I usually pay attention to computer fairs. 
Cos these are the best times for me to buy my top up card for my M1 prepaid card. 

Today, I saw this for this weekend's Comex fair. 31 Aug - 3 Sep @ Suntec

I'm looking at the $29/mth deal for 500MB...
Like damn you M1... I just downgraded my plan from 1gbps @ $44/mth to 300mbps @$29/mth.
And now you offer 500mbps @ $29/mth.
It's pretty frustrating, cos something like this happened 2 years ago as well. 
It doesn't really affect me cos I don't think that the extra 200mbps speed will change my life in anyway. 
But it still makes me a bit upset cos... hey, I got a worse off deal...

And of course the most important part of Comex deals. 
The prepaid section...
Oh man... M1... you've disappointed me again...
Previously, during these fairs, M1 offered...
$18 top up card, I get a $21 value. Similar to the picture. This is a given. ​
(This bonus $3 is pretty worthless to me cos it expires within month.)
On top of that, they would give me a separate free $5 top up card which I can use to top up at anytime. 
That's $23 of cash value on my top up for $18 spend. ($18+$5)

During the last computer fair, they started giving away this free bonus value for E-top ups. 
What happens is the customer (me) goes to top up during the fair, I pay $18, the staff will give me $18 cash value in my account and $3 of bonus value AND another $6 of bonus value due to the promo. All this is done electronically via a laptop at the booth.
But all this bonus value expires in 1 month. So I basically get bonus value which I don't really use. 
What I would prefer is not the bonus value but another top up card, cos that would allow me to top up at any time. Usually at the end of 6 months when most of my credits have been used up, that allows me to continue using my card for an additional month. Cos in my case, I'm more concerned about the validity period rather than the bonus value which expires and cannot be extended. 

Oh well... Can't be helped. Doesn't really affect me, but I expected a better deal. Can't win 'em all.


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I read something recently.
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Using cash is normal. There are still a number of places which do not accept credit cards. So 90% of people using cash is expected.
However, according to this study, 43% of Singaporeans said that cash was the payment mode they used MOST often. Which I take it to mean that they will use cash for transactions which accept cards as well.

I understand when it makes financial sense to use cash or bank transfers. 
Like most clinics only accept cash or NETS. 
Or when booking budget airlines, the cheapest payment mode is via bank transfers.
Now these are actual valid reasons why not to use any form of credit card.
Cos there is either no choice, or there is a financial benefit from NOT using a credit card.

However, when we look at the variety of credit cards which are available, 61% own a credit card, but only 25% of people use it most often. I'm one of the 25%. Credit cards are the best way to save money... Strange but true. If people take advantage of the rebates, they would be getting a 3-5% return on money SPENT. Which means they get a 3-5% discount on any thing on top of whatever discount they are going to get. I did a post on this previously. These are just stand alone cards which do not need much monitoring. I can somewhat still understand why some people would be turned off if they have to jump through hoops to get bananas (according to Mr15HWW). So let's not talk about combo-ing the cards for bonus interest or any complex spending requirements. 
But even if we take a simple credit card.
The Citibank Cash back card, minimum spend of only $888
Or BOC Family card, minimum spend of $500
Or OCBC 365 card, minimum spend of $600

I would not even talk about the DBS Visa Debit card, with 5% rebate for Paywave, cos it may be a bit troublesome to not be able to withdraw $400 of cash from your bank.

I'm sure most people would have a minimum spend of $500 on their total expense for the month. Any average person should be able to hit a $500 spend. We're talking about averages here, not the frugal community. Cos the study above is saying most people use cash. So my point is that any normal person should just switch to the BOC Family card at the minimum. Cos it's easy to spend $500 in a month and you can get a rebate straight off it. 
So I don't understand why people just don't get used to swiping their cards.
It's like throwing away free money. A simple estimation is that most people are throwing away at least $15 per month. $500 x 3% = $15.

It's interesting, cos free money not taken is the same as money thrown away. Yet somehow the mind doesn't see it as such. 
Let's say you didn't use your credit card, so you don't get the $15 rebate. So you have $0.
Next, I give you $15, and ask you to throw it into the dustbin, you still have $0. But you would think I'm mad for asking you to throw away that good cash.
So going by that thinking, if someone thinks I'm mad for asking them to throw away the $15, then it would be fair to say that they think that they are also mad for not earning the free $15 of rebates offered by credit card companies. Of which it takes no real additional effort, cos paying for something in cash requires opening the wallet and taking out the cash, same as opening the wallet and taking out a card. 
There's even a convenience, cos you don't need to count change, make mistakes in payment, wait for the cashier to count, etc.

So why do people still NOT choose to use cards and continue to use cash...
Some reasons I thought about...
1) They lack financial discipline
Ok fair enough, they may end up overspending on their credit cards and end up in debt. Not a good reason. But ok, I think I would prefer people to not have financial troubles, than to try to learn discipline and end up in a mess. 

