All my important equipment like my computer, printer and fridge, I will have these appliances going through a regulator and a UPS. As for this iron, my maid is using it behind as and when required.

With a blink of an eye. the iron breathed its last!

Latest design.

Today when I lined up the coins, I walked down my memory lane again. My dad used to come back early in the morning after his round of taxi driving, he would place stacks of coin on the table top for everyone of us. These stacks of coins were meant for our daily school pocket money. In primary level, we had forty cents for the day and our pocket money will be increased to eighty cents once we entered secondary.

Looking at the stacks really brought back the times when all of us were young, vulnerable and needed our parents so much. Time flew by so quickly.

It was a quiet CNY for me this year. All my Singaporean friends had gone back. I was surfing and chanced upon this video posted up by my friend.

Living life is all about how you develop a beautiful creative mind. Adversity always bring out the best in you. Singapore, you are really blessed.

The crossing for the year will be a quiet one because all my staffs had already left for holiday. I am left only with my 6 faithful dogs and my faithful Mac playing iTune. While writing this blog, Dr. Hook’s “A little Bit More” came up. Brought back so much fond memories. Dr Hook’s music are evergreen.

Looking back, 2011 was the year that I got the most invitations to give talks to share my experiences and my work. I am already in the process of preparing another talk for a forum in Singapore University next year. I had been advised by a writer to pen down my journal into a book. How interesting. Maybe I should do it before I become senile.

I chose the above title for this blog was because I felt it was relevant. In order for one to see the fruit of labour, one has to bite the bullet of perseverance. The striving for excellence is never easy unless you are born with a silver spoon in your mouth.

Speeches and talks only lasted for a few minutes, but what was not seen was the rough and tough road less travelled by many.

Happy New Year!

Of late the electricity was very erratic and we were facing constant load shedding. This had disrupted our lives quite a bit. My friend were lamenting that due to the load shedding, her aged old mother was getting restless because she cannot access to their monthly subscribed DSTV India channel.

I asked why was that so since they had their own generator. She said, it was not about their own generator, it’s about the station, which also faced the load shedding problem. They are unable to provide the service because of the load shedding. They cannot power up.

I was amused! I asked her, “then what about your monthly subscription to the station? Aren’t they supposed make sure the consistency and to provide you the service paid?” she said, “no, we still have to continue paying the service.”

Lucky I am no TV addict. Sometime I still cannot understand and comprehend the working system here although having stayed here for so long.

If I were in her shoes, I would had terminated the service.

Or is it because I had a lower tolerance level compared to my friend?

This country is blessed with the second largest lake in the world and the source of the Nile river. Only a handful countries in the world can be so lucky to have all these water source to generated electricity but yet it is a disgrace that the electricity issue cannot be managed.

The answer is like the nile, murky and lots of undercurrent.

After going through all the trails and errors, I had finally got my first Gorilla beeswax candles out. The feeling was fantastic when I extracted them out of the mould after they had solidified. It does gives me a sense of achievement.

Never too old to learn new things.

Speak no evil, see no evil, hear no evil.

I managed to catch up with a friend of mine after things had settled in. We had our regular once-in-a-while get together chat to see how we are getting on. We happened to touch on the community we were working on and I was expressing my many disappointments which I faced every now and then.

The last case was about some farmers, having worked with them for a few years, started their monkey tricks again. After sending them some money to get the honey down for me from the village, not only did they told me that there was no honey, they had even used up the money for their own instead.

Just when they were about to start gaining trust from me, they started their nonsense. I was just lamenting to my friend why it is so difficult to get good people to work with. I know there are good ones out there, but till now I am still trying to find one that you can trust whole heartedly. Time can only prove what I said.

He rebutted and told me that he always felt frustrated to hear people not giving enough trust to the people. He told me he had come across honest people since he arrived in Uganda 2 or 3 years ago. He mentioned that there was one that told him,”We are honest people, but just don’t tempt us”.

In my heart, I was taken aback. How can this statement defined him as “Honest”? Just because he was honest enough to tell my friend not to tempt him in anyway? I don’t find the logic behind. My friend pointed that we should keep our money in the bank and not at home so that he will not be tempted when he could not see the money. I cannot imagine that I have to wake up everyday, go to the bank and stand in line to withdraw money, inconvenience myself just to avoid “tempting” that person.

My friend followed up with an example, saying that its just like if we were to know that someone is an alcoholic, we should not bring him to a pub. I felt that this has nothing to do with temptation. Its all about self discipline and integrity.

Now, what if a lady is wearing something short or sexy? Does that mean he has the right to molest or rape her because she was “tempting” him?

A sensible person who has self discipline and integrity, should know his own problem and not pushing the problem to another, blaming others for his weakness. I found the reasoning very weak. I felt that the person who claimed, “not to tempt him” is smart to push his responsiblity to others.

To those people who feels that we are always belittling the Africans, we are not. We are just sharing our experiences and the different upbringing. We just need to understand and be prepared to accept what is real.

To us, it is wrong, to them, it’s not their fault.