Time flies. It's June tomorrow and two days hence we will be setting out for Heathrow as we have done so many times before. The difference is that this time Harriet won't be waiting at the other end, she will be coming with us; back to the land of her birth and our first proper holiday as a family.
On the one hand we lead the typical modern life of being busy all the time. We are taking bookings from family in Scotland to come down in September and we are jetting off to San Francisco where the first order of business is to catch up with a friend from my best year in Edinburgh who is himself jetting down from Washington State.
On the other hand we lead a fairly quiet, sedate life. When the evenings come it's mostly just us, the dogs and the cable TV. Harriet's milestones - such as her first proper steps that we witnessed this week - are a private spectacle. Sadly they are all too private because I am most likely to be at work when they happen (her arrival into the world included).
So, I am dreading the flight (really, really dreading it) but hugely excited about spending some serious time with her. The really confident walking is about to happen any time soon and that will be a great boon to see.
Of all the trips we made during the time that we were expecting Harriet the one I hope to replicate is our trip to Arizona - Kartchner caverns to be precise. We were staying on a campsite that was little more than hard standing with a picnic table. It was a beautiful, calm place and so very fine to sit out in the evening drinking a little bit of the local wine.
That trip J saw so many shooting stars but every time they came I was doing something else (opening the next bottle most likely). Strange thing is that it didn't bother me because you knew if was special anyway.
But this time it's going to be the real thing. Big thanks to Matt for realising we are not so very far away and making the effort of a trip down south. It will be great to see Yosemite at last too after all of those trips when we have just missed it. But best of all, some 6,000 miles away from where I am writing this, I will get to see my shooting star for two uninterupted weeks in her home state.
Mobile Blogging from here.
Monday 31 May 2010
Friday 28 May 2010
Cui Bono?
I enjoyed watching the election coverage during the day in Singapore and it has been a drama ever since. The day that Brown announced that he would stand aside to allow talks between Labour and the Liberal Democrats I left early because I was so enraged by the possibility of it. That didn't last too long thankfully and the resulting Liberal-Conservative coalition is something I rather like.
I have always voted Labour in every General Election. Even in 2005 I decided to lend my support to the independently minded MP for Walthamstow Neil Gerrard because he was essentially an opponent to the government and I wanted to reward his good decisions. Labour's legacy is a good one in many ways and for Civil Partnerships and much of their equality legislation I am grateful.
The decision is not a simple accounting one though where I put the Iraq war in one column and repeal of section 28 in the other and add it all up. You have a feel for which group of people best represents you and your interests. Politically I am probably an 19th century liberal and I despise much of the Conservative's dogma around morality and nationalism. I am sure that I would like Neil Gerrard much more than our Tory MP in Hertfordshire whose voting record on gay rights was abysmal and who is probably just the sort of person who would rather Harriet be taken away from us.
But what really lost me to Labour was my perception that they wanted to control every aspect of our lives. David Davis is likely to be no fan of gay parents but I felt like he spoke for me on civil liberties. Labour I think was corrupted by the management consultants and wanted endless databases, performance metrics and micro-management and frankly government is simply not fit to hold all that information as the Child Benefit debacle cystalised so clearly. No doubt Gordon thought he was clever in using tax credits, topups and benefits to get help to people but present them with forty page forms and the result is obvious - some people game the system and exploit the inconsistencies while the vast majority of people who need and deserve the support don't claim it because they either do not understand the form or resent exposing every aspect of their lives to a government machine in a pathetic plea for help.
So Lib-Con works for me and the big hope is that they can govern from the centre in the way I believed Mr Blair would in 1997.
My own personal interest beyond parenting is of course banking and the election campaign was depressing. It is now gospel that the only attitude permissible to banking is overt hostility and derision.
Derivatives have been an important part of finance and the real economy for hundreds of years. They are primarily about the transfer of risk - the agricultural producer can sell the grain he has not yet harvested for a given price and know how much he has to invest for the next year. A company making an international aquisition can ensure that foreign exchange movements six months hence do not render the deal impractical. Risk has to be transferred somewhere and for that you had better hope there are people willing to speculate.
In fact the main innovation in recent years has probably been the concept of securitisation. The idea is that you pool assets that will pay income but that payment is tranched. Different types of investors buy different tranches and receive different amounts of interest. Losses are allocated to those who receive the most interest first. It opens up the possibility for very risk averse investors such as pension funds to access markets such as real estate, commercial loans and so on.
Obviously things go wrong but in my view it is largely a question of scale. Pass too much risk around and if there is a blow up then the whole system can crash. If the housing market in Florida collapses the world would still go on and there would be enough cash to sort out Florida but if you have done such a great volume of risky deals that all the states start to fail then you set in chain the potential for financial catastrophe.
