OKAY! So I recently got my laptop fixed. As my regular readers know, I've been having laptop issues and that has also prevented me from posting more regularly. 

And finally, I actually went to get my laptop repaired.

The thing was, I was actually very scared to go get my laptop repaired. 
My impression of SIM LIM was pretty much a cowboy town. So I was prepared to get myself totally conned and they would recommend me repairs that I didn't need and I wouldn't know better. 

I bought this laptop at around $800. It's a simple laptop cos I use it mainly for watching movies and just surfing the net so there's no fancy stuff. And I have already used it for 3 years or so. 
For my repairs, I hoped that I would be able to cheaply extend the life of the laptop for another 3 years plus and I would be probably happy with that. 
And I was always hesitant to take the trip down to SIM LIM, cos, what if they quoted me $300 for the repairs. It would be hardly worth it, or what if they recommended other repairs which I didn't need, but I also wouldn't know. So I mentally gave myself a budget of $200 and hoped for the best. 

So I told myself I needed to get my laptop fixed. Then I went online to research on some repair shops. OK so there was a repair shop which had quite a number of good reviews so I decided to go down to talk with them. I told them my issues, I had already did some research on my own on what could be the problem with my laptop. I likely needed to replace my hard disk. 

And they said, "ok minimum 3 hours. We will investigate and if it is a hard disk issue, we will change the hard disk for you. A 1 TB hard disk plus service fee will cost you $120."

WOAH! That's under my budget. YAY...
So I asked them... hey wait, I don't need a 1 TB hard disk. How much is a 500 GB hard disk? 
And they said... errm... it's only a difference of $10, why not just take the 1 TB hard disk...

And I thought for a while and said. Nope... I just need a 500 GB hard disk. And so the repairs cost me $110
For many people, it's only $10, but this $10 is wasted on me. I would not need this extra storage space. It's the same as flushing $10 down the drain cos... I don't store enough things on my hard disk such that I would use more than 500 GB. So why bother to buy a 1 TB one?
Few years later, I'll probably change my laptop so I might as well go for the cheapest repairs possible.

Anyway, it was late afternoon so I had to pick up my wife, so I went to retrieve my laptop the next day. 
So far the laptop seems to be working well enough.

Lessons learnt. 
1) Sometimes, things aren't as hard or complicated or scary as it seems. I lived without a functioning laptop for a couple of months. All I needed was to make one day effort to go down and get it fixed. It's not THAT hard. Should probably have done it earlier. 
So I should have done some quick research earlier then made the effort to settle it and not live with such inconvenience for so long.  

It's like settling your insurance. Most people procrastinate and don't get it done. Or they are afraid to look at their finances or they are afraid the financial adviser will cheat them. 
It's probably the same. Just need to set aside some time to research then really get down to doing it. 

2) Sometimes even though something has better value, it's still not worth buying. 
1 TB Hard disk + repair = $120
500 GB + repair = $110
I think most people will feel an additional 500 GB for $10 is really cheap. 
But if I wasn't going to utilize it, then there's no real point in spending that additional $10. 

​It's not like 1 chicken $5, 2 chicken $8... In this case, I can always keep the chicken for another day to eat. But a hard disk... I know I won't use it so... no point. 


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We hear it so often right? People say they don't have enough time. 
And most people say they can't buy time. 

But the thing is... most of us are already "buying" time. 
Don't believe me right?

You see, whenever you are buying convenience, you are by right, buying time. 

Lazy to cook? Too troublesome? Too messy? Buy dinner from downstairs? 
That's buying time. Cos when I prepare my meals, I take an hour or so plus another 30 minutes of cooking. But if you buy food, it's a snap of your fingers and dinner is ready.

If you hire a domestic helper, isn't that similar? 
You are tired after work, you want more time to rest, but many people need to do chores. If you don't want to do chores, and you want more time to rest, then you can "buy" time to rest. By hiring a helper at home. 

Take a bus, train, car to work? All of them are different. 
If you take public transport, you may save some time. 
If you take a Grab or taxi, you may save even more time.
If you own a car, maybe you can save the most time cos you won't need to wait for a vehicle to come pick you up, but you may need to find parking at the next location. 
Imagine 100 years ago when motor vehicles weren't available. People were riding horses.
If you didn't own a horse then you'd have to walk? 

