Contrast of the World – Haiti Earthquake and Golden Globe Awards

Our world is globalized; from the magical box called tv, i was looking at the news which broadcast on Haiti earthquake with piles and piles of bodies being buried while minutes later, a hollywood enthusiasts and fashion commentator discussing on Golden Globe Awards fashion. As a  third-party view, I feel weird; on one end, humans are struggling for justice, praying for the slightest hope that government could send in aid to save their loved ones who might still be breathing under the bricks or caught a curable disease, but just waiting for the right treatment or medication or maybe just having the access to clean water. On the other end, humans dressed in silk, spent $$$$ on hair, face, accessories, stage, dinner and only make a donation of $100, 000?

I believe all those who attended Golden Globe Awards would have spent more than this amount! Even if Haiti no longer need more money, the money could have spent wisely elsewhere too. I wonder how many people at the dinner realized that in another corner of the world, a city named Jos just had a religious conflict again that killed at least 15o human lives. In my view, religious conflict has always been a secondary reason, the primary reason lies with money related issues like property and natural resources. The same go for the incident in Jos, if some money spent at Golden Globe Awards could be spent at Jos to reduce poverty, would have the innocent 150 lives be taken? This brings back the ubuntu logic.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8468456.stm

Have a look at the video. I do not believe that those Nigerians are barbaric, they are simply desperate; desperate to have a job, desperate to feed a family, thats all.

Fish-lovers

I love to eat fish. Grilled, crumbed, steam, i love it all. I used to think that i can have fish everyday. Now, thats an ignorant thought. There are so many fishes facing the fate of extinction because of fish lovers like me. Why? the process goes like this;

1. fish really taste that yummy that me and many others want to have it almost any other day
2. demand of fish increase
3. in a capitalist society where money matters, everybody flocked into fishing business to have a slice of the profit
4. your neighbour or uncle’s friend could be a wholesaler in your country
5. these wholesalers need to find the cheapest and best quality source of fish
6. fertile fishing ground that used to be the ground of the locals are now invaded by foreigners or foreign hired fishermen
7. fishes reproduction cannot catch up the fishing rate
8. fishermen get desperate and slit the bellies of the female fishes to get the foetuses out which could very well be next year’s catch
9. competition between local and foreign fishermen increase
10. the rich and powerful foreign countries would then buy ‘RIGHTS’ to fish on those ground
11. the poor but fertile countries cannot resist the offer because they are usually heavily indebted
12. fishing continues; fishes continues to face extinction; poor continues to face unfair competition; rich continues to do whatever they want which makes them still rich or richer

If it sounds anywhere familiar, because it’s an example between the European Union (EU) and some African countries like Mauritania or Senegal. I heard of developed countries taking over developing countries’ assets like oil, river, rainforest, and now FISHING GROUND. Seriously, it is not a big news anywhere, but its a BIG DEAL, isn’t it? the fishing ground can be the lifetime career for the many local fisherman there. just as we dream of BMW, they dream of having a full meal everyday. Well, since now the situation is very unfavourable with less fishes around to continue their survival, they save extremely hard to take a ship out as refugee. As on whether they had been able to reach a good country (as in capitalist perspective) or able to get a residential rights, both you and I won’t know.

Now, is it a sin to eat fish? I seriously hope the answer is no.

Movie, Avatar speaks the truth

Apologies for the long negligance here, I was really busy working .

Besides, I flocked to the cinema like the majority to catch Avatar, the top movie of the year. After watching it, I came to the conclusion that both the effects and story made it a success. Effects aside, the movie really engage us emotionally; let’s flashback to the scene when the tree in the village was destroyed, the fear and sadness that engulfed the Na’vi were captured so vividly. It, too affected us, in our minds we were thinking why humans could have done something so horrible to innocent tribe group and insisting that if we were in the human position, we would definitely choose a amiciable solution. Luckily, the movie has a perfect ending. Hence, our accumulated fustration in the midst of the movie were dissappated immediately after seeing the evils being subdued.

