Walking 33 km to and fro to work daily

Oh boy! Just have to record this one to remember and for the children to read too.

I prefer the version by the Detroit Free Press.

Total respect for this fellow. Amazing work ethic but I also emailed the kids that this privilege is not usually opened to management. My latest reminder was watching Constantine as the first Christian emperor struggling to be a Christian. Then I flashed back to failures of Israel's King David because he was king etc.,  Jack Ma said his immense wealth is a burden but I think he was thinking of something else. Come on, he more Chinese than cosmopolitan. Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan are probably closer to the mark.

If you are in authority and you don't put such folks at the top of your priority list it is really hard to imagine how you would at the end of your life said you have done well. Recall Clayton Christensen's TED talk. I asked the kids to watch that every once in a while. Get anchored.

Now for getting real. There are lots of managers and somehow they have a knack for failing to get to the top who will do this for their reports. Those who arrived at the apex often find that they have no desire and if they do, they often can't because frequently business is war. Publicity for this guy, James Robertson has brought out the inner and oft repressed desire to serve such kinds in their society. We have many of such kind hearted people among us too. Now when the government doesn't even try to share some of these values, our leaders lose respect. They have purportedly changed but we cannot tell if it was from the heart (does that matter in politics?) or because of votes. That's result of having people remind you to be kinder first. You have got to be doing so before we start telling you. On the other hand they were already there with red carpets under their arms to roll out to the private jets. And if you are a billionaire you get to meet the PM too. More like you get invited before you even express interest to visit.

And he said he was doing it for Singapore. I must be stupid and if I am not wrong he and his ministers are getting more and more alarmed that there are so many stupid ones here. Do not fret PM, there are clear as day even more dirty ones.

Long ago I learned how to convert miles to kilometers. That is the baseline for stupid.


Update: 12:30pm

I forwarded the story to my American friend now retired. Old school values where poverty is the norm and I could use her to play the role of our government here. That's great. I told you I was stupid in the PAP sense.

Excerpted this is what came in the mail before it gets too late over there.

..... yes, of course I like walking stories, since that is my chief way of getting around, or used to be, ...... I am back to walking again, 2-3 miles a day, not the 7-10 a day previously.
But.. I find some discrepancies in the article.
a) he & his girlfriend live in a house she inherited so.. no rent or house payments, only taxes and insurance
b) says he makes $10 an hour and his car had fritzed out back in 2005, so that's 10 yrs of no car and he maintains
he cannot save enough to buy a replacement ?
c) not a WORD about this girlfriend's life, is sh employed? does SHE have a car? If so, why doesn't he? and if not employed
surely he could use her car or she could drive him..simply not adding up..at all
d) the fact they think he needs supervision in handling the windfall tells me they KNOW he has a history of wasting money so he'd let the thousands of $$ slip thru his fingers..maybe he gambles? 

..... when I've been employed I mostly walked to & from work, 8 miles round trip in Victoria, 6 miles round trip here, always on time, too. I never thought of this as a ' big deal '.  but..to most Americans .. walking ANYWHERE is a 'big deal'. I live 1/2 mile from a small shopping 'strip' mall and I cannot think of another person in my neighborhood who walks there and back. I am the only one.  

Now one of the key idea of wanting to be and getting rich is to be able to be gracious and generous. To be not afraid to be cheated of sums you can easily recover from, to test the sincerity of those you helped and the degree of their need.  To his credit Tan Chuan Jin and some of his colleagues since the last GE now regularly risked such monies and help. It is money worth spending especially when the effort and time needed to establish the degree of genuine need is in fact many times more costly.