Welcome to my blog

Recently, I have been testing an upgrade of a Content Management System and like the new functions and ease of management the site content, so I thought I might as well upgrade my long over-due personal site! And also update the so outdated content!

Who am I?
Business Advisor, Independent business consultant, Corporate trainer, Angel investor,
Entrepreneur, University lecturer, World traveller

This year since I am not flying as much as previous years, I would like to do more meaningful things outside work, thus I have decided to join Metropolitan Lions Club whose objective is to promote education in Hong Kong. I have already got to know some of the members through a very good friend of mine and found that our concept and attitudes are very much in-lined.

We love travelling and we are always on the move, in the old days when laptop computer was hardly "portable", carrying it to a travel destination was a big hassle indeed, it was heavy, bulky and a liability as it was an expensive and delicate item. You didn't want to leave it in the hotel room, it was too big to be put in the safe in the room, and it was too heavy that you didn't want to carry it out when you were site seeing and ruin your leisure time.

As the size and weight of the laptop continue to shrink and at the same time, we are now taking pictures exclusively using digital camera, we appreciate the fact that we can backup and process our holiday photos the same night that they are taken, still fresh on our mind. But the problem of the size and weight of the computer remains. Small version of laptop computers are available but the price is prohibitive, that is until this year.

Budget computers are now so affordable, same price or cheaper than a good mobile phone, budget computers are highly functional and completely adequate for everyday use especially when travelling. They are light, small but still with a decent screen, long battery life as much as 6-7 hours on a standard battery, fit nicely in small back pack, and the tray in front of a airline passenger seat and any size of in-room safe provided by hotels. The connectivity to the internet is seamless.

Technology is not the only thing that has evolved, as a result of the technology advancement, our way of work has evolved too. We find ourselves increasingly communicating and exchanging information with people who are in remote locations, and we may never ever actually get to meet each other. We can take advantage of the internet to access and exchange information, arrange schedule, manage friends and business associates' presence and contacts. Take advantage of Voice over IP and society community technologies. Furthermore, with Web 2.0, we are now able to store files and use applications online and synchronized to computer for offline use, it is called cloud computing. Of course you all know that already.

These days, when travelling, Irene and I each bring a light weight budget laptop of convenient size that comes with international power adapter, and each laptop has 3 USB sockets for other peripherals (like USB standard size battery charger, memory card reader, USB drive) and can be used for recharging the batteries of our mobile phones even when the computer is not switched on. Each of us has a stereo bluetooth headsets with microphone that can be connected to the mobile phone and the computer at the same time, it is completely cable-less, we use it for voice communications or listening to music, language courses, or audio journals like The Economist. That's not all, we have recently gone a step further, we even bring a small size Wi-Fi encryption enabled router (HKD 150) with us whenever we travel and staying in hotels where usually only one fixed LAN internet connection is provided, we use this router to enable secure Wi-Fi access so we can share the internet connection using the two laptop computers and the 2 Wi-Fi enabled mobile phones.

As a result, our work and travel life have changed forever, for the better I hope! If these sound too futuristic to you, well, welcome to the future today. Actually, from time to time, I also wonder how quickly things have evolved and how fortunate that we are able to adapt and how things will continue to advance!

I was at McDonald the other day and saw a couple speaking to their very young daughter in English while the couple spoke perfect Cantonese to each other suggesting that like me, they are local Hong Kongers. Are they normal residence overseas and returning to Hong Kong for a vacation? I don't think so, because they are definitely not alone.

Being born and grew up in Hong Kong myself, I can "understand" why there are so many Cantonese speaking concerned parents in Hong Kong who would rather have their kids speaking English as first language. While some may say these are very international minded parents because English is for sure the most important language on the international scene both for business and general communication. However, there are also many of us who are capable of speaking multi-language at ease, so why would they need to train their kids to speak an unnatural mother-tongue?

The more I think about it, the more I feel this is very very sad. I cannot imagine anyone growing up in a Western family in his own home country would end up not speaking the mother tongue of his parents'.

So why is this happening in Hong Kong? I think the reason can be traced back to Hong Kong's colonial history.

