generation immigrants whose taste are more in tune with the locals shun their products. As this develops, most of these “specialty” stores are forced to go “mainstream”, i.e., cater to the locals other than the particular immigrant groups. However, going mainstream has it’s difficulties and challenges. For example, in the Philippine Chinese deli’s case, selling mushrooms, wooden ear, and scallop to the Filipinos would be futile since Filipino cuisine don’t actually use those stuffs. Some of the more exotic delicacies like intestine sausage don’t exactly appeal to the Filipino palate at all. However, the Philippine Chinese deli’s are pretty much successful in going mainstream precisely because it was able to adapt to the locals. Tikoy for example has become popular because it has adapted (by coming up with small personal sizes) to the Filipino’s gift giving tradition during major holidays (which in this case is the Chinese New Year). Now, it becomes an SOP to give and receive Tikoys during the Chinese New Years whereas in China and elsewhere where Chinese are the majority, such practice of giving Tikoy is less seen. Hopia, as a Chinese delicacy has evolved into a Filipino delicacy simply by adapting its flavor to the Filipino taste. Instead of the original mungo only variant, it now has ube….. Changes can also be seen from the way businesses are conducted by the Chinese delis. They no longer boxed themselves in Chinatown. A few of them actually branched out ostensibly to cater to the growing demand of the mainstream markets. As a conclusion, for any businesses “transplanted” from the home country and into a foreign country, adaptation is a must, be it in the product offering or in the strategies used or in the business models being utilized. Relying on a proven successful formula made in the home market doesn’t guarantee survival in the new foreign market much less success.

SUNRISE/SUNSET

I’m not exactly a “beach” person though I am not necessarily averse to it either. My ambivalence towards the beach has more to do with the fact that I can’t swim. As such, the most I could do when I’m at the beach is to “soak” myself in the water, which is not exactly the most enjoyable of all the activities vis – a – vis to the boisterous partying in the water surrounding me. However, the good news is that there is more to the beach than just simply swimming. In most cases, the location of the beach has some of the most beautiful natural sceneries that one can feast his/her eyes on and I happened to be an avid nature lover especially of the sunrise and sunsets over the sea. Such is the case during my recent vacation trip to Virgin Resort at Laiya, San Juan, Batangas. Virgin Resort, one of the several resorts that dot the area, is situated right in the middle of “Laiya Cove” located at the eastern most coast line of Batangas that opens to the South China Sea. Anyway, during on my first day at the said beach, I was as usual “engrossed’ at my favorite “activity” at the beach, i.e., soaking. Probably it is the clear blue sky, or the crystal clear waters, or the strong splashing waves, or maybe it was all of it that enticed me to get out of the waters and lie down on my back on the shores and stare straight at the sky above while the cool water splashes and washes over me. It is then that I noticed that how beautiful was the sky that afternoon at the beach. Not much cloud, no skyscraper or tower to clutter the view, not much glare from the sun either. All one can see is wide, expansive, blue just plain, bright, cheerful blue. Funny, how can somebody like me could miss something so plain, so simple, so obvious, yet so beautiful. I ended up staring at the clear blue skies for an hour or so. As I was staring, it came to me that behind that beautiful, “unpierceable” blue “curtain” is the eternal darkness of empty space. Although, it is an obvious fact but still staring at the sky, I find it hard to fathom that there is actually “something” beyond the skies. I remembered in my reading of Mongol history that Genghis Khan before his campaigns would remove his belt and slung it over his shoulder and climb up the mountains alone to pay his respect to Tangri or Tengri, the Eternal Blue Heavens. He would spend a day and a night at that. What does he sees when he stares at the Tengri? Does he wonder as well? Although between Genghis Khan and me, we’re 800 years apart and he was in Mongolia and I’m in Laiya but still wasn’t it fascinating to wonder, to stare? That evening, around dinner time (7pm maybe), as I was waiting in the open bungalow for my dinner to be served, I noticed something over the horizon. A huge yellow ball, the size of a peso coin if you are able to reach it with your hand and get it, came out from under the sea and hung over the dark skies. The moon in it’s fullness shone so brightly that it dimmed the twinkling stars around it, smothering them in it’s brightness. It was like a giant lamp or more like a humongous flashlight that illuminates only a slice of the sea, leaving the rest in total darkness. The sea under the moonlight looked so calm and tranquil that it actually betrays the actual rippled turbulence. The whole scenery is like something that plucked out from a painting or any drawing of the moonlit sky over a body of water. It looked so “artsy” except that it is real and is directly in front of me that night. I can’t help but be reminded of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata (one of my favorite actually). Ludwig van Beethoven wrote Moonlight Sonata sometime in 1801 (over 200 years remove from my time). Moonlight Sonata, is a piano solo whose music is soft, literally quiet, and serene. The first time I strain my ears to hear the music, I felt I was strolling beside a lake and staring at the moon and enamored by the beauty of the moment must like I was then that evening except that there is no music in my ears (and I forgot to bring the radio or the CD containing the said piece neither was the song in my sister’s ipod) and I wasn’t strolling beside the shore. It made me wonder however. What Beethoven sees in such a beautiful moonlit night to inspire him to write such an immortal piece that captures the moment? Am I seeing what he is seeing? Or more accurately, was I seeing what Beethoven wanted me to see as depicted in my piano sonata? The following morning, for unknown reason (probably felt refreshed and invigorated by the events the day before), I woke up early, around 530. And as I opened the door of the cottage that we’re staying for the night, I discovered that it was already morning and everything is quite “illuminated” but the sun hasn’t fully come out yet. I thought that this is probably my lucky day and that I get to see the sunrise that morning. And so I set out to the shore, bringing along a chair and planted it near the water out in the open beach where I could clearly see the sun slowly rising up from the east behind the mountains. And turning my head to my right, I saw the moon now pale white setting over the mountains running away, fleeing maybe from the chasing sun. “The moon and sun shall never meet, one would eternally chase after the other but they will never meet” as the some forgotten old poem would say (or something to that effect). But of course, the sun and the moon do meet….. during eclipses. Between the chasing sun and the fleeing moon on that beautiful morning lies the “serene” sea in the middle. It’s rhythmic waves gently crashing onto the shores while further away, the crystal green waters reveals the bed on which that water rests. On it’s surface, schools of dancing fish, jumping out of the waters cheering, beckoning the sun to come out and play with them. What a sight to behold! Too bad, I could only see what’s in front of me and because of that, I had to constantly turn my head, paying only intermittent attention to the sun, to the moon, to the dancing fishes, to the serene sea. I wish I could “see” the whole thing in just a glance but I can’t. As the sun slowly rises, it resembles a lot like the New Year Ball at Time Square in New York but instead of descending from its pole, the sun is rising up from its invisible pole. Its brightness seemed quite subdued until it reaches it’s “peak” (of the imaginary pole, figuratively speaking). Right then, the sun blasts its full brightness in all direction, covering everything with a golden glow and blinding anyone who dares attempt as to even peek at its silhouette. Even as I was “blinded” by brightness, I felt a sense of renewal, a sense of energy, a sense of hope, a sense of life. I could only imagine that millennia ago when the first man came out its cave, he must have felt the same thing as I am feeling that morning, a sense of new beginning after a night of total darkness. It is probably due this feeling that our ancestors worship the sun, the light, the day and imbibe the sunrise with the meaning of renewal. It is only then that I came to realize a fundamental truth, which is “we are the reason”. We are the reason that what we came to know to be beautiful is beautiful. The sun, the moon, the sea, and even the fish don’t know what beauty is. Heck, they don’t even care that they are part of a choreograph performance that defines beauty. We define beauty. We are the reason that beauty exists, that the sun, the moon, the sea, the world and everything around us exist. In fact, we are the reason that reason exists, that meaning has their meaning. We are the reason. And it also us, that “ruin” beauty, that erase beauty when we no longer enjoy them, when we “busied” ourselves with whatever we’re doing, when we no longer get up to see the sunrise and instead opt to sleep through the day, when we no longer stayed up to gazed at the fullness beauty of the moon and instead glued ourselves to the nightlife. We are the reason.

