Blog Post #7: Final Reflection

I must confess I used to absolutely hate blogging! The idea of putting my life up on display on an online webpage so people could read about what I did, did not do, or thought about doing on a daily basis was simply absurd. I used to think such activities were confined for closet exhibitionists and attention whores. I mean, blogging can even get you imprisoned on charges of sedition (if in doubt ask Malaysia’s Raja Petra Kamaruddin)!

Setting up the blog and displaying the virgin post were the first steps towards selling out. When the comments from my classmates and Brad started coming in, I actually started to feel a bit curious, excited even. I thought ‘Hm... this might actually turn out to be fun.’ Now, it’s the last post and I’m literally sobbing into my keyboard, wishing it wouldn’t end.

In so many ways, blogging has been so indicative of how this class has progressed. It has encouraged us to move out of our comfort zones, shed old habits and adopt new approaches towards effective communication. Learning about effective communication and practicing it has been such a dynamic and enriching process. What also intrigues me is that despite all the conventional wisdom and rules pertaining effective communication, everyone can still have a distinct and unique personal style without compromising these guidelines. It has been incredibly fascinating learning about everyone through classroom interactions and blog posts.

The word ‘professional’ usually conveys a sense of formality, starchiness and boredom. This course has been anything but. Thank you Brad and my amazing classmates for a brilliant experience. Let’s all get drunk together please!

Blog Post #6: Je m'appelle Ben...

My name is Benjamin Ng, and I am a 4th year Mechanical Engineering undergraduate at the National University of Singapore. Having worked and studied in England and France respectively, I speak fluent French, possess a global outlook and enjoy travelling and interacting with people of different cultures.

I relish team-sports, and embrace leadership roles with passion and responsibility. One of my proudest achievements is being appointed captain of every sports team that I have represented my secondary school and junior college in.

Working as a counsellor during National Service and a month-long community service expedition in a rural Cambodian village have had a profound influence on my attitude towards mentorship and contributing to the community.

Growing up in the Mandai kampung and weekly childhood visits to the zoo have nurtured my 'wild' side. Scuba diving has inspired me to save my beloved coral reefs by marrying my engineering knowledge, sense of giving back to the community and love for nature and pursuing a global career in environmental sustainability.

Why do we write?

As is the case with most NUS projects, sometimes you wonder why you bother going through the motions of doing a project that so many years before you have already done. How many people are able to walk away and say that they have actually learnt or done something useful with their reports?

I was just channel surfing a while ago and chanced upon the last episode of Once Upon A Tree: Tides and Coastlines – Hopes and Future on Arts Central. The show is a locally produced info-ed on the ecological footprint in Singapore. The show showcased Singapore’s tidal and marine habitats, and also described how Singaporeans could be more pro-active about conserving Singapore’s natural marine habitats. Having just completed a report on the conservation of Singapore’s natural heritage, I found it incredibly gratifying that my team’s report was incredibly relevant to the show and also reflected similar themes and veins.

My team has attempted to relate Singapore’s natural heritage to its national identity, thus encouraging more Singaporeans to engage conservation efforts through a sense of pride and ownership. The host of the show, Dr. Shawn Lum, also commented on hoping to see a future where Singapore would be able to celebrate her marine biodiversity as much as her ports and urban developments. It was so satisfying to see some form of vindication for our efforts, to know that our research could actually go some way towards fulfilling his hopes and dreams.

As an avid scuba-diver that has dived so much around the region, writing this report was an opportunity to learn so much about my country's biodiversity, right here in my own backyard. If anything, it reinforced my belief that all of us can do something if we really care about our natural heritage, something I believe we have so much to be proud of.

If anything, I believe reports should be this way, not just an experience in terms of team building and personal development, but also of relevant material that can come in useful to society.

Picture courtesy of www.cjproject.blogspot.com

Blog Post #5: A Positive Learning Experience

When I first realized I would be doing my research project with Hannah, Yi Lei and Yuk Lum, alarm bells were going off like crazy in my head! The few other occasions in which I had had to work with girls had ended on the brink of disaster, and now I was the lone male in a group with three other females! Shock! Horror!

I had foreseen the voting of the research topic as a possible topic of disagreement. Much to my surprise, everyone in the group proved to be very receptive of each other’s opinions, and the research topic was agreed smoothly and peacefully. This was a team with three girls! I had been expecting lots of bitching and catfights, but there were none whatsoever! It was not supposed to be like this! Things were almost too good to be true and I was starting to suspect serious foul play.

