Father Sez

It seems the Malaysian Government has agreed with a suggestion to institute shorter work weeks to counter the possibility of job losses. This move, whilst reducing the take home pay of the affected workers at least keeps them in their jobs.  

So far the Government has come up with announcements on 2 stimulus packages. Though I have yet to find the full details. I hope the leaders have the right planners to steer us through these rough times.  

Listed below are some of the blog posts I found worthy of sharing with you. 

The CFO asks is buying a house jointly before marriage a good idea? As she says, it depends. Still I wonder if people who seem not ready to make a marriage commitment could be ready to make this “usually the biggest purchase of our lives” commitment jointly. 

MDJ gives 6 reasons why a recession can be a good thing. Yes, every cloud does have a silver lining. These 6 reasons may not apply for everyone, though.  

NCN wrote a good piece on 5 methods of reducing debt. I follow the debt snowball method (though I did not know this was the term applied till I started reading pf blogs.)We did a massive reduction of loans in 2008 when we sold one of our properties. It’s back to steady whittling down of loans this year. 

PaidTwice suffered a recent tragedy. Her father passed away and he was the principal finance manager in the household. Despite the deep emotional grief she must be going through, PT is also wondering about the steps she has to take to get back the family back to an even keel on financial management. I am also the principal finance manager in my family. This post has made me wonder (yet again) about what I should do now to ensure that my family is not thrown into confusion if something untoward were to happen to me.  

One of FMF’s readers asks a question. Should he take advantage (a little deviously, perhaps) of the relief, banks were giving their customers who could not pay their instalments?  I think it is a question of integrity and the reader would have to make his choice and live with it. I have very high regards for this reader, as a person without integrity would never have asked this question in the first place. 

This is all for the week, folks. Have a great weekend.

Last week one of our local papers carried a story about a 11 year old Malaysian blogger who writes and maintains a blog, www.glosonblog.com, with the tagline, “Learn online with Gloson – Anything that Gloson learns”. 

Gloson seems to be quite a child prodigy, being able to design websites when he was 8 and having helped create a product called ‘Linking Memory”. He could read and sing in English and Mandarin when he was just one and a half.The blog looks neat and well designed, and includes some ads. He has some interesting articles including this one on actions to consider before we publish a post. Advise that I can do with.  

I shall be following Gloson’s blog and wish him all the best in his blogging and other activities.   

The Digertati Life has an interesting post comparing the present nasty economic cycle to its brethren from the past. I am fascinated by the graph on Equity Markets Performance. It seems to me that the present dips are way overdone and a mighty swing upwards to the mean might be in the works.   

Business Opportunities blog wrote about the Asian Enron, Satyam Computer Services of India. The company’s Chairman has admitted to presenting fraudulent accounts for the past 5 odd years. This disclosure has sent the stock reeling and is expected to have repercussions in a number of the many countries where Satyam   operates, including Malaysia. In absolute terms the amount involved may seem small, USD 1 b or so. The loss of shareholder wealth when the shares took a steep dive is something else.  I suppose, PwC, its auditors must be looking at some serious class action suits to be hurled at them soon. 

Pakdi wrote about a Korean blogger who got arrested by the Authorities in Korea. Apparently this blogger, known as Minerva, had allegedly claimed the Authorities had advised the banks to stop buying dollars. Well, freedom of speech is one thing. Announcing something that has serious implications but is not true is another. And if the announcer is a person with influence it’s yet another. Just where do we draw the line? 

JD asks a very pertinent question. What monetary value should we give to our principles? Principles are not quite the same as integrity. There may be no fraud or cheating or bribing involved, for example having a principle of being vegetarian. Look at how JD examines the situation he was put in and how he came to a logical conclusion based on his principles.    

One of GLBL’s readers, Sarah, has turned to him for some advice. Apparently there is increasing debt and lies involved and Sarah’s conscience is now at a critical point. To resolve any problem, first we must recognize and admit that there is a problem. Sarah has taken this first and most important step.  I think the GLBL guy has given some great advice. Click through and hear what he says.  