THE PILGRIMAGE II

To better understand this article, please refer to my previous article, “The Pilgrimage” dated May 19,2006.

This article is a continuation of my narrative of my vacation last December.

“Veni, Vidi, Vici” (I came, I saw, I conquer) – Julius Caesar

I’ve finally made it. I’ve finally reached the top of the Great Wall after more than two years. It was a great feeling to finally have reached the top of the Wall except that the feeling I had is somewhat “different” from what I’ve expected after completing such a “momentous achievement”. The feeling that I was expecting if I had completed the climb is one wherein the confetti dropped from the sky, everybody is clapping their hands while standing, cheerleaders dancing and hooraying (figuratively speaking although it would be nice to actually see cheerleaders dancing). The feeling should be like winning the NBA championship all by yourself ala Michael Jordan. However, the feeling was nothing like that. Not even close. Don’t get me wrong, I felt great on reaching the top but not “too great”. Maybe it’s the freezing weather that seemed to ruin almost everything nice. Maybe, it is the fact that we started the climb mid – way at the Badaling section of the Great Wall (八達嶺長城, located high up in the Badaling mountain) as opposed to Ju Yong Guan section of the Great Wall (居庸關長城), which starts from the level plain way, way down below. As such the climb at the Badaling section of the Great Wall is less arduous and hence, less challenging and therefore, less inspiring. In addition to that, I don’t get to see Mao’s famous words etched in stone, “不到長城非好漢” (if you haven’t been to the Great Wall, You’re not a man), which happens to further dampen the almost listless atmosphere. Or maybe it’s because I don’t have a little girl by the name Megan with me during my recent climb. Although my sister and the youngsters are good companies during the climb, I nevertheless missed Megan……. A lot. Anyway, it was the 28th of December, 2008, a Sunday and also the third day of our trip. We got up early, had our breakfast at the hotel. I was particularly “giddy” that morning since I was really looking forward to the climb at the Great Wall and fulfill my vow to come back and finish the climb. At the lobby, I received a gift from the Lionel, our tour guide; a manuscript of his half finish short story. So far, that morning seemed to be going quite well and I took it as a promising sign that things would be splendid that day but as the day progressed, things didn’t really live up to my expectation. The first thing that somewhat “ruined” my supposed splendid Sunday was a trip to the same old jade factory that I’d gone during my first trip to the Great Wall some two and half years ago. Like the first, it was supposed to be a “brief” detour but actually took like a good solid two hours. What a dampener. After that supposedly “brief detour” turned into a two hour shopping bonanza, we headed to the Great Wall. I was fully expecting to revisit the site of the Great Wall at Ju Yong Guan section (居庸關長城) where I made my first climb but instead, we went to the Badaling section. There was nothing wrong with visiting the Great Wall at Badaling per se except that at Badaling Great Wall, the climb is less arduous because the slope is less steep and walkway of the Wall is comparatively wider than that at Ju Yong Guan plus the climb to the topmost battlement of the Wall is relatively short. Furthermore, as mentioned, Mao’s stone inscribed “inspirational” challenge was nowhere to be seen at Badaling, which is to me a real bummer. Since, the Badaling section of the Great Wall is situated on top of the Badaling mountain range as compared to the Ju Yong Guan section Great Wall, which is way down below the narrow plain, we took the cable car up to the Badaling section. Now, the cable car ride might look every bit “dangerous” because you’re travelling high up the rocky mountain slope and hanging in the mid air without an engine or a parachute except for two cables isn’t really what we call a “fun” ride. Nevertheless, the ride is rather smooth with no surprises at all. This is because the cable cars are built on the southern slope of the Badaling Mountain and the mountain served as the barrier to the scouring wind from the north and thus spares the riders from the “thrill” of the ride. Once we arrived at the mid – section of the Badaling Great Wall, I, without delay began my quest to “conquer” the top of the Great Wall. The temperature that day was like the last two days at -8OC. At that temperature, the weather could be appropriately described as Freezing. I had to wear a thermal shirt and 2 sweaters and a winter coat on top of it just to keep me warm. But that doesn’t help with my bottoms, my foot, my hands, and my ears never mind the face. Even with thick gloves, heavy pants over a thermal pant, two socks, and a scarf wrapped around my mouth, the “cold” still got into me. The cold got a lot worst at where we are starting, which is at the mid – section of the Badaling Great Wall. Thankfully though, my sister and I bought some heating pouches, which are actually a pouch filled with pyro – chemical giving off heat once you rub the pouch. In this way, I got to keep myself from turning to an icicle but that further put a dampener on my already ebbing enthusiasm about the climb. Nevertheless, I persevere and started the relatively “short” climb (around an hour or less) to the top of the Great Wall. Got quite a work out there (and in the process generated enough body heat to keep me warm but not sweating) but nothing dexterous even for my “lazy limbs” (only got to stop for rest once or twice during the climb). At any rate, I find the climb rather uneventful and as such, by the time I’d reached the top, I felt rather drab yet the same time victorious, for I finally reached the top. Even so, I felt that victory isn’t sweet at all but a bit hollow. It is then I realized I missed little Megan. Somehow I get to realized that there are more important things than reaching the top or more aptly, there are things that make the climb to the top much more worthwhile. Funny, how I didn’t realize it beforehand or have forgotten it. Anyway, regardless how I felt that moment, I cannot but be awed by the sheer magnificence of the scenery atop the Great Wall. The Badaling section of the Great Wall is reputedly one of the most picturesque scenic spot of the Great Wall next only to the Simatai Great Wall (司馬台長城, which in my knowledge have just been repaired and opened to the public pretty recently around February of 2009?). And from my vantage point, one could truly appreciate the reason why the Chinese called the Great Wall as Wan Li Chang Cheng (萬里長城) literally, the Ten Thousand Mile Long Wall. The Wall seemed to have extended towards the ends of the earth as far as the eyes could see. Even in winter, the beauty is still ubiquitous. The scenery is both breathtaking and at the same time, eerily perilous. I mean lest we not forget that the Great Wall is first and foremost a military installation built by the emperors to keep out the marauding barbarians of the north from invading the farmlands to the south of the Great Wall. Soldiers of the ages past who had manned the Wall against the hordes must have drank the scenery of the Great Wall all day and all night. They probably like us must have been awed by the grandeur of the place but unlike us, tourists, these ancient warriors almost constantly felt the dread, the danger of an approaching storm over from the north. At the top of the Great Wall where I was, the place is crowded with tourists, boisterous and noisy but back then, the place is populated with only but a handful of soldiers and they are isolated from the rest of the world. The dreadful yet picturesque silence must have been deafening then. One could only imagine such whilst at the top of the Wall and in the middle of the jousting crowd eager to get their picture taken. Well, I’m a tourist, not a soldier, a historian maybe but definitely not a soldier and so I do what every tourist do, take my picture. But before I made my way down the Wall, I did what I did the last time I was here. First, I looked out in the open on side of the Wall, put both of my hands in my mouth and shouted, “I AM THE KING OF THE WORLD!” (well, that felt great indeed) The second thing that I’d done was to etch my name on the Wall and preserved it for all eternity except that I forget to bring a marker or a knife (now I know what I forgot to pack in my suitcase). And so, I had to look for “something” to use to “write” on the Wall. I got to borrow a pen from one of the youngsters and I lightly “wrote” on the white borders in between the bricks, _ _ _ 到此一遊 (for those who are visiting the Badaling Great Wall and wanted to see the “historical mark” for themselves, looked up at the left side of the Wall at the top, upper portion of that wall). As I was “writing” my mark, one of the youngsters “questioned” me as to why I’m “vandalizing”. Well, my reply then was graffiti as I was doing then provided a very important historical value. You see in all archaeological excavation sites, a lot of the artifacts, which are basically everyday things being used at that time are long gone. They are destroyed, stolen, or degraded. Graffiti on the other hand are left intact and provided valuable clues to an archaeologist about the social environment of the times. Besides, everybody is doing it (putting their names on the Wall) and they are aplenty. As they say, “When in Rome, Do as the Romans Do”, si fueris Romae, Romano vivito more, si fueris alibi, vivito sicut ibi (if you are in Rome, live in the Roman way; if you are elsewhere, live as they do there). However, I wasn’t quite satisfied with the markings I’d made. For one, it is quite light. Hardly visible. As such, I decided to make a second marking. This time I used the softdrink can pull up pin as an etching tool and finally “carve” the same words on the Wall (same section as the first except that it is at the lower portion about on the third brick from the floor). Having done that, I take one good look at the scenery and began my way back. Someday, I’ll be back for a third climb and by then, I know what it would take to “reach the top” and I’ll be prepared for it.