2) It's just a habit since young
Since we were in school, we always used cash. So it's natural to think that people would continue to just use cash. I switched to cards cos I had an unfortunate incident where I went on a date and had insufficient cash to pay for the meal... OH MY GOD, the embarrassment of that incident... hmm, maybe that's why people still hold large amounts of cash.

3) They may be trying to wash some cash
I mean some form of money laundering. They may have some undeclared income which they just want to slowly spend and avoid any financial system.

4) Lack of knowledge
Some people don't know about these promotions or rebates. They just aren't getting the info. It's like I'm not interested in Jay Chou, so I don't know when his concerts are or how much they cost. I just don't notice the info even if I see the adverts.

Anyway, I find it somewhat strange and yet, I've seen it happen before my eyes. My wife used to just use cash. When we were younger and when I started managing the cashflow, I noticed that she used cash very often, so I asked her why. Her response was, "It's just a couple of bucks, it doesn't make a difference and it's a habit." Well, I told her to change that habit, cos the "couple of bucks" all add up and we can get some free money out of it so it needs to change. Now, she just asks me which card to use and I update her when the limits are hit.


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I don't really like watching movies. As I grew older, I stopped watching movies cos I felt they were a waste of time. I don't really like sitting down for 2 hours. Typically, if I want to know about a movie, I'd just read the plot on wikipedia. It summarizes the movie in around 5 minutes of reading time.

I did watch movies when I was younger though. And there was this movie which I learnt quite a bit from. Have any of you watched "The Patriot" starring Mel Gibson, it's about the American Revolutionary War. So you may think, what has an old war movie got to do with budgeting and financial prudence. 

The movie is about the some American war, I'll not go into details. In a few parts of the movie, the main character, Mel Gibson, teaches his son to shoot a rifle. "Aim small miss small". Meaning, if you aim at a smaller area of the target, you may miss, but you will still hit the target in general. So if you aim at someone's head, you miss, well, you miss the head, but if you aim at the eye, you miss, you may still hit some parts of the head.

So let's take this to budgeting. I keep a real tight budget for my travel spending. $6,000 for 2 pax for 4 trips a year. We're fully aware that this is not much to work with. I set my Taiwan trips to be $1500. So if we work backwards, we'll need $500 for our food and transport which leaves us $1000 for our flight and accommodation. We can get our flight for $450 and try to keep accommodation within $550 for 7 days. It might sound tough, but we've been constantly hitting these budget numbers for the past few years. We go to Taiwan every year. 

My thinking is very simple. When we are in Singapore, we have control over the flight and accommodation. We can slowly choose and wait for deals. So we run a very tight and tough budget especially when we are still in Singapore. Cos we can always say, nevermind, let's wait for a better deal another time. When we are overseas, we will spend normally. But yet, we don't control too much. If there's a fancy restaurant we want to try, we'll try it, if there's a new food we'd like to experience, we do it. When I'm overseas, my thinking is, I've already flown 4 hours here, paid for flight and lodging, I'll enjoy it if it's reasonable. That's not to say I go crazy with my spending. I just loosen up the budget a bit. 
That's the thing about running a tight budget when in Singapore. Cos we still have control over everything. When we are in another country, we lose some control. So we let money be our power. So if we need to take a cab cos we got lost, then we just do it. 
Sometimes, we exceed the budget, by a bit. But cos the bulk of our planning has been settled in Singapore, anything we exceed is the spending money. So maybe we exceed it by $100. No real issues. 

IF we had been loose with our funds during the flight and accommodation planning, let's say $1200, this leaves us $300 on spending money for the trip. Possible to work within, but it's more challenging and there's a higher room for error. Not to mention, if we see something interesting to eat or try, we wouldn't be able to easily budget it in without exceeding the budget. The numbers just become harder to play around when we're already at the location. 

So this is what I think is an example of "Aim small miss small". Set a tough and tight budget, even when I miss it, I don't miss it by much. 

This mentality can also be used for many other things in life. 
For example - 
Setting savings goals. Let's say we want to save $1 million by 45 years old. It's tough, but probably possible. So we may be really frugal, go on less trips, invest wisely, etc. Even if we don't hit $1m, we may still end up with $800k. Still not too shabby.

Or students can aim to get top 5 in class. So study smart, study hard, etc. Must still study the right way, sometimes hard work isn't enough if the student is studying incorrectly. Let's say the student is doing most things right, even if he/she doesn't get top 5, maybe still end up in top 10. 

Same like weight loss 
Or training for a long distance run
Monthly budget
Sales targets, etc

Essentially, aim small miss small.
Set a tough but possible target. With some luck, maybe you can hit the target. Even if you miss it, you still get a good end result. 
It probably won't be wise to put the minimum result to be the target. Cos miss then...

The mind works in strange ways. I find that usually the mind can get close to the target, as long as the target is possible. So setting a low target, usually the mind will just barely make it there. 

I used to have this issue when running.
When I trained to run 2.4km, I got tired around 1.8km. 
When I trained to run 5km, I got tired around 4km.
When I trained 15km, I got tired at 10km. 
For me, I find that typically, my mind and body will strive to reach the target but barely get me there. But if I change the target and train for it, the mind and body will just exceed the previous target and adjust to the new "normal" target, but yet barely making the new target.