This week I participated in the Carnival of Family Life that was hosted by Colloquium. The Writer’s Coin who hosted the Carnival of Personal Finance, rejected my article as it did not meet his qualifying criteria…which was for the post to be interesting. Well, I’ll just have to try again next week.  

This is it for the week, folks. Have a very happy and memorable weekend!

Jaya is one of the rare breed of writers who can make the well chosen words jump out of the paper upon which they are written and narrate the story to you. And he speaks much the same way. Full of wit, well placed jokes and with a colourful choice of words that are worthy of a AAA Grade wordsmith and storyteller. 

Though trained as a biochemist, he spent very little of his working life in this field. He has been in the journalistic world, including a long stint with Dow Jones, for as long as I can remember. Presently he is the bureau chief of Singapore’s Business Times in Malaysia.

He also writes a weekly column in a Malaysian daily. Here I am listing just two of his recent articles that made me laugh out loud. 

i. This one is about the growing tendency for Malaysians to get a name worldwide as counterfeiters.  

ii. And this one is a light hearted poke at the one thing one of our elected representatives figured should be aired in our Parliament. This article was picked up by one of Malaysia’s heaviest hitting socio-political blogs.    

Onto the other interesting articles I found in my reader.  

Adam Khoo, a Singaporean author and a peak performance trainer, asks “How much would we sell 10 years of our life for?” Read why he asks this telling question.  

The CrackerJack Greenback writes about the benefits of premarital counselling. Couples in love often forget to discuss many important things in life. Having a structured discussion with a trained counsellor mediating helps the couple in understanding each other better so as to have common goals in life. This is something that is quite commonly done in Malaysia though I have sometimes thought that it seemed a little too commercial. I hope my children will go through this kind of counselling when they decide to tie the knot.  

The Malaysian Life has an interesting post on password selection. He provides links to Stanford University’s guide to selecting a good password and another to a site which outlines how your passwords can be hacked. A must read, I must say. 

Shaun warns us that inflation is inevitable. He gives his reasons and promises to write about what we should do to protect ourselves.  

This is all for now. Have a great and happiness filled weekend, folks. 

In Indonesia, a very common reply if we were to ask a local about something that seems not too easy to get done would be “Bisa diatur”. This translates roughly to “it can be arranged”, or as my friend seems to have translated “Everything is possible”. 

A former colleague who spends a lot of time in Indonesia and West Africa has this blog by the same name. He chronicles the more interesting thing he sees in his travels. He is a great photographer and many of his pictures speak a thousand words. Mamadou is quite a historian and very observant. You can tell from the way he writes, fusing history with pictures in a manner that makes pleasant informative reading.  

Amongst his posts that I found really interesting was this post about a bird building its nest (a series of pictures that I think are worthy of NatGeo) and this write up on his visit to Timbuktu.  

Among the other posts that I read recently, I would suggest that you have a look at the following: 

Frugal Dad announces that he has just reached his first year mark with his blog. And he made mention of something that quite a few of us might find sounding familiar, “being great starters but poor finishers”. Hmmm…..This should be my tag line.  

I am an admirer of FD and wish him all the very best as he continues to educate us. 

And going through the posts Frugal Dad listed as some of his more popular articles for 2008, I found this gem, on teaching an eight year old about compounding interest. (I have already kicked myself for having missed this so very relevant post earlier.)  

Steve has some piercing analysis and sound advice for the rats still in the rat race. Do you like your job but hate your career? Or do you like your career but hate your job? Or do you hate both? I would have benefited from this post a whole lot more if I had read it about 20 years ago.  

Jacquelyn writes about how to encourage children to read. I love books and have a mini library at home. The children don’t seem to have picked up the habit though. TV or the Net wins hands down anytime. I wonder if I can still set this right. 

