The scheme

A year ago, I remember having dinner with my friend at Canteen 1. I recall him mentioning about a terrific investment which he was giving serious consideration. One of our mutual friends had made an investment in the company and he was making good returns on his investment and was advising his family members to seize the opportunity. My friend recommended me the investment and I was very skeptical at that point of time for a number of reasons.

It was too good to be true and I sensed something was amiss about the scheme. The company was Sunshine Empire. When I saw the company in the paper last week, I thought it was the bread company. After a friend told me about the company's name today, it begun to dawn upon me that it was the same company which my friend recommended me a year back.

My 2 friends had invested a bit of money into the scheme and it will be sometime before they might get their money back. I will have flipped if I was in their shoes losing my hard earned money. This is a very important lesson for future investors who should think twice about such easy get rich schemes.

Investment

I have officially begun my education at NTU where I am doing something useful with my time for the first time in 4 years. I felt almost lost wandering aimlessly for the past 4 years until I stumbled upon investment. I am currently reading an investment book written by Peter Lynch and have finished 1 book earlier and gained a considerable amount of knowledge in the space of a month and I still have long long way to go.

I have benefitted tremendously from having a few friends who are more knowledgable than myself in finance and business whom I can clarify with if I have any doubts. Friends do play an important role. I am not sure if this is my true passion as my new found passion has yet to be tested. Only time will be my judge and I will find out. Until then, it is investment time.

To the person who loaned me Rich Pop Poor Pop: Thank you so much.

The Pursuit of Happyness

I frankly have lost count the number of times I have watched The Pursuit of Happyness. It is a heartwarming story which I still could not bring myself to believe that it is based on a true story because no man should ever live through such problems. Will Smith, his son and Thandie Newtown did an amazing job in the movie.

I will not know how I will have fared if I was in Chris Gardner's shoes. Any ordinary man will have crumbled and gave up with doing numerous sales calls to sell unneccessary bone density scanners to hospitals. On top of that, he had to cope with the demands of internship where the chances of being selected were very slim, fatherhood where he had to take care of the baby after finishing work and homelessness after being thrown out of his rented apartment for not paying his rent.

I went to check out the real Chris Gardner interview online and was surprised to hear that his son at that point of time was only 2 years old. He told in the interview that the son was portrayed as a 5 year old for the sake of dialogue. During the entire interview, one thing which he said stood out: Baby steps do count. As long as you are moving forward, these baby steps add up and will bring you to the desired destination.

Sense of Purpose

The movie is a clear reflection of people who truly want something will get what they want if they put their heart and soul and work hard. I'm still lost and trying to find my direction and sense of purpose. The hardest part is finding your passion and I will not stop until I have attained it. I have begun to immerse myself into a world of finance which could be my passion but I should not be sure until I'm very sure.

Newspapers

I have been reading the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and The Times for the past 2 weeks and have been impressed with the high level of journalism. The papers do not subscribe to their government and I’m glad for that as the papers will lose their credibility if they did so. I’m particularly impressed with NY Times columnists who offer an insightful opinion on the issues that they write. They have Paul Krugman, the Nobel prize winner, Thomas Friedman, the author of The World is Flat and even the Libyan leader, Gaddafi as their guest columnist.

I was very intrigued by the article written by Gaddafi which touches on the Israel Palestinian issue. He will employ a systematic approach in his article highlighting the problems faced by both sides and will propose a solution which makes perfect sense. This solution will not be accepted by both sides as it seems ridiculous but in my opinion, it is the most logical answer to the Palestinian issue. I shall not reveal the answer on the blog as I will rather want the reader to view the article at NY Times. You will not be disappointed for sure.

Investing

I had the good fortune of being recommended Rich Dad Poor Dad by a friend and I took to the book immediately. The book was written in an informative and simple manner. It discusses the reasons why the Rich gets Richer and the poor gets poorer. Although the book did not give outright tips on how to invest, it did awaken the sleeping ‘investment’ giant within me as I realized that I have simply wasted too much time doing useless things.

Investing takes obscene amounts of patience, intelligence and guts. These qualities are repeated throughout most investment books and it’s not easy to possess all 3 qualities considering the environment that the people are brought up.

It made me realize that I do have a passion for Business and Finance which I silently kept it under wraps as I was lazy to bring it out of the open. I aim to read a few investment books and get a basic understanding of the market in a few months before I begin my investment education proper.

Reflection

The start of 2009 has been pretty good as I’m getting into the flow of good habits which I told myself I should cultivate and continue. I have met with average success on the goals that I set out to achieve as I lost the drive and discipline to continue certain habits like waking up at 7a.m which I did for 1 week before I became lazy(the magic word).I will have to continue working towards to improve on my old and new goals and not slacken on them.

Job Search

It is very depressing not to know the direction that you will be taking after 4 years of university. I thought I will have a better idea when I came into university and told myself that I will eventually find my passion and the job that I will love to work in. I did not spend enough time finding my passion and instead whiled my time.

I have started to give my career a serious thought this semester and told myself not to even think of teaching as it robs my prime years of life. Moreover, I will not enjoy the work after I leave NIE. Although the money is certainly tempting, I shall not give in as learning on the first job is very important and do not want to make the same mistake as I did with CEE. I shall continue the search.