Log 21-8-13 / Breakfast with three fuckers

This morning I dropped by to join my tiny Singaporean community for Bak Kut Teh – to me it is an opportunity to fellowship, network and further extent my sphere of influence – business is after all about networking (bear this in mind always if you want to be successful in business – you need to develop a people orientated personality – you even need to be comfortable and be at ease with people – and the best way to do this is to practise, practise and practise.)

As a general rule of thumb I try to avoid any discussion concerning politics and religion early in the morning. Experience informs me, it’s best to keep to light subjects such as the weather, hobbies, family and friends if one desires to come across as congenial, affable and friendly.

During breakfast when we were all sitting in a large round table – I caught wind of what seemed to be a heated conversation in the next table – there was a loud fellow accompanied by two other businessmen drumming down a poor chap loudly just because he did not agree with Mini Lee’s crocodile teary eyed speech – what I regarded as bad taste was how this obnoxious fuckers proceeded to tear apart this poor chap in front of everyone just for voicing out his opinion – who the fuck do they think they are? Why are they behaving like the overseas division of the MDA aka thought police – that was at least how they came to me and everyone else just then – these three businessmen are new to our circle – I thought to myself and judging from the way they carry themselves, they must have been captains in their industry, heavyweights unlike poor house me who is just a pocket battleship farmer with a miserable veggie plot.

But even if you happen to be rich and successful what right do you have to muzzle people from speaking out on their objects of interest or what they genuinely believe to be true – besides the very idea of three against one just rubs me all the wrong – so I got up and went to the next table just about the time when this obnoxious businessman was pummeling this poor chap who looked very much like a shivering rabbit before a cobra.

“….Whatever our grumbles, whatever we may gripe about sometime, it is not perfect but by international standards they are all excellent and that is a fact.”

That was how the fat obnoxious man put it (I can’t remember his words exactly, but I remembered he spat out the words ‘fact.’) as he and his buddies glared at this poor chap who looked so small that morning. He must have wished he could just go ‘poof!’ and disappear.

That was when I pitched in, “If what you say is true. Then perhaps you can share with all of us – why is it if everything is excellent as you say it is – then how is it by the same benchmark of international standard that you keep referring too are Singaporeans rank as the worlds most unhappiest people? After all that is also fact. So it seems there are so many facts out there. We can more or lesss cherry pick any fact we wish to fit our arguments….yes?”

The whole restaurant fell silent like a tomb – you could even hear an ant tip toeing – I realized then, I may have gone and tad too far – so I adjusted and cracked a joke by pretending to sob and saying to myself, “forgot to take my medication again…” everyone burst out laughing and soon they were back chowing earnestly again.

Thereafter those three fucks glared menacingly at me – had they continue to keep quiet, look down and just pretended to eat their pork chops – I would have been happiest to let the matter rest – but no, one of the buddies of this obnoxious fellow even had the gall to even look me up and down like a jaga kereta boy. I felt like giving them all a round house Bruce Lee flying kick and slitting their throats. At that point, they must have surmised I was a planter – as these days only landowners go around in bush jackets. One of them asked rudely, “how many acres do you have?” I did not answer him and smiled instead. Then another put a gun on the table, metaphorically at least when he mentioned, “we are in property development business.” As he leaned across the table.

Now for those of you who may not be familiar with business parlance that is just another way of saying – you better sit down before you fall down. As you are now in the big league. You are dealing with big boys now. We can chew you up and spit you out like a seed. So you better give respect.

I looked at these men hard and said to them, “Yes, I too am very interested in the hotel business as well.” I notice after that those three loud mouths were not smiling any longer – they even shifted uncomfortably and looked at each other and then at me again.

I am not tell you what this means in the unwritten language of business world – all I can say is, it very clear and ambiguous to those who know how to read this language. This I can assure you all. You need to find out for yourself – to connect the dots so to speak.

Remember what I write should never be confused with the same genre as Stephen Covey’s seven habits of highly effective people – as it remains the very real case of regularly having to deal with the seven habits of highly effective motherfuckers and how to neutralize them. But I digress, let me con’t….

I took seat beside these three fucks and shared with them in a very grave and serious tone – diversification may after all not be a matter of choice, but rather a necessity from now onwards and with these thoughts I smiled and turned to one of them and asked,

“Now tell me where do you plan to build your new hotel?”

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“Many things are seriously wrong in Singapore. Some of these problems are already so acute they can even be considered systematic – so just because politicians talk about kiddies and airports doesn’t mean that all is well and fine – it just means they prefer to talk about kiddies and airports. Instead of much more pressing issues that in my opinion require their immediate attention. No! I am not running down Singapore. I am running down the leadership of the government of the day in Singapore. There is a big difference. And I want to make that distinction very clear. No! I am not malicious, subversive or for that matter even harbor a secret agenda – I am just stating a fact that I feel needs to be highlighted. As I don’t believe the government of the day, the media or for that matter so many Potemkin sites such as Breakfast Network want to talk about those inconvenient truths either. To put it plainly, I am just using my brain. And I have every right to do so, as I only past through this timeline once. If I don’t speak up, then we will all be only talking about kiddies and airports again next year and that I think would be a catastrophic disaster.

You are not my judge. You cannot scare me. History is by witness. And that is really enough for me to think and say anything I like.”