Anyway, hope you have found this post useful today.
Remember. Aim Small Miss Small


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I don't really like taking photographs. 
As in, I don't like being in them. I don't really mind being the one snapping them though. 

You see, when I was young, I didn't like being in photos, you know, those picture perfect poses, and smiles, etc. and last time, we needed to take nice shots cos it wasn't digital. So each pose needed to be done well. One shot, that's all we usually got. 

My mum kept telling me. Just take the pictures. Please.
I never understood why.
She would say, in her youth, she never had the chance to take pictures and she didn't have very many memories of her youth. Cameras weren't very common so it's not like they even had the opportunity.
And as I young kid, I didn't really bother.

But as I get older... I understand what she used to say. I look back at my old pictures ever once in awhile and I reminiscence about my youth. I see pictures when I used to stay at my grandmother's place or when I was a kid taken with my parents on a trip, etc. 

So now I try to take more pictures. But I don't like to take pictures which are picture perfect. I find those kind of pictures, without much character. I tend to take candid shots, make funny faces, etc. Personally, I just find picture perfect shots too... rehearsed. Yes, some group shots need to be picture perfect, I'm talking about all the other shots. Anyway, that's my preference. Cos when I look back at the pictures, I like to see what everyone was doing at that point in time, their real expressions, happiness, sadness, etc...

And now, with everything digital, it's so good right? Not really... I've found that as people take more pictures, the pictures now lose value. They become cheap. So cheap, that people don't look at them. They are just stored in a nice Cloud somewhere, or even just forgotten when people change their phones. I don't backup my pictures. I just take them and leave them on my phone. If I change phone, it's all gone. I do extract some of the pictures which I know I want to keep though.
But when was the last time you looked at your old pictures? I reckon, very seldom.

When do people usually look at their pictures? 
If you think about it, it's usually when you're cleaning up the house, OR when you're moving house. 
More often, it is when you are moving house. If people are going to start storing their pictures on Cloud, then, in the future, there's going to be NEVER a time to look at the pictures. Cos there won't be anything to look at when they move house or clean the place. 
No one is gonna suddenly think, "Oh today is a nice time to look at pictures, lets turn on the computer."
Come on, let's be realistic. Pictures on Cloud are probably going to be just forgotten.

So I now make it a point. To print out our pictures, especially after our trips. Every trip we have, we have a task. We need enough pictures to make a photobook. And for every trip, I tell my wife, we need to have a photobook done. Even if the photobook is not well designed, just whack in the pictures and print them out. Cos if there's no physical item, the photos will just be lost. My wife does the photobook designing, cos she likes the books to look pretty. If she let me do it, then it would just be a simple plain book with printed pictures. 
Nonetheless, to me, it is a very important task. Cos printing out the memories is crucial. It creates opportunities to flip through it when we accidentally stumble upon it. 

So I do suggest. Just print them out in whatever form and put them in a simple album. It doesn't need to look pretty. It just needs to exist physically. Cos in the digital world, it's very easily forgotten. Even though it's available at anytime and stored almost forever, it is rarely called upon. 

And since I opened the memories drawer, I also flipped through the folder which contained my Magic The Gathering (MTG) cards. Ah... another flood of memories. If any of you hung around Coronation Plaza or Serene Center around the prime years of MTG (1995-1999), you may have seen me around. I don't hang around Bishan.
I flipped though the folder and saw the first rare which I opened from the very first pack I bought.
A revised edition Fork.
Some crazy luck right :o)
This isn't the exact same card which I got when I started playing in Sec 1.
I intentionally bought a Fork for collection when I quit playing to keep the memory.

This got me thinking. What if someone offers to buy all my cards for a fair value.
Let's say all my Dragonball cards are worth $1000 and my MTG cards are worth $1000.
I don't know the actual valuation now, but let's just say...
And someone comes along and says he's willing to buy them all at $2000.
Would I sell them? It's a fair valuation. 
If it's a crazy valuation, like $10,000, then I would definitely sell them. Cos I could use the money to buy back my collection and still have excess. 
But what if it was a fair market valuation or even 10% more? 
Would I sell my memories for $2000-$2200?
I probably won't sell my Dragonball cards. They really are very old and happy memories of my primary schol days. 
As for the MTG cards, I probably would sell them all for a fair value, or even 10% discount for a bulk sale. Cos there are a lot of cards which I don't want anyway. I'd probably use the money and buy a few cards back for collection/memories and save the remaining cash.  

So how much are your memories worth? Priceless right? And yet, what value are memories if we aren't able to recall or trigger them a times? I'm sure many of you have stashes from your past kept somewhere, about your youth, or your kids when they were just born. Very sweet memories which seem so recent yet so many years past.
And I think all these memories are so important to us and that we should cherish them dearly, cos who are we, if not an accumulation of all our past memories and experiences?


