On the Greek financial crisis, Grexit, et al...

I know I shouldn't be treating it as a dark comedy, but that déjà vu of the Greek financial crisis since 2008, the endless bailout and numerous deadlines, the slo-mo train wreck, is almost comical in its own twisted way. Seven years and two bailouts later, we are still talking about bailouts, Greece is still asking for more money without so much as a commitment to reforms or concrete plans of it, the troika is still pushing for reform plans and not getting it, Germany is still getting blamed for being too harsh on Greece (and in some instances insinuated as enabler to allow Greece to borrow and live beyond its means).

No wonder no one (not least the Greeks) is taking these threats (of Grexit) seriously. Afterall there will almost always be some last minute, hail-mary pass to allow Greece to kick the can down the road for a few more weeks (or months), and then the whole thing will flare up again, without fail. Suddenly someone would say, let's take Greece's plan "at face value", and everyone can go back to their nightly prayers that the Greeks would do what they say they would do (which almost never happens), and then all the eurozone countries would express dismay, yet again, at how Greece fails, once again, when the next deadline comes along. There will be lots of tsk-tsks, lots of disappointment, the "negotiations" will start again. And so it goes.

All the while, investors would trim their exposure to Greece. Seven years on, it's highly doubtful Grexit would have much contagion to speak of, except that the troika would have to write off those few hundreds of billions of euros that they have collectively poured into the Greece sinkhole. Would they throw more good money after bad into that same sinkhole?

Yes I do get it, that euro (as a general integration project of eurozone, as an experimentation of monetary integration of euro as a currency) is huge and messiness comes with the territory. But if you ask even a 5-year-old, you would get the same commonsense response, "yes, but why can't I have that?" (substitute whatever "that" is, as an alternative, when what they ask for is not working). Therein lies the biggest problem, there is no Plan B. Everyone knows the risks, everyone wants to start the party in 2000 (when euro was introduced), nobody wants to play the devil's advocate of what-ifs. Every country, if only for the sake of "democracy" on paper that each and every country in the eurozone would be treated as the same, both in voting rights and also in their state of economy (the latter of which of course is beyond anyone's wildest fancy to ever be true). And of course the strong economy in Germany is not the same as those in Greece, or Portgual, or Poland, for example. No one wants to point out that obvious fact. So, the whole eurozone is now playing catch-up with the what-ifs, and still no one would accept the possibility that the what-if scenario (of Grexit) could, and probably should, happen. 

I used to say to my kids when they were little, that if they try to do the same thing the same way and get the exact same results, three times in a row, then they need to adapt and learn. Either the way they do it has to be modified, or that the expectation of results should be adjusted. Is this too much to ask for from the eurozone as a whole? Greece would not accept that reality. But as the IMF chief has put it aptly, they need to have dialogue with the adults in the room. Apparently Greece still doesn't have any adult in the room, and they refuse adult supervision. To the Greek PM Tsipras, there is only one line, "I know what I want, I want it now."

And while we're on Tsipras, what kind of idiot or amateur he must be, for on the one hand, push and prod EU to give Greece yet more money, yet on the other hand, thrashing and biting the hand that feeds him (and his nation) by thumbing his nose to eurozone by pledging solidarity with Russia, for example, when Europe is considering imposing more sanction for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He must be feeling very sore by now, for dancing the PR dance to the Putin tune, yet no money is forthcoming. If there is a sure way to commit suicide, this would be it. Indeed I'm surprised that ECB is still willing to up the ante in propping up the collapsing Greek banks via ELA. If I were German taxpayer, I would have told Tsipras and Varoufakis to go eat dirt.

I know I sound harsh, and I do appreciate the hardship that the Greeks have endured. But as the saying goes, you take the good with the bad. Anyone with an ounce of sanity or sense should realize that they can't be expecting to enjoy the party time when euro was flying high (and Greece and everyone else in PIIGS in particular were borrowing on the credit of the Germans who seemed to be the only one living within its means and not borrowing like there's no tomorrow), without the expectation that there's something called gravity, and whatever that goes up can come down too. Yes yes, hindsight is 20/20, but if the Greeks are idiotic enough not to see through that simple rule in life, no one can help them.

