Another subdued week doing housekeeping stuff and getting ready for our UK trip next week for the start of my older son’s uni term. It will be an adventure travelling to Oxford in these Covid19 times.
We reached some milestones this week as my older son celebrated his 21st birthday. How time flies as I watch my own flesh and blood grow over the years from a baby to a toddler, teenager and now a young adult with voting rights. It is an amazing journey tracking his growth and the development of his thought processes. Hopefully, he has developed a strong infrastructure by now to prepare him for the next stage of his life journey. He will start his 3 years of uni in Oxford soon to do an Economics and Management degree.
We spent the last 2 weekends doing a scrapbook with photos as a 21st birthday present/farewell gift for him. My younger son coordinated the whole effort to reach out to various parties, family members, cousins and friends to create this booklet. We sorted out old photos and wrote messages on our individual pages to attach to the booklet. It was a labour of love for all of us. We then had a nice family celebration on Tues at La Petit Chef with a made-to-order birthday cake.
I waited for months to execute the FX to buy GBP for his 1st-year school fees and finally did it on Tues. I should have waited a few more days as Boris outdid himself by trying to backtrack on UK’s promise to the EU. I am generally bearish on GBP due to Brexit and have asked my son to only convert as and when he needs it over the next few years. I can only foresee negatives for the UK for wanting to break away from the European Union.
Thanks to stored-value eWallets like YouTrip and TransferWise, another bank staple rice bowl is being smashed. Anyone can now get close to interbank FX rates with the convenience of cashless payments. Covid19 has also accelerated the adoption process. Credit cards with their ridiculous FX spreads on overseas spending will now be a thing of the past. Moving and remitting money in real-time is also being offered free by banks now. Having a multi-currency account is also very common nowadays. So it is easy to move funds between banks and eWallets as one can use apps on the mobile to do it.
With the expected avalanche of job losses to be expected in the coming months because of the virus, the government has been trying to take proactive steps to help those affected to upgrade to learn new skills as well as create new jobs in the internet economy. My sister showed me an interesting SGUnited initiative organized by IBM which I shared with 2 other friends who were recently affected.
IBM had a Zoom call on Tues for those of us who registered online to get more information about it. Successful applicants to their 6 months courses on AI, Cloud Computing or Data Science will become full-time students taking up to 200 hours of study plus 1.5 hours of an exam at the end. This highly subsidized course cost about SGD 20,000 but we only need to pay SGD 500 which we can use our Skillsfuture funds to pay. On top of that, there will be a student allowance of SGD 1,500 per month for the duration of the 6 months course. If one cannot finish the program due to the reason that they found a full-time job, then they can drop out of the course without any penalties. How great is that??
https://webibmcourse.mybluemix.net/SGUnitedProgramme
The only big condition : an applicant cannot be having a part-time or full-time job during the program. My friend decided to apply as he was retrenched in Apr and did not see the possibility of getting a new job this year with the worsening job market.
For me on the other hand, I have been doing my Myanmar consultancy role and also recently completed my IBF project via the consultancy group I belong to. There may be upcoming projects in the near future but this IBM program may hinder my consultancy work. This is a problem for those currently freelancing in the gig economy like Grab drivers too.
Google is also conducting a similar SGUnited program too: https://grow.google/intl/ALL_sg/skillsignitionsg/#?career–ready-with-google_activeEl=career–learning-plans
Separately, another business opportunity is also developing for me in Myanmar. The chairman at the group level has been observing for the last 2.5 years what we consultants have been doing at the microfinance subsidiary on Treasury, Risk and Audit processes. There are now ongoing discussions about getting the 3 of us to replicate it at the group level for all 12 subsidiaries, to push them up to a stronger level of corporate governance by strengthening their infrastructure with new committees and policies which currently doesn’t exist. My 3 months IBF project as an exam questions setter has also finally come to an end. I had to submit an invoice for my work and hopefully will be paid in Oct.
Finally, I had lunch with my current NUSS mentee yesterday. 12 months had passed and Covid19 had disrupted most of the mentorship process. I am happy that he had managed to secure a permanent job offer from JPM after he graduates next year. This ambitious guy had managed to do internships in Citi, JPM and GIC, being very sharp and hungry about his career. It was refreshing for me to share my life and work experiences with him and I hope that he finds it helpful. I have volunteered to participate in this mentorship program again for the 3rd year and we will be having a Zoom call on Mon to present ourselves to a new set of 25 potential mentees.
Just under a week from now, my son and I will head to the UK. It is indeed strange and unusual times to travel overseas in this Covid19 era. We have been preparing for months and will take safety precautions seriously. We will head straight to Oxford and begin our 14 days of required quarantine in separate locations, him in Keble College and myself in an apartment that I had rented. I will then stay for another 2 weeks to help him settle down before heading home for another 14 days of quarantine in S’pore.
I prefer to look at the bright side of things and enjoy this “vacation” of me-time while tasting nice Scottish whisky along the way. I will always remember to stay healthy and happy, to count my blessings every day 🙂
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