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I was reading a couple of financial sites / blogs.
And most of them don't tell the whole truth about what they think.
I can hardly blame them. People like to read what they want to read. If you don't say nice things or things that are fairly expected, people don't go to the sites. So it makes good sense to bend the truth a little to make their message more acceptable to the masses. 

Note: When I say most readers or masses, I mean most average Singaporeans. Not the frugal financially discipline community.

For me, I don't really care, I typically say what I want. I have some readers, not a lot compared to other blogs/sites and I'm very grateful for my readers. So I always want to keep things as true as possible for my readers and not just put across a message just to seem less extreme. 

So about today's topic, when I used to get my salary, the company would pay to my OCBC account. It was the account for good interest last time. I had a standing instruction set up, which would transfer $2,000 from OCBC to my DBS account, which is my float account. Basically, that's my spending money for the month. It never changes year after year. $2,000 is plenty of money to work with. SO when my salary increases, the $2,000 still remains the same. Every increment goes straight to savings. I only adjust every few years, if/when life has some milestone changes.

So what's this nonsense about spending 80% and saving 20%, or whatever percentage which so many sites talk about. Ok I understand when someone just starts work, he/she may save less, that's fine, but why are we talking about percentages here. The necessary spending every month, is typically fixed. Why would you want to increase your spending just cos you have gotten an increment? Furthermore, you have already gotten used to spending X amount every month, so there's no real need to spend more right? Once you have gotten used to spending a lower amount, WHY INCREASE IT??? Then you'll get used to spending the larger amount, then the next year upgrade again?!

So you know, I get it, I get it, people like to upgrade, ok fine, so many writers would say set a budget of 80%/20% or whatever other percentage they recommend, so that people can enjoy their increments. Ok maybe I'll close one eye for this way of thinking...

But when I read these sites again, and they talk about how to spend the bonus, it's in some percentage breakdown again!? Hello? Want to upgrade how many times? Bonus should be saved. 100%. That's it. Daily spending has been budgeted for, by absolute amount or by percentage, why is there any need to splurge when getting the bonus? People should be recommended to live on their monthly salaries and keep within their budget so that they can plan for their retirement.

The thing is, I think, it's fine, IF the writers really believe that funds should be budgeted by percentage or IF they think readers should spend a share of their bonus. BUT, I believe, many financial writers DON'T believe in this. Look, many financial writers are frugal, save hard, and try to gain financial independence as early as possible. It is highly likely that they would have a hard budget of their monthly salary and save their increments, and when bonus comes, they would likely save 95% of it and maybe treat themselves to a nice meal. 

But I can't really blame them, if they were to write like me, and advocate a high savings rate and be tight on the bonus spending, who's going to read their sites? If most financial writers say to lock their monthly budget up for 10-15 years, and spend only 5-10% of their bonus, who's going to read it? If I were an average reader, I'd think this guy is mad and go to a "less crazy" site, who is going to advise me to save 10-20% and "allow" me to spend large chunks of my bonus. Because a financial writer says it, it must be right, so I feel better spending 80% of any income that I receive. It makes me feel better to spend cos someone who has financial knowledge has endorsed it.

And yet if we think about it, most financial writers ARE "crazy" most are considered extreme vs the normal context. Since they practice good financial discipline, it is highly likely that they are very prudent in their spending regardless of their increment or bonus. Which leads me to conclude that most of them are typically not telling the whole truth. What they would probably like to say is, "Spend a fixed amount every month. Save any increment. And give yourself a small treat and save 90-95% of your bonus." And yet they can't say that, cos it would turn off too many readers. 

So it's an unfortunate situation...

I'm not saying everyone SHOULD be extreme. To each his own choices. But rather, I'm highlighting that most financial writers would recommend a normal advice, so that they would seem more mainstream, and appeal to readers, whereas, their feelings, beliefs and their own practices differ significantly.

So, personally, what I'd recommend is spend a fixed amount every month, $2k, $3k, whatever, save the rest regardless of increment. Don't even adjust for inflation. Inflation is your "challenge" to cut your spending by the level of inflation every year.
As for bonus, save 100%, cos you won't know it even came into your bank account. When I set up my bank account, the bonus went into the OCBC account so I hardly noticed that it came in. Since I have gotten used to the fixed amount every month, why is there a need to spend anything more?

If you think this is too extreme, then just adjust the numbers to amounts which you feel that you can accept. That's your choice. You always have a choice.

The thing is, most readers would adjust their budget to whatever amounts they feel like, regardless of who they read. It just makes them feel better that they aren't deviating too far off the recommendation. So a "crazy" recommendation makes people feel worse than "normal" advice, so people like to read normal advice. 
But that's how the world works. Can't blame them. Readers like to read what they like to read. They read news that appeals to them, and reject or avoid news that they don't like to hear.

Life's just like that. Unfortunate but true.


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It's Monday.
What's there to be happy about? I understand. I used to hate Mondays and start feeling happier on Thursdays and Fridays. It's back to work and it probably sucks, or maybe it's just tolerable. 
These days my life is much better. Mondays I'm a bit sad cos my wife goes to work and leaves me all alone. Then I have to do most of my chores on Mondays, buying food and all that. It's fine. I'm not complaining. But there's nothing much to be happy about right? It's just another day.