Tsipras and Varoufakis (one of the earlier point man in the Greek negotiations with eurozone) are a prime example of what not to do when it comes to begging aggressively. No one hears Greece complaining about Germany when the latter was effectively underwriting borrowings in euro; afterall who in their right mind would treat the strong economy of Germany and the weaklings like Greece and Portugal to be the same - with it, the same low interest rate - but voila, with the use of the same common currency of euro, they were all treated as "equals" which is most insane. When times are bad, Greece demands $300B from Germany as nazi reparation. History aside, and while Greece might really have a case, asking your creditors to pay you when you're supposed to be paying back in the other direction is not the way to go about it. There was thinking circulating among the Greeks too, that Germany wants to re-enslave other European countries with money. Notwithstanding the fact that Germany had indeed started not just one, but two, world wars, it's hardly a fact that Germany was holding a gun to the Greeks' heads, forcing them to borrow hugely in euro before the 2008 meltdown. This is in fact the same kind of twisted argument by those subprime mortgage borrowers in US and elsewhere, who would blame banks for lending to them, so that they can continue to use their property as collateral like piggy-bank, given the prices-can-only-go-up expectations of the property market.

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For what's worth, I'm getting so tired of reading about Greece, its bailouts, its suffering, and the rest. If I were Merkel, I would have told Tsipras to go right ahead with Grexit. No one is standing there to stop the Greeks. There is no more needs for bailouts, there is no more complaint about subjugation, you are your own man and should stand on your own feet. Be a man, for a change. Afterall Greece has lots of pride to sustain it. We'll see how Tsipras' Plan B (in aligning with Russia and China) would turn out, and see how those totalitarian regimes would give a rat about the suffering in Greece.

As the bargaining chips of Greece are diminishing in value (and the risk of financial contagion of Grexit greatly diminished these days), the moment of truth is fast approaching. Greece, its being the cradle of a great civilization upon which the different cultures in Europe and beyond were nurtured, is fast becoming irrelevant to the rest of the world. If Greece really wants to be taken seriously (not only by its eurozone member neighbors, but by the rest of the world as well), its people really have to show some grit (as others like Spain and Ireland have done in toughing out the financial crisis since 2008). Otherwise they are nothing more than whiny babies.

On the anemic recovery since 2008 downturn, and the new normal...

I'm sure everyone has read quite enough about the anemic economic recovery since the 2008 downturn. I certainly have. My guess though is that most everyone doesn't need to read about it to know it; anyone who knows a wage/salaried job should know it by now.

There have been sporadic economic news about the increasing number of jobs being created, but unlike the past economic or the roaring days in the Bill Clinton years, these jobs are mostly low-wage, service jobs that can hardly support oneself, never mind the dream of moving up the economic ladder, starting a family, and join the "middle class" ranks.

Adding salt to the wound, is the fact that employers are resorting to once-off perks, rather than pay raises, I don't know about other sectors, but in IT, this is particularly true. In fact, I'm surprised that it takes main media and economists this long to figure it out because this trend, much like the outsourcing and offshoring that started in mid/late 1990s, has been going on for more than a decade now. I know it because I live it every year. While my employer has been making gobs of profits (and the senior management ranks have been amongst the highest compensated in the IT sector), a majority of folks have not seen a pay raise for more than 12 years, and counting.

And then there is the increasing wealth gap and income gap among the super-rich and the rest of the people, which looks to be a worldwide trend these days.

The trickle-down economics that GOP has always propositioned never work because for an economy to go roaring, it needs not just the super-rich buying yacht or sports cars or staying in resorts and fancy restaurants, what it really needs is the rest of the economy to have that capability to spend and consume as well. Bill Clinton has right general idea, rising tide lifts all boats.

Before the economy hits its snag, everyone was drunken on the easy money from Greenspan, coupled by the dismantling of regulations (like Glass-Steagall Act) and much weakened enforcement, so much so that even a dog could get any loan. No docs? No problem. Second or even third mortgage? We'll take care of that. Zero down? Why not. With all those, even a day laborer or unemployed could have finagled a mortgage to buy properties, turning the real estate market into a huge casino.

We know how that party ended in 2008 with the collapse of Lehman Brothers. Suddenly everyone realized that they couldn't really afford the mortgage. They lost their jobs, their mortgage rate reset after the teaser rate ended, foreclosure ensued, and then it's someone else's fault for giving them a loan, any loan. Suddenly people claim they can't read fineprint, they could not have known or understood the terms, they don't know how to balance checkbooks. They MUST be helped. But this is a story for another day, and I'm not that ready for another sob story of how someone lost their house. What I want to look at, is the way forward.

But with these folks in the lower strata and even the great middle class losing their ability to spend because the easy money is not there anymore, and they are unable to borrow, the economy is unable to pull itself out quite so easily. For the first time ever, when the inflation is tampered by the collapsing oil prices, americans are pocketing the savings rather than spending the few extra hundred dollars. The harsh truth is that, americans have been funding their spending with borrowings. Greenspan was happy to oblige with near-zero interest rate, the chinese buy up gobs of US Treasury so that the interest rate can stay low. When americans continue to buy, the chinese are happy to sell (whatever that their factories can make).

