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After a very long time, the 4 of us managed to catch up for dinner at FX’s house. I flew back from KL just in time for this.

The food, cooked by Pandian, was simple and yummy. And his house is quite well done now and looks very nice. Just a pity that it is a rental place so there is never any permanence in your life.

The four of us got to know each other because we were all in the same firm. I joined in 1995, FX in 1998, Haq in 2006 and Harish in 2008. All of us were in the commercial litigation department. We used to meet every working day in the office, until Covid came by and people stopped coming to the office. That work from home mindset, which started during Covid, has continued for many people even till now. Now 3 of us are retired from the partnership, with the last one to follow year end.

We talked about a variety of topics, changes in the judiciary, bad behaviour by lawyers, and political changes amongst others. We only finished at 1015pm.

Someone in my law class posted these pictures on a group chat. These photos were taken in 1982, during an era when there were no handphones or hp cameras and every photo taken had to be printed out.

I am sure I had a set of these photos too, because they look so familiar. But then I have no idea where mine are now and whether I still have them. So it was amazing to find out that some one had kept these for 44 years now.

When I completed my A levels, I didn’t know anything about law or the law faculty and I was disrupting from NS after one year to study law in 1982. My classmates from JC who were attending university would either be one year ahead or one year behind me.

So I decided that I better attend the law camp to get to know some people before I actually attended law school. This camp was held about 2 or 3 weeks before matriculation and it was at some church premises in Changi.

About 40 people were there and I didn’t know anyone at the start of the camp. The residential camp was very well organized with many activities throughout a 5 day period. I had some wonderful times there and I got to know so many people and became friends with them. Sadly, have lost touch with almost everyone after law school. These were such good times I had then, both during the camp itself and in my first 3 years of law school. Not so much during my final year. And if I could relive that period I would do so many things differently but of course, one cannot turn back time.

Still it was good seeing these pictures again, albeit in their very blurry form, after all these years. Brought back such good memories.

I am off to KL for 2 days and presently sitting in the lounge waiting for my 825am flight.

I just met so many people here I know. Chua Eu Jin, who was in the same firm in 1997 and is now in Temasek. Jimmie Tay from ACS, who has just invited me to a charity dinner. C W Tan, a client and friend who has just collected an arbitration award we won for him who is off to Jakarta and Elaine Giam, who was doing marketing in the firm many years ago.

All these meet ups in just half and hour.

I was expecting these changes in the later part of the year. Instead they were announced on Wednesday evening.

It was a smaller change than I expected. The PM has identified about 6 people in the last cohort of fresh candidates, who were elected in the GE, and promoted them. These are people he picked and brought into politics. He is building his own team of people in the Cabinet whom he trusts and relies on, as he should.

Sim Ann was the only exception as she was from an earlier cohort. She has been moved to MFA, presumably to understudy and take over the current Minister for Foreign Affairs. She has also been made the 2nd Minister at Home Affairs. These indications point to the fact that Shan will be stepping off some time soon, now that he has also been made a Senior Minister.

Ng Chee Meng’s appointment was a surprise. I didn’t think he would have moved up, especially since there is still a strong negative reaction to him. But I guess they owe him something. And this may be his last chance to prove himself, both as a Minister and as an MP.

I had expected some of the other younger Ministers to move up to take up more senior positions. To my surprise, they weren’t.

I expect the next reshuffle to be next year. Either the promotions of those in the earlier cohorts are going to happen then or they are not going to go anywhere.

We shall see.

I have known him for many years. I was a NWCDC councilor and he was a grassroots advisor there. A friendly, soft spoken and gentle man. Well liked by his residents and he was just promoted as Minister in charge of Muslim Affairs only last year after the General Election.

And by all counts he was doing very well. A popular MP and a Minister well liked by his community.

I remember when he was asked to move from Nee Soon to Marine Parade during the last election, he texted me and said “pray for me bro”. I thought all the stars were perfectly aligned for him at that time. Instead of facing the Workers Party, there was instead a walkover at Marine Parade, the only one. And immediately after the election he was promoted to become full Minister. A huge promotion for him.

Now this has happened. And it came as a huge shock to me. Reading the account of what happened from the press release, I wonder whether the matter was so serious that it required him to step down as a Minister and as an MP. Perhaps I am forgiving and perhaps I don’t know the full facts. Also I don’t know about the complainant, who might not have taken too kindly if there were no consequences for him.

The PM has however taken a firm stand that the party cannot lower its standards of what was expected of their office bearers and they have to show the public that they would not countenance any deviation from their expected high standards.