As I thought about this last night, I came to a realization that happiness is very much like every other thing. You can get used to it. Like you can get used to spending, and thus, need to buy more stuff to make yourself feel happier. After the first purchase, another $1000 bag doesn't make you as happy anymore. Probably you'll want to get something more expensive for the thrill. Read about dopamine here. Same as when I used to go for hotel buffets, we used to go for $70/pax buffets, then upgraded to $100 buffets, then we ended up with a $200/pax Sunday brunch, and when I signed the $400 bill, I realized that the buffets had gotten out of hand and needed to be controlled better. 

So I think, we, as humans, can also get used to happiness. 
I think most of us, take happiness to be something which we need to do something to obtain. Like, we bought ourselves a nice meal, or we went on holiday, or we went to Sentosa, whatever, essentially, I think many of us would think that happiness is a proactive thing, that we need to do something to achieve happiness. 

Then I thought, what about stuff we don't do or didn't happen? Would stuff that we don't do make us happy? Or rather, did we get so used to it that we take it for granted? Cos it needed no special action from our own part, we think that it's a God given right. But yet, if we lose it, we would feel significantly unhappy. Not neutral (not happy or not unhappy), but significantly unhappy.

So I thought I'd list down some stuff which I think many of us take for granted.

1) Our health and the health of the people we care about
This is quite often over looked, we more often than not, just think we'd be young and healthy forever, then as time passes, things deteriorate and we don't pay too much attention, then by the time things gets really bad, it becomes hard to fix. 
Or suddenly someone gets diagnosed with some strange illness which just came out of nowhere.
I know of someone who disappeared in less than a year. From no problem to "have a good rest" within 12 months.

2) We stay in Singapore (location & Government)
Ok it's not the best place. Expensive, blah blah blah. 
And yet, it's one of the only countries which is extremely safe, other countries are safe, US, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia. Many countries are safe, provided you don't go out at night, don't hang around in dark corners, etc. These countries have crime rates that sound high, but in truth, they are normal. It is Singapore that is abnormal. Singapore is abnormally safe. 

In Singapore, you also have minimal racism. We grow up with other races in our schools and in army and we learn to live along with them. We celebrate their festivals and eat most of the same food. 

The government helps you to find a place to stay as long as you are fairly hardworking. CPF and HDB. Let's not talk about the outliers. Most Singaporeans are doing ok. Might not be great, but ok, and if they make changes to their lives and be more frugal, they would probably do better.

Many other things we take for granted are from the very fact that we stay in Singapore.
Like fast internet. It's easy to get cheap 300mbps - 1gbps for home and 3G/4G network for your phone. Many other countries do not have such speeds and fast network coverage. We're not the best as compared to Korea, but if we compare even against the USA... we're still ahead.

We can't compare every aspect against the best, to be reasonable, we need to compare with a fairly reasonable benchmark. Can't be we take the best aspects of every single country and compare all against Singapore right. For a fair comparison, we should take an average country, not too good, not too bad and well developed and compare against what we have. 

Many other stuff just cos we stay in Singapore.
Another thing taken for granted is our Visa-less travel, Singaporean passport is one of the best in the world. 
We have a large variety of food choices at convenient locations.
Good enough education for everyone. 
Good enough medical quality and at ready access. 
No natural disasters.

Ok, enough about staying in Singapore. I have my opinion about the Government and all that, and stuff I don't really agree with, but I'll take the good with the bad. And truthfully, we are fortunate enough to be living in Singapore. 

3) The MRT did not breakdown today
Hey, it breaks down all the time these days. Be grateful it didn't breakdown today. We've taken it for granted that MRTs haven't broken down in the past 10 years when it started, and now when it starts breaking down, we are unhappy about it. So let's be happy it didn't breakdown again today, considering that I doubt they will EVER be able to fix it properly, Singaporeans should get used to it instead.

4) You didn't lose or break anything today
You probably didn't break your phone or lose your keys or anything for that matter. 
I thought I lost my keys yesterday, luckily was able to find it. 
So I think I should be grateful today that the lights are working at home, the appliances are working fine, my phone is fine, everything is all good.

5) Having my morning coffee
It just seems so normal that I have my morning coffee that I take it for granted. So when I'm having my coffee, I feel neutral, but I guess I'm just used to it, cos if I don't have it, I feel sad. But I shouldn't feel sad when I don't have my coffee, cos I didn't drink coffee when I was young. So actually, I should feel neutral when I don't have coffee, and happy when I have coffee. But since I've gotten used to it, I feel neutral when having coffee, and sad when I don't have coffee. So I think I should once again appreciate my coffee and be grateful for the drink.
(This point is with regards to whatever daily habit you may have.)