However, in our world, the ending has never been so perfect. Amazon, the biggest rainforest in the world contains tribes too who arn’t as lucky as the Na’vi. Take example, Ecuador. She do not have what amazing stone that sells at 20 million per kg, but she is oil rich – the current most valuable asset in the world. As the norm, foreign major companies came in and controlled it, while the locals were slaved. Like a snowball, problems get bigger and bigger; those companies priority is profit, hence who is going to care about the oil spill ? o yes, the tribes living there! but since when history allowed slaves to speak up? Just like the Na’vi who never get the chance to negotiate and resort to war means. Lets be truthful here, our dear tribes in ecuador’s amazon has no some magic dinosaur-bird to assist them if they were to go to war. They would only die miserable under the gun-fire that those countries have been investing continuously and massively. Ok great, now we in the civil world can come up to the tribes and say ‘hey you know you guys can file a lawsuit!’. Well, a lawsuit is going to take years, maybe in our new year 2010, the tribes are accounting the debts in 1990! We are all fighting for all children’s futures, while the tribes are securing the forest which is their home, we are only concerned that our children get the best piano or tuition teacher. We are all fighting for cultures, while the tribes are securing their languages and traditions, we are only concerned that music and games would be more impressive.

Our world is definitely as beautiful as Pandora, let’s make a little effort by giving back to the nature since we are already in a system that seemed really irreversable.

Nixon in Obama?

There was a saying that Richard Nixon was the greatest salesman ever lived, who managed to swindle millions of Americans to cast him a vote when he promised to get America out from Vietnam. However, he sent in more troops to Vietnam when he became the president. Oddly, i find this happening today. Obama promised the world that wars in middle east will end which is one of the reason why he had won the presidency against republican, McCain. Further to this, Obama even clinched a Nobel Peace Prize. However, at the very same period, he sent in more troops to Afghanistan and defended that war can be necessary at times. Pardon me, but I really can’t picture peace and war together. A war president getting a nobel peace prize? It’s just like a kid got caught stealing sweets from the shop and the shopkeeper offered him the sweets without any payment. The kid accepted the offer, yet still continue the habit of stealing. Sounds like Obama to me; he’s in the war and was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize, yet still continue the war or worse, intensify it! I hope Americans will not look back in twenty years’ times, and wonder why they were swindled again. But this time, an even more influential salesman. Hopefully, this salesman would use the right techniques and not disappoint his millions of customers, which the predecessor salesman did.

 

Ubuntu, only if we understand this before innocence were killed

I learn something new everyday. What i’m sharing here is news to me and maybe you, but not to those who already had their lives sacrificed. There still can be discussion around, but the fact that they are dead, whats the point? Yes, learn from it, but just exactly how much do we learn? Since world war II, just exactly how many conflicts have the world been through? Many. The most shameful thing is that one of the longest war since then is still taking place currently.

Apartheid, was a racial separation system implemented between 1948 till 1994 in South Africa which had cost many innocence lives due to intense pressures between minority whites and majority blacks. Mainly, the blacks were the victims being tortured and murdered, being suspects of terrorist against the ruling whites. After it was abolished, Truth and Reconciliation Commission was setup to allow the victims and families to share their experiences. Hence, knowing that hands were chopped, women raped, manhood destroyed, electrification, burnt to death were really common. However, amnesty can be granted to those who committed the abuse by the commission. Surprisingly, some victims families were really forgiving. To them, its Ubuntu; humans are all related, what he do affects both you, me and the world. Hence, its like a ‘lets stop seeking revenge or harming one another, because it would spread the harm to more people’. If only everybody understand this concept, and stop thinking of each individual, race, religion or country, I believe less lives would have been lost.

However, even after this south africa eposide, humans still continue their selfish thinking in protecting themselves. Protecting may be a natural human instinct, but the way we are doing is causing more problems. Is going into war the best way to protect ourselves? Surely, we can do better. Furthermore, some soldiers who were deployed changed, exactly because its call a WAR and so they became hostile. Mahmudiyah killings took place in 2006; it involved the killings of a innocent family and gang-rape of a 14 years old girl who was then burnt. Me, being hundred of thousands miles away from this girl, feel terribly pain knowing this; just imagine how would this girl’s neighbour and friends would have felt. Hence, this war is not going anywhere, it just involves more lives being taken away and greater hatred developed. It would be never-ending because of Ubuntu. Sometimes, government are the most stupid thing that can ever exist; they were so focused in reaching the top of the mountain and would take whichever shortest route possible, yet forgotten that they have intruded to someone elses territory without their permission.

i copy this picture from the movie, Redacted. It took me much courage because I am 110% disgusted and feel really nauseous by this picture. The identity of this picture is ambagious, but surely it cant be anywhere better as well. Whats your thought of the war now? or even our government support in this war? Remember, Ubuntu, we are all inter-connected.