Think that all these don't really mean "BUYING" time? 
You see, the thing is... I had this experience in Paris. Transport is pretty expensive. Not like in Singapore. 
I was trying to keep my budget low when I was travelling around and sightseeing. So I walked a lot. 
And I could see a lot of local sights. But I had difficulty reaching further places. I would have to walk 10km to reach the next attraction that I wanted to see. And this would take me a good half the day, and I had to walk back to the hotel after that. 
During the first few days in Paris, I walked around a lot, but I quickly learnt that I just didn't have the time to just keep using my legs to get to places. If I wanted to clear 4-5 attractions in a day, I needed more time if I wanted to walk, else, I would need to "buy" time by paying money. 

It's not possible to buy more than 90+ years of lifespan. Or you can't buy more than 24 hours a day. BUT, it's possible to buy more time to do more things within the 24 hours in a day. 
And the thing is, we take these conveniences for granted. 
Compared to a lot of our ancestors, most of us are already doing a lot of stuff that they couldn't do cos we just have more time than them. We can travel further and faster, communication is faster, we can work on the train, in the plane, etc. But yet, many people still seem to have not enough time. 

It's kinda similar to money. 
If you earn $2,000, and you spend all the money for living expenses. 
Then suddenly you find a cheaper alternative for groceries and now you spend $200 less. So by right you can save $200 for retirement. But instead you upgrade your lifestyle and buy premium meats, cos it's cheaper now, so in the end... still no savings. Then you take for granted the new premium meats and tell yourself that it's basic necessities. 

Same same right? Last time no domestic helper. Then after hire a domestic helper, by right supposed to have more time to rest, but in the end still busy, then at this point, don't want to let go of the domestic helper, cos... woah if now so busy, and have domestic helper, imagine what life would be like if don't have domestic helper again... 
Thing is... most likely, this person has filled up the free time provided by the domestic helper, with something else and once again, this person has not enough time...

So... think about it, where has all your time gone? Are you spending time doing low value things? Is rest more important? Or exercise? Or watching TV? Or looking at your phone? 
Most of us have gotten so used to a certain lifestyle. Same like how we talk about spending money and our financial lifestyle. 
But there is also a time lifestyle. And I think we also need to recognize if we are wasting/squandering time, as important as we look at whether we are wasting or squandering money.


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Ok, I'm not really going to talk much about 28 Feb 2019 Expenses. I end up saying usually the same thing. 
Food expenses seemed to be quite high last month. $361.28
I think we were getting a bit sloppy and just decided to go out to eat more than normal.
Bought a Taiwan flight for April 2019. $522
Wife bought some lunches for her staff in Feb cos it was Chinese New Year so gift expenses was quite high as well. $151

​
What's more interesting is the below table where I tabulated my expenses for the past 12 months. 
I tried my best, but I could be careless, so I may have tabulated stuff incorrectly through the months, but I reckon generally it should be representative of my expenses for the past 12 mths.

I split them into 3 categories.
1) Basic expenses. These are needs. So food, household expenses, transport, etc all go here. 
2) Then come the Wants. Anything else comes here.
3) Next is my wife's work related expenses. These I put them separately cos they would likely disappear if she stops working.
4) Are the fixed expenses. Also needs but these expenses don't change every month.

The last 2 columns are the total for 12 months and the average which is the total divided by 12.
So right at the bottom right, I spent $43,994.78 in total, $18,154.06 are personal expenses, $25,840.72 are work related expenses.
So if my wife retired, it's likely that our monthly expense would be around or slightly above $1,512.84. Which is the personal expenses divided by 12.

Can't really say my expenses are super low. Cos I know I could bring them lower easily. 
Can't really say my personal expenses are super high. I think $1,512 per mth is pretty reasonable. 


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I'm just about ending 10 days in KL. It's been a long trip and I've been spending quite a bit on food. There are a couple of days when we spent S$40 for dinner, which is considered a lot in Malaysian terms.

As I spend more on food for these 10 days. I keep thinking to myself. Why do I save on $10-$20 for meals. When I can save so much more if I just don't follow my wife to Paris? That would straight-out save $1300 at least.

It's like skimping on the small stuff but making poor decisions on the big stuff.
Then after that, I continue to think. If I continue to work or take up part-time work, what's another few dollars here and there?