So it all has gone terribly wrong but some of the solutions proposed are misguided. The size of the bank is not relevant - cf Lehman and Northern Rock. Short selling is not the work of the devil - it is a legitimate way of testing the value of an asset. Remember the hue and cry around the hedge funds that were shorting our fine institution Halifax Bank of Scotland? Well they were right, it was bust and they did not bring it down. Certainly we should have controls to stop banks entering businesses they do not understand and it is important to have greater transparency over what is being shorted and some controls to protect some assets. I'm not saying it's perfect just that it is not black and white.
And as for the huge bonuses and salaries I won't defend everyone but I will say this. The government's bonus tax brought in £2bn to the treasury. No bonus no £2bn simple as that. As for my own position - I suppose the best I can say is that at least my gains have not been squandered on an over-the-top vehicle but used to enable us to have Harriet and hopefully her future siblings.
We all act to protect our own interests it is natural. At dinner when a nice lady from Dulwich complained to me about the banks and how distressed she was when her money in Northern Rock seemed to be at risk I asked what she thought the previous year. She looked a little confused before I reminded her of Farepack. Government guarantees protected 48 thousand of her money and eventually they protected the whole lot but for the people who had invested £480 in total what help was there. None. Nil. Nada. It would have cost 50 million to bail them all out - not much to ask from the bankers 2 billion tax one would think.
Perhaps there is some justice and that we get the government, and the finance system, that we deserve. So when it all goes base over apex the place to start looking for answers is perhaps closer than we would like.
I have always voted Labour in every General Election. Even in 2005 I decided to lend my support to the independently minded MP for Walthamstow Neil Gerrard because he was essentially an opponent to the government and I wanted to reward his good decisions. Labour's legacy is a good one in many ways and for Civil Partnerships and much of their equality legislation I am grateful.
The decision is not a simple accounting one though where I put the Iraq war in one column and repeal of section 28 in the other and add it all up. You have a feel for which group of people best represents you and your interests. Politically I am probably an 19th century liberal and I despise much of the Conservative's dogma around morality and nationalism. I am sure that I would like Neil Gerrard much more than our Tory MP in Hertfordshire whose voting record on gay rights was abysmal and who is probably just the sort of person who would rather Harriet be taken away from us.
But what really lost me to Labour was my perception that they wanted to control every aspect of our lives. David Davis is likely to be no fan of gay parents but I felt like he spoke for me on civil liberties. Labour I think was corrupted by the management consultants and wanted endless databases, performance metrics and micro-management and frankly government is simply not fit to hold all that information as the Child Benefit debacle cystalised so clearly. No doubt Gordon thought he was clever in using tax credits, topups and benefits to get help to people but present them with forty page forms and the result is obvious - some people game the system and exploit the inconsistencies while the vast majority of people who need and deserve the support don't claim it because they either do not understand the form or resent exposing every aspect of their lives to a government machine in a pathetic plea for help.
So Lib-Con works for me and the big hope is that they can govern from the centre in the way I believed Mr Blair would in 1997.
My own personal interest beyond parenting is of course banking and the election campaign was depressing. It is now gospel that the only attitude permissible to banking is overt hostility and derision.
Derivatives have been an important part of finance and the real economy for hundreds of years. They are primarily about the transfer of risk - the agricultural producer can sell the grain he has not yet harvested for a given price and know how much he has to invest for the next year. A company making an international aquisition can ensure that foreign exchange movements six months hence do not render the deal impractical. Risk has to be transferred somewhere and for that you had better hope there are people willing to speculate.
In fact the main innovation in recent years has probably been the concept of securitisation. The idea is that you pool assets that will pay income but that payment is tranched. Different types of investors buy different tranches and receive different amounts of interest. Losses are allocated to those who receive the most interest first. It opens up the possibility for very risk averse investors such as pension funds to access markets such as real estate, commercial loans and so on.
Obviously things go wrong but in my view it is largely a question of scale. Pass too much risk around and if there is a blow up then the whole system can crash. If the housing market in Florida collapses the world would still go on and there would be enough cash to sort out Florida but if you have done such a great volume of risky deals that all the states start to fail then you set in chain the potential for financial catastrophe.
So it all has gone terribly wrong but some of the solutions proposed are misguided. The size of the bank is not relevant - cf Lehman and Northern Rock. Short selling is not the work of the devil - it is a legitimate way of testing the value of an asset. Remember the hue and cry around the hedge funds that were shorting our fine institution Halifax Bank of Scotland? Well they were right, it was bust and they did not bring it down. Certainly we should have controls to stop banks entering businesses they do not understand and it is important to have greater transparency over what is being shorted and some controls to protect some assets. I'm not saying it's perfect just that it is not black and white.
And as for the huge bonuses and salaries I won't defend everyone but I will say this. The government's bonus tax brought in £2bn to the treasury. No bonus no £2bn simple as that. As for my own position - I suppose the best I can say is that at least my gains have not been squandered on an over-the-top vehicle but used to enable us to have Harriet and hopefully her future siblings.
We all act to protect our own interests it is natural. At dinner when a nice lady from Dulwich complained to me about the banks and how distressed she was when her money in Northern Rock seemed to be at risk I asked what she thought the previous year. She looked a little confused before I reminded her of Farepack. Government guarantees protected 48 thousand of her money and eventually they protected the whole lot but for the people who had invested £480 in total what help was there. None. Nil. Nada. It would have cost 50 million to bail them all out - not much to ask from the bankers 2 billion tax one would think.