BLACKING OUT – CRACKING THE LOTTO: A FEASIBILITY STUDY

A few days ago, a friend and a fellow blogger of mine wrote in her blog, www.jazchan.blogspot.com (which incidentally is a nice blog to follow), a commentary/opinion piece regarding the lotto craze phenomenon. Specifically, she was in the opinion that gambling is really bad for people and that there is no substitute to hard work as a means to get rich. I made a comment though on her blog stating my disagreement to her view since I’m an occasional bettor myself of the number game. For the record, I whole heartedly agreed with her that gambling is bad but occasionally, I see it as an opportunity worth exploiting. But before I proceed any further, it is appropriate to understand the background of this whole episode. Last February 22, the jackpot prize 6/49 Super Lotto of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) has reached a historic high of P347,836,903.20, a staggering sum indeed. It was won by 2 individuals betting on the combination of 06-34-20-26-12-33. As such, the prize money was split between the two individuals who won. Anyway, going to my reply to my friend’s blog. I opined that as an occasional bettor, I only bet when the prize money reached a certain amount. Below which, I don’t even give a damn. Furthermore, I only bet on a single 6 number combination and at most on 3 combinations and nothing more. And at P20 per bet, my bets cost me around P20 – 60 per game until of course my reason for betting no longer exists (which usually meant that somebody else won the pot). The reason for my small bets is rather simple. It only takes one 6 number combination to win the pot and regardless of how many number combinations you bet on, only one would win it. Betting on several number combination sets (and therefore in the process bankrupting your meager finances, which to me is the true definition of gambling) would only increases your odds of winning the lottery but doesn’t necessarily guarantee success. Henceforth, it is illogical to me to bet on more than one combination set unless of course I’m going to “black out” the game. It is the latter thought (of blacking out the game) that got me thinking the past few days and the reason why I’m writing this piece. I’m not here to debate upon moral – ethical issues of the lottery game rather I’m exploring the possibility of “blacking out” the game. For those who are clueless about what “blacking out” is. Blacking out is betting on ALL POSSIBLE number combinations in a lottery game and in a 6/49 lotto game, there are 13,983,816 possible combinations according to Wikipedia (for an in dept analysis of the calculation, go to Wikipedia and search “Lottery Mathematics”). Blacking out might seemed to be a far – fetched crazy idea but some financial whiz in the US did such an audacious scheme years before (I saw that on TV, forgot which show that is). For such idea to remotely succeed, you need a huge pile of money to black out on all possible combinations and that the prize money should be in such amount that it would be large enough to cover the “investments” made and of course provide ample “return on investments”. In short, the prize money should be equally humongous. And I believe in the last 6/49 Philippine lotto game on February 22, that singular condition has been met. At P20 per bet, betting on all 14 million combinations would require an investment of less than P280 million. Subtract that from the prize money of almost P350 million, one can gain a profit of P70 million or a return of 25% over a period of at least 24 hours! (The 6/49 lotto game is held every Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday, the shortest time lapse between games is Tuesday – Thursday draws with only 24 hours separating between the two draws). However, such calculation is at best, a fool’s math. The reality is much more complex than at first glance. For starters, how do you suppose to get 2.3 million betting cards (a betting card can hold 6 bets or 6 combinations and with 14 millions combinations, one needs 2.3 million cards), filled up 14 million combinations, and placed the bets (think the impracticality of placing all 14 million bets on one betting station, you’ll likely burn up the computer terminal before your 10,000th combination and as well as carrying all P280 million in your pocket, you’ll most likely be robbed before you even made the bet) all by YOURSELF in 24 HOURS! The logistic challenge is herculean if not nightmarish. You need help, lots of help. You have to hire staffs, create an organizational structure to oversee such operations of staffs and all of this entails costs, which might turn your “investment” foray into lotto a lot like gambling on credit derivatives swaps from Lehman Brothers i.e., you’ll end up with nothing, a pile of debt, and another pile of worthless pieces of papers. And this where my MBA education comes in handy, figuring out how to OUTWIT the system. For our hypothetical feasibility study, assuming the prize money reaches P350 million and that we have 24 hours to make the black out bets. The first logistical challenge we would find is to gather 2.3 million cards for betting (more just in case you commit mistakes in filling up). Of course, you can’t expect to gather all of these in one betting station and granting you can, you need several trucks to transport those cards to your headquarters. The best solution to the challenge is to sent out hundreds if not thousands of people to equally hundreds or thousands of betting stations across the country (this is on the assumption that the PCSO is against blacking out operations and henceforth would do everything to disrupt its success including delivering cards in bulk and accepting bets on all combinations as well). Take note, you have 24 hours to make all the bets and betting is only done on the day of the draw till 9pm. With 2.3 million cards to gather and assuming 1000 cards are to be gathered per betting station, we need 2,300 personnel to gather those cards from 2,300 betting stations. Now, this is no easy feat. It means we have to FIND OUT where those 2,300 stations are located. It would be great if