It's probably pretty annoying to the poor when the top tells them to cut costs when the country faces financial trouble.
I mean, they're most definitely overworked and unlikely to be particularly intelligent to begin with. Saving money and cutting costs require planning, and planning takes time and brainpower.
It's probably a better idea to show them how they can save money. Merely telling them to "cut costs" isn't going to cut it.
For example, I like this idea of having a logo stating which hawker stalls are offering food at lower prices. Too bad it's only available at Bedok.
Like the free water-saving thimbles offered by the PUB (just call them for some), they should probably be provided with a list of products that are very cheap, although that would be advertising, which may cause another problem.
I wonder how much manpower it would require to complete this research and keep the list updated.
Once that's done, runners could probably be hired to offer delivery services for the poor, FOC. That will definitely require the help of charitable organizations. If that's possible, they could replace flag-selling with deliveries for the schoolkids completing their volunteer work requirement. That would educate them more than flag-selling ever could since they will be able to see what it's like to be earning less than S$1k a month.
Just found this site called Deal Extreme. Looks interesting. Prices appear to be very low and if I guessed correctly, they are automatically adjusted to our countries when we visit it. The reason for this guess is that it seems to be based in Hong Kong, yet if the prices I see are in HKD, it would be a little too extreme.
And the best thing about it is free shipping worldwide.
Even if the shipping fee has already been added into the prices of the products, it just doesn't feel necessary to order more items to make the shipping fee worth the money.
EDIT: Prices are in USD.
Work. Work is daunting. It scares me. People are friendly but I feel uncomfortable. I know they're never going to be honest with me, yet it is necessary to deal with them.
Learnt to type some documents the other day. Nothing big.
Met a buyer with my boss to show her our samples. I used to think women were fussy. That wasn't completely true. That buyer was probably the pinnacle of fussiness. Other women are men compared to her. Then again, she's the buyer.
But she's got tastes, better than the salesgirls despite their direct contact with the customers. Makes sense, since she's got the job instead of them.
The thing is, I'm more or less the antisocial kind of guy, but necessity dictates that I'm going to have to learn to be professional and not feel awkward whenever I touch the models, who were also the salesgirls. My boss had to, to show the buyer the hard-to-see details of the samples and the possible changes to the designs to counter the issues the buyer raised.
I just stood by and watched without speaking a word unless spoken to directly, as instructed. I'm still a complete newbie, so it wouldn't be right to suggest anything. Still, the buyer asked me twice for my opinion, which I believe was a test. I don't know whether I passed or failed, but when I simply agreed with everything she said (and not what the boss said, since the customer is always right), I most definitely revealed my noobness.
The only consolation was that she told me not to give up, citing herself as an example, saying that she too had to learn her job from scratch. I wouldn't say that's the whole truth. Women are just born fussier than men; all she had to do with improve on that. I'm the one who really has to start from scratch because I'm the "anything" kind of guy.
As for the design I drew for my first lesson some time ago, it's still not done yet. Not that it matters much, since it's not my idea (and I had none), but it allows me to gauge the time it takes for a drawn design to become a sample.
Contrary to my initial belief, it's impractical for me to take design courses in the art schools in Singapore.
Oh right, I also saw some white professional models in the reception area, most likely waiting for a photo shoot. They looked exactly as I expected (I haven't seen any in real life before) - tall, slim, thick make-up, probably Russian.
Not my type.
No photos. They might charge a fee if I had taken any.
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