However, over the course of the project, I realized that I was blessed with extremely patient and cooperative group members. Although the three of them were already close friends from junior college, they were careful about involving me and not appearing clique-ish so that I would not feel excluded. An irrelevant yet particularly delightful memory involved all three of them all putting their legs up on their chairs simultaneously when they saw a cat approaching. The negative perception of working with girls developed from previous experiences was quickly dissipating.

Hannah, Yuk Lum and Yi Lei, I would like to thank you for changing my attitude towards working with girls. I was also able to draw upon this experience to reflect positively upon past failed working relationships. However, I am still unable to comprehend your obsession with having meetings at Macs!

Blog Post #4: Who says food always brings people together?

While on exchange in France, I grew close to some of the other fellow exchange students. The group comprised of students from Brazil, Mexico, Sweden, and Italy. We often spent our weekends combing the alleys of Lyon for new sights and eating-places.

On our virgin adventure in an old Lyonnaise restaurant, I asked some of the friends around me if I could try their food. Immediately, I noticed some discomfort in their faces and voices as they replied with an uncertain ‘yes’.

My other Singaporean friend on the other hand, was gladly helping herself to the others’ food, not realizing no one else was taking from her plate. She was also voraciously ‘attacking’ her chicken main course, putting the chicken parts in her mouth and sucking all the meat off the bone before spitting the chicken bones out.

Eventually, the other international students around her started looking visibly annoyed and stopped eating, and subsequently stopped making conversation altogether. Some had very disgusted looks on their faces. The meal ended in awkward silence, prompting an early return to school. On the way back to school, my Singaporean friend and I felt rather excluded from the rest.

The incident left me rather perturbed, as these were people I considered myself close to. My friend and I were wondering if the rest were being mean, or perhaps even racist to the only two Asians in the group.

Ironically, over some beer later in the week, I asked the Swedish girl about the others' reactions and learnt that in some of their cultures, they were not used to sharing their dishes. Main courses were considered personal, unless it was a picnic or ‘tapas’ session. Hence, they found having someone stick a fork into their food extremely offensive. This was certainly different from our way of sharing food. They also found the act of eating the chicken to the bone extremely repulsive. This was confirmed after checking with some of the others. In that sense, they were very open and forthcoming with their opinions without being personal. Mindful of the others’ preferences, we were more careful about our mealtime etiquette after that.

The group in happier times.

Blog Post #3: Research Topic: Solar Energy in Singapore

Solar energy, specifically photovoltaic energy, is energy created directly from the sun’s incident radiation. The benefits of photovoltaic energy are its clean method of production, its cost (sunlight is free and limitless) and its almost constant availability. Being situated on the equator, Singapore is well positioned to harness this green source of energy.

However, application of photovoltaic energy locally in homes and offices (such as the placement of solar panels on rooftops to harness solar energy to power lights at night) is limited. This could be attributed to the general lack of awareness regarding implementation of photovoltaic systems, poor availability of photovoltaic appliances, as well as the high initial costs involved in installation.

Initial installation costs for these systems can be costly, but can be offset in the long term due to practically zero maintenance costs. In some countries, excess electricity produced at home can be sold back to the power grids, allowing home owners to make a small profit.

Research question:
Are NUS Science students willing to forfeit the high initial costs of installing photovoltaic systems in their homes in order to reap the long term economic and environmental benefits?

Purpose Statement:
This report aims to educate students from the Science Faculty about the benefits of solar energy and its applicability in Singapore. It also aims to persuade them to consider adopting these systems at homes and offices in future.

Justification for attudinal Survey:
Since students from the NUS Science faculty are future home-owners, rising utility bills will be an inevitable issue. Attitudinal surveys will aid in finding out whether these future home-owners are willing to invest in high initial installation costs for photovoltaic systems in order to reap the long term benefits in their homes and offices. Surveys can also help find out what reservations (other than price concerns) they might have about adopting these systems.

Questions from Monday's class on inter-gender communication

I remain intrigued by the question we discussed during class on Monday: whether communication between man and woman can be considered as intercultural communication. I don’t think there was a definitive conclusion.
Personally I ‘like’ how girls always like to ask questions to which (guys feel) there can be no correct answer, for example: “Am I fat?”
Girls, what I want to know is: Can there be a correct answer?