Apanama, a Malaysian socio political blogger has chosen the Malaysian Turkeys of the Year 2008. I think that this must really have been a very tough race as I can offhand think of about 3 or 4 others (politicians, of course), who would have given the winners a run for their money.   

LOD quotes a grim forecast by a former Russian KGB analyst, Dr. Panarin who predicts that the US would collapse by 2010, a mere year away. None of the commenters seem to agree with Dr. Panarin. Still, it is most interesting that this forecast was made way back in 1997!!! 

Still on predictions. The coming Year of the Ox which as per the Chinese calender comes around every 12 years allegedly does not bode well for Asian stock markets and economies. Perhaps this is because the last 3 Ox years, i.e. 1997, 1985 and 1973 were painful ones. Three out of the thousands of Ox years behind us cannot be used to come to a credible conclusion, can it?

I participated in the Carnival of Financial Goals which was hosted by the founder, Patrick at Cash Money Life. I particularly enjoyed Shaun Connell’s “The pursuit of Financial Happiness”. This Carnival features a lot of stories on goals and related stuff and I have bookmarked the site to go through the articles carefully.

Well, this is it for this week. Let’s all laugh a lot, work hard, play hard and God Willing, 2009 should be a good year.

A dear friend, now no longer a rat of the rat race and living what I think is quite an exciting and fabulous life, writes a blog called Cycling Tales. He is, as you may guess, an avid cyclist and has written about the many expeditions he has done, either solo or with a bunch of fellow cycling enthusiasts.  

His latest article is about the Railway Station in Tumpat, a small town in Kelantan, Malaysia. This railway station, being in the town where he was born and grew up holds a very special place in his heart. Read and enjoy! And know a little bit about my country. 

Some of the other articles I read and enjoyed are listed below. 

Flexo wrote a post listing his 9 suggestions on identifying and working towards achieving one’s purpose in life. For many of us, pinning down our purpose in life (or our ultimate goals in life) might seem a little hazy. Going through Flexo’s tips would help clarify our thoughts. 

Lazy Man asks a million dollar question. What if history does not repeat itself? What if the stock markets do not bounce back? What if, what if? I think that despite the allegedly historically correct “history repeats itself theory”, we never really know. I share the thoughts of some of the commenters who said that, irrespective of how history plays out,they would be sticking to the time tested methods of earning more than they spend and investing the difference wisely. 

I truly enjoyed this post (and the resulting comments) by Four Pillars about a store that put up a sign proclaiming “Christian Owner”. Assuming the owner’s name is not Christian Owner (as pointed out by Looby), what would you think about patronizing such a store? 

The One Caveman announces the latest addition to his family. The precious Alyssa. The Fathersez family heartily congratulate and welcome Mr. and Mrs. Caveman into the world of unbridled joy as the little child grows up and showers them with her “no strings attached smiles and laughter”. And some sleepless nights!

MMND talks about an interesting study done in the 60’s and followed up 14 years later. She links the results of the study with 5 important observations she makes on money management. A really cool post!

This is it for the dawn of 2009. May this year be better than 2008!

Last week was pretty hectic.  

My wife and I went to Tanjong Balai, an Indonesian port that is about an hour’s ferry ride from Malaysia, for sourcing the Indonesian workers for our goat farm.  If all goes according to plan, the 2 workers should be in our farm by the end of this month. 

My eldest daughter returned home from Wales after completing her Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology.  

Meanwhile posts that I think are worthy of mention are listed here.

Malaysian fuel prices were raised by a whopping 41%, to RM2.70 a litre on the stroke of midnight, the 4^th of June 08. This is going to (actually it already has) unleash a tsunami of price increases across the board. Malaysians now have to tighten their belts and it’s not going to be easy to tighten one’s belt by at least 20% overnight! 

A guest post on Clever Dude makes some compelling points for the better side of debt. The roads to all mistakes are paved with good intentions, so if we are not disciplined, then all debt becomes bad. If we are disciplined, debt can be a useful tool.