I remember vividly, during the time when Hong Kong was still a colony of Britain, a high command of English language could certainly land you in high position, especially before 1990s. So in those days, every parents would dream of having their kids to speak good English. While this is still true, it is no longer a key differentiation because there are now so many people who can speak it fluently whether a results of better education in Hong Kong or the huge number of returnees from overseas.

Sadly this idea has extended well beyond the colonial days...

More thought:
I just met a friend who's ethically Chinese, she was born in Hong Kong with Hong Kong parents and she grew up in Sweden. Her school in Sweden encourages immigrants to learn their own language and even though she was the only Chinese in her school, they went through the trouble of finding a Chinese teacher for her. Interesting...

Say NO to junk surface mail

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
We are sick and tired of the junk mails stuffed in our mail box. We want it to stop! Here are some actionable items from the easiest to the more involved ways:

1) Circle the return address on the promotion junk material, put it in the post box and send it back to the advertiser.

2) Do (1) but add your address on the space of the promotion material and write "not accepting unsolicited mail"

3) This is a long shot and is quite involved, generate bad publicity by documenting who and when the advertiser sent you some unsolicited materials that are not friendly to the environment and causing you nuisance.

I would encourage everyone to do at least (1).

Results expected:
- The post office is handling many returned mail, a nuisance to them and costly
- The advertisers receive a lot of returned mail if the post office is doing their job and it may cost them, because they are the recipients? of returned mail without a stamp

FULL MESSAGE
Aren't we all sick and tired of the countless junk mails stuffed into our mail box? It is bad enough that my service providers such as banks, telephone, utilities, credit card companies are all sending me promotion that I don't need, it is even worse that any company that engages the efficient and reliable service of our government post office can deliver (with an affordable fee, I am sure) any promotion junk without a recipient name nor the address to our mail boxes everyday! As a result, millions of tones of rubbish in the form of papers, plastic wraps are produced everyday while the recipients? don't even read the content. Often the mail just goes from the mail box to the nearest rubbish bin in the lobby of the building.

As a person who is mindful of the impact on such activities on our environment and is annoyed about the time wasted in dealing with this nuisance, I have been thinking how we stop this. Often the offenders will print a small note on the cover claiming that you can write or fax (suspiciously they don't usually provide you with an email address) them a note detailing your particulars (name and address), saying you don't want to receive such material from them. Come to think of it, would you bother to go through the trouble? and does it work? We cannot seriously expect the post office to keep track of your name and address on some bulk delivery service that they provide without the name of recipient and address.

The stakeholders are the advertisers, the deliverer and you & I as recipients, what can we do to exert pressure on the advertisers or the deliverer. Here are some actionable items from the easiest to the more involved ways:

1) Simply circle the return address on promotion material (they provide the address because they are being clever to comply with the law to provide an address intended for you to "write" to them to get you off the list), and put it in a nearest post box. You are exercising your right to return the mail to the sender for material that is mistakenly place in your mail box, after all there is no name of recipient, address and you certainly didn't ask them to send you things.

2) Do (1) but add your address on the space of the promotion material and write "not accepting unsolicited mail", this is what they ask for, right? Details of ourselves and stating that we don't want to receive their mail. Postal service has to treat each of us seriously, because each of these returned mail has unique information about "important consumers" who are communicating with a potential service provider

3) Okay this is a long shot and is quite involved, so I won't drill into the details. Basically, make some publicity by documenting who and when the advertiser sent you some unsolicited materials that in your opinion is not environmental friendly and causing nuisance to you. If we gather momentum, this is bad publicity for the advertisers etc. Okay this is a long shot and too involved.

I would encourage everyone to do at least (1).

The results I am trying to achieve is as follow:
- The post office will soon realize they are handling many returned mail, a nuisance to them and costly (if they can't pass this cost to the advertisers)
- The advertisers will receive a lot of returned mail if the post office is doing their job and it may cost them, because they are the recipients? of returned mail without a stamp

Hopefully, one or both of them will have to conclude that something is seriously wrong.

Don't get me wrong, I understand there are people in the printing industry, advertising industry, delivery industry and perhaps the advertisers who are making money on this, I am just saying that please please please be more creative and make money in a way that it doesn't cause nuisance to us, hurt the environment and our further generations. Go find some ways to be more targeted on locating your customers!