The train of thought is neverending. Save a few cents at supermarkets vs save a few dollars at restaurants, vs save a few hundreds, vs save a few thousands. Then the thought becomes, why not just work a bit more and don't need to save so much.

And I was having difficulty reconciling this, cos as I spent more on restaurants this trip, I thought to myself, I could easily have saved more than this by not doing one of my Paris trips. AND that would probably have saved even more.

Then I stopped thinking about it...

You see, there's no end to this. Everyone lives their lives differently. Some people want to eat more, travel more, buy stuff, etc. And there's really nothing wrong with that.

Some people start out with $1 others start out with $1,000 in their bank. Some people earn $1,000 others earn $100,000.

If you earn $100k, then even after flying a few trips to Paris the savings after expenses will still be more than the person who earns $1k.

So how to reconcile? Cannot reconcile la!!!

Everyone starts differently, lives differently, and ends differently.

The best we can do, I think, is to live within our means, we save where we can, spend when we feel we need to spend. Cos there's no end if I keep questioning each and every one of my decisions.

Of course saving more is better, but if I scrutinize my every spending, then I might as well save all my money and live homeless.

Cos that's the cheapest way of living right? Live without a home, but have a lot of money in the bank, or I rent out my current home and I live on the streets. Then I only need my handphone and insurance coverage. And I can probably even find food, water and shower for free. Everyday live in a tent along east coast.

But I don't think that's the kinda life anny of us wants to live. So as much as I'm an advocate to cut expenses and keep high savings rate, I think we all need some balance to live life the way we want to. Or to maintain a certain level of acceptable lifestyle.

​We're not trying to reduce expenses from $50 per month to $40 per month. We want to live well on maybe $400-$600 per month. Sometimes more, sometimes less, depending on situation.


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I apologise that I haven't been writing much.

Life has been... Kinda just moving along and I now understand how people can get so caught up with things that they do daily that they forget about other stuff. I'm not sure if it's a good thing or a bad thing. Cos it's kinda like the wind blows and I just move along and I don't really ponder about things as much as I used to.

And interestingly My15HWW seems to have taken a break from writing as well.

It's like when I was working. I really wanted to get out. Then after I got out of work, I struggled a bit to get a sense of what to do and how to keep low expenses and maintain a good lifestyle. Then now that all that has been settled, I'm pretty contented with where I am and there's not much to talk about for the time being.

And I'm hoping that the status quo doesn't change, cos I'm really glad to be in this Goldilocks situation.

BUT... There may be some changes in the future so... Let's see what's going to happen next.

I haven't been posting much recently.
Some things have cropped up and I've been trying to settle them. Maybe I'll update everyone when things settle down.

Anyway, here's a good clip to watch.

Ever wondered why casinos want people to play using chips?
Or why some restaurants like Marche use a card to charge your purchases?
​Or how about online games where people buy "tokens"?

​It's all similar to what this talk is about. Financial abstraction. Making people less connected with their money so that they don't feel like they are spending money, so that it's just a number on a computer or handphone.
In this way, there's a good chance that people tend to spend more. Cos they don't feel like they are spending money.

Long time ago, I was happy living under other people's expectations. 
So I was pretty happy doing things that made them happy, until I realized that they only bothered that I made them happy and didn't bother whether I was happy whilst doing those things. 

That's when I realized that the idea of living for other people's expectations and putting up a false front, a very tiring and sad thing to do. 

Sometimes it seems like the right thing to do. Maybe some people may thing that they need to fulfill their parents' expectations so they try to hard to make their parents happy. 
But to me, I try to make them happy in other ways. Caring for them doesn't mean I need to fulfill their expectations. Taking care of their well-being is a different matter as living the life they hope that I will live. 

And I think a lot of people may not understand this. That being caring or taking care of their parents or dependents is not really the same as fulfilling their expectations. 
​
For example, someone may love scuba diving and decide to be a diving instructor. But may disappoint their parents, cos the parents want them to be a corporate worker. 
But that doesn't mean that this person doesn't care about his parents and wouldn't be able to take care of his parents whilst enjoying work as a dive instructor.  

So I think it's important to differentiate the difference between living someone else's expectations vs taking care and showing that you care for that person. 
It's really 2 different ideas but very often, they are seen as one, or they are confused to be the same thing. 


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Not going to say much about my expenses this month. 
It's pretty normal and expenses is around the same every month.