The Chief Family Officer celebrates the 3^rd anniversary of her blog. And the Dude who is also Clever celebrates his 2^nd!  To the CFO and CD, my heartiest congratulations on your anniversaries and all the best for many more to come.  

I found Pinyo’s post on how he started the M Network very informative. Over the past year, I have seen a couple of networks being formed and it looks like a good idea. Maybe I should try to see if I can help form a Malaysian PF Group.  

Congratulations to the Frugal Duchess on the launch of her first book, “How to Live Well and Save”.  She is a great writer and has shown her prowess at frugality in her blog postings, so I’m sure her book will be a great success. 

This post by Jeff on following our dreams and desires was an inspiring one for me. Especially his No: 3 …..”Don’t be afraid to fail”. This statement dovetailed well with another quote I read earlier, attributed to JR Rowlings….Rock bottom is the rock solid foundation on which I shall build my future…..or something to that effect. 

The fear of failure keeps us from trying to live our dreams. Reading inspiring posts like Jeff’s helps in overcoming these fears.  

The Art of Manliness had an interesting listing of good and bad TV Dads. My favourite role model would have to be Dr. Huxtable, that witty cheerful doctor who has a way of resolving every issue a family with 5 kids could possibly encounter. 

Have a great weekend, folks.   

Hello. The week is coming to an end…for me anyway. There is still the full reader box to clear. In the meantime:

Posts I found interesting from those I managed to read include: 

The Glbl guy reminds us that we should surround ourselves with constant reminders of our goals.  These reminders are a tool to help us stay focused and stay on the path to reaching our goals and dreams a little sooner. I am a total believer of this theory. I have reminders on my laptop screen and my handphone, not forgetting my daily lists.  

And Ririan from Romania gives his suggestions on how to create effective to-do lists. 

Feeling ripped off (even if the feeling is misplaced) in anyway is painful and not pleasant at all. I hate it even more when I feel that the vendor is devious.  I signed up to purchase an E book on goats, (goes to show how powerful sales letters can be, as I am sure most if not all of the material in the book probably came from the free pamphlets distributed by our Department of Veterinary Services.) Anyway, I felt pissed, when I was asked to submit too much personal particulars AFTER payment was made. 

It looks like I am not alone. Read about what made Naomi feeling pissed. 

I enjoyed this post about how to fly the national flag. Our politicians started a program a few years ago to instil some patriotism and everyone was encouraged to fly flags. We had cars, buses and lorries flying flags. Needless to say, after a while you could see quite a number of really dirty looking soot / smoke encrusted and even torn flags flying all over the place.

I used to feel ashamed and often wondered how a foreigner would have judged us. Our TV stations should have carried Brett and Kate’s post repeatedly.     

I also thoroughly enjoyed this post comparing bloggers with pawns on a chess board. I think these observations will work in a lot of other situations too.  

Who can resist not reading a post with a title that goes…..”The most important piece of career advice you probably never heard”? The title turned out to be true, I had never heard this piece of advice before. And you know what, it does make a lot of sense.   

I participated in the Carnival of Family Life which was hosted as a Memorial Day Carnival by one of my favourite family sites, Colloquium!. (I must learn to spell this word correctly, since I am going to use it often.) 

Well, that’s all for the week, people. Go on and have a great, productive and jolly happy weekend.  

I have taken a short break from blogging this week. Other than the first post for the week on the progress of our family’s goat farm, I have just taken it easy. 

For my round up this week, I’ll just focus on the two Carnivals I participated in.  

First the Carnival of Family Life.

It was ably hosted by Karen at WritefromKaren, a technical writer and a mother of two teenage sons. More than 70 articles were presented at this Carnival.

I particularly enjoyed the following messages.  

Slow Down Fast’s “What can your kids teach you about technology?”  This appears to be the first time/generation in human history where parents have to learn from their kids. I know that my wife and I do.     

