Unions are bullies

Peter Jackson is damn right: The unions are bullies. It is a pity that the government lets them run rampant in the country and holding the nation to ransom.

Frustrating...

Just had a very frustrating planning meeting with the volunteer group. It is downright annoying that some people would give plenty of suggestions and yet do not implement them. It is downright irritating when they issued you "commands" and expect you to do it. It is downright frustrating when they decided to make the plans to suit their needs where they see it fit and expect you to compromise them.

GST rises to 15%

On one end they give you tax cuts, then they take your money away with GST rate increase. One thing the government and the public companies done very well in this country is ripping you off. Yes, NZ is a100% pure rip off country.

On processes

Sounds too familiar to me and my asylum (a.k.a workplace)...

7.1 hits Christchurch

Disasters strike without warning and they do not pick their victims. A couple of months ago, I was visiting Christchurch for a meeting in the mid winter and the city was all well, lively and bustling with all activities. No one would have thought that the city will be hit by a 7.1 magnitude earthquake at 4:35 am this morning and turned the place into rubble. Life can be so unpredictable sometimes.

Just another Sunday morning

I never really like the pop rock band Maroon 5 until I heard this number. Of course, the cute and hot looking frontman Adam Levine certainly has a lot to do with this new found interest of mine with this group. Since then, this number has become one of those perk-me-up songs to jump start the day. :-)

Had an uneventful and pretty quiet day yesterday. Firstly, I woke up at 3 am and because I could not go to sleep, I meditated until the sun rises. After a few text messages wishing me a happy birthday, I had the whole day all by myself. I went to downtown and started off with a nice breakfast in a cafe, then I trotted off to the second hand bookshop nearby and read some books about palmistry and water colour painting. Later on, I went to another shop and had a chat or two with the shopkeers followed by one full hour of body message. By that time, I came out blissfully refreshed, I was pretty much hungry and I had Jewish schnitzel pita for lunch at the same time ogling at the cute Jewish cook. :-)

Then spent the rest of the afternoon doing some housework and petting the cuddly cat. However, when the night falls, I had this mild headache and then nosebleed. Well it did not bother me that much because I am heading to bed anyway. The whole night I did not sleep very well. By 5 this morning, I feel nauseous all of sudden and took a full glass of aloe vera juice to calm my guts. I am supposed to meet up someone to take a drive to City of Sails for some event but ended up cancelled it because I do not feel well.

And so here am I sitting here resting and listening to this number and ogling at the photos of this eye candy. Apart from that I am not going to do much else...

Recession

I was chatting with my friend a while ago about the recession in NZ. He was commenting about how bad it was in the job market at the moment. He was getting sick of his day job and contemplating on starting a his own business. But business is hard to come by these days especially in the area where I lived at the moment. But this is only a tip of the iceberg, apparently even the shopping district in City of Sails and Wellywood are punctuated with "For Leasing" signs all over place, many shops had closed and deserted the place.

Then we got talking about how Kiwi expatriates with high flying careers returned to NZ only to be greeted by a rude shock because they could not find jobs in NZ. Moreover, I have heard that many migrants who came to NZ have to leave the country because there is nothing much to offer here. They also discovered that living in NZ is far worst than their home country and so they packed their bags and go. Even the net migration is at it lowest. Worst still, a lot of people I known of had left the country and crossed the ditch. 

These days when you flip the newspaper, apart from crime news, civil disobedience, public bickering and political circus, the rest will be gloomy news about so-and-so company is closing, so-and-so finance company went into receivership, more jobs were cut due to cost cutting measures by the government and the private companies. Makes one wonder whether there is an economy exist in this country.  

All the great news from the government, the Treasury and Statistics department telling us that this country has come out of recession is just a big lie. All the happy news about how NZ is one of the most desirable country to live in is just smoke and mirrors to cover up the true deplorable state of this country. To be honest, apart from the scenery, there is nothing much NZ can offer here. Even the scenery are not that special because they can be found in other places as well.

I have been through many cycle of recessions throughout my life. I was born right smack in the Middle East oil crisis in the 70s. Then came another economic doldrums in the early to mid 80s which affected a lot of factories and manufacturing sector in my home country. Just when we thought we had a breather, the 1987 Black Monday brought the stock market down and it prolonged till early 90s. By end of 90s, we experienced the currency crisis in the financial and currency market. Then the dot com bust in early 2000 followed after that. And now we have this financial and property market collapse thanks to the reckless bankers and  unethical speculators in the western countries.

Throughout those recession cycles, we have been hit hardest and we really had to grit our teeth to make ends meet and to keep moving on. But it starts to get weary because it's just never ending and I wondered how long I can keep going to put up with all this crap.