So, where are we right now? Borrowings might be coming back, but only to those with good credit scores (presumably with a decent job and steady income), which excludes the low-income folks. Jobs are coming back, but with such low wages that some have to work 2-3 jobs to stay afloat. Having a college degree is no longer any sure bet, afterall college grads in US are competing with those elsewhere in the world, and college grads in China, India, and Eastern Europe are always ready to work for less. Globalization benefits big corporations but it's decidedly a two-edged sword for those toll their labor for a wage.

I don't need some economist to tell me why our economy is not roaring back because I've known it on gut level already. I don't need some main media talking heads to officiating this as our new normal because this has been with us for 6+ years now. I do feel bad for the younger generations, those who come of age finishing college right when the Great Recession hit, because they have been dealt a very bad hand.

But I'm not Bill Gates or Warren Buffet, with billions of dollars stand ready to change the world through philanthropy. I can only do the best I can on the personal level. To me, the silver lining of the Great Recession is more than golden because I've been able to buy up some choiced properties in great neighborhoods that I could otherwise never have been able to buy. I've saving up too (and I'm never a big spender anyways), so I don't have to worry retirement. In fact, I'm preparing for the day when I can call it quit at my job, and I won't have to worry about monthly income/expenses. Along the way, I'm starting my own business because I no longer have faith in a job - some job that works for someone else to put profit in their pockets.

Life is busy when one has to multi-task but it's better that than idling by. Given this anemic economy and this new normal, I count my blessings everyday.

On the rise of non-believers in God...

I read with interest a recent article in New York Times about the rise of non-believers in God particularly among the millennials. With the recent passing of my dad, it prompts me to do some soul-searching as well.

I was brought up in Catholic school, but most of the nuns turned me off, big time. There wasn't much preaching, but tons of praying and rituals, with masses and prayers all the time, all in keeping with the Catholic Church's teaching that we should just listen and do as we're told, and we're good to go. With the rebel in me, I grew away from Catholicism as I get older and away from the elementary/high school. It's not a place I relish anyways, what with all the very strict rules and no room for interpretation or questions. Deep down though, I do know that I've had some part in me that takes in the faith of a creator, some high-being that is the wise one, watching over us. 

None of my siblings nor myself who went to the same school was baptized, yet one by one, each of them turns to Christianity. In the end, even my parents have become the true faithfuls. My parents, in particular, enjoy the loving community built around their Christian church, and I'm happy that they find serenity in that. 

I was the only hold-out of the family, the last one awaiting baptism. As they get older, my parents' urging (for me to go to church, to bring my kids to church too, and to baptize) becomes more earnest. They want us all to reunite in heaven. As the preaching goes, if we don't get baptized, if we don't repent, we are condemned to hell, and would say goodbye to everyone in the family forever. Such are horrible thoughts for my parents. One of my dad's dying wishes was to see me baptized, for that same reason.

The death of my dad has left a big impact on me emotionally. It was the first true passing of someone I love since my grandma's death, but I was too young then to comprehend. Everyone in the church has been wonderful in helping (with the funeral and everything), and most of them feel like genuinely good people. So this is thus a rather strange feeling to me that I've since lost patience in all the preaching, hence the soul-searching. 

In a way, I don't concern as much about the eternal hell. Maybe over the years, I've come to embrace secularism without even fully aware of it. I've come to dislike all forms of organized religions, never mind what the religion actually is, all of which does nothing more than imposing the wills on the people, and should you disobey, well you know where you'll go when you die (voila, eternal burning hell). It's all the same with Islam, Judaism, Christianity, Catholicism, to name a few of the biggest mainstream culprits.

Is this such a God that is so vengeful that anyone, however good and decent in heart, will be condemned to hell, just because they would not say "I love you" to this God? Where had my dad gone after his death? Does anyone really know he's in heaven now? Yes, it's an act of faith for those who firmly believe that he is. For me who is still mourning for his death, I can't feel it, I don't feel it. I just know he's gone. For what's worth, he's gone with his last breath of life. 

I heard it somewhere that "whatever helps you sleep better at night", you'll buy it. Right about this moment, that's how I feel about organized religion and all the preaching and urging from my family, that I need to repent, that I need to baptize ASAP before some true hell strikes me, that when there's good fortune it's God's blessing, that when there's hardship it's God's tests on our faith. 

But is it really? Or, is it just some good luck, bad luck? And that when we die, we die, and there's that. 