BeThisWay asks “Do I have to pay to appreciate them?” Referring to a problem faced by many parents with young school going children - notes from the school asking parents to pay for Teacher’s Appreciation Day or Week or whatever function the school comes up with. I also think this is being carried a little too far, placing subtle pressure on the kids to cajole their parents to contribute cash.  I think all of us parents should just put their foot down and go back to the days of a children prepared card or poem or something along these lines. This would reflect far better appreciation from the children.   

And this card should qualify for one of the best Mother’s Day gifts ever!  

We are reminded that what we, as parents, say to our kids are a very big influence into what our children will become later in life. During the formative years, children’s primary source of information, knowledge and everything that they can learn are their parents. Hence we should pick our words and phrases carefully. Seven common phrases that most parents use and their corresponding alternatives are presented. Check out the post yourself.  

Meanwhile the Carnival of Personal Finance was hosted by Money Under Thirty.   

As usual there were lots and lots of articles presented and MU30 must have had a hard time choosing his Editor Picks. I think he did a great job. 

Posts which I found interesting include:  

Paid Twice, the mom with a Ph.D and a black belt to boot tells us how to fight the bad habit of buying on impulse. By doing so, she has done all of us a great favour. (I suspect, the supermarket chains would probably want her locked away.)    

ShuChong talks about the financial lessons learnt from her mother. Though her mom never talked about money, her running of their household made for great lessons in financial management.  

Feminist Finance writes about her utter shock when she found out that the love of her life had debt levels that almost made her faint. And this was when they were planning to set dates for their marriage and as she says, grow old and doddering together. 

Well, she laid down the law and it worked out well for them.

I think she did the absolutely right thing. Her reaction and the plan of action she took should be mandatory for anyone of us who are in the same boat and contemplating even engagement.  

Pinyo gives an excellent overview of getting ourselves into better financial health. This roadmap will work only after recognizing and accepting that we need to better ourselves. As he says, self awareness is the first and most important first step.  

The Glbl guy offers his suggestions on how to survive a recession. I think this topic is one of the more popular google search phrases and for very good reason. Government statisticians are not rated No:1 in telling it as it is, and it may do all of us a lot of good to bone up and start putting into practice the steps as suggested in this informative post. 

Deepali says that wealth is a state of mind, a concept that I am beginning to understand and appreciate. I quote her here:

“Wealth is not just about my financial assets, but it’s also about my quality of life… and that of those in my global community. It’s also about my state of mind. A man with little means can be wealthy if he believes himself to be - if he’s happy with his lot in life instead of being resentful of those things he doesn’t have.

But wealth is also about opportunity. A man who has cut himself off from growth is not wealthy. But a man who can dream of other possibilities has infinite room to expand and explore. He can enrich his life and the lives of those around him. Wealth is not just in the current, it’s also in the potential.”

Well said, don’t you think!

This is it for the week, folks. Have a great, happy and productive weekend.

Whilst we pray that the birds will sing, the flowers bloom and the sun shine for all of us, let’s take a couple of minutes to reflect upon the suffering of the people of Myanmar and now China due to the devastating recent natural disasters. And where we can, let’s do our part to help! 

There are still lots of posts lying in my RSS reader. I don’t intend to use the “mark as read” button, and hope to clear them later this week. In the meantime, posts I found interesting include: 

Ben of Money Smart Life makes an emphasis on “time” being the secret of investing success. This has been said by so many people, start early, wait patiently etc.  Yet, I wonder, if there is some secret system that requires most people must make their mistakes and then shout out loud to all who listen that they should start early. 

At least that is what I am doing (shouting, I mean), and hope my children will listen.  

The Baglady has had 3 jobs in 3 years and declares she’s not afraid of being labeled as a job hopper. Recruiting new people is a burden and an expense for employers and they value stability in employee tenure. I know I would.  