Sophie Scholl – Die letzten Tage

I watched this German film last week, the final days of a german heroin, Sophie Scholl, during Nazis occupation. The plot is really predictable, but somehow the movie still managed engaged me closely throughout (most probably the sound effect). Sophie and his brother, Hans were caught distributing anti-Third Reich notes in their university campus and subsequently executed. The highlight of the movie is definitely the trail they have in the courts, the obvious bias and propaganda from the judge, the submissive and obedient members and the fearless resistance from Sophie and Hans. Here are some quotes I really love:

Sophie  – ‘Trucks came to pick up the children at the mental hospital. The other children asked where they were going. “They’re going to heaven,” said the nurses. So the children got on the truck singing. You think I wasn’t raised right, because I felt pity for them?’

Sophie – [to the court] ‘You will soon be standing where we stand now.’

Hans – [to the court] ‘If you and Hitler weren’t afraid of our opinion, we wouldn’t be here.’

Hans – [to the court] ‘You may hang us today, but you’ll be hanged tomorrow.’

Although in this twenty-first century, less of such unreasonable executions are happening (or maybe intelligence nowadays have been doing and covering their jobs well), but the number of people who are willing to stand up and stage a change for the unfortunate is decreasing as well. Not that I would like to see everybody going to the street and stage a protest everyday, but surely there’s some organized method we can apply to help those entangled in this unfair system. I believe this Sophie Scholl spirit is in both you and me, it’s really a matter of initiative to make things happen. It could be a little chore for us, but a miracle to another.

The Nike story

I managed to do a commentary for youth.sg on world poverty, http://www.youth.sg/content/view/7556/59/, please have a look. However, a friend told me it looked heavily edited, yes it is. There is this lot I would like to post on my blog, because i find it simpler and easier to understand:

‘Made in China’ is a very common tag we find on our clothes, shoes or bags’ tags. I remember owning a Nike shoes that says ‘Made in Indonesia’ while some may have a ‘Made in Thailand’, ‘Made in Vietnam’, ‘Made in Pakistan’ or ‘Made in Philippines’.   It is widely known that this ‘Made in Somewhere’ tag represents where the goods were produced at. Hence, Nike, a United States product is made in so many corner of the world except for United States itself. Those production countries all share a same feature; they are termed as developing countries or ‘Third World’.  Hence, it explained why Nike would set up their factories there; so to utilise the widely available cheap labour. However, the whole process for Nike to produce sufficient products to cater to the developed countries’ population (like us) is worsening the developing countries’ population living condition. First, to produce the colourful Nike Air-Jordon Shoes, raw materials are needed and usually extracted from the same country of production. Hence, the production countries are depleting more and more of their natural resources which is both wealth and environmental asset. Second, factories processed the raw materials and produced harmful chemicals that are released into the air or river in the production countries. Hence, the population in these production countries can easily contact with diseases if they use the river water.  Finally, in economic terms, Nike would want to maximize profits and would do all means to keep production costs low. Hence, child labours are employed or maybe just violate the minimum wages level. If we zoom our lenses out to examine this process and asked ourselves ‘where do the money flow to?’, the answer is United States. Although jobs are created in the developing countries, their natural resources are extracted, polluted and their pay exploited. Hence, if we continue to satisfy our luxury wants, it create a demand and Nike would increase production or source for an upcoming ‘cheap’ country to start another production site. The poor will be left poorer.

I hope you see the whole picture now. and I need to say this again to you and myself,

this logo or that logo on your t-shirt, laptop, and so forth all share a corporate story that they didnt want you to know. Hence, its up to you and I to recognise and do something about it.

 

Matt Preston is just doing his job

Who is Matt Preston? I shall do a brief introduction here; he is one of the judges of the Australia popular TV show, Masterchef. Due to its popularity, the production team quickly came up with the second series but with slight variation, Celebrity Masterchef, screening on TV currently. Basically, he’s a food critic. However, on the last episode (watch it: http://www.masterchef.com.au/episodes.htm), a comment from him sent me into deep thoughts. On that particular episode, the contestants were sent to a fine dining restaurant to have ‘first-hand’ experience. The real customers have expectations; hence any overcooked or undercooked or not presentable food are all thrown away. At the end of the episode, Matt actually told the contestants ‘I do not care how much food were thrown away, what matters is the end product that is going to be presented to the customer’ (not direct quote). I was quite taken back at first, still couldn’t accept the fact that we the so-called developed population have achieve such high standard of living that food needs to be perfect for consumption.

