The Recession Survival Kit

How to survive the current economic recession? Here are my tips:

1. Cut down transportation costs: In Macau, you can always use the ferry terminal and the barrier gate as transit points and take the free casino shuttle buses to any destination. It's absolute free.

2. Get all the perks from corporations: Large corporations often give out fantastic perks to lure your business. But you can always out-smart them. You can apply all the credit cards in Macau and get the department store coupons and gifts. As long as you don't miss your payment deadline, they won't be making any money off you. You can also use the casino cards to get free ferry tickets to Hong Kong. But remember, you don't have to gamble just because you have the card. Gamblers always loss.

3. Shop at last minute: Supermarkets often mark down bread, dairy products and other fresh food stuff a couple days before the expiry date. This is an excellent opportunity to shop. My friend working at the health department told me that the actual date for the food to turn bad is actually weeks after the expiry date. So that means you can eat perfectly safe food at much lower price.

4. Go green: When you're saving money, don't think as if you don't have any money to spend, think as if you're helping to save the environment. I'm not eating sirloin not because I'm poor, but because eating vegetables produces less carbon dioxide and is better for the environment. I'm not buying designer clothes not because my wallet is empty, but because I can help to reduce waste by wearing the old clothes.

5. Stay connected: Go to the library to read the newspapers and magazines, and community centers use the Internet. You can stay connected to the world without spending a penny.

6. Have a drink: Go to the a nearby casino for free coffee, tea and mineral water when you're thirsty. Don't buy the expensive bottled water at convenience stores.

7. Enjoy free entertainment: There are always free high quality performances at the Macau Art Festival, Macau Music festival, Macau Fringe Festival and other art performances and exhibitions sponsored by the government. You may have to queue up for a couple of hours to get the tickets. But it's free, and it's serious art. So it's definitely worth every minute of your time staying in the queue.

8. Public health care at it's best: Don't visit private physicians who may charge you a fortune. You can get free services at public clinics and hospital as long as you claim that you don't have any money to pay and your dying. This is the hidden secret: the doctors at public institutions won't take the risk of journalists waiting in front of their cars and ask them why some poor citizen of Macau were left dead in the cold. They have a budget set aside for people who won't pay. Now you know it. Use it well.

9. Be faithful and practice safe sex. Go back to your wife and girlfriend. Prostitutes costs too much. Definitely a no-no during the recession. Always use a condom, as kids cost lots of money. They are the major source of poverty in underdeveloped countries.

10. Live an affordable luxury lifestyle: You can't let your lifestyle and standard of living appear to have made any obvious changes. This will keep your cheered up and maintain a positive attitude for the rest of the recession. You can always wear a Zara instead of Armani when your income was down. Nobody would notice any difference from the outside. By the way, counterfeit Louis Vuitton is readily available just across the border.

Say No to Kung Hei Fat Choi

It's the Chinese New Year - the Year of the Ox. Just like mainland China and Hong Kong, the most common greetings overheard during the holiday seasons in Macau is Kung Hei Fat Choi. Although the English media often loosely translate this line into "congratulations and be prosperous" or "wish you a prosperous new year", the true and original meaning of this line is actually "wish you get rich". Maybe this is just another symbolization of how the ideas of capitalism and consumerism had taken over socialist ideals dominating mainland China or traditional values dating back Confucius years or thousands of years of Chinese history, but the over-emphasis on material goods and money made me feel uncomfortable every time I heard someone taking a narrow-minded approach and materialistic view on life. If the Chinese or China as a nation put so much emphasis on craving for material things, the people will never be satisfied by the desire for material comfort, greed and crossing substance, money-centered view gradually became the dominant voice in society, gradually values, ethics and concerns for the well-being of others had taken a minimalist value in our society. I just hope more Chinese people can realize that a common greeting such as Kung Hei Fat Choi is not the best greetings available out there, and it expressed to a sickened over-emphasis over money, and within the next few years, I can hear much better greeting words than this selfish expression dominating in an acquisitive society. For me, even a simple "have a nice day" is better than Kung Hei Fat Choi.

Blue Pen and Black Pen

Just had lunch with someone working at an office 5 minutes away from my office. Someone from my office said he had to refill dozens of forms this morning because his boss told him that all official data must be filled in with blue pen instead of black pen. Our guest from another office was totally shocked when he heard this. He told us that his boss has issued a memorandum to all staff telling them that all official documents must be written and signed by black pen, otherwise the data would be invalid. Nobody at the table could figure out any logical reason for putting so much emphasis on the color of pen people use at work, and how the seemingly absolute standard at each organizations was formed, and why some people at the top at the organization put such a strong emphasis on something considered totally irrelevant in the eyes of others. What a strange little world we all live in.

My Uncle

My uncle passed away.

The relationship between my uncle and I has never been very close. My father left his hometown to attend university, and had never stayed in his birthplace for more than a week after that. In all these years, I met my uncle in less than ten occasions. Our families took a short trip together. We went to his home during the Chinese New Year holiday on a couple of occasions. And he traveled to Macau during his vacations on another couple of occasions. Besides that, I couldn't even remember when and where I had met him.

The most memorable image of my uncle is the family photo my father put on his desk. That photo was taken right before he left home for university. They were 18 and 15 respectively. When I was still in school, I took postcards or letters written by my father to the post office and mailed them to my uncle every two or three months. And every two or three months, I found postcard or letters written by my uncle in our mailbox and took them to my father. When letters were replaced by telephones, my father would pass the telephone to me and asked me to say happy New Year or happy birthday to my uncle. I had nothing more to say after those phrases. But he was always repeating the embarrassing thing I did as a baby boy. I didn't remember any of those and wasn't thrilled of being constantly reminded of that either.

My father and my uncle look like identical twins. However, I really couldn't find anything else that suggested that they share the same genes. My father went to university, got white-collared jobs in major cities across China before settling down in Macau. My uncle never finished high school and spent the rest of his life in the countryside he was born. While my father is immensely patriotic and always in touch with current events and in support of the government and political leaders, my uncle acquired most of his happiness like the rest of the men in the village, through alcohol and tobacco.

Sometimes my father would tell him to drink less alcohol and smoke fewer cigarettes, and he would ask my father what’s the point of living on this earth if a person was not allowed to enjoy life.

My father often tell us that Mao Zedong's new China allowed poor kids like him to attend university free of charge. Otherwise he would not be able to achieve his Chinese dream of a comfortable middle-class lifestyle. My uncle blamed the rule of providing only one free education quote to each family by the communist regime took away his opportunities and hope. Given his talent for music, maybe he could become an instructor at a music school or even a professional musician at an orchestra.

I took him to a Lang Lang concert in Macau a few years ago. He later told me that it was the best moment of his life.

My uncle was always telling my father to give me more music education. He was deeply disappointed when he heard that I still couldn't read the musical notes. He was much more passionate about music than his routine day job at a money-losing state factory in the village. Unlike my father, who doesn't even have a CD player at home, my uncle played at least five instruments, and was considered an expert in certain kinds of Chinese folk music. He composed a few songs. But they were never published.

My father believed in hard work and nothing else. My uncle is superstitious and dreams of winning the lottery every day. At the end, he did win the lottery, sort of. After he retired from the job he always hated, he made a small fortune by giving private music lessons to the rich kids in the village. The jackpot came when the abandoned family farm land was taken away by the government to make room for highways, somebody sued collectively and he was rewarded a lot of money in compensation. He built a four-storey house for himself as reward. Although it was in a remote village in rural China, the breathtaking scenery surrounding the place made me feel like he was living in paradise.

Less than a year after he moved into his new home, the bottle and the nicotine had finally taken its toll. I visited him in the hospital during his final weeks. Once again, I couldn't find the right words to say. He told me how much fun he had with me when he visited my family in Macau - the food, the sightseeing, the concert.

I could hardly hold back my tears.