Gift ($155) is a bit high this month as my wife was buying lunch treats for her colleagues/staff/friends who have helped her through the past year. 
We also ordered a photobook ($15) cos we always do up a photobook for our trips so that we can capture our memories. (see previous post)

The end of Feb expense update will be more interesting as I have been tracking my expense for the past year. So I'll be showing a full 12 months with some good classification to distinguish what is my wife's work related expenses vs what is our true living expenses. 

So let's talk more about that in a month's time.


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It's the lunar new year period now and many people are done with their spring cleaning and rituals and what not. And everyone wishes and hopes the coming year will be prosperous and good.

And so, as usual, I wander around and look and see and observe. 
Since young, my mum always told me of things to do, things not to do during the CNY period.
She would make preparations, buy new stuff, etc... and as I grew older, I noticed this was the norm for most people. 

​And she told me not to say unlucky things during the CNY period, which I deemed "Ok fine, not too unreasonable, no point being rude or negative any day, so CNY period shouldn't be any different."

What really gets to me is the amount of wastage that I see every year, my mum included, but it's pretty much everyone else as well...

People do spring cleaning EVERY YEAR. They throw out stuff which they bought last time... Most of them are in good condition. This means that they previously bought it and didn't use it much and eventually threw them away. Making space for them to buy even more new things this coming year ahead. 

Then many people stock up their fridges. Food during this period is more expensive but yet people like the feeling of 满, or full, so they buy new rice to fill up their rice buckets, even people whom I know don't cook rice, they will buy rice to fill up their rice bucket, or buy groceries, or new sugar and salt and some people I know will throw away their old sugar and salt cos they haven't used all of what they bought for the whole of the previous year!
But why do they need to buy so much during this period? Food is more expensive so maybe it would actually be more prudent to buy just enough during this period and buy again once the festive season is over? 

Not to mention, most people buy and gift multiple containers of CNY tidbits/goodies.
People buy for their own consumption and gift to friends and family. Then they themselves receive so they have multiple containers of goodies. And many people aren't able to consume all of them. And very often, after 2-3 months, they realize they won't be able to finish all the food and throw them all away. 

And then CNY period gives people the excuse to buy new clothes. Long time ago, people didn't have much money, so they used the CNY period as an opportunity to buy their new clothes for the year. But now... People buy clothes all the time and they have new clothes every month. But still, they buy new CNY clothes just for visiting. Some tailor their clothes just for the first 2 days and never use them again. I know people who purchase clothes that they will only use for one time and not use it again. And they do it every year. 

Then some people buy CNY stickers or ornaments to place around their house, buy new plants to make the place look nicer, etc... and once again, all these will be thrown away in a couple of weeks.

I don't even want to talk about ang bao money, I don't know any parent who's happy to give away free money to other people for no other reason except for wishing them a happy new year and to remain prosperous in the up coming year. 
I'd rather BE prosperous by saving my money and not having to give it away. 

And the thing about all these practices... is... does it really promote prosperity? 
I suppose it shows that this person has been prosperous last year, cos it means they have money to waste during this CNY period. But it definitely isn't going to promote prosperity after the season. I mean... using more money to buy and throw away stuff isn't going to make anyone richer. Except the vendors. 

So the question is... do you want to be prosperous? OR just talk about it? OR try to show it? 

Cos... pretty much, actions speak louder than words. 
It's more likely that you'll remain prosperous by holding on to your money than by spending it on stuff and HOPING that you'll be prosperous in the coming year ahead.


HUAT AH!!! Wishing all my readers a HAPPY PROSPEROUS NEW YEAR AND DON'T WASTE MONEY!!!


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I haven't been posting about getting free stuff from Pasir Panjang for a long time. I usually go and collect on Thursdays. But recently I haven't been taking much stuff cos I have other sources of free food. So I usually go mainly for the fun of it.

So today this is what I took home. Its been a long time since I took so much, cos I have an event I have to plan for so I needed more food. Some of these items were labeled as organic, such as the potatoes, carrots, beetroots, corn. I forgot what else, cos I don't really bother about it. Cos it doesn't appear all the time.

It's amazing that during Chinese New year period, when food and vegetables are getting more expensive, vendors are continuously throwing away good produce. In fact, they throw away even more stuff during this period than on normal days.

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