At the end of the conversation, my friend told me that he decided to stay on his job because he felt grateful to have a steady income. As for me, I am not sure about my situation and I am really exhausted to think what the future might hold.

Maybe I am just tired of living...

Time to file tax return

It's always the same ritual every year: Filing tax return to feed the bloodsuckers in the country!

The evolution of NZ TV

Still alive...

I really had nothing much to report lately. I have been quite occupied with a lot of stuffs for the last few weeks so much so it wore me down and I was down with cold for the entire week. Still sniffling and feeling run down as I am writing this post. Mind you, this is only the start of that damn winter season in NZ and I hope I can cope with the extreme wetness and low temperature.

Just exactly what I have been busying about? Frankly, I have no inkling at all. All I know is despite the fact I tried to scale down my daily working hours to 8 hours per day, I am still busy zip zapping here and there to get things done. Somehow I just have never have enough time to do a lot of things.

The toxic waste dump (affectionately known as work place) is still the same, in fact it is more toxic than ever due to the extreme cost cutting measures. But I got so tired with the constant drama and basically just shut them out. I need to move on. Even though physically I am still here, I have already move on with my inner self. Seriously, nothing matters to me any more with the place. Should they decided to close down the whole place tomorrow, I am fine with that. Actually I wish it will close down sooner because it will be good riddance.

I am in the process of inching my way out of the closet and I am making some progress. Lately, I confided to a lady friend in one of those long conversations about life and everything. It turns out she suspected all along and she was cool about that and very supportive. Which is a huge relief for me. Of course, there is still a long way to step out of the closet door, but I will keep soldier on.

Boxing Day...

I have been trying hard not to give in to the temptation to go shopping today. LOL. Besides that, I am feeling a bit lethargic as a result of my second day of detox and dieting. So it would be a good excuse for me not going anywhere. I have been splurging too much lately and so it would be a good time for me to tighten up my purse strings.

Merry Christmas!

Found this clip of Billy Idol singing a Christmas jingle. Enjoy...

Stoned neighbours...

I live in a complex of 10 units of flats. 2 blocks with 4 units stood facing each other with a big courtyard in the centre. Another block of 2 units is situated at the north end of the compound between the 2 blocks.

The block opposite to mine is what I called the Oldies block because all the four units were occupied by senior citizens. They were friendly but they mostly stayed indoors and kept to themselves.

The block of 2 units is what I called the Invisible blocks. You can see their cars parked in front of the block but you never see a single soul stepping out the flat.

And then there is my block which I called the Motley Crew block. I occupied one of the units in this block. Next to me is occupied by a family who do not seem to go to work and yet they have 2 cars and satellite dish! The 3rd block is occupied by a working couple but lately I seldom see him going to work. The last unit was occupied by a bachelor whom I occasionally met when I go to work.

All the tenants are pretty well behaved. However, I am slight apprehensive with the family that lived next door to mine. The original tenant moved out earlier this year and then replaced by the current tenant in mid April. They do not seemed to be working. How on earth can they survive, I wondered? The occupants will slam the doors loudly whenever they go in and out of the flat. Other times they will be moving and shifting things around the flat day and night. I even woke up in the middle of the night to the noises of clanking and washing.

More often than not, I noticed a stench that comes from their unit. It's felt like the smell of cigarettes but the stench was much heavier and repulsive. I suspected they smoked pot or some substances but I could not pin point what. Most of the times, the occupants seemed to be in a drawn out state. Apart from the man of the house, most of them do not look up when I pass by. If they do, they just stared with glassy eyes like they are in trance of something. Lately, I find that the occupants were mumbling to themselves whenever they walked past.

All these while I have been tolerant and just plain ignore their quirkiness. But I know this is not going to be a long term solution. With the job prospects running thin in this town where I live and coupled with the uncertainty in my work place, I going to move out...the question is where and when?

Strike, strike, strike...

For the past few years, we have doctors, nurses, radiologists, police, firemen, laboratory workers, teachers, airline workers, cleaners and truckers going on strike. A couple of months ago, we have bus drivers and Telecom NZ engineers going on strike. A few weeks ago, we have tutors in tertiary sector going on strike. And now we have staff of the Ministry of Justice going on strike. What kind of country is this? The whole country has been degenerated into a state of civil disobedience. Seems there is no law and order any more...maybe the tourism board should market this country as "New Zealand - Land of the Long Strikes"

Another example of blatant waste of taxpayers money

One of the news this morning made me question the effectiveness and the fairness of the justice system in this country. It also made me wondered what the heck is ACC doing? It's little wonder that ACC made a huge loss because they keep making cock ups such as this.