we could find all 2,300 stations within a certain vicinity like Metro Manila but what if we couldn’t and that the stations are more spread out as in like the entire 7,107 islands. Furthermore, the betting stations would also serves as the place where we could place the bets after filling up the cards. Also, it would be prudent to have some “contingent plan” on alternate betting station locations just in case thing goes wrong. (One possible scenario is that you can’t get no more than 500 cards per stations, which means that you have to go to 4,600 stations instead) As such, it is therefore obvious that we have to map out the betting stations and this entails some planning and a logistic planning team working on it way before the actual betting date. After gathering the cards and transporting them to the headquarters, the next step is to fill up the cards. Now, this is the crucial phase of the operation. Due to the sheer size of the task involved, the number of people involved is understandably sizable as well. This makes supervision and quality control daunting. I mean the plan is to black out ALL POSSIBLE COMBINATIONS. As such, we can’t risk missing out just one combination and bet twice or more on a single combination because of lousy work of those filling the cards (and it later turns out that the missed bet is the jackpot combination). To rule out such possibility, we need to have computers to print out all the possible combinations instead on relying the individual brain power of the staffs and distribute them to those staffs. Next, we have to hire quality staffs. Filling out cards from a cue card might be a brainless task but then again, we want to avoid “stupid” mistakes for the stake is really high. Assuming that a person can fill out 4 cards with 6 combinations in each card in an hour for a total of 24 combinations or roughly less than three minutes per combination, a person working in an 8 hour shift could fill out 192 combinations granting that that person doesn’t eat or rest or even go to the bathroom. Simple math would tell us that we need 73,000 people (excluding other staffs like those working on the computer, gatherers of the betting cards and bettors plus other administrative staffs) in a single shift to fill out all the combinations (or if you’re working on two shifts, around 36,500 people per shift, and 24,333 people per shift working on three shifts). Of course, it is impossible to hire 73,000 people in a single day and expect them to start immediately and finish in time for tomorrow’s bet. Hiring should be done way, way before the actual commencement of the operation. Probably months ago. Activation and mobilization on the other hand could be done on that day but that entails we have to have some transportation to be able to gather and assemble that many people. In conjunction to that, another challenge is in finding a place to hold all those staffs, all 73,000 of them. Size is not only the problem in looking for a place to house all of those the staff, location is also a huge factor to consider. If the betting stations are located within a certain geographic vicinity like Metro Manila, then the location of the Headquarter/Worksite should be at or near the center of all these scattered betting stations. Now, if the betting stations are more widely dispersed, we may have to consider having more than one worksite and the leases of all these worksites would significantly add up to the initial investments. Furthermore, one simply cannot lease those places “right on the spot”. Leases must be made way before hand even if it is going to be used for at the least 24 hours. In addition to staffs, we have also to hire managers and supervisors to execute “the project”. Again, this can’t be done on that day. Instead, this should be done way ahead. In addition to that, managers and supervisors must be at least be briefed of what to do much less trained on what to do so as to become effective on what they’re going to do. We cannot simply let them lose inside the worksite and assume that they could deliver the “numbers” to you without them having a clue on what to do, can we? The last step after filling out the betting cards is to actually place the bets. The 2,300 betting stations where we got all those cards from would be the same stations in which we are going to place our bets. Each betting stations would be receiving 6,000 bets (1,000 cards) and each of the gatherers/bettors we are sending out would carry at least P120,000 (a comparatively modest sum) to make the required bets. And each gatherer/bettor has around 12 hours or less (9 or 10 am till 9pm) to finish placing all the bets before the draw. Afterwards, sit back and wait for the money to pour in (since we’re blacking out, winning is assured “theoretically” if no “stupid” mistakes occurred). Simple as that. Now the overall cost of such a venture can be “estimated”. Hiring 73,000 staffs to fill in the “numbers”, assuming you’re being “generous” and pay them P500 each would amount to P36,500,000. Add that to worksite leases, transportation costs, electricity bills, salaries of “other” staffs, miscellaneous expenses, and the salaries of all those managers and supervisors (which you most likely have to hire way before the actual event) including their “balato” or bonuses (you have to pay off some cash rewards to the people that contribute the most to your success), we are looking at a total bill of somewhere in the area of P50 million. Add that to your lotto “investments” of P280 million, we need around P330 million as initial seed money just to black out the game. Subtract that to the prize money of P350 million, our profit would only amount to P20 million pesos or about 6% ROI. Now, 6% ROI earned over a period of 24 hours may sound like a measly sum but that is significantly better compared to investing the same amount in any fixed income instrument such as time deposits or bonds that earn the same interest over the course of A YEAR! However, by blacking out the game, some positive development would occur that would increase our “profit”. First of all, by blacking out all the number combinations, we would also win the