I see this everyday in my restaurant I’m working at as well. Food was ugly (for example the cream doesn’t stand), Chef got unhappy, reprimanded the assistant, assistant throw the food, assistant prepare the same dish again. Even the waiters are throwing the leftovers from the customers’ plates. Just imagine if all these food can be delivered to those who need them, who will still suffer from hunger in this world? If only a boss would step forward and say ‘ok, no food is to be thrown away, keep it and I will arrange for them to reach the poor’. Our capitalist society have created millions of profit-driven corporations to meet customers’ demand. Hence, if a customer doesn’t like it, we ditch it! This capitalist world have mould us into humans who disregard other humans; we wouldn’t realize that another human needs the food, we have become too focused on the profits. This is not Matt Preston’s fault, it is the system that we living in that caused this problem.

APEC is asking for its doom day

APEC stated very clearly – reject all form of protectionism and embrace a very open liberal economy. Yes, back to basics, free trade and more free trade. It looks more like going back to square one instead; we are embarking our first step again to bring about another financial crisis (in the future). Have we not learn from our history lesson? Again, I believe everybody will be horrified if a government decided to wipe out the Jews race again, which I believe everybody should be just as horrified that our governments have decided to promote Adam Smith’s free market theory again. The great depression in 1929 is the failure of Adam Smith’s theory;  maybe Asians didn’t feel the impact as much back then, but now that we are striving forward in economic terms, we are in greater risk of experiencing what US and Europe had experienced in 1929. Finally, the 1970s recession brought upon by world-wide opening up their economies is another exmaple of free market weakness as well. Even the 1997 Asian financial crisis and the last global financial crisis has its roots to our free market, free trade policies.

I couldn’t emphsize more on the downsides of free trade. The governments are again going back to adopt it which is the exact root cause of poverty! Mexico President Felipe Calderon even used NAFTA (North America Free Trade Agreement) as an example to encourage Asia Pacific to enter free trade! However, according to some actual facts, Mexico farmers are worse off since NAFTA and terrorist group is formed on day 1 of NAFTA formation.Why would any ordinary farmer with a family to take care of resort to join a terrorist group? It is definitely because NAFTA would make him incapable to take care his family anymore. My dear Asians mates, can you see what we are getting ourselves into?

Finally, free market has this ability to increase the volumn of economy in short period of time. It means we will receive news that our GDP is rising, goodnews? NO! It would only make the income inequality gap greater. Furthermore, with globalization in place, the production rates will be increasing tremendously, pollution and more pollution. Finally, China the biggest polluters in the world has not made any committment to ease their irresponsible action. However, it is solely China’s fault? I doubt so, the international brands are setting their production there, polluting China even more! It’s a cycle, why are we gearing ourselves to another loop of it?

Saw this cartoon on the newspaper few days back:

I’m neither the one who drew that nor I’m the only one who realize the consequences of the APEC summit this year. If you have read this entry till this far, I hope you will make an effort to share the content to the next person you see today.

We are destroying our Earth

Few days back, I was watching the morning tv (either channel 7 or 9) who invited a geologist for interview on discussion on the movie 2012 – is it really fictional? The interview flow to other disaster movie like the day after tomorrow which the geologist was confident that it will not happen yet so ’lets sit back and relax’. Funny how a national tv is informing the australians to ‘relax’ when we should be worried and doing more.

Food produced today can feed twice the world population. Whats the consequences of that? Land was exhausted by farming and fish like tuna faced extinction. When the land become barren, it risked forming a desert and that explained why Sahara desert and many others are expanding. Besides the fact that human cannot utilise the land anymore, it also can increase global warming because of less vegetations. When tuna extinct, it does not mean ‘alright, just stop eating tuna, no big deal’, it has a much more serious consequence of affecting the eco-system food chain. When tuna is removed, fishes feed on tuna would have adverse effect and so on. The rate we are exhausting the natural resources to feed the world is much more faster ten years back. Worse, the food never reach the poor! Instead, the food went to the buffet counter or thrown away in restaurants or even us when we couldn’t finish the dinner or left them in the fridge to rot!

I didn’t understand how exactly we can just ‘relax’ when we should be doing more to curb the compounding speed of extracting resources from the earth. Surely, the high record of temperature in summer, brought forward snow storm in China and the worse storms experienced in England are indicators of impending doom in the future.