6) There's no war around where we are
We take this very much for granted. 
I was reading a blog on how to make doenjang (this is something like Korean miso paste). So the blog posted on how to ferment the beans for 2 years.
There was a commenter who was a girl from Syria. Her post went something like this "Thanks for sharing how to make doenjang, I've set it aside to ferment for 2 years, but considering the condition of where I'm staying, I hope I'll still be alive when it's ready."
(Not the exact words, but something like this)
It was quite shocking when I read it, cos I never really thought about it. Cos in 2 years, I'd probably be alive. But when living in a warzone, a bomb shell might make her never be able to taste her own doenjang.

7) My neighbour
I'm grateful my neighbour is reasonable. They don't throw stuff all over, isn't a mess, isn't noisy, whatever. They live their own lives, we pass by, we say "hi", I'm grateful for that. 
Cos it's a random chance, I get someone who leaves a lot of stuff outside the house, is noisy, dirty, throws cigarette butts all over, etc. So I think I should be happy that I have the neighbour that I have. 

​8) My wife
I have to remind myself, my wife allows me to be unemployed in peace. Yes, we've discussed and come to a common understanding, but there are folks, who are pestered by their spouse to continue working even though they have enough, or one party has enough but the other party does not allow the person to leave the job cos they just want to earn more. I am always happy that I have my wife who we can discuss everything and work together for our combined happiness. 
I'm sure each of us take our partners for granted in our own ways. Like who takes care of the kids, or who does the laundry or cleans the toilet, etc. So even if your partner doesn't really support you in your early retirement, also be grateful, he/she is cleaning to toilet, cos if he/she isn't cleaning it, means you have to.

So there's quite a lot to be happy about today. Stuff that we always take for granted, but if we didn't have them, we'd be unhappy, so if we think like that, then, we should be happy that we have them. 

So if you think your phone camera is too blur, then remember, we once were marveling at a 5 megapixel Nokia phone, or if your phone screen is slightly cracked, then remember we once lived without phones or Facebook. Or if you think your internet speed is slow... HELLO we used to connect with dial up. So relax and feel happy today, that things are better than yesterday or at least not worse off than yesterday.


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Everyone thinks they can handle large amounts of money. Like, what's so hard to handle right? More is better, especially when we're the frugal community.

I personally don't think so.
For us, we saved my AUM while working. So every few months, we would just buy some stocks and slowly built up our portfolio. It was simple to manage cos it wasn't a lot of money every few months.

I started feeling some discomfort when I was rebalancing our portfolio a few years later. I was selling down some stocks and consolidating our positions in other stocks when I noticed that I needed to make large purchases to consolidate. It wasn't just a bit at a time anymore. That was when I realized that handling larger sums of AUM wasn't as easy as it sounds. I was fortunate that I accumulated it slowly cos it allowed me to get used to the numbers gradually and that made me confident in making larger orders cos percentage wise, the numbers were still correct.
If it's 10% City Dev then it's 10%
So $5,000 or $50,000. If I used to buy $500, well, now is going to have to be $5,000 allocations. Ok maybe I might do $2,500 in City Dev and $2,500 in Capitalnd, but no way would I be doing 100x $500 different stocks right. So the numbers which I was used to just had to be scaled accordingly.

I was talking to my friend recently. He made a huge chunk on a risky leveraged bet and got some crazy returns. We were discussing about being ready to handle large amounts of money and he admitted that it wasn't easy to get used to it. He's a close friend of mine with some financial discipline so he said he locked up the money for a while and took out only what he was used to. He's planning to sit on the funds for a bit before taking them out for reallocation. I think that's pretty wise. Cos the mind might not be ready for the sudden fortune. Everything needs to scale up accordingly but the mind is not ready to suddenly scale everything by whatever multiple that sudden fortune has brought.

So if you think that you are ready to handle a sudden fortune, you may want to think about it again. Am I ready? I can truthfully say, "I do not know." Let's say I win the toto Chinese new year ang bao draw. Suddenly I have $10m in my account. I will likely follow my friend and sit on the funds for a bit before deciding on what to do with it and how to allocate it. Maybe I will look at my bank statement daily, until I get used to the numbers that I am seeing before deciding what to do next.

You may think that as a frugal person it's not so easy to go astray, but I'd prefer to err on the side of caution. Maybe I might increase my spending by just a little bit, go to further places for my holidays, or get that Mercedes which I was hoping for, then... Since I have so much money, I might want to get a new Mercedes instead of an old one. And before I know it, I maybe down $5m. Hey you never know... So I'd prefer to minimize the probability of that happening. Cos there's a high chance that I would loosen my spending a bit if I encounter a sudden fortune.

Hey... Come on... I'm only human.


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Everyone loves to feel good. That's what makes us successful. Most humans are driven by the chemical dopamine. It's supposedly the feel good hormone which is released when we do certain things, like sex, chocolates, finishing a task, getting praised, etc. Essentially it rewards us for stuff we do, so we continue doing it.

Dopamine is also released when people gets likes on Facebook. Which results in people posting many things just to get likes. It makes them feel accepted and release dopamine and they feel good. So they keep doing it.

However, it's like a drug, when you get used to it, you need more to make you feel happy. So if you used to get 10 Likes, now you might need 100 Likes to feel happy.