Nevertheless it is a serious loss for them. A popular MP and Minister now gone and they would have to face calls of why no by-elections are being called. Not to mention the inevitable bad publicity on social media about the conduct of their Ministers.

Finally it is over, after 39 days, and Spain won. I didn’t watch any of the games on tv, except for one game on day 2. I found that game so boring that after that game, I confined myself to watching only the highlights. But I told myself that I should at least watch the final. And I did.

The game was boring for most parts and Argentina didn’t look like they were playing to win. At the last world cup, I enjoyed their style of playing and was rooting for them to win. But not this time. I think they deserved to lose. Good for Spain. They have been consistent throughout this tournament.

I went to Russia and then Qatar for the last 2 world cup tournaments. Somehow the thought of traveling to the US for this year’s tournament was not appealing. And no one I knew was traveling to watch to finals.

I remember the first world cup final that I watched on tv. That was in 1974. With my father at our one room HDB flat in Margaret Close. That final was the first time Singapore started colour tv. Of course, we didn’t have a colour tv then. West Germany, which I supported then, won. They beat Holland that year. I have seen every final since that year. 52 years have passed.

Last night our group met to celebrate Crystal’s birthday, at Morton’s Steakhouse.

The choice of restaurant was Dr Teo’s. This restaurant has been around a long time. I used to frequently visit them. I recall they used to bring a trolley of all their cuts and have you choose what you wanted to order. They have stopped doing that now.

Anyway I think the place is rather expensive, especially their side dishes and was a wrong choice because Allen doesn’t take beef. He ordered fish and he thought it wasn’t that good.

Conversation as always was good. But it was a bit difficult to carry on talking because the restaurant was rather noisy with a very good crowd for a Tuesday night dinner.

Lunch today was with former Minister Khaw Boon Wan and the usual suspects, i.e. Dr Teo, Allen Ang and Peng Hong.

We last met on 7 January 2025 at Kings Copthorne Hotel to have penang food. On that occasion I was late as I had lunch with my mom to celebrate her birthday. Then the bulk of our conversation that day was on the upcoming GE and what were the likely scenarios for the PAP. Of course my worst case scenarios for the outcome then were all well off the mark.

Today’s lunch was at the same venue and one again penang food. We managed to get a private room where we could eat and talk comfortably.

I raised my concerns about about AI and its implications for the job market. I pointed out that quite a number of people I personally know have been retrenched and were having difficulties finding a new job. These are people in their mid 30s. We then talked about the current young people’s aspirations and how they view what a working life means to them and their likely future in this new era. We all agreed that we must prepare our people for what may lie ahead, a high GDP growth situation but low employment scenario in Singapore. The high medical costs in Singapore and property prices were our other discussion topics.

And I voiced my views of the Albatross Files and how I viewed the Malaysian leadership of that era. It was interesting to hear his views on this since he was himself born in Penang.

I like talking to him because he listens and is keenly aware of what might turn out to be future areas of concern if matters are left unchecked.

As an aside, he told us about the comic book he has created with ChatGPT. This comic book is based on his recollections of his childhood and his younger days in Penang.

Glad to see that everyone had a good appetite and are doing well and healthy.

This morning I woke up to news that the legendary South Indian playback singer S Janaki passed away yesterday, aged 88.

She started singing at an early  age in various South Indian languages. Since I only know Tamil songs, I remember listening to her songs such as singara valena deva and her songs from Then Nilavu, which were released in 1961. Then for the longest time she didn’t sing that many Tamil songs, although she was singing in the other languages.

Until Illayaraja came to the scene in 1976. She sang the songs in Annakili. She again rocketed to fame in the Tamil movie industry and after that she sang so many memorable songs with music composed by Illayaraja and the later composers.

Called the Nightingale of South India, she recorded more than 40,000 songs in multiple languages.

Rest in peace. All the artistes of the era when I was growing up are all slowly departing.

Last night I watched the MPO perform 4 suites from Studio Ghibli movies. Kiki’s Delivery Service, My Neighbour Totoro, Howl’s Moving Castle and Spirited Away. The music for all 4 scores were composed by Joe Hisaishi.

MPO only had one performance scheduled when I booked my ticket 7 months ago, but it was so popular that in the end they had to have 9 performances.

I must confess I haven’t seen a single movie by Studio Ghibli, although I do know they are popular. I liked the music for the first 3. Spirited Away wasn’t that great and the piece I like from that movie, Always With Me, wasn’t preformed as it wasn’t composed by Hisaishi. A pity.

A completely local audience. It’s good that there are enough Malaysians of all races who support live orchestra music.

They were selling music and piano scores for the Studio Ghibli movies as merchandise and surprisingly they were selling out fast. So many musically inclined people there!