Momma has finally spilled the beans on the project she has been keeping secret from all of us. She is launching herself into Household Finance Coaching, her passion. Her experience in raising a family with 6 children will sure come in handy, not forgetting the countless hours she’s spent in devouring almost every single article on finance she’s been able to get her hands on. 

I can feel her enthusiasm and commitment oozing from her post and I’ll join her family and friends and cheer her on!  

Darren has made me think deeply after I read his posting of a quote by a poet. “Do not follow where the path leads, rather go where there is no path, and leave a trail.” 

It’s so true that we usually end up following the paths of others. It’s less risky and the outcome can be better predicted. What if I set my own path, throw aside all the advice I have been reading, and just do what my heart says is right. The risk taken might be enormous, but then so may be the rewards.

Should I? Would you? Food for thought isn’t it.

I participated in the Carnival of Personal Finance which was hosted by Alpha Consumer and the Carnival of Family Life hosted by All Rileyed Up.                

This is it for the week, guys. Have a great, happy and productive weekend.

Labour Day, the one day of the year which offers a little recognition to us poor working stiffs. A very happy Labour Day to all my fellow workers. 

Last week I participated in my two favorite Carnivals. 

Jen who writes as the Diary of 1 hosted the Carnival of Family Life. This former educator now homeschools her children and writes about homeschooling, faith and family. She has done a really elegant and tasteful theme weaving interesting facts about tea into the Carnival proper.  

This Carnival, as always, has tons of interesting stuff about ….like it says, Family Life. Family life is important to me as, I am sure, to many others. Don’t forget to check out the Carnival. 

Meanwhile, it looks like Lazy Man of Lazyman and Money had to burn the midnight oil to get the picture perfect 150^th Carnival of Personal Finance up as scheduled.  

Having to go through the more than 100 posts, choose his Editor Picks (He has given 5 entries this coveted honour) and dealing with an outage from his ISP at the same time, seems to have blown his cover. I don’t think he is lazy at all; otherwise this Carnival would not have made it!  

I have always said that if people feel they have only time to read very few pf blogs, then this Carnival should be it. 

Other blog posts I found noteworthy are: 

American Small Business News talks about the importance of insurance for partners of small businesses. We are considering just this. We, the four shareholders of a small telecommunication contracting company, have requested for a proposal from an insurance consultant on this kind of insurance. Within the next month or so, we hope to apply this insurance to provide for protection for our families in any unfortunate event. 

The Digerati Life has some words of wisdom for those wanting to go on their own. I cannot truthfully say “check” to all the points made in the post. I still have a little ways to go before I can join Ms. SVB and all the others who have taken the leap. But make the leap, I am determined to do.  

Jonathan at MyMoneyBlog lists out his extensive research on how to get a mortgage in this 2 parter. Someone should have beaten me over the head with this before I ended up with the costly mortgage I am now in the process of unwinding. 

Ana gives some great pointers on how to pay for college. My wife and I have just finished paying for our eldest 2 girls’ college education. The younger 3 are still in school, and rest assured, we’ll put Ana’s and Madison’s advice to good use when the time comes.  

What’s happening? Another blogger has called it quits. The Iowahippiechick has announced that she would be focusing her energies in a different direction and has said her goodbyes. I, for one, shall certainly miss her.  

For all those outdoors people and latent Robinson Crusoe’s, the Art of Manliness has posted the perfect article detailing 9 ways to start a fire without matches. I did not even know there were so many ways! There is even a way to make fire from ice! Interesting. 

The lady, Squawkfox, writes about the 10 things you must carry in your purse. The list makes great sense. I must caution that in a number of cases, it looks like it is the dregs of society who are the first to turn up in the event of any accident. And the thing foremost in their minds is to steal whatever they can. 

My friend lost his laptop, and there have been many reported cases of necklaces, watches, wallets, hand phones et al being stolen. 

That’s all folks for this week. Have a great, happy and productive weekend.