All these, is not to say that having loving and caring community and familial support is not a nice thing, because it is. But I simply can't take it or feel it anymore. Right about now, I feel drifting away from the increasing piety of my family. I'm supposed to feel bad about it, but somehow I don't feel it. 

Maybe tomorrow I'll die of some unknown cause, and the world will not miss a beat, whatever good (or bad) I'm done. It'll just move on, the earth will continue to revolve around the Sun until maybe some million years later when the Sun implodes, taking with it the earth and all the planets around it. That is, if humans won't self-implode and destroy the planet earth sooner than that. Along the way, people would continue to preach apocalypse, and the end of the world, and Jesus will come again.

Right about now, my family tells me I should be running scared, but I don't feel it. Maybe I'm not blessed that way, but I don't really care. Or, is it another way to say, to hell with it? You tell me.

On public funding and social services...

I was recently reading, almost with pain, the New York Times article about the closing of public institutions for the developmentally disabled. But somehow I cannot quite reconcile some dilemma inherent in the situation.

There is no doubt about the angst of the families of these developmentally disabled folks who have been institutionalized on public funding, requiring intensive care, one-on-one staffing, and other high maintenance services. I can't begin to imagine how it could have been liked to care for and worry over your own child or sibling or relative who might be severely autistic and aggressive or prone to becoming violent, say. It is not something that I would possibly wish it on anyone, just to get a taste of it.

If money (and funding) is no object, I'm sure too that everyone would want the best 5-star care to everyone, private room, and more. That is what the public institutions slated to close had been there for these folks for decades now. It works out for them in the past, by and large. But one has to ask, at what costs?

And so, when these institutions are closing, mandating these individuals to be moved to large group settings, families fight to preserve those facilities. Some, like the 50-year-old severely autistic man, who have never experienced anything else other than this form of living in all his life, his parents are fighting to keep it open, if not just for his own sake.

I know it sounds cold and highly calculating, but at the end of the day, there are costings that the society has to bear, and any benefits that the society could ever reap, by providing any social service. While the article doesn't mention the dollars-and-cents involved in the different kinds of services, old and new, it should have, because that would give us some idea the alternative outcome would be. Even as roughly as an estimate of how much it costs to keep the old facility opened, per person per year, juxtaposition that with what other kinds of social services could have been provided to other members in society (eg. turning the facilities into homeless shelters or to homeless families), it would have been a much easier decision to make. Say, by moving one severely mentally retarded person to a group setting can free up public funding to help three to four homeless family of four, the decision would have been a no-brainer.

In the real world when resources are limited and decisions have to be made to allocate those limited resources, that's often how it would come down to. It's far from ideal, unfortunately.

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It reminds me, years ago, when my daughter started with the swim team of the town. Kids were all small, and the town swim team is more like a communal thing that tries to be as inclusive as possible. Same goes with town traveling team in soccer for my son. Basically as long as the kids want it (or more like, as long as the parents want it), they can stay and get their field time.

And so it happens that there's this boy who also joined the swim team. He doesn't have outward trait that might mark him out, but when he gets in the water, it shows. It might have had issues with muscle control, or it could have been issues with taking instructions, or maybe more, but I never found out for sure.

In four short words, to sum it up, this boy can't swim. I don't mean to sound demeaning, but it's the way it is. When practice started and all kids start the swimming (however poorly they start out at first), but this boy would float in the pool like a dead fish. He would go on floating, face down, for maybe a minute or so until his breath ran out, and then he would wake up and started flopping in the water like he's screaming for help, gasped for a lungful of air, and then he would go back to floating face-down. Usually in an hour of swim practice, he would be able to move through the 25-yard pool maybe once.

Why does this article remind me of this boy, you would ask? Well, it comes back to limited resources, funding, and allocation of those limited resources.

For each lane in the pool with maybe six to eight kids swimming in circular fashion, there would normally be one coaching aide to teach and watch the kids. Due to the special needs of this boy, one lane was blocked out, just for him alone, pushing those six to eight kids to the other lanes which were heavily congested already. On top of that, the head coach had allocated two to three coaching aides, just for him alone because every step of the way along that 25 yards, these coaching aides would be constantly calling his name, over and above his parent who was also calling his name constantly to wake him up from the spectator stand. This was all while these two to three coaching aides who should be watching and teaching the other kids were now dedicating to one kid alone. I'm sure you get the idea of the white-glove treatment of that.

Some of the parents were visibly fuming, considering that this boy should not even be on the swim team. Given the altruistic nature of the swim team admission, he's admitted anyways. But his presence had depraved all the other kids of the teaching and resources that they should rightly have enjoyed. When that boy finally stopped going to the swim team after some two years, there was almost an audible sound of relief that resources could finally be freed up.

