Harry Dresden and Sean Drummond

When I first started reading from Sean Drummond's perspective in The Kingmaker more than 10 years ago, I was instantly hooked. Here was a murder mystery fest, fronted by a wise-talking, bone-breaking all action hero, which was just the type of humour I craved. Hence, from time to time, I would look out for further books in the Sean Drummond series. While Private Sector and Man in the Middle did thrill, there seemed to be a pattern in each of the plots, whereby the hero would be taken on a merry on round by associates/enemies, but still end up on top in the end. Recently, I gave The Night Crew a go, and while Sean Drummond does move up the career ladder across the series, there does not seem to be much character development, and the jokes just dont seem so funny anymore.

Compare this with Harry Dresden, wizard for hire. Initially, the first two or three books in the Dresden Files series also seemed to take similar arcs, whereby the hero solves mysteries to pay his rent. However, from the third book, Grave Peril onwards, things take a dramatic and irreversible turn, when Harry's girlfriend, Susan is turned into a half vampire and he ends up starting a war between the White Wizards and the Red Vampires. From this point on, the perceived repetition ends, and Harry ends up in a variety of roles (Warden, Winter Knight, Ghost), and levels up in terms of skills and magical powers. The supporting cast is also given time to shine, be it his holy dog Mouse, or his doctor friend turned Jedi. I guess it also helps to have long term enemies in the book, for additional drama.

All in all, I'm looking forward to the next instalment of the Dresden Files!

Travellers' Tales of Old Singapore

The book is a compilation of writings of visitors to Singapore, spanning from the time of founding, around 1819, to the British surrender in 1942.

Of more interest were the accounts of early Singapore, where the Temenggong was suspected of being a pirate, to stories of the Orang Laut, who were highly skilled in both swimming and spear fishing.

Early Singapore did indeed seem to be ruled by pirates, with the beaches laden with skulls. But the island, with its numerous smaller offshore islands, seems to have been very picturesque, with some tourists making visits of the area to swim and play in pools of clear water and wonderful beaches. One wonders that if these skills and nature's wonders had been preserved, it would be a key part of our tourism industry today.

It is also interesting to know that there were already people traveling for health, and later, tourists making round the world trips a hundred years ago. How rich were they to afford it!

Other than that, the writings seem to be heavily influenced by the nature of the writer themselves. The imperialist wrote of lazy natives and their barbaric customs, while the poetic traveler wrote of how beautiful and exotic these foreign practices were. It is quite clear here how pre-informed prejudices were being applied here, such is human nature.

The Diary of a Young Girl

Just finished this short auto-biography of Anne Frank's experience of living in the Secret Annex and so many thoughts are running through my head.

Firstly, it tells the complexity of emotions one goes through during puberty- the loneliness, the feeling that no one understands you, the yearning for companionship, especially of the opposite sex. I hope J will pass through it with the feeling that her parents understand and support her, and not wind up seeking solace in the arms of strangers. This is no easy task as by all accounts, Otto Frank was a great dad but Anne had no feeling of closeness to him.

Through the entries we also see Anne's maturity, strength in character, depth in thought and ability to bring across these thoughts clearly. It is really a pity that her life ended prematurely, and in such tragic circumstances.

The planned extermination of a particular breed of people is senseless. Even if there were some bad nuts, well there are bad nuts in all races, creeds and religions. Nothing justifies such killing. What's shocking is that a whole nation either became involved or turned a blind eye to the killing, which shows how broken humans can be.  Even worse, there are holocaust deniers who try to claim that such events never occurred. We have to constantly educate the younger generations, to prevent such things from ever occurring again.

Lastly, war is a terrible affair that breaks up families and kills not just the fighting soldiers but also innocent civilians. Reading of the fear, hunger, desperation, it takes great courage, wits and luck to survive and I doubt that I may make it through if I was alive then.

Defending the Lion City: The Armed Forces of Singapore

Another great read which i neglected to write about, and with the passage of time I seem to have forgotten many details.

What I do recall is that the writer did some really comprehensive research into the SAF, and the reader gets a firm appreciation of how small the armed forces were at the point of independence. While it is common knowledge that we had two infantry battalions then, I only found out from the book that many soldiers within the ranks were Malaysians, so our own army was really nothing much to write about.

Hence we get to better understand the needs of conscription, and also in building up our NCOs and officers within the ranks. While we may get criticized for enlisting Israeli aid in building up our army, the reader also gets to know that it was not as if we went out seeking for Israeli expertise. It was through a selection, and other countries were considered as well - with the Swiss telling us that there was no need for an army.

Many other interesting details in the books, such as on-off sweet/sour relations with our neighbours, and that at the point of writing, Singapore was able to call upon a larger fighting force than them as well!

I also get a better understanding of how in other countries, the armed forces plays an internal security role, while this is not so in Singapore. In addition, the Singapore situation is unique, in that the political leaders keep a firm grasp on the army, to prevent power from falling into out-sider hands ;)

Surely you must be joking Mr Feynman

I first heard of Richard Feynman about 10 years ago, when an ex-classmate enthused about how reading Dr Feynman's book made him want to pursue a career in physics. Intrigued, I picked up one of his textbooks but soon gave up as I was not able to follow as quickly as I wanted.

Fast forward to present day and I came across two of his semi autobiographical works : 'Surely you are joking, Mister Feynman!'  and 'What do you care what other people think?'