secondary prizes. Getting 5 out of 6 number right would earn us P56,000. A four number hit would earn us P500, and a three number hit would allow us to place a return bet. Now, disregarding the last prize, the secondary prizes amounts to 43 possibilities x P56,000/combination – possibility = P2,408,000 plus (43x43) possibilities (for getting 4 out of 6 numbers correct) x P500/possible combinations = P924,000. This would give us an additional income of P3,332,500, which would pad our net income to about P23 million. A much larger positive effect as a result of the blacking out the game would be in the substantial jump in the prize money itself. You see the jackpot prize is proportional to the amount of bet. The more bet, the higher the prize. However, not all bet money goes to the pot, a portion of the bets goes to charity funds and frankly, I have no idea how the PCSO appropriate the bet money. However, based on their website, www.pcso.gov.ph, the PCSO is by law required to contribute 25% of their gross earnings to various beneficiaries. That figure doesn’t include operational expenses as well as other required minor charity contributions. Assuming then that that is the case, it would be a “safe” bet to assume that 50% of the bet money would go the pot, which in this case would boost the prize to P350 million + P280 million/2 or P490 million. In which case, the net income that could be earned from winning the pot by blacking out the game would be P490 million – P330 million or P160 million, which means that our initial investment of P330 million would earn us a hefty return of 48.5% in 24 hours! Take that Wall Street! At this point after reading 4 pages of what I’ve written so far, you’ll probably be dreaming about vacationing in Cancun, on board of your own luxury yacht, sipping the priciest champagne, and eating the most expensive caviar you could lay your hands on but what a minute! Like in every investment, there is a downside risk! Foremost that comes to mind is the waiting game. You need to make plans and the initial preparation way ahead before the “actual” day, that is if it ever happened again. That entails, cash outlays for a what – if scenario that might not happen at all, which therefore makes all your expenditures irrecoverable sunk cost at least in the near term. Another risk issue is the tax issue. The Lottery was never advertised as being tax free. That means, the jackpot prize is taxable and the tax take could be significant as to alter our profitability calculation. A 35% tax take (assuming the highest income tax rate we had) would translate to P171.5 million less from our winnings, which would actually wipe out our gains and leave us in the negative. Well, the tax rate maybe significantly lower than the one we assume but at what rate? I really don’t know. Ask the tax experts. Collorary to that is the legal issue. Do we need to come up with a legal corporate entity to handle such a complex yet short lived operation such as this? If so, there are tax and legal issues here that may bankrupt us instead of enriching us. The third risk issue and by far, the gravest is the possibility that there is more than one winner to the game. And this is a distinct possibility because of the size of the pot, which attracts a large number of “opportunistic” and “occasional” bettors like me. In history of the lottery in the Philippines, there are several instances wherein there are multiple winners usually 2 but rarely 3. According to the PCSO rules, the winners have to share the pot. If there is another “lucky” winner to our hypothetical scenario, then the theoretical P490 million pot would be split into two P245 million prizes. This would result into an instant lost of P85 million. Now, in an unlucky event that there are 3 winners to our hypothetical draw, we stand to lose P166.67 million! Risky indeed! A fourth risk issue to address is related to the payout scheme. Most of us believed that the jackpot prize is paid out to the winner in one lump sum cash less whatever taxes that had to pay for. However, I knew that in some states in the US where the lottery is played, the payout is divided into several equal size tranches and remitted to the winner annually over a period of say 10 years more or less. This thus became a sort of annuity. In short, you payout your investments in cash and receive your return in staggered basis over a long period of time, which if you discount it to the present period as in today using the Net Present Value (NPV) computation, might translate into a definite loss. That of course is the case in some states in the US, what about the case in the Philippines? Well, it is obvious that I don’t know because I haven’t won the jackpot prize yet for myself. Actually, there is a way or specifically two ways to circumvent all these risks in order to win the Jackpot prize (make that 3). The first is to scrimp all the “expenses” on staffs and infrastructure and instead do it by yourself. You can start right now if you want and assuming that you can fill up 192 cards in an 8 hour – workday. You can finally place your bet after 73,000 days (working just exactly 8 hours a day) or 200 years granting of course, you’re still alive and kicking. In fact, you could concurrently start a savings fund for your “financing” needs come 200 years later granting of course, that there is no financial crisis that could happen in the next 200 years that could wipe out your savings and that the cost of bet doesn’t change at all in the next 200 years let alone the obsolesce of the number game itself. The second way to circumvent the risks and win the coveted prize is to bet P20 on a single combination like what I’m doing and hope that lady luck would smile on us. The third and final way to circumvent the risks and win the jackpot is simply follow what my friend and fellow blogger recommend. Don’t gamble, save every penny you have and work your butt off to riches! So after all this brouhaha, I came to my conclusion to this feasibility study of mine and that is WHERE AM I GOING TO GET THE P330 MILLION IN SEED MONEY?
P.S. Anybody care to loan me the seed money? We could split the profit. “ )