I have to almost admit it with guilt that I was glad to see him stop coming to the swim team too. But why did I feel guilty about it?

Was it that I was peeved that his boy was depraving other kids, my daughter included, who was squeezed out to other lane with minimal to non-existent coaching? Quite likely.

Was I disappointed that after some two years of dedicated excessive coaching staff from the swim team to just one boy, there's still no progress or improvement to this boy whatsoever? You bet I am.

Had all the resources that were dedicated to this boy so that his parents would feel good about his boy being taken care of, while the other regular kids would "sink or swim" on their own, literally? I would think so too.

This was all while the swim team, and indeed the town as a whole, had been struggling with budgetary constraint, and there had been talks of cutbacks and raising fees for everyone to cover just the basics for the swim team.

In a way, this anecdote of the swim team is like a shrunken version of the resource allocation and the cost-and-benefit issues that the NYT article has illustrated. In a perfect world when money is not an issue, we won't even be bothered about hard choices like this, but we don't live in a perfect world.

If we are to choose between caring for a 50yo man who would have little hope to contribute much to the society (while continuing to consume ever more resources from public funding), or we could free up much needed resources to help the next generations to become more productive members in society, it's almost heartless to say it, but the choice is fairly clear to me.

On radical muslim terrorists, violence, and other thoughts...

Just when we once thought that Al Queda, the radical muslim terrorist group that gained infamy from the 9/11 attack and made Osama bin Laden almost a household name, was bad, the muslim fundamentalists have suceeded in outdoing it by ISIS more than a decade later in terms of violence. While Al Qaeda under bin Laden was prone to staging well-planned spectacular attacks, ISIS and all the splintered groups these days resolve to the medieval means of beheadings and unorganized attacks (though no less deadly) by crazy individuals. Case in point: The lone gunman in the Sydney cafe attack, the hacking death of British soldier in just another street on British soil, the Boston Marathon bombing, and now the Paris mass shooting of a cartoon magazine (including the killing of Paris policeman in execution style). There are many more, too many to elucidate.

I'm sure I'm not the only one, but the senselessness of it all is bewildering. All these nutjobs - yes, I would only call them nutjobs, nothing more - profess grievances of various sorts, all in the name of Islam, but their methods are all the same which is to cause mayhem and induce fear in the western countries. 

I can't make sense of it because many of those those claims by these nutjobs are almost unrelated as one can get. Some are haters of Israel which, thankfullly to these terrorists, has given them more excuses to do so by suppressing the Palestinians in the occupied territory and the expanding Jewish settlement, (the latter of which is an entirely topic of discussions on its own).  Some, like the Boston Marathon bombers-brothers, cite the suppression of the muslim Chechens by the Russian government as reasons. Some, like the Paris shooting perpetrators, claim to avenge Prophet Muhammad in a cartoon a decade ago. Others just want to bring death and chaos to the infidels in general. 

Truth be told, I didn't pay that much attention to the Middle East in the past. Afterall it's as faraway a place in my head as one could get, and I never have that much interests in it. If the news don't mention Middle East that often about oil, and now the news about crazy groups like ISIS or Boko Haram and their dealings, I can't really care less, to be honest. 

I don't profess to know much at all about Islam the religion and the practice because Quran does not interest me. (Heck, I have probably made myself out as a target for the next attack by Muslim radicals by just saying that!) I did work with a few muslim guys in the past who were from Pakistan. Can one really form an informed opinion about a religion and as diverse as the different cultures that muslim populations around the world? Of course not. But we are what our experience makes us, and those few dealings with muslim folks have nothing unusual about it at all. The guys were fun-loving young guys, just another immigrants working in a western country, and they seemed to be have the time of their lives. We never probed that deeply about the meaning of religion and life, but I'd bet that they never did either.

And then there were the muslim students that I spent quite some time with at the college dorm. Those were muslim students sponsored by Malaysian government, and they were just cruising along on their government's dime. I don't want to generalize too much, but in this case, I have to. None of those muslim students on government sponsorship should have been admitted to grad school for a higher degree, in fact I don't think they could even pass the muster of a first degree. But the college administration wants the funding from the Malaysian government, and none of these lazy muslim indigenous students could be kicked out for academic incompetence. To call them muslims is probably an insult to the Islam religion because they did everything that muslims shouldn't have done - yes, even an infidel like me who don't know much about their religion know this much - including drinking, surf porn sites, eating everything (yes, pork, big time), and they even eat during Ramadan (just not publicly). Thinking back, I wonder if any of those lazy muslim students is now in some upper echelons of the Malaysian government. 

