Tag: Newsweek

Never let go

14 Vietnamese women were found and freed from Baby101, a Taiwanese outfit operated outside of the law in Thailand.

They were paid to be surrogate mothers (artificial insemination or otherwise), whose future babies would be put up for adoption.

Baby, never let me go.

Newsweek has a piece about anonymousUS.org, an organization which seeks to organize “kids who are not all right” and demand access to their records.

In “Never Let Me Go” Ishiguro explores the “human side” of clones (children who are brought up to stay healthy and to eventually become organ donors).

“We ‘let you study arts’ just to see if you had any soul at all”, says the head mistress . It’s “the Island” 2.0.

I realize the technology (for cloning and artificial insemination) is there.

And that once we let the tiger out of the cage, there is no turning back.

Still, I feel sad for the characters in “Never Let Me Go“.

They seek a normal life i.e. romance – in this case triangular one, in vain.

It’s been more than a decade that the top 1% of the world’s richest keeps getting richer, while the bottom billion live on longer (thanks to vaccination and bio-tech discoveries ). This divide will only rush in the next rung of colonization (Upper vs lower rungs): medi-tourism- offshored drug testing- outsourced pregnancy and why not – organ harvesting.  Money can buy anything from nuclear waste to nuclear families.

Sign here. Down payment now, and the rest paid upon delivery (organ donor to baby delivery). First, start with donating the blood. Then, just don’t stop there.

Half a kidney is quite acceptable.

How about your whole kidney.

How about your whole life, since inception.

Test tube babies. Youtube adults. (How about $400 to keep the peace).

Life is difficult, completely. Just never let me go. Hold me like I am (the Only girl – by Rihanna).  Ishiguro portrays a world of tomorrow, where there are only  forced choices – yet like the retired butler in

“the Remains of the Day“, we are reluctant to leave the estate of comfort behind. Gone are the days of laughter under the lantern. Modernity doesn’t ask for permission. It just shows up like a force of tyranny – way past curfew, and not for a cup of tea. It asks us, to set aside Rousseau “social contract” for  a  “biological contract” – surrogate mothering – in the name of progress. What can be done will soon become that which must be done.

 

Unfortunate guy and the happiest place

I still remember Sang. He helped me set up sound equipment on the weekend (my attempt to crowd-source and create an open-air coffee-house for refugees), and attended my class on weekdays.

Sang was in that transition camp in Hong Kong, on his way to Norway, his new home.

I was feeling sorry for him, an unaccompanied minor, who only knew the seas and spoke no other language besides Vietnamese.

Now he is in the happiest country on Earth perhaps with a fully paid house and a steady job.

http://images.businessweek.com/ss/06/10/happiest_countries/index_01.htm?chan=rss_topSlideShows_ssi_5

You will never know.

I thought of Nordic countries as being very cold, isolated and their languages incomprehensible. While in Hong Kong, I was taken to New Territories, on my day off , for a peek at then inaccessible China. That same view, today, looks out to Shenzhen. Back then, it was the equivalence of standing at the Korean DMZ.

Back to Sang.

He got to Norway safely, I learned from a few letters, one of which had a picture of him with sun glasses and cigarette.

Cool!

I was impressed with Norway then, because they took on Sang and others in their most unfortunate of circumstances.

Norway had nothing to do with the wave of Boat People, risking pirates and prolonged processing at camps.

Yet they pitched in because their ships picked up refugees at sea.

And now, it’s voted the happiest country on Earth.

A lot has changed since. Back then, I read the Boat People story on Newsweek. It struck me.

The ordeal and the odd (1 in 2 survived. Survivors might resort to cannibalism at worst,

or got raped along the way, at best).

Now, Newsweek itself got sold off for a token $1.00

And “Ladies and Gentlemen on both sides of the aisle” actually sat together, from senior level on down (Kerry and McCain).

Sang looked up to me, naturally. Now, it’s my turn to envy him.

I wish I were the happiest guy in an unfortunate place instead.

So he projected himself on me, and I, with a delayed reciprocate response years later.

Back then, CNN was a novelty. Today, the President takes his Q&A on YouTube.

My hope is for the last of those “boat people” to find their happiest place this New Year (another wave has ended up in Australia).

Many have posted sweet memoirs about Tet and places they once loved.

It’s a culture which holds high regards for the collective memory (sticky-rice cake, moon cake etc…).

Allegorically, those symbols resonate even and especially for those who now live comfortably in Nordic states.

It will be so strange, if one day, I ran into Sang here in the States, or Vietnam.

And we will exchange notes, how much (the price) we have paid for progress.

We know there is not much room at the top (the Mayan pyramid steps got smaller as you climb higher).

And the way down has always been much scarier, because it’s counter-intuitive for us to ever look down.

Who wants to go back to school like that laid-off textile lady at the age of 55. We were toilet-trained and mentally trained for a one-way race. No one seems to be able to recall more than three top winners in each sector. Hence, it’s more than necessary to attain and sustain the top place.

Just make sure, you have ownership of the climb. For Sang, then, it was a very sad journey he took to transit camp and onto NORWAY.  As it turns out, he was an unfortunate guy in the happiest place on Earth years later.

 

The vase and the Beast

One is auctioned for 85 million (with tax and fee), while the other merged with Newsweek after it was sold for $1.00

After a lifetime of standardization and automation, something is still of value.

Nobody had appreciated Van Goh’s self-portrait or any of his pieces until after he was long gone.

Still, we want maximization, optimization and standardization, pre-reqs for an economy of scale.

What happened to innovation amidst of instead in the absence of chaos?

Google tried 20% time-off for employee’s personal and passionate projects.  May the best idea win.

Then, it resorted to salary increase. Money talks.