These collections of stories were not written by him, but were rather written by his friends who had heard of these stories recounted by him, and decided that the stories had to be preserved for posterity.

The first story that stood out for me was on Feynman as a kid, where through his perseverance, he taught himself how to invent machines such as intruder alarms, and also how to fix appliances such as radios.  That gave me a brief bout of inspiration which lasted one weekend, where I made my own excel spreadsheet to help with work (that my colleagues ended up not using).

Another interesting story is about how he (again) taught himself to pick locks and then safes , which reminded me of my brief interest in lock picking some ten years back. I once opened some other peoples' locked drawers by fluke, and panicked when I could not lock them back.

Yet another tells of how his father taught him to learn through understanding and not by rote, and how his father instilled in him that sense of curiosity that enabled him to be a scientist. All these in spite of the fact that his father never received much formal education. I can only hope to be able to do the same for my children one day.

Some other stories are similarly inspirational, such as where he participates in the Manhattan Project and meets all sorts of legendary scientists, some are pretty cool, such as when he learns to draw and play Brazilian bongo drums. There are also serious issues, such as his investigation of the Challenger shuttle disaster, and also the state of education in general.

The books are also not without controversy, as Feynman shares about experimenting with drugs (though he does say that it's not good for mental health).  His stories also attracted criticism from his peers such as Murray Gell-Mann who remarked that while Feynman was a brilliant scientist, he spent much effort generating anecdotes about himself. Gell-Mann also complained that Feynman's books failed to give Gell-Manm credit where due, and in the end, Feyman did have to issue revisions to his stories to make them more balanced.

All in all, a good read which gives some insight into a fascinating life.

Alibaba - The House that Jack Built

First of all, this is not an autobiography, which I was initially quite disappointed about. Nonetheless, the author is close to the inner circles of Alibaba, having been an advisor to the group in its infancy stages.  Hence, the reader still does manage to get a pretty good understanding of how Jack Ma built up the current day Alibaba empire.

There are quite a few cool things in the Alibaba story. It managed to overcome eBay's initial dominance of the Chinese consumer-to-consumer market, eventually kicking them out of China altogether. That said, it is apparently very difficult for foreign companies to successfully navigate the Chinese market, and from the book, eBay also significantly contributed to its own downfall through a series of blunders due to its arrogance.

Overall I felt the book is clear and well written. The writer does a great job in describing the 'iron triangle' which reinforces Alibaba's success.  There are also many players and sub-plots to tell about (which could end up confusing) but these are also led into very nicely.
The Alibaba story also shows that the model of plowing money into startups does work, since Alibaba and Taobao are all profitable businesses now.

There is also the controversy of how Alipay was divested from the Alibaba group, into a company directly owned by Jack Ma. In this respect, I came to appreciate having a neutral point of view from the writer, instead of reading from an autobiography.

Overall, a great read. My conclusion is that to succeed in business, one needs a lot of tenacity, hard work and grit, but also a huge dose of luck as well.

Adventure Capitalist

Its the last day of my one week break and I couldnt be more depressed. It has been pretty restful, and i do not look forward to getting up early, given that it is now mandatory to get up at least once a night.

During this break, i've managed to catch up on my gaming, so much so that i eventually grew bored and finally got round to reading on friday. I suspect i've read of Jim Roger's books before, but i cant really remember. Anyhow, this is one is about his second round-the-world trip, this time in a car (with his fiancee-and-then-wife) instead of a motorbike.

Through the book, we get to follow Rogers through many different countries, each in various states of development (or despair). At the same time, Rogers gives his assessment on whether he found the country a good place to invest. Typically, he gives his take on the future of the country - whether the Government is sound, investing in capital, what is their monetary policy like, and how much red tape there is.

Not surprisingly, what stood out for me how important a good government is. You have former freedom fighters turned dictators, corrupt or simply incompetent bureaucrats, and finally in the former Soviet Union, no government at all, where the country is just falling apart. Rogers has little love for politicians, who in his opinion frequently ruin the economy in order to buy votes. These all have a profound impact of people's lives, since the health of the economy directly affects people's livelihoods and wealth. Irresponsible leaders also have no care for the environment, which also impacts jobs and more importantly, health.

Rogers also has a very clear idea of how the economy works, and hence can easily come to a judgement on whether a certain country is a good place to invest. This is something i am lacking knowledge in, even though i am quite sure i studied macroeconomics in JC.

Another interesting point is how Rogers frequently predicts the future of various countries. Many countries today were carved out as a result of war, and many are unstable due to racial/religious tensions. While it may be true that such countries eventually divide themselves into smaller and more homogenous countries, I find it hard to understand how these will benefit the people in the long term, given that such an arrangement will simply make it harder for them to tolerate and understand the different practices of people different from yourselves. Rogers also frequently pushes for the freedom of movement of people, as this encourages competition and innovation. As such, it should actually be better for people to learn how to get along, rather than enclosing ourselves in individual communities.

All in all, a fascinating read. Rogers actually travelled through many war zones, and it definitely takes a great amount of EQ to stay alive in such situations. I am pretty sure i would not survive such a trip. Not only is my EQ low, i suspect having blonde hair and blue eyes and American may have played a part in it as well.

Rogers is actually living in Singapore with his wife and two kids now, as he wants to his daughters to speak Mandarin - one of the most important languages for the future!