PHENOMENAL WOMAN

by Maya Angelou

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.
I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It's the fire in my eyes
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing of my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.
Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can't touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them,
They say they still can't see.
I say
It's in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.
Now you understand
Just why my head's not bowed.
I don't shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It's in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
The palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
'Cause I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

P.S. Read this poem in this morning’s newspaper. It’s nice. Thought I share.

THEY HAVE A NAME FOR THAT……..

It’s been quite some time that I’ve read the front page of the Inquirer. In actuality, I was avoiding it. This is because I don’t want to sour my mood further by reading the latest political scandals early in the morning. I mean reading the business news nowadays is depressing enough. One doesn’t need to keep torturing oneself by keeping abreast with the latest political drama. However, how should I say? Fate intervened? That one day sometime last week that I read the front page of the Inquirer. And lo! I didn’t get depressed by what was plastered at the front page. Instead, I got furious! The news that made it to the front page that “fateful” day was about the Senate investigation on the banned World Bank contractors and how things turned literally upside down. For starters, sometime in November 2007, the World Bank sent a confidential report of collusions and corrupt practices of 7 government contractors to the Philippine government, specifically the Finance Department. The report was made after a very thorough investigation. The gist of the report is the “suggestion” of the involvement of the First Gentlemen in the anomalous transactions of these contractors. However, the report was strictly confidential and contains only leads and not much substance plus a clause that it couldn’t be used in prosecution proceedings within the country in question. It is quite understandable as to the reason why the report was prepared in such way. For one, the World Bank being a supra national entity is and should be politically neutral and second, they shouldn’t interfere in the local governance at all. Because of the “lack of capability” of the Finance Department, the report was eventually referred to the Ombudsman and sadly like all other cases of grand corruptions and high crimes, it was left to gather dust and largely forgotten for more than a year. Then, sometime in early part of this year, the contents of the report got leaked and the Senate began an impromptu investigation of the alleged corruption. And to make a long story short, the investigation drags on and on like the usual zarzuela we all got use to. But that is not what incensed me. What infuriates me is that Senate committee in charge of the public inquiry has suddenly turned the tables on the accuser, the World Bank! Specifically, some “distinguish” senators are venting their “irrepressible” ire on the World Bank and calling it names. In fact, in one scene of this sad and pathetic “comedy”, a distinguish senator with terrible temper even wanted to kick the World Bank out of the country! Now let me get this straight about the entire issue here. Here we are perennially short of money due to a simple reason that we spend more than we could earn, which could be trace further to the fact that we tend to pay excessively more than it should be and these excessive pays, instead of benefiting a great number of people tends to end up in the pockets of a select and favored few. Because of the sorry predicament we are in, we are forced to seek help from a few creditors to finance our needs. And then along came a generous creditor, the World Bank who not only extended loans to our beleaguered nation despite our poor credentials but also given us a favorable treatment in terms of concessional rates and longer repayment terms. And unlike other financial institutions who are only after the profits that could be derived from such a loan without regards as to how efficiently that such money could be spent, the World Bank even offered to help us improve the efficiency of our spending by telling us the names of “corrupt” businesses and contractors such that the wealth derived from the investment of the loan money might be spread evenly and maximizing the benefits to the greater number of recipients instead of ending up in the hands of a few. And instead of showing our gratitude for such concern, our honorable and distinguish senators has the gall to be ANGRY at the World Bank! What the f*ck is this? Ok, maybe I’m not being clear here and for the benefit of those who couldn’t understand a word of English, let me phrase this in Filipino. Tayo’y lubos na naghihirap at kulang ang ating salapi para sa ikauunlad ng kabuyahan natin. Dahil dito, humingi tayo ng tulong. At sa awa ng Diyos, meyron naman tumulong sa atin. Hindi lang yan, bukod sa pangungutang, pinagbigyan din tayo sa pamamagitan ng maluwag na konsesyon. Higit pa diyan, tinulungan pa naman tayo na iwasto ang katiwalian sa paggagastos ng ating salapi upang sa ganoon ay marami makinabang sa salaping ito. Ngunit, sa halip na tayo’y matuwa, magpasalamat, at magtanaw ng utang na loob, tayo’y nagagalit pa! Now what kind of a person would do that? You know they have a name for such a person in Filipino and it’s called G*GO! I rest my case.
P.S. the whole brouhaha is not actually bad for it gave me an idea who NOT to vote for in the upcoming election some 15 months away.