Don't get me wrong, they are just regular guys to me, but that's exactly the point. Some muslim fundamentalists make the West out as some land of infidels who are inferior to culture and practice than muslims. Truth is, many muslims are just as corrupted, they just don't say or do things in public to keep up their appearance of a pious muslim, is all.

Unfortunately, these young men are so impressionable, emulating their low station in life and grievances of their own (that they're just losers in general), that they have to find some higher purpose to exact their own grievances to the larger society they grow up in, the society that has given them a new lease in life (as in the case of the Boston Marathon brothers). These young men and women seem to be so gullible and ignorant that they can't even see through how ridiculous their claim is (like the case of avenging Prophet Muhammad in the Paris shooting when it's all just a goddamn satire, for goodness sake. Apparently, even these muslims - or maybe Islam in general? - never evolve with time and get civilized, as such, they are so thin-skinned in general that they cannot handle anything "bad" to be said about Islam, not even a satire. (But maybe they don't know what satire really is.)

My disappointment is that, moderate muslims (and I'm sure there are many more) do not speak out more forcibly against all these violence done in their name and their religion. Do they secretly condone such acts if only just to show the west their "real power"? Are they, as a loose group, so cowed that they are too afraid to speak up? It is only when they speak up against such violence, against the twisted interpretation of Islam, that they can become the counterweight of this worrisome trend of radical muslim spreading in Africa and Middle East, as groups like ISIS and Boko Haram are doing now, exacting great toll on their own people and the countries.

While I'm not against immigration - afterall, I'm an immigrant myself afterall, but one would call world citizen to live in various countries and continents - I'm against immigration without assimilation, which is exactly what is happening in Europe and other western countries that open its door to refugees and immigrants without ensuring that these folks are assimilated into the host countries. And if you ask truly, I would honestly tell you that while I don't mind hijab, I don't like seeing niqab on the streets at all.  And if those folks are truly so unhappy and harbor so much ill will in the western countries, why don't they leave and never come back? 

At this point, I'm just getting very sick and tired of hearing all these news. Maybe I'm getting lazy, and just want the problems to go away, rather than trying to figure out how to deal with the pandora's box of immigration, particularly the second-generations that are local citizens now, getting their ignorant radicalized and doing the bidding of others when they don't even have a rational reason to.

2014: Taking stock, and looking ahead...

I've quite deserted my blog for months now. Not that I haven't had much in mind to jog down, but I've much rather doing something else with my time on hand. But perhaps when it comes to year end, it's always a good time for reflection.

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On the personal front, as parents are getting older, they've finally reached a time this year where they're moved to nursing home. Not that it's something they've ever fancied, but reality and practicality dictate it that nursing home is a realistic option, in particular, in times of failing health. By providence, amidst all the frenzy and near desperation, we came upon this nursing home that meets almost all criteria that parents have wanted (diet, language, environment, friends, friendliness of staff, and more) and the finances work out too. We couldn't ask for more. Better yet, should they feel like it, they can leave nursing home whenever they feel like it. They have their own sizable room, with private bath and all. Meals and snacks everyday are nice, with activities all day. They have their rooms next to the nurse station too, so that care staff are always one shout away. As my mom puts it, it's better than a hotel. I must say, I have to agree with her.

Kids are getting bigger too, though with each stage of childrearing, there are always different worries and challenges. With globalization these days, kids are competing with peers not just locally, but with those around the world. One can only hope that they are disciplined and equipped enough to rise up to the challenge, to strive and thrive. As a parent, increasingly I have this feeling that the kids would need to chart their own path (even if they have yet to reach their teens), rather than having us paving the road for them, every step of the way. In any case, I don't want them to take a path in life that's determined by me, but to take charge of their own life - a fruitful and meaningful life - as they want it. Hope always comes with worries, but one must not lose hope, and the faith that somehow things will work out for them (as Steve Jobs had so famously said it in the Stanford commencement speech of his own life).

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Economy wise, finally - yes, FINALLY - the US economy is showing some sign of life. It feels good to see that the economy is getting better (even though there are still millions of people out there who are still unemployed and underemployed, and wage level still barely budges). But with the outlook of interest rate sets to rise, and the property prices (in our areas anyways) have gone back up past the 2008 pre-crisis level, it's time for me to wrap up my purchases of properties.

Given how bad the economy in US and around the world had gone down the tube in the past six years or so, perhaps the silver lining for me is, the window of opportunity has opened up for me to buy the number of properties that I'm quite certain I would never have been able to get them all otherwise, should the property prices have stayed at the inflated level (before the '08 crisis). It is a blessing too that the economy in the area and rentals have not dipped much at all, thereby allowing me the amount of yield that I could only dream of. With the sizable chunks of investments for the past few years, I have no doubts that I'd need to take at least the next few years to digest them all which I'm ok with it.

Perhaps my one disappointment is the startup that hasn't taken off as we have wished. Then again, we realize it's never gonna be easy. At least if we are to fail, I'd rather it fails fast, and I'll just move on (which is what I'd do). I can only hope to realize the couple more ideas that I still have inside my head, and turn them into something more meaningful in the next few years. Not that I expect them to be billion-dollar success, I do like the idea of having created and nurtured something to fruition as a standing business. With that, I would be well-satisfied.

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There have been so many world events this past year that I can scarcely begin to recount them all in a small blog, one of which is the geopolitical issue with the muslim fundamentalism and extremist movement that's the most worrisome. Afterall, the almost randomness in their violence, the brutality in their most uncivilized acts (like beheading), the propaganda of which seems to increasingly attract those muslim individuals who feel marginalized by society, and the spread of the muslim community to different countries that would make it increasingly hard to control such spread.

Yes, I know this sounds like racial profiling and biased towards the muslim community who might be painted under one broad stroke. But it's often hard to tell these days if it's marginalization (or the lack of opportunities particularly to their youths) of the muslim migrants that is the cause, or effect, of the rise of muslim extremist groups like ISIS. That said, ISIS is but one of the latest offshots that catches the world's attention with all their beheading and propaganda. There were numerous others garden variety groups, like Boko Haram, that have all since surpassed the news value of Taliban or even al-Qaeda.

As a bystander (or perhaps no one can truly be a bystander these days anymore), one has to ask why the moderate muslim communities (which I have no doubt that there are lots of muslims who are peaceful and non-violent) would continue to allow these extremist groups to hijack the name of their religion or even commit extreme violent acts "on their behalf"? Why doesn't any muslim groups come out, and stand up to publicly denounce what has been done "in their name"? Are they afraid of retribution? Do they secretly condone these acts against westerners or infidels simply because they all feel wronged by the policy from the west historically? Have they harbored some desire to show the west some of their true colors (of what they're capable of) while at the same time demand help and assistance from the western countries because most of the western countries still feel guilty about it? Perhaps it's a combination of all these, but as a bystander, it makes me angry, very angry of how these muslim groups allow civilized society to degenerate under fear.

Given all these, it comes as no surprise of the backlash against muslim immigrants in so many western countries, including those in Europe and Australia. If the moderate and secular muslims do not get cowered, and stand up to speak with a civilized voice against violence, they can't possibly blame others for seeing their communities as complicit in violence acts like beheading.

There is little hope of changes any time soon, but as the year of 2014 wraps up, I can only look ahead with more hopeful eyes that 2015 will see improvements. I don't want the society to regress, a society that my kids and the younger generation will inherit from us.

On female fertility and egg freezing...

I was reading the article, with much interests, on egg freezing and how it buys time for women whose biological clock is ticking in their childbearing ability.

I got married in early 30s and have my first child in mid 30s. There was already high anxiety about the possibility of Down Syndrome, given the demarcation of pregnancy at the 35-year-old mark. I was 34 at the time. Unlike my sisters who went through pregnancy at similar timeframe in their lives, not by design, but by pure coincidence of how things turned out, and none of whom wanted to get the fetus tested for possible Down Syndrome. As Christians, they've already decided to keep the baby, no matter what. But I don't want to rely on just faith; I don't want a cruel world for my child if s/he turned out to be Down. I knew I would have terminated the pregnancy if it's turned out positive. It's a matter of pragmatism. By Providence, everything was fine.

It's not a woman's fault that she never meets the right man, marries at the prime age of 20s, has babies right after, and then starts the career path when the children come of age. No, that would be a logical path for men, but not the women. For women, everything has to happen all at once. Right after college, you'd better find a great job and move up the rank as soon as possible (so that you can call the shots); you'd better find the great guy who's great husband/father and who's supportive to your career and household chores and baby-rearing; you'd better save enough to have a home in a great school district so that you won't have to worry about moving again when the kids start schooling. Better yet, you'd better be sure you do all these before mid 30s because 40s is just round the corner and your energy level will go downhill soon (never mind what people say about 30 being the new-20, and 40 being the new-30, it's just all in appearance, when your body will tell you otherwise).

For a lot of women, things don't always happen according to plan. For some, nothing happens according to the usual script. They have to make hard choices. Do I defer looking desperately for the right guy? If I find the right guy who happens to want to be a father too, do I focus on baby-making or career-building? Can my finances support my decision? These are all hard choices.

That's why it's so maddening when I read about discussions about Can Women Have It All? I mean, hello, if all stars line up perfectly, of course you can have it all. But let's face it, how many women are really that lucky? Chelsea Clinton maybe (with no money worries, with job offers always waiting for just because of her famous last name). I don't mean to disparage or demean Clinton for her own accomplishments, which I'm sure are many, but women in her position are simply shielded from hard choices. Now, at 34, she's free to take her time off to have her baby, and then go back to work for her parents' foundation in a few years' time, all without missing a beat. That's the rare exception; not the norm.

That's why I get mad too, for women in power like Sherly Sandberg to patronize women that, if you're not getting all that you want, it's because you don't lean in enough. Giving talks and writing books about how great she's done, and "you can be like me too, if you have just spoken up some more!" Yeah right.

And I get mad too, about women who are supposed to know and understand the need for work/life balance, women in power like Marissa Mayer who are in the best position to do something about it to change the public discourse about how hard it is for women (and men) to jungle between work and life. Instead, what does she do? She bans telecommuting in Yahoo which is one of the best tools to allow employees to achieve work/life balance. Of all people, one would think a woman should know and understand this, right? Wrong. She's just tone-deaf and senseless as the next guy in suit. She would taunt the fact that she's working right from the maternity ward, she's back to her work desk right after childbirth. But of course she would conveniently omit the fact that she can have x number of au-pairs and maids to have with everything. She doesn't need to rush the newborn to daycare or go buy grocery because, oh don't worry - someone's taking care of that at home. How nice.

So, ok, let's forget about all these patronizing women (and men) on top, and focus on ourselves (which is what these women, and men, ask us to do, right?).

If a woman has not had stars lined up, and tough choices are demanded of her, what is she to do? Conception helps removing the high anxiety of unwanted pregnancy at inopportune times. Catholic church would frown on you, and conservative right would condemn you to eternal hell, but frankly, it's a godsend. Apart from dropping a few balls that she's been trying to jungle all along, one of the best tools is to buy time. With the hope for an eventual family, and lovely babies, the best (and perhaps, the only) course of action, is to freeze it's eggs. Not that this strategy is without risks, but at least it would hopefully allow a woman to achieve what she wishes for, with the critical baby decision deferred. With biological clock ticking, one has to act fast.

For those who freeze their eggs, I would say hurrah, three times over, to them. All the power to you, sisters. If my kids have not come in time, I would have done the same.

One of my sisters is a case in point. She spent her time focused on career building in her 20s and 30s. By the time she's ready, she's suddenly 40s, it seems like all the decent men are gone by then. She eventually got married in her early 40s and she wants a baby rightaway. The doctor told her that the chance of getting pregnant was remote. She would have sworn that her prayers were answered, for she found a decent buy, got married, and she miraculously got pregnant when she's 47 (right at the point when she's all ready to go for IVF). Thank goodness the kid is healthy and free from Down Syndrome, she readily admits that she sometimes feels like she doesn't have the energy to keep up with the baby all the time these days. Along the way, she gave up her career as a high-flying executive, and is now a stay-home mom. Tough choices they are: You win some (a baby, a family), you lose some (a career, a treasured and hard-won identity). Balls dropped surely as day-and-night. At least my sister has been lucky enough to be blessed with a baby she's always wanted, at such advance age that her doctor told her it's nothing short of miracle. (That's one main reason she insisted that her powerful prayer to God has everything with this.) Other women might not be as lucky.

I was lucky enough to have been able to keep building my career, with kids at home, and all. Two things have counted to our benefits. I've been able to telecommute at the most critical juncture in life when I need to stay home and watch over the kids, while doing my work; and my husband pretty much gave up his career to stay home and help. Thankfully both of us are now back on the career track, our cases are hardly the norm.

If you ask me, would I have taken the path that my sister took, by giving up my career to stay home, have kids, do chores, and be content? I would have told you a "no, I can't that" rightaway. Would I have been able to achieve it all (kids, family, career), without the stars all lined up for me? I would say "no, I don't think I could have done that, all by myself" in order to have it all.

However readily that anyone would tell women that yes, you can have it all, I would say, those people don't know what it takes to get there, not with lots of money and support.

And for those women in power who are not ready to help in a realistic and meaningful way, I would tell them readily, to just shut the f**k up, you're not helping at all. Changing their company policy to be more family-friendly, would be a good start. Writing a book or giving speeches and lectures to tell others to copy what they do, is not. Lobbying Washington to change public discourse on family-friendly policy would certainly help. Telling other women that if they don't achieve all they want it's no one's fault but their own, is not.