How do you quantify an idea, especially a break-through and disruptive one?

Sometimes a whole industry clusters around a breakthrough product e.g. Apple apps.

Why do we listen to music? Because it tapped in different parts of our neuron.

It resonates and brings us back to the time we first “connected” with that tune

(First time, I ever saw your face….).

Time and Life is tapping into this reservoir to urge you “to make that call” since operators are standing by in India to take your orders (Singers and Songwriters).

Something, in this case the vase, which had been tucked in the attic, now sees the light of day (and commands the highest auction price from a caller in China). You can imitate art and artifact, but that one piece testifies to uniqueness, rarity and antiquity.

No standardization, no automation, no reproduction. The only one. The Beauty.

Newsweek has a section called My Turn. That had been before blogging arrived.

Now, the Post, the Beast and Newsweek will join forces. Their turns to synergize and optimize (still can’t beat Huffington Post who also has to join forces with AOL – to leverage existing sales force).

Just don’t resort to standardize in this age of Page-ranking.

We honed in the efficiency model, and ended up missing the forest for the tree.

Luckily, we discovered something of a treasure in the attic, and rediscovered the meaning of value vs price.

I am sure for cheaper vase, the buyer from China could have walked down any street or gone straight to a local factory

where high production, low labor-costs and large profit return are norm. But then, it’s a Made-in-China vase.

I still read Newsweek, if it’s still published. And I wish its new Editor in Chief, Ms Tina Brown better luck this time around.

At least, there is only one Tina Brown, the Beauty who rules the Beast.

Dentist and Disney

Christopher Shaw, winner of the most recent Power Ball lottery, said he would go to the dentist and then Disney World. (this is a retweet, a year later. Not much has changed, except for Chris’ dentistry).

I guess that’s how winning feels: being on top of the world, full of positive forces that lift you up, brushed by a stroke of luck.

He will have plenty of time and money to look his best. Good luck with beginner’s luck, and with investing.

The rest of us can look forward to another work week, another mortgage or rent payment, and another long summer.

The decoupling of stock market (on the uptick since April 09) and unemployment figures (still quite upsetting).

We have stretched productivity and inventory to the max. It’s time to venture out of the cocoon, to bounce back from

the “creative destruction” period.

Texas has been spared. Michigan has not.

Newsweek‘s Daniel Gross argues that America is making a comeback, unlike Japan in the 80’s.

In other words, there won’t be a Lost Decade after this Recession (which if cyclically predictable, will swing back up for a roughly half a decade of prosperity).

Let’s hope he is right. After all, we already lived through a lost decade (2000-2010) since the Y2K scare.

Cannot afford another one. Numbers don’t add up on Wall Street or Main Street if we keep spending away the future.

Harley Davidson is cool. Facebook is cool.  Zappos is cool.

These are examples of companies which can still survive with solid deliverables.

And to put the icing on the cake (or cream on the latte), Starbucks reported strong Q1 earning.

Hello, welcome to Starbucks. What’s your name? (reminds me of Cheers, where everybody knows your name).

And from there, the behind-the-counter man/woman in black starts “pouring his/her heart into it” (Starbuck’s motto).

I am supposed to use this as a canvass for reflection. After all, I have lived here for 35 years.

I have seen things come and go (Pinto? Yugo? Datsun?) and things which stay and stick (Post-it, Ben and Jerry, J&J).

One thing I know, I wasn’t happy when first arrived due to the extraordinary circumstance of my evacuation from Saigon.

No expectation, no deliverable. In VC’s term, I wasn’t ready with my business plan. Just float, like on a boat.

Each day is a bonus. Even on those days when I witnessed (on TV) the blow up of the Challenger, the Twin towers, and  Three-Mile-Island nuclear reactors (in person).

And I also found myself out of work, at the exact downturn  87, 93 and 2009.  Tell me how can one stay a bystander, unaffected.

My journey is America’s.  It just happens to be personal, but with tragedy and triumph nevertheless. Like Shaw, it involves both dentist and

Disney, pain and pleasure.  OK, I feel lucky just to: 1) stay alive 2) be here in the US 3) live through the past Recession. I am going to buy a lottery ticket

this week. Need some wind on my back. Maybe I too, can win. And maybe I too, will go to Dentist and Disney (World). Got to show up to win.

Staying alive, as the Bee Gee would sing at the top of their lungs.

Winning is contagious!

If you need to be motivated as I do, watch the Winter Olympics.

You will share peak emotions, peak performance and peak mountain spots of Vancouver.

Everybody loves a winner, and the winner loves to savor and share that moment .

We empathize with their struggle, their trial and triumph. In a word, we self-project.

Their hopes, fears and dreams become ours.

Think of that Newsweek cover photo of the US women soccer player who took off her shirt on the green (Olympic 96?). Spontaneous and sweet victory.

Or at SB44, when the Saints number 22 intercepted that football (he pointed the finger at the end zone, where he was sure he would be in seconds).

No point of stopping someone on a winning trajectory.

Down in Brazil and New Orleans, the parades rage on.

Good to be alive. But it’s better to win.

Unless you were into anti-hero theme, winning has been popular in literature, film and throughout history.

Sadly, to win, you need to learn from the mistakes of others. That’s where training films and failed-business case studies come into play.

Remember that uncle in your secret family history? It’s better to whisper and leave the past in the dungeon. We all involve in mental editing, of data scrubbing to reinvent ourselves, just like the bean counters of Worldcom and Enron, to show positive P/E. There is nothing wrong with self-reinvention. But we need solid “wins” to show.

At the Olympics, sometimes, winning comes after years of training and practice. Even loss of life. But so contagious is winning . “I’ll have some of that” (Rob Reiner‘s mom said that famous line in “when Harry met Sally“.)