My lady's presence makes the roses red

by Henry Constable

My lady's presence makes the roses red,

Because to see her lips they blush for shame.

The lily's leaves, for envy, pale became,

And her white hands in them this envy bred.

The marigold the leaves abroad doth spread,

Because the sun's and her power is the same.

The violet of purple colour came.

Dyed in the blood she made my heart to shed.

In brief: all flowers from her their virtue take;

From her sweet breath their sweet smells do proceed;

The living heat which her eyebeams doth make

Warmeth the ground and quickeneth the seed.

The rain, wherewith she watereth the flowers,F

alls from mine eyes, which she dissolves in showers.

BEIJING NIGHT LIFE

To be quite honest, I never like going out to bars at night. Although as an insomniac I usually sleep late, I rarely stayed out late at night. I prefer to stay up at night reading books than go bar hopping. Not that I totally dislike staying out late and go bar hopping rather that I am a boring “couch potato” who felt much more comfortable staying home. As such, I “normally” don’t have a night life either during my foreign trips even when during my backpacking trips to Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore. Well, aside from the fact that I don’t have a habit of staying out late at night, almost all of the guided tour trips I had in the past are packed with “old” people, who shun the night life. At the other end of the spectrum like the backpacking trips, I simply don’t have anyone to accompany me to “chill out” at nights. However, this last trip of mine is different in the sense that there are more “hippie youngsters” in the bunch. All in all, there are about 7 of us “youngsters” including me and my sister (and I happen to be the “big brother” literally). Anyway, it was the second day of your trip to Beijing when one of the “youngsters” propose to literally “chill out” in the freezing night (-8OC) right after the day tour ended. He proposes to go to Hou Hai (後海, literally “the back sea”), a lakeside bar – entertainment complex close to the place we are staying at the Grand Mercure Hotel (the former Beijing Marco Polo Hotel) at Xi Dan avenue (西單街). Anyway, I really don’t have much to say about the night life scene in Beijing because of my “limited experience”. However, according to the Wikipedia, “Hou Hai is a famous night life spot because it is the home to several popular restaurant, bars, and cafes. The area is especially popular with foreign tourists visiting Beijing as well as the expatriate community and younger locals”. In spite of what is being said in Wikipedia, I honestly don’t see the so – called “popularity” of the place, i.e., I didn’t see any foreigners either expatriate or tourists (as if I could tell the difference) except for us (me, my sister and my 5 “little brother and sister”) although I do see a lot of the younger locals patronizing the place. Well, it could be that we end up at the “wrong side of the lake”, i.e., the “boring” side of the lake and therefore I wasn’t able to witness the “popularity” of the place. It is that or the weather is simply too horribly cold for any “functioning” night life to exist. At any rate, before we set out to Hou Hai, I had my younger “brothers and sisters” get my phone number as well as Lionel’s, our tour guide (by that time, he already had retired to his home) and the emergency police number in Beijing, 110 just in case everything went terribly wrong and of course, the hotels, address and phone number. I had to do this because I had this feeling that one of the major reason that the parents of these youngsters allowed them to go out in the first place is because they are with me, “the big brother”. Even so, I wasn’t the “leader” of the pack since I was hands down the most boring of the bunch. Somebody else fill that shoe. I was just simply a “chaperon” of sort. Aside from handing out contact numbers to everyone involved, I also brief them about some “rules” of engagement like never leaving somebody behind and going together as a group. Having done that, we all took the cab to Hou Hai. Speaking of cabs, Chinese taxi drivers are a notorious bunch. My very limited experience in dealing with them is simply unpleasant. Chinese taxi drivers are known to overcharge their customers and unless “reminded” upon (or insisted upon depending on the intransigence of the driver), they would seldom flag down the meter. It is probably due to this notoriety of Chinese taxis that the government has required them to install a receipt issuing meter complete with the taxi’s general information so that the riding public can use the receipt as proof when filling a complaint against a taxi driver (so asking for a receipt is a must when taking a cab in Beijing). Also, Chinese regulation allows taxi cab to carry only a maximum of 4 people. Since, there are 7 of us in the group. We are “force” to take 2 separate cabs to Hou Hai. The flag down rate for Beijing taxis is at a minimum of 10 or 11 RMB with additional surcharges after midnight (verification needed). It was around 930 pm I supposed when we got to Hou Hai and boy! The weather is simply freezing cold! My 4 layer of clothing barely kept me warm! The lake at Hou Hai is actually frozen rock solid due to the “mild” cold weather (that is according to Beijing residents, a harsh cold weather would see temperatures at around -20 degrees Celsius) so much so that we saw a lot activities literally over the frozen lake such as skating and “ice football”. My first impression about Hou Hai and probably Beijing’s night life in general is that the night life is not an “exclusive right” of the mid 20s to 30 something yuppies. At the “entrance” of the Hou Hai area, I saw a lot of “old” people, generally those above 50 years old doing some dance lessons with a dance ribbon. Kids are also around the area playing and they don’t look like from the neighborhood (just a hunch). Surrounding the lake on all sides except the front are bars and cafes, and the most prominent establishment (and the one right in front at the