2 articles today, the obviously slightly raunchy one below, *grin* and a more sober one about being your own boss further down. Read what you want.

Sex in the... Gym?

Am listening to Perfect 10, morning show right now, and the topic of the day appears to be the raunchy stuff that goes on in gyms. You know, the kind of thing that everybody knows happens, and is whispered furtively from person to person. "I donno whether true or not, but my friend tell me that..."

So Daniel Ong and Sheikh Haikel right now are taking in calls from the public about all the *cough* sweaty stuff that goes on in gyms. The way you hear it, gyms are like a hotspot for gay sex nowadays. All the callers keep talking about the gays that hang out in the gyms and who check each other out and have sex in the toilets. This girl even called up about walking in a pair of lesbians making out in the sweat room. [sweat room. Hm.] This guy with a bit more balls [bad pun] called up, admitted he was gay, and that he agreed with it, and said it was because gays were visual and with the sight of all those sweaty bodies... *wipes sweat off brow* He even mentioned an "Orchard Road gym" and how many gyms are there along Orchard? ;)

The other consensus also seems to be that gays are a whole lot freer with the lovin' and are more open to anyone who catches their fancy at the time. I see you, I like you, let's make for the toilet. Yipes. Someone did comment to me that this was a failing of the gay community, that because they don't have to worry about pregnancies, unlike the rest of us straight folk, they don't mind spreadin' the love if they feel the need. [I'm putting in effort to not mention the F-word here. Give me kudos for that at least]

Sensationalism at its best, folks. The guys had to put a disclaimer at the end that "Gyms are for working out, and not everybody who goes there is there to pick up guys, and is gay" It was getting semi-pornographic at the end actually. Ok lah, not so bad, but definitely getting hot there. ;)

Have to admit though, that if what I heard is true, then there isn't much to dispute on the gay sex part. Does the Gay Researcher have anything to comment on this? [oh, you know who you are you... hahaha]

On to other more innocent stuff....

To Be Your Own Boss

One strange effect of my biz education is that I'm more hesitant about jumping into biz. Funny huh? I donno whether I'm supposed to graduate with all these grand delusions about being 'my own boss' and having my own office with my own namecards or something, but I certainly don't have those.

I wonder about the rest of my cohort. Do they all have urges to start their own businesses? Be their own bosses? Have a horde of employees to lord over and boss and bitch over? Work, slaves, work...

Sounds like a revenge complex. As I have suffered at the hands of my bitch-boss, so you shall suffer at my hands.

Anyway I comment on this, because being part of a biz cohort, naturally I have offers to go into biz or to help someone with their biz. Maybe they think that as an NUS Business School graduate I'm supposed to be more 'qualified' or have access to secret knowledge that only the holiest of holiest academics hold. Nyuk. Joking lah.

I think it's more to the fact that people like to be bosses. Who'd want someone lording over them, wielding whips and dangling your salary cheque just safely out of your reach? The main point is that we don't like to be vulnerable. We don't want to feel that someone has such a large amount of power over us. By God and nature, we are made to have free will, and naturally we resent any attempts to remove that freedom from us.

To counter this, thus, we have the option of going into biz. I'm a boss. The power lies within my hands. Best still, the power over other lies within my hands. Yes, as much as we like to be free, we like the feeling of power and superiority over others too.

Is this the right approach to biz at all? Face it, even as a boss, there're gonna be people with power over you, who've more money and who can squash you within their grip like a hamster in your hand. [bad allusion to what Tenderheart and I were talking about last night.] There'll be clients you have to humiliatingly kowtow to, there'll be customers infuriating in their incessant and impossible demands. There'll be suppliers who couldn't care less if your biz will collapse if they don't deliver that batch of T-shirts by the agreed time. [another bad allusion to the T-shirt stunt]

So maybe doing business isn't about power at all. After all, there're still people with power over you, just that they're a different batch of people.

What else then is the point of doing biz? Opportunity? Money?

Is it considered a good biz practice to grab at every single opportunity that comes your way, regardless of whether you can handle it, or whether your biz is suited to it, or whether you know the market at all? [Tenderheart: Remember A?] I have a relative who blindly grabbed at opportunities presented before him, without considering the risks involved. Needless to say, he's not exactly rich lah. [my dad pointedly told me never to attempt to ask him to invest in any schemes I have, lest we face the prospect of him pounding at our door asking for his returns.]

It's even worse biz practice to work purely for the money involved. Biz literature is full of case studies of companies who only cared about the bottom line, without caring about the effect on customers, employees and overall company reputation. This doesn't just happen to small Lim-Ah-Hoe-Pte-Ltds. British Airways back in the 90s wanted to cut costs, and did so by firing off a great bulk of their experienced staff and hiring cheaper inexperienced staff, hoping to train them in the long term. [at least, i hope that's what they intended] Of course they screwed up bigtime, pissing off a lotta customers to fly to other airlines.

Enron is a prime example of a company that wanted to see profits so badly, they ventured into areas that deviated from their core biz, and in the end, had to resort to unethical practices in order to avoid their asses being sued off. Of course, we all know now that didn't work.

What other reason is there now to go into biz? I'm gonna say something that might go against the grain of what everybody thinks biz should be about. I say, go into it for the love of what you do.

Sure, sounds like more of Khel's fancy-shmancy dreaming. Wake up to real life. You can't survive on love alone to do biz.

No you can't, but you'll certainly have a lot more ommph to go through with it. Love ain't enough for you to survive in biz, but I say it's a large deciding factor in whether you'll stick to it, and succeed in the end. Every large biz started with a vision. Someone had a dream, and pushed that dream through, until they made good. Don't believe me? Try Anita Roddick, of Body Shop, one of the most successful social entrepreneurs around. Take a look and see why NKF has more money than any other local charity.

So my advice to all budding entrepreneurs: Forget the money. Forget the prestige. Forget the power. Find something you love, you have a passion for. Everything else falls into place after that.

To people joining the workforce: Don't fall into that i-need-a-job-now mentality. You can find a job, you can be good at it, but is it worth being miserable for the rest of your life? Don't just jump at the first job offer that comes your way, and don't bother about people who think you're picky or fussy. [tell them to read my blog for the entry about Unemployed Graduate Woes. You have to scroll down to the bottom.] Find out what you truly love to do. Then only will you be able to succeed in the end.

And the real reward of all this? Looking at all those people that doubted you in the beginning, slogging at their lousy jobs, complaining about their bosses and wanting to quit but the economy's so bad and i need the money for the downpayment for the car and the maid and the blah blah blah..... And being able to laugh in their face outright.