How on earth can a double murderer gets compensation (at the expense of taxpayers) from ACC to pay for his artificial leg? Who is compensating for the lost of lives? Who is going to restore the lives of those families who lost their family members as a result of the crime committed by this low life?

The thought of me paying ACC levies to compensate criminals who injured when committing crime is downright depressing...

Life on the dole...

I guess some of those who are living on the dole are way much more better off than most of us who slave and toil in the toxic corporate world. After working like a dog and paid too much tax but got nothing in return from this useless government (both Labour and National), maybe I should consider getting on the dole too... LOL

Bare essentials of air safety...

Regular patrons will note that I always moan about the things in NZ in particular about the downright appalling and inept justice/corrections systems, inept but lot of hot air politicians, idiotic and destructive political parties, unproductive and disruptive unions as well as those pompous and over zealous political correctness bullies - they are a lot of them lurking here.

Oh, did I forget to mention about the poor quality of the housing, the health system that was designed to give you inconveniences, those primitive transportation, the suicidal and maniacal drivers, the famously insane tall poppy syndrome afflicting the nation, those binge drinking and violent gang culture, those unscrupulous real estate agents and greedy banks?.

Despite all my misgivings, NZ is still better than many places and there are some good things too. For example the Air New Zealand flight safety video is one of them. I think this is the best flight safety video I have seen so far. Also worth to note that these are real crew members (pilot, flight attendants, pursers) and not some hired actors and they gave a brilliant performance. Kudos to these guys and gals. Enjoy. :))



P.S. I think the pilot is quite cute, don't you think so? The blonde and lanky bloke is also quite fun to watch. :D

Sick people...

I just could not understand it. Why would a person who has a good job and decent looking (actually, he is not bad looking) would go around and infected other people with HIV intentionally? It just goes on showing that how sick, sadistic and twisted the mind of some people nowadays. The court has finally lifted his name suppression and it had brought a huge reaction to the gay community here.

6 types of food that can help to boost immunity during winter

Wintry season is the time where people here get sick easily. The lack of insulation and too much humidity in most homes in New Zealand makes it even worst for those asthma, flu and cold sufferers. It is a known fact (a notorious one) that most New Zealand houses are too cold in the winter and too hot during summer.

I just could not understand why the locals still do not know how to build houses with proper insulation and ventilation despite staying in this country for so long. Don't even get me started on leaky homes. It is one of the biggest shame for the lame duck New Zealand government (be it Labour or National, they are both downright incompetent anyway) and yet they are shying away from their responsibilities and kept passing the buck around while the common civilians like you and me suffered in silence.

Anyway, that is the price to pay if you want to live in New Zealand. If you can afford it, you can pay heaps of simoleons to buff up the insulation and ventilation. If not, then you have to do whatever it takes to keep yourself warm and pray that you do not get sick. Also, be prepared to be "slaughtered" by the power companies because they will charge you with those sky rocketing electricity bills during winter months.

Another way to keep yourself healthy is to watch your diet. Greasy pies? No. Coke? Nah. Sugary cakes and muffins? Nope. Fish and chips? Don't touch them. Those kinds of food may looked tasty but will be marching you to slow death, so stay away from them.

The food that will boost your immune system are as follows:-

1. Omega 3 - Eating two servings of oily fish a week helps to reduce inflammation, which improves airflow and protects lungs from respiratory infections.
2. Wholegrains - A daily serving of wholegrains, especially oats (contained beta-glucans), can boost immunity and may help antibiotics work better.
   
3. Garlic - Allicin, a compound found in garlic, fights bacteria and infection.
4. Probiotics - The bacterium Lactobacillus reuteri can stimulate white blood cell production.
5. Chicken soup - The amino acid cysteine, which is released from chicken when it is cooking, helps thin the mucus and blocks migration of inflammatory cells.
6. Tea - L-theanine found in tea boosts the production of virus-fighting interferons in the blood. Drink several cups of black or green tea each day.

Bloodsucker...

It seems that the Inland Revenue Department of New Zealand (IRD NZ) and local banks have given the word bloodsucker a new meaning. All they do is to suck your hard earn cash till your coffers run dry. Don't believe me? Look closely at the snapshot of my bank account below.

Come on, what can you buy with $0.19 nowadays??? Yet, the unscrupulous IRD NZ and ASB wasted no time in deducting $0.06, an amount that is insignificant to them without batting an eyelash. Are they so desperate until they need to stoop down so low to pinch such a measly sum of money from a simpleton like me? Now this is what I called daylight robbery! X(