Perhaps there is some justice and that we get the government, and the finance system, that we deserve. So when it all goes base over apex the place to start looking for answers is perhaps closer than we would like.
Sunday 9 May 2010
Singapore
I eschewed the offer of a car to the airport because it was an early morning trip on a Bank Holiday and I reckoned the tube would be faster and quieter. It is also a rather pleasant trip on the Piccadily line once you emerge from the underground section - it's a gentle pace to be sure compared to the Heathrow express but does not subject its passengers to a very annoying, constantly looping TV.
It's also absurdly expensive and although my business class ticket was equally absurd you do at least get something in return. From the moment you arrive you get a separate queue and the satisfying sight of a bright orange label "priority" stuck to your luggage . You then proceed through the Fast Track security channel and are soon safely enclosed in the lounge. I wasn't very impressed with the lounge but that is probably because we were spoiled by the new facilities BA has at Terminal 5. Everything was there - champagne, beer, wine, sandwiches, cakes and the like - but it looked rather corporate and generic.
If that sounds pompous and picky that's because it is. It's just still a little new for me and everyone wants to fit in and the best way to fit in is usually to appear jaded and fed up. Still I was really excited when it came to going on the plane, which was the Airbus 380 double decker monster.
Decades ago aviation advances meant that we could fly supersonic from London to New York. Given its dreadful envirnomental impact it is perhaps no bad thing that Concorde flies no more. But something was needed to make plane travel a little more exciting than the prospect of having to find a quid to go to the toilet on a Ryanair jet flying to an industrial site many miles away from your intended destination. The A380 was surely going to be it.
And it is a wonder to look at - a little bit like a beluga whale from the front, strange and not appearing to be from this world. The bit I missed though was going upstairs - the connecting bridge simply glides up or down to your destination floor which makes perfect sense but means that once you're in it looks like any other aircraft and some of the magic is gone.
The business class seats are huge and could comfortably seat two John Prescotts. The service is excellent and the food sublime. No reasonable human being could want for more on a flight but even we esconced in business class luxury gazed longingly at the front of the plane. The first class on the A380 is spectacular - it is not a seat you get but a suite with a separate bed and seat. On the Emirates service you can even take a shower in the sky.
There are some who take the James song literally - 'If I hadn't seen such riches I could live with being poor' - and sat bitterly bemoaning the fact that in first class you get Krug whereas you have to put up with Piper Heidsieck in business class. Two old crones I heard complained that the beds were uncomfortable and the designer 'should be shot'.
Don't worry - to keep me real I had only to think of the next flight I will take. Economy class to San Francisco with Harriet. Every time I thought of it I shuddered and downed some Piper Heidsieck and was damned grateful for it.
However, even the suite class passengers must be glad to get off the plane after 13 hours. Thankfully the label had done its job and I had picked up my bag and was out of the airport in ten minutes. My taxi driver gave me a history of the Changi airport and explained that it had all been constructed on reclaimed land. The motorway leading from the aiport to Singapore proper was long and straight and no matter whether his story about it being an alternative landing strip in emergencies was true it filled in the time and helped me to start adjusting to the accent or more precisely the speed at which people talk.
I checked in to my hotel and realised immediately that J could never come here. I was on the 20th floor and there looked to be a similar number above me. The internal lifts were transparent and even I preferred to keep my eyes fixed on the control panel. One of the big disappointments about leaving Field View was losing our power shower and the new one in London is frankly attrocious. But this hotel took the power shower to a whole new level - there were two showerheads built into the fixed unit and a separate freestanding shower just in case. It certainly blasted away the cobwebs and I set off for the office.
When I took over as the head of the front office model validation group I decided I had to visit Singapore. We have had a group there for several years and no one from the management team has ever been to see them. I wanted to give them the benefit of access to me in person and try to make them feel valued members of the group. Since we are setting up another group in New York too I shall be doing quite a bit more of this.
Singapore was chosen as a lower cost location but it has proved popular with some of the London managers who have chosen to relocate there. Quality of life is usually cited as the reason and provided you have the means I can see some of the attraction. You can have maids, cooks and nannies, pay low taxes and enjoy hot weather the year round. The main downside I could see at work is that because of the time differences people seem to work late to ensure they can have meetings with London and meetings with New York are really out of the question.
Still, every day we ate out at a different restaurant, first Chinese then Indian then Thai and then Japanese. It was comparable in price to our in-house restaurant in London but vastly superior in quality. On Thursday we went out for a team dinner. My local manager there is French so I suggested we tried a French restaurant and he obliged by picking Au Petit Salut.
For years I just turned up to work dinners, ate and left but now I was the one who had to pay for everything and scrutinise the costs. The restaurant was staggeringly expensive and the policy would just about cover the set menu. No one could be persuaded to try the escargot