The next issue concerns sexuality. If a guy likes a girl who behaves exactly like a guy, does that make the person homosexual? What is it that you think determines one’s gender and sexuality, the cognitive distinctions or the physical markers? Let’s discuss!

Blog Post #2: Resolving interpersonal conflict: When East meets West

I did an internship last year with a local shipyard, working on a few ship repair projects, each lasting a few weeks. Normally, each project would require a team of local shipyard staff to liaise with the ships’ owners over its duration. On one particular project involving a French navy ship, a team of French engineers was hired to represent the navy.

After the initial niceties, working relations between the local shipyard and French teams became increasingly strained due to differing work ethics and cultures. The local shipyard’s practice was to finish a task by the pre-arranged by hook or by crook, with strict adherence to timelines. The French on the other hand, preferred ensuring every single detail was perfect before progressing to the next task, which usually led to delays. The French also usually came to work at 9.30 instead of the pre-determined 8.30, and had 2-hour lunches instead of the shipyard staffs’ allocated 1 hour.
(Lazy French: Common misconception or merely cultural differences?)

Naturally, the difference in working styles was causing a lot of friction, and I haven’t even mentioned the language problems yet! None of the local shipyard staff spoke a word of French save ‘Bonjour’. The French, with their already limited grasp of English, if any, could barely understand the locals’ heavily accented English. All this made for an extremely combustible atmosphere during the morning meetings, which normally ended with both teams shouting at each other. Obviously, things were not going well.

From the local shipyard team’s perspective, considering the number of ships waiting to enter the docks for repairs, it was imperative that the job be finished on time. Any delays would lead to losses in profits. They felt frustrated by the French’s slow pace and tendency to nitpick. In contrast, the French team felt attention to detail was more important than sticking to the schedule. Both teams’ different attitudes towards time were definitely causing a lot of friction. The French too, could not understand why people were always shouting at them and rushing them to complete their tasks. The French were feeling confused due to the fast-paced working environment and put off by what they perceived as shoddy workmanship due to the pace at which the jobs were completed.

If you were mutually appointed by either team to manage this project, how would you have done it? Bear in mind the different priorities of the respective teams. Next throw in the language issue. Remember that hiring a translator is an expensive task, and many would have been required for each French engineer. Was this an unfortunate clash of working cultures that cannot be resolved and should be avoided in future? Or could steps have been taken to avoid this. I would like to hear your piece, please. Merci.

Gems of Japanized English

On the topic of accented or heavily modified forms of the English language, here’s a book I read a couple of years ago on ‘Japlish’, titled “Gems of Japanized English”. Here’s an excerpt from the review:

'Shortly after Japan opened her ports to foreign traders, one doctor advertised himself as “a Specialist in the Decease of Children”; eggs were sold as “extract of fowl”; and a notice advised that “Tomorrow, from midnight to 12 noon, you will receive dirty water.”

Fortunately things are improving, but very slowly. A more recent English-language newspaper reported that someone’s “wedding was consummated in the garden of the American consul’s home,” while a road sign was posted near a busy intersection that commanded drivers to “Have many accidents here.” '

If you're having problems understanding the cover, my father used to teach English to a Japanese student who always said 'I like flied lice' and 'The rion loars'. Chew on it.
Anyone interested in reading the book get in touch with me and I’d be glad to lend it to you!

Taken from "Gems of Japanized English", Miranda Kendrick, Charles E. Tuttle Company Inc(1988)

Blog Post #1: A case for engineers from a frustrated engineer-to-be

I’m sick of people moaning about engineers having all the technical complexities figured out in their bespectacled heads, but not having a clue on how to express themselves when the need arises. That being said, I’m also sick of speaking to fellow engineers and getting blown away by incredibly mind-boggling page width-length terms.

Are these stereotypes still relevant? Why can’t we be simple, direct and clear in what we want to say without sounding from another planet? Why talk AT each other when we should be talking TO each other? How can we effectively explain how solar panels work, whether to a tribe of African villagers or a meeting room full of Japanese corporate executives? How can we leave a positive lasting impression on the people that we meet and work with?

I reckon with the right set of communication skills, all this can be achieved. To be a successful global engineer, the ability to understand and adopt national and cultural sensitivities into one’s speech and behaviour while interacting with others is a must. Knowing one’s product alone is insufficient. It is equally, if not more important, to know the target audience well. It’s about having the ability to analyse a situation, and then adopting the necessary mediums of communication to understand a customer’s needs before delivering an appropriate conveyable solution.