Wrapping Up

The blog was supposed to be an exercise in creativity, but it has ended up as a little bit of a burden. I've read some great blogs that have been quite entertaining and also very educational. Part of what I've noticed of all the blogs that I've enjoyed, is that they've had a theme that has guided the posts and the author has been very good in following and maintaining that theme.

I just don't have that, at least not at the moment. All my posts have been random and scattered. If anything, they've just been inward focused.

So I'm going to close up for a while. I don't have the intellectual bent to provide the blogging experience that I enjoy so much in other blogs.

I'll leave you with a couple of blogs that I've recently discovered and found quite entertaining:

  Religious Policeman
 
  Lowering the Bar
 

Ernest Hemingway

I don't know much about Ernest Hemingway other than that he is quite a recognised author and what I have read on Wikipedia.

However, today I also leanred that he had a six-toed cat called Snowball. Apparently the descendents of Snowball live on today, many of them also with 6 toes.

http://www.hemingwayhome.com/cats

Sometimes the thought isn't what you'd expect

It is nice if someone brings you back a souvenir from their travels. It means that they gave at least some time during their leisure and fun to think of you, and spend a bit of their money to bring you back a small piece of their holiday. A sentiment that maybe doesn't have as much value these days when travel is much more accessible to the masses, but I think most people appreciate it.

It can get weird though when you start to wonder if much thought went into it. Some relatives of mine tend to travel alot, a slight perk of their income and career I guess. They have occassionally brought me back souvenirs and have opted for shirts for me, as its something that can be used. Its a gift that is practical.

Except for when they think you're hugely fat...

Now the general excuse is that in asian countries, the sizing is smaller, but I'm not a big person. Even in Australian sizes I'll generally wear between a small and a medium, even in the days when I used to frequent the gym, I pretty much was still medium.

So it confuses me when people bring back XL for their gift for me. They couldn't try it on themselves to gauge the sizing? Do I really look that big to them? Were they just diving in the tourist budget bin on their way to the airport on the last day?

The most recent time this happened was when I was brought this shirt from a Vietnam holiday. No matter how amusing a motif may be, when the shirt is two sizes too big, it loses the impact immediately.

Its a corny joke, and people might be embarassed to wear this in public, but just a couple of weeks ago though, I saw a guy at the train station wearing it and it looked fine; because it was the right size.

I'm going senile

For the past couple of days, one of my work colleagues has had 3 apples sitting neatly together on a corner of his desk. They've sat there untouched and every time I pass his desk, I have to fight the urge to pick them up and start juggling.

I'd also forgotten to bring my own fruit to work the past few days, so his apples only rub salt in my hungry wounds. However today I remembered to bring my fruit and weirdly, as I was walking past his desk with my apple after washing it in the kitchen, I noticed one of his apples were missing. For a split second I thought I had taken his.

I hadn't, but it still had me hesitate for a moment.

Stuff that makes me laugh

I think I have this fantasy at least once a day at work...

Amway follow-up

So, in declining the invitation to join Amway, my ex-colleague was obviously disappointed but also seemed unable to understand the reasons I gave on why I wanted to steer clear of their program. It was interesting that she couldn't (or perhaps wouldn't) see things from my point of view, and leads me to think that there might be more to people's view that Amway "brainwashes" their members.

Reason 1) Return on investment.

I explained that as far as business goes, for all my effort and personal expenditure, I share the rewards with those who are above me in the hierarchy. This is the case in many businesses, but at least you feel that your manager/boss is at least in the office and doing "manager" type work. Whereas in Amway and MLM schemes, the person who brought you in could just introduce you, then spend the rest of their life at home twiddling their thumbs and still getting a return on your effort. This aspect is a bummer, although the idea is that this also can work in your favour.

Note: There was some concern about percentage return as compared with other industries. However, it actually isn't too bad in terms of raw numbers. Take the real estate or vehicle industry where the salesperson typically gets a return of 1~2%. There is variation on this due to various factors such as prestige level, experience, ability and so on, but it is a fair comparison though. The problem though, is that 1% is fine if you're selling a single $1million dollar home a fortnight. It's great even. But what if the items you are selling range from a few dollars to a few hundred? How many now do you need to move?

Reason 2) Lack of transparency.

If I get a regular job, I know my salary and I know my tax obligations. If I run a business, then I get to know my fees, tax implications, and running expenses. Amway does not reveal this to you easily. On one hand, they claim that you will have no running expenses as you don't maintain inventory, and its just the cost of running around and bringing people into the system. But as I am not officially a registered business owner nor an employee of Amway, then they don't provide me transparency of how money will be coming in to me, and they certainly won't explain it to me if I'm not yet a member. If you don't like the Church of Scientology, then you won't like Amway.

Reason 3) Bias

Majority of people writing about Amway all state that the people looking to recruit them, would not provide a fair unbiased account of what is involved and what it takes to succeed. Instead, the pitch is always about the people who make fortunes. The lady I was talking to didn't get aggressive when I finally declined the offer after some discussion, but other people had experienced their contact becoming insulting when they refused. If a person can't be balanced in their presentation of an opportunity, then it may not be an opportunity at all.

If the entire business is built on bringing in people for them to get rich, then there will either be alot of victims like the GFC, or there just will simply be many disappointed hopefuls. A company needs to have some consumer focus in order to succeed, and Amway just doesn't.

End of the day, I hope she does find this business works out for her in the long run, but the odds are that it won't.