So let's look at saving. You save $10 when you were young. You got pretty happy, then $50, then $100, then $1,000. By the time you reach $50,000, you start feeling cold to these amounts. The next ,lies tone you set for yourself is $100,000, then $500k, $1 million. As the numbers get bigger, the time it takes to get "high" gets longer. It takes so long to get your injection of dopamine.

Next let's look at spending. Your friend buys a Hermes bag, she gets a shot of dopamine, feels happy, then she posts it on Facebook. Another shot of dopamine, then she brings it to office. Her friends all exclaim about how jealous they are that she has such a luxurious bag. Another shot of the drug. Woohoo... One action, so much "high". It's so easy to want to do it again. But guess what, maybe you need something bigger next time, cos buying something cheaper won't have the same effect on herself or the Facebook audience or her colleagues. So... Well you get the picture.

The thing is, it's so easy to get "high" buying stuff. You just need to spend, and you can do it regularly, at anytime you want. It's so easy for the brain to request for the drug. That's why it's called retail therapy. Cos on a bad day, spending makes one happy. You'll get a load of that wonderful drug.

Looking back at saving again... It may take 1 year to save $25k. That's one shot of dopamine. And the saving community doesn't share this on Facebook. Like... no one's gonna post "Woohoo saved my fist $25k today" with a picture of their bank statement. So no other supply of that wonderful drug.

If the next milestone is $100k, then... Another 3 years... It's just not that fun. The brain doesn't like it. Also, it doesn't help of you set cheap milestones. Cos the brain knows you're cheating yourself.
Imagine, you save $100k, and you tell yourself that you will be happy at $110k... That just doesn't cut it. The brain doesn't work that way. It's more likely you'd think, "another $10k... It's good, but no big deal. I'll need another $50k more to feel something."
The dopamine caused by AUM is the same as the release by getting a bag. You need a bigger stimulus to get the same "high". And since saving takes long, you probably don't get high as much as just spending.

Which is why the brain isn't really wired to save. It wants to feel happy and saving just takes too long. Now, that's not to say that there's no other ways to get high. There's plenty of ways, but the act of saving itself isn't going to make one high and keep calling for more, cos it's not easy to get the release of dopamine from savings. The easier way is to just spend.

For me, I like to get my dopamine from food and travel. Yes, I eat cheaply on normal days. That's our rule. But on weekends, we go out and try good value nice stuff. It must be nice and it must be good value. So it's not as easy to find as just fancy stuff where we can just pay for it. It makes us keep our eyes open for the good deals that come along.

Next, we like short trips. As previously mentioned, our travel budget for the year is $6,000 and we allocate it to 4 trips so it's probably something like,
Taiwan - $1,800
Japan - $3,000
SEA x 2 - $1,200 (Penang, Bangkok, Batam, etc)

This really keeps us entertained cos we get our dopamine planning for the trip, anticipating the trip, going for the trip, and telling stories after the trip, and by the time all that is over, the next time is being prepped up so we get a constant flow of that wonderful drug.

So I suppose the important lesson today is, we probably need to pay some money to get our fix of dopamine. I suppose that's normal. The most efficient way is to make the money spent worth it. Don't get the dopamine from simple purchases that will just fade away quickly, but rather spend wisely to make the dopamine experience last as long as possible. Simple material purchases just expire so quickly and it's just inefficient and wasteful buying more and more stuff just to make the brain happy.



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What is a normal family?
Think about it. Everyone wants to have or live as a normal or better than normal family.
So let's start with some definitions.
For this purpose, I'll say that a family is the personal self & partner, the parents, and the kids, if any. I've defined it as such, cos if any of the parties have any issues, then it usually ends up affecting the personal self.

So, what is considered a normal family that many people desire?
Well, I would think that for the self and partner, both of them love each other, quarrels are inevitable, but they are quickly settled within 2 days and things get back to normal, they both are OK financially, might not be well off, but they aren't struggling. No extra issues are plaguing them, such as extra martial affairs, substance abuse, gambling, etc. And they are both healthy for their age.
(Light drinking or smoking is considered still reasonable.)

As for the parents, normal parents would be in a similar situation as the personal self and partner. Financially, they are ok, no extra issues, and their relationship with each other is fine. They don't disturb the self and partner too much in their daily lives and don't get too unnecessarily involved with the upbringing of the kids to the point of unreasonableness. They are reasonably healthy for their age. They may or may not be alive, but when they were alive, they were in the above mentioned situation.

As for kids, they are respectful and aren't delinquents, they study reasonably hard, don't overspend, may or may not do well in school, but are ready to progress to the next stages I life.

Sounds ok? Seems reasonable right?
Everyone would love to have or be born in a nice normal family at least, and if born rich, then even better right?

WRONG...

Cos, the word normal means "conforming to a standard; usual, typical, or expected"
Which means... Average.
Which means, if many other families are not normal, then actually, a somewhat dysfunctional family IS normal

Considering that there are at least 6 parties involved in the family, the couple and 4 parents, the probability that one party is 'not behaving well' is very high.

