I have been really lucky. So have many others my age. We have not been through any real crisis, like war or depression or famine. Because of the country I am staying in, there are also no natural disasters. No earthquakes, no volcanoes, no deserts, no droughts, no sandstorms, no hails, no typhoons, hurricanes and cyclones. Even the tsunami bypassed us!
Being a developed country, there is also no poverty and no hunger. The “poverty” people feel when they go bankrupt is nothing as compared to those in real poverty. No racial and political protests and civil wars. Maybe that is why people of my generation (a bit older and younger) have been taking life easy. We have been taking things for granted. Complaining about everything and anything under the sun. We have been saying how bad the country is, how “unrecgonised” our talents are, how rigid the system is.
All true in a way, but if one comes to think of it, we are lucky to be able to go to school. To learn how to read and write. To be able to have resources at our doorsteps and fingertips. If one is not smart enough or not inclined or motivated enough, then there is no one else we can blame. People say they hate reading, they do not bother keeping up with the times. But they should be thankful they could even have the opportunity to read and write.
People say they are stuck in a dead end job, hard to make ends meet. But they should be grateful they still have a roof over their heads and earning a salary. I am of the generation that have not experienced any wars. I was born during the time when the country had become independent, no longer under our colonial masters, and split from our neighbours.
I grew up during the time when the nation was fast developing into a world class country. And I was born and brought up in a family that has never experienced staying in public housing. There had never been instances where there was no food on the table, or my parents asking me to stop schooling because they could not afford the fees.
Like any young kid, I yearned to have more, but still, I had been very fortunate. I never experienced the first World War, nor the Great Depression, nor the second World War, nor the fight for independence. I had never experienced the recession of the late eighties, where my parents were luckily holding rather stable jobs then. Even the Asian Financial Crisis of the late nineties did not affect me that much. I was still in school.
The turmoil after 911, the tsunami, all did not affect me, as I was in the civil service, thus had an “iron rice bowl”. Where I saw my peers being affected by the Asian Financial Crisis (some had to downgrade their lifestyles), and the aftermath of 911 and the tsunami saw many who could not find jobs or got released from their jobs, as that was the time when most just graduated.
Now, with the rest of the world being in turmoil, I have finally sat up to take notice. Now I wish I had paid attention during Economics classes, or shown more interest in the subject. Now I wish I could have gone into the Finance line instead, so I would not be kept in the dark so much about what was going on.
Seems like almost every decade since the twentieth century, something happened. The first world war of the 1910s. The Great Depression of the 1930s. The second world war of the 1940s. The fight to independence of the 1960s. The stock market crash of the 1980s. The Asian Financial Crisis of the 1990s.
Now, just one decade into the twenty-first century, things start happening on bigger scales. The terrorist attacks of 2001. The bombing of the London Tube in 2005. The current financial crisis going around. What will the future bring?
Being a developed country, there is also no poverty and no hunger. The “poverty” people feel when they go bankrupt is nothing as compared to those in real poverty. No racial and political protests and civil wars. Maybe that is why people of my generation (a bit older and younger) have been taking life easy. We have been taking things for granted. Complaining about everything and anything under the sun. We have been saying how bad the country is, how “unrecgonised” our talents are, how rigid the system is.
All true in a way, but if one comes to think of it, we are lucky to be able to go to school. To learn how to read and write. To be able to have resources at our doorsteps and fingertips. If one is not smart enough or not inclined or motivated enough, then there is no one else we can blame. People say they hate reading, they do not bother keeping up with the times. But they should be thankful they could even have the opportunity to read and write.
People say they are stuck in a dead end job, hard to make ends meet. But they should be grateful they still have a roof over their heads and earning a salary. I am of the generation that have not experienced any wars. I was born during the time when the country had become independent, no longer under our colonial masters, and split from our neighbours.
I grew up during the time when the nation was fast developing into a world class country. And I was born and brought up in a family that has never experienced staying in public housing. There had never been instances where there was no food on the table, or my parents asking me to stop schooling because they could not afford the fees.
Like any young kid, I yearned to have more, but still, I had been very fortunate. I never experienced the first World War, nor the Great Depression, nor the second World War, nor the fight for independence. I had never experienced the recession of the late eighties, where my parents were luckily holding rather stable jobs then. Even the Asian Financial Crisis of the late nineties did not affect me that much. I was still in school.
The turmoil after 911, the tsunami, all did not affect me, as I was in the civil service, thus had an “iron rice bowl”. Where I saw my peers being affected by the Asian Financial Crisis (some had to downgrade their lifestyles), and the aftermath of 911 and the tsunami saw many who could not find jobs or got released from their jobs, as that was the time when most just graduated.
Now, with the rest of the world being in turmoil, I have finally sat up to take notice. Now I wish I had paid attention during Economics classes, or shown more interest in the subject. Now I wish I could have gone into the Finance line instead, so I would not be kept in the dark so much about what was going on.
Seems like almost every decade since the twentieth century, something happened. The first world war of the 1910s. The Great Depression of the 1930s. The second world war of the 1940s. The fight to independence of the 1960s. The stock market crash of the 1980s. The Asian Financial Crisis of the 1990s.
Now, just one decade into the twenty-first century, things start happening on bigger scales. The terrorist attacks of 2001. The bombing of the London Tube in 2005. The current financial crisis going around. What will the future bring?
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