entrance) is the ubiquitous Starbucks. Most of the establishment seemed “small”, the biggest I think is just about 100 sq meters in lot area. Some establishments are two floors but most are single story. The streets in Hou Hai (at least in the place that we “landed”) are filled with hawkers and side walk vendors peddling everything from souvenirs to laser point pen. Included in this crowd are the employees of the different bars trying to lure or entice passersby to visit their bars. They are generally young, well – groomed, pretty (the ladies of course), and quite fashionable themselves. To me, they don’t seem to be bar employees at all but rather sales people/models. And oh by the way, these are people are quite pesky and insistent! They would follow you all the way trying to convince you to go their bars to the point that you felt that they are quite harassing already. Most of the bars are empty with only a handful being jam packed. I don’t know as to why is that the case but it could be that we are at the “boring side of the lake” or that we are early for the “formal” start of the night life (it was around 930pm then) or it was because the economy is bad and people are just avoiding spending altogether or it was because the weather is too cold for any functioning night life to exist. At any rate, we straddled through about half of the perimeter of the lake in search for a “nice” spot before we all decided to return to the front and picked the most “popular” bar nearest to the entrance of the lake. It so happened that the bar we chose has a Filipino band singing English songs. The bar was cozy but not “posh”. It looks so – so rather than “groovy” (that is if I understood the term, groovy at all). The drinks are well I don’t know expensive? I mean the cheapest drinks, which included bottled water, shakes, and juices (which me and my sister and the youngest in our group ordered) and beer cost 50 RMB or roughly, Php350 or US $7. Aside from me, my sister and the youngest in the group (I don’t drink. I’m no teetotaler but I definitely don’t drink. I only drink when very, very close friend of mine ask me to, otherwise nobody can get me to drink), the other youngsters ordered beer, Tsingtao beer, one of China’s popular beer brand. The bar also carries the more expensive wines like Jack Daniels and the likes, tequila. The price tag I think is around 1500 RMB (?, verification needed) upwards (Php10500 or US $250). We sat at the table directly in front of the rather “small” stage. At first, the Filipino band (they are 3 of them in the band, 2 lovely young ladies and a middle age guy in his late 30s perhaps) didn’t realized who we are but after overhearing us speak in Filipino, I could see their face grinned and they acknowledge us at the stage in Filipino (apparently, they so missed the Philippines that it’s a welcome sight for sore eyes to “see” us there). About this Filipino band, I was surprised to learn (and actually hear them) that they can speak phrases of fairly accurate Chinese Putonghua (普通話, the official Chinese language). They speak in “Chinese” whenever they are asked by the staff to acknowledge or “special mention” some bar guests (and who said Chinese is difficult to learn). This band is fairly popular I guess among the patrons of the bar because Chinese or more specifically, Beijing Chinese dig American music and this Filipino band sang quite well. One of the youngsters actually caught a few patrons “attempting” to sing along with the band. During the break in the performance, we got to chat with the band members and I was surprised to learn that there are many Filipinos who are working in Beijing and many like them worked as band musicians in Beijing bars and I thought Shanghai has the most number of Filipino bands “rocking” the town. Anyway, about the patrons of the bar, I observed that most of the patrons are in their 20s and 30s. They are mostly white collar workers who probably came by to unwind after a stressful day at work (it is only but logical to see such a demographic crowd in a place like this given the price tag of the liquors). Most of the patrons came by in small groups of somewhere between 2 – 5 people. Surprisingly, a number of the patrons actually came to the bar alone! Too many lonely people in Beijing perhaps? The crowd is quiet, not boisterous, although some of the younger patrons do get a bit noisy when drunk but generally, the atmosphere is pretty quiet save of course for the song that band is singing. It is as if everybody in the bar is paying close attention to the music except for “me and my group” (apparently, we’re the noisiest in the bar). Most people in the bar are in my point of view, don’t really care about who is sitting beside you, i.e., they’re not that nosy and they simply don’t care. I mean I saw a couple probably in their late 20s engage in a steamy “make out” session right inside the bar beside the window and totally oblivious of the crowd around them. I mean the couple has been going on with their steamy session like for an hour of our duration of stay in the bar. In fact, they’re still at it by the time we left. Yet, nobody seemed to feel “scandalized” or even remotely felt “uncomfortable” with it. Public display of affection isn’t a common “thing” in Asian countries like the Philippines. The same thing goes with China. I mean I never seen couples in China “kissing” in public before. However, inside the bar, things seemed to be less “inhibited”. Probably, it’s the alcohol or maybe, bars are the principal place for a make out session in China, well, at least in Beijing. It is just a guess though. We left after an hour or so of fun, light conversations, and good music. My impression of the bar scene in Beijing though this is no expert opinion since I’m no expert at all when it comes to bar hopping is that the place is small and cozy, the music is good, the place is generally quiet, the crowd usually just mind their own business, and the beverages are expensive. Not of much of a party atmosphere, I would dare say (as if I knew what a party atmosphere remotely looked like).