It is very common that there is someone in the family which is causing issues.
For example,
Somehow, it is quite common for parents not to sleep in the same room. I've heard of quite a number of such instances.
Then it is also quite common for guys or dads to have some sort of extra marital encounters. This could come in the form of a short term affair, a long term one, a commercial transaction, etc.
Then there are gambling issues, or substance abuse.
There are also cases where one parent abandons the family.
A lot of couples also have problems with the in-laws. Especially females with their mother-in-law.
Not to mention, many couples disagree on how to bring up the kids, AND also issues arise when the parents get involved when raising or taking care of the kids.

There are so many issues which people face where we don't really hear about.
What we see is what they want us to see. And what they will show the public is naturally the best picture that they can paint.

So being normal is actually, to have a somewhat dysfunctional family. There is always someone 'misbehaving'. The perfect scenario I painted above is exactly what it is. A perfect scenario. It typically doesn't exist. If it does exist for you, then you are considered very lucky.

And I haven't even included siblings, cos as more parties are included in the equation, there's more chance that there's someone who somewhat affects your overall happiness due to their misdemeanor.

So if you've ever thought "if only I had a normal family", well, whatever you're wishing for, it isn't normal. Cos it's normal for almost all families to have some issues. And you'll have to work around it. That's just what life is. Everyone faces their own issues and has to overcome them. What you see of other people, that's just the picture which they are showing the world. Their issues, rarely will they share with others.
So rest assured, that whatever family you are born into and/or whatever challenges you are facing, your family is probably already normal.


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Every once in a while, I think about doing this.... I haven't actually don't it before, just that I think it would be fun.

Most, if not all people, judge others by visuals. It doesn't matter what's real or not. Take for example, food, many restaurants serve similar things, but yet those with better presentation charges a premium for the visuals.

There are many people who buy a lot of stuff to make themselves feel better or to make others jealous of them, or to make people think that they are doing better than they really are.
In truth, you never really know anyone's financial position unless you know them very well. What you see is just what they want you to see and may or may not be the true depiction of where they are in life.

The people around me all pretty much know me as a frugal or stingy guy, depends on who, others may think I'm lazy and broke so... Whatever. It doesn't matter to me.
But every once in a while, I think of putting up a show to throw them off a bit.

So I think of decking myself and my wife out with some flashy stuff. For most guys, the items most noticed by others is, the belt, watch, wallet and shoes.
For females, people would notice the ring, bag, wallet, earrings, watch and shoes.

Buying the whole set for me would cost maybe
Watch - $10,000
Belt, wallet, shoes -$3,000
Total - $13,000

For my wife
Watch - $10,000
Bag - $3,000
Ring - $10,000
Earrings, shoes, wallet - $3,000
Total - $26,000

Around $40,000 for the both of us.

So I've considered getting a full set of 'replica' stuff.
Which would probably cost $5,000 or less for the both of us.

It would be pretty fun to see the reactions of the people who I encounter, like friends and in-laws who I know are still highly influenced by these material stuff.
Especially those folks who I know will feel compelled to compare and will be easily influenced to try to get something comparable to match off.

Now, I'm not someone who appreciates such stuff, so getting a replica doesn't affect me one bit. Some people don't buy replica stuff cos it doesn't make themselves feel good. Cos they know that it's not real so they don't feel proud to acquire such stuff. However, for me, I don't care, cos the whole objective for getting such stuff is pretty much to just prove a point and to make others jealous.
To me, getting a $3,000 item vs a $20 item is the same if they both provide the same function.

Then I think about the cost... $5,000 is still a lot of money. That's my full year's travel budget, I get all turned off by that quantum. $5,000 just to prove a point and make others jealous? No thanks. To me, it's just a little bit of fun, and yet, I know it's not worth it.
Maybe one day I'll be bored enough to splurge on 2 his & hers Rolex watches for $500 and post it on Facebook like what so many other people do.

Although this post is about making the folks around you 'jealous', I doubt anyone would be going to get a bunch of replica stuff. Cos the thing is, most people who care about their image will want to get the real stuff, it won't make them happy getting the fake stuff, and as for those who don't bother about such material stuff, like the good people who read this blog, since they care about such stuff, then they also won't care about buying the replicas to 'impress' others.
Basically, readers would probably feel the same way as me, and think that it is a waste of money anyway.

Although, I do realize, that actually, there are a lot of people who are already doing it.
So next time if you see someone showing off his 'stuff', hey, you never know they may be having the same idea as me and getting a bunch of replicas.

I once heard a 'rich' lady talking to the sales girl at Max Gordan, which is a diamond simulant shop. She said, "I always buy the real one, then keep it in a safe, then buy a simulant to wear."
Real or not, no one knows. Maybe she's just saying that to try to impress the salesgirl, so that she would not look cheapo by purchasing at a diamond simulant shop. But who knows. Maybe her story is real...

So next time you see someone who has some fancy stuff and you think "woah", think again. You never know how much the person really paid for the stuff. You also don't know how much the person has sacrificed to afford the stuff as well.


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