Ramblings..

Was up doing a quiz. Been reading up on the articles for this weekly quiz set by Tony, which isn't assessed, with no time limit. MCQ = easy? NOT.

The quiz's to let us prepare for the one in October. Questions are quite specific. Had to readup on some excerpts including-

• Anne Krueger's "American Trade Policy: A Tragedy in the Making" (1995) - interesting one re evolution of international trade system, GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade), how the term "beggar thy neighbour" was used to describe some policies..
• Graham Dunkley's "Greening the GATT or GATTing the Green?" (1997) - question is trade first or green first? Conclusion - Green's GATTed themselves a little but GATT didn't show many signs of being greened. hahha sounds confusing? but it really isn't that bad, it just shows how trade overshadows environmental concerns.

From another set of readings also found out the documents of GATT creating the WTO runs to a whopping 2000 pages! and Tony actually included that in the quiz!! Aduh..

Current reading list:

Mitch Albom's "Tuesdays With Morrie" - my opinion so far: Who needs Anthony Robbins when you have Morrie? Pertinent issues put through simply. No delusions of grandeur, no fancy jargon. Better still, the de-emphasis on material wealth/power/career as opposed to the other (undiscovered/unfulfilled) joys of life.

Weiss, Forsythe & Coate "The United Nations and Changing World Politics" (2004) - this'll be an interesting read. Haven't even gotten past the introduction of the book (which's like 1/9th of the entire book) due to the distraction offered by the following book below.

Krugman's "The Great Unravelling" - waited in the library loan queue FOR SO LONGGG to get this! finally got hold of it this week. I enjoy his columns tremendously. Looking forward to a good read.

On other things..

The Economics and Commerce Society is organising a series of "Entrepreneur: Business Start-up Seminar" over a period of 2 weeks - free. First seminar was "Intellectual property" on Tuesday. Went for a previous one in the city a coupla months ago, but it wasn't so detailed. This time, Susan talked abt it all and delved into the costs and timeline for obtaining patents.. interesting -- very costly it is, and takes darn long. Not really useful for me at this moment, but extra information never hurts..

Met Jocelyn and dined with a few other Thai companions that night. I tried learning to say "How are you" in Thai and just gave up. The language's just so so foreign. Been awhile since I actually NOT understood what others were saying - which makes a good change in environment =) Haven't really interacted with anyone from Thailand, so meeting some people is fun for a change. Gained abit of insight into Thai manners, as Ann's really demure and sweet.

Hmm..next seminar's tonight - Idea generation/Team building. It'd be interesting to note what they have to say about this. Some things I've already experienced with Desiyah..

As usual I'm posting in the middle of the night (or in this case early morning). Bad habit its becomed. Faced with a never-ending pile of readings, just have to learn to "make" time to get things done. I believe I haven't been reading this much at any one time for the past 4 years. Used to read lots but probably lessened ever since I started going off on road trips.

Man, those were the days.. skimping, working and saving for the expenses.. But every cent was worth it - seeing all of glorious Peninsular Msia, the experiences, fab companionship, beautiful sandy beaches, coconuts!, numerous hotel rooms, lazy nights, thousands and thousands of kilometres, fishing/swimming in Kenyir, eating in Penang, bumming in Kelantan, hundreds n hundreds of photos............oh dear I WANT TO GO ROAD TRIP!!! saddening thing is, times and circumstances have changed. Travel mates here? - not easy to find. People who are willing to travel simple, adventurous souls (or at least inquisitive) are rare..