Oxymoron In The Tropics

Some people seem to think that weddings and prudence cannot go together.  A wedding has to be BIG ... even if there's no money to pay the bills for the froth and flash. I've heard tales of young couples maximising their credit cards just to pay for one reception at a hotel because they wanted to impress people.  But will their financial troubles later on impress those same people?  I've even heard of grooms borrowing money from Ah Longs (moneylenders who charge extortionate rates in exchange for no-questions-asked loans).  What on earth happened to the common sense normally found in every human being? What is the point in looking impressive for one night and suffering for countless years later? What is the point in borrowing money you cannot pay back from moneylenders (and risk broken limbs) or money from relatives (and risk broken relationships) or money from colleagues (and risk losing support at work)? For a Christian, the most important part of the weddin...

One big hassle for teachers is homework.  They have to plan it, hand it out, chase after it and in some cases, get really worked up over it.  Well, they don't HAVE to get worked up over it but then that would mean that they just don't care about it.  Tough choices. However, the fact remains that homework is one of the most important tools for a student to master a topic.  For an English teacher, homework is about the only way for her to get students to finish an essay or a project involving more than 300 words.  For a Math teacher, homework is the only way she can get students to acquire skills in solving math problems. As a student, I used to have to do around ten to twenty sums for every sub-topic before I could reach that oh-so-sweet level of ' looking at a problem and instantly knowing the solution '.  I was definitely a product of constant slogging.  I have a few colleagues who religiously keep a log of their students' homework.  It is no...

Read the CNN article on Top 10 Money Wasters today.  It's always good to be reminded of things like this. These are the culprits, according to CNN Money. 1. ATM fees     I'd have to be careful of these.  Time to check my bank account rules. 2. Lottery tickets       Luckily I don't buy any! 3. Gourmet coffee     I totally agree!  Fortunately I am now allergic to coffee and nescafe :) 4. Cigarettes     So glad that I don't smoke.  5. Infomercial impulse buys     Not a problem for me. 6. Brand name groceries     Guilty! 7. Eating Out     Yes, this IS expensive. 8. Unused Gym Memberships     Phew!  I don't have any :D because I believe in running around my house.. ha ha ha 9. Daily Internet Deals     GROUPON!!!  Well, so far I've only bought one and that's for photobooks (for the many photos I have in my hard drive which never       see the light of day.  I have to watch my book buying though. 10. Bundled cable or phone services       I do think so...

FFacebook poses a special problem for teachers... from my point of view.  The advantages are many and multifarious but so are the diadvantages. As usual, the most nagging headache would be TMI or in full, Too Much Information.  Especially information about personal things.  Information is always good unless interpreted in a way not expected or not wanted.  As a teacher, I most especially do NOT want this, when it comes to students. Allow me to illustrate.  And I shall use the example best known to myself : Me. By default, I tend to be relaxed, sometimes flippant, almost jolly most times :).  But I knew I couldn't be 'relaxed, flippant, jolly' at work.  It was practically an imperative at my first posting : SM La Salle.  The boys in La Salle were a motley bunch; mostly rambunctious, mostly interested in earning some certification but mostly in need of rigid supervision and monitoring.  You can't monitor boys very effectively with only sm...

Last year, I heard about the case of a lady who was stopped at KLIA and not allowed to board a plane for Europe.  Despite having a valid passport and visas galore, she was not allowed to leave Malaysia because she was on the Immigration blacklist for not paying a student loan! I'd never heard of such a case before.  Well, maybe people don't talk about it... not exactly something you'd want others to know, right?  I thought Immigration blacklists were only for terrorists and bombmakers.  Obviously I don't travel much out of Malaysia.. heh heh. I wondered if I were on this black list... coming from Sabah with rampant identity theft, it's a legitimate concern!  So I went to the Immigration Dept (Counter 16) to ask.  Lucky for me, I am 'safe'! But just to make sure, I checked online as well at http://sspi2.imi.gov.my/.  Yep, I'm still 'safe'.  I also checked at the PTPTN website http://eform.ptptn.gov.my:8080/blacklist/login.cfm.  Yep, nobo...

After saving money in Skim Simpanan Pendidikan Nasional (SSPN) accounts for a few years, I can say that it was a good decision to begin. First of all, the RM3000 income tax relief has been very useful.  And on top of that, I got dividends too! Here's a table I got from another blog . They don't look like much but if you add that on to the income tax relief, the numbers look pretty good. Second, the tax incentive has helped me to keep saving the money in SSPN and the account terms has discouraged any withdrawals.  Well, since withdrawals can only be done one year after the account is opened and only ONE withdrawal (maximum 10% of total amount), any thoughts of withdrawing will be effectively squelched. Third, I am able to use this opportunity to teach my nephews about savings and university.  Plus, the possible uses of PTPTN loan.  Of course I also stressed the fact that a PTPTN loan is still a LOAN.  The way some students talk about PTPTN loans... it's ...

One of my friends got two shocks recently. Shock Number One She found out that by end of December 2011, she would only be allowed to hold two credit cards. The extras have to be cancelled. She would only be given two years to settle the outstanding debts from the cancelled credit cards. Shock Number Two She was informed that her maximum credit limit for her remaining two credit cards could only be 2x her monthly income. In her particular case, she has six credit cards.  When she cancels four of them, she has a combined debt of RM20,000.  But her remaining two credit cards have high credit limits... and she has to settle RM4000 to comply with the new credit limit. So now she is dizzy thinking of those debts... yes, she is given two years to settle them... but RM24,000 on top of her other debts is a very very heavy burden to pay.  While I pity her, I also think that this is something that Bank Negara Malaysia should have done earlier. These rules a...

One day, I flipped open my PDA and tried to read one of the ebooks in it.  After ten minutes, I gave up.  Age had taken a toll on my eyes.  I used to smile indulgently at those people who used big-screen e-readers and pat myself on the back for using a small PDA to read books.  Well, Time has a way of getting back at people like me.  Sigh. I tried increasing the font size on my PDA.  Have you ever tried to read a book on a screen that displayed only ten words a a time?  Go, go give it a try.  If only to laugh at me.  So I began my search for a big-screen replacement. The Amazon Kindle kept coming up in the course of my quest.  I didn't want an LCD screen with a backlight because they tire my eyes out pretty fast.  'Pretty fast' means four or five hours of reading.  Sometimes I like to go on ebook reading marathons.  People kept telling me that Amazon doesn't ship Kindles to Malaysia.  Amazon doesn't sell Kindle eb...

The work I do involves sending documents of various formats and extensions (.doc, .xls, .ppt, .pps, .txt, just to name a few).  Within upgrades of the same software, there may also be multiple formats not compatible with each other.  Sometimes I waste a whole morning just saving documents in different formats to be sent a second or a third time.  Naturally, I searched for a solution.  And it was a no-brainer.  PDF was the answer to my problem.  With documents in PDF, everyone would be able to view them. For those less in the know, PDF stands for Portable Document Format.  However, the ubiquitous (and free!) Adobe Acrobat Reader only reads docs.  I needed to be able to create them. At first I used a pirate version of Adobe Acrobat but through multiple upgrades and through the hassle of dealing with cancelling requests for connections to the Adobe website, I gave up on it.  Besides, I was busy teaching others about the evils of piracy....

Last year, I began having problems with my old notebook (Dell 700m Inspiron).  The old Faithful has served me for about six years and is STILL serving me but it just won't display pictures anymore.  I blame this on the gazillion-MB pictures produced by the new cameras.  HOWEVER, as I was expected to deal with pictures in the course of my work, this posed a huge problem for me.  At first, it was only the screen that refused to show me the pictures (they would print out fine).  But after a while, the pictures wouldn't even print out.  So I decided to walk through the shiny electronics-awash halls of Karamunsing Complex Third Floor.  The specs of notebooks and desktops flabbergasted me.  320GB hard disks, 4GB RAM etc etc.  I checked old Faithful's specs... 60GB hard disk memory... 256MB RAM... ohhh, no wonder the poor thing couldn't cope.  I upgraded the RAM to 1GB.  Pictures still refused to show themselves.  So I bit the bullet and bought myself an Acer. At first, I ...

A few days ago, I had a sudden realization... sometimes a good thing isn't always a good thing. Let me elaborate.  About two years ago, I applied for a post.  I'd already given up on it when 'something' happened.  To summarize, I was given the opportunity to have the opportunity of joining a certain organization.  LOL... that sounds complicated, doesn't it?  The catch would be that I'd probably have to pack my bags and move someplace far.  If you ask me how far, then I'd say, a bit beyond Labuan. Perhaps in younger days, I would've started planning what I'd want to pack the very same day.  But now, I've gone through quite a number of experiences that has taught me that money and promotions aren't everything.  If I could, I would and all that jazz.  But in this case, I 'couldn't'.  And that was my epiphany.  I weighed my career prospects against family and family won hands down big time.  A decade ago, things would've been di...

This blog sure has been neglected... but that is due to other more pressing demands on my time.  Beginning October, the preparations and courses and briefings for the new Primary 1 curriculum kept me hopping from meeting to course to report.  I was supposed to organise Maths and Science courses at the end of November but from past experience with the PPSMI programmes, I didn't want to take the risk of not meeting my target participants.  I knew very well that many teachers had already booked their tickets home and for Sabah, many teachers are from other districts.  What many people in Malaysia just don't get, distances in Sabah aren't as easily navigated as distances in Peninsular Malaysia.  First, Sabah can easily fit in seven of the smaller states in Peninsular Malaysia.  Second, the rainy weather we'd been experiencing (and still are!) created so many problems, such as landslides, floods and high tide.  Third, in Kota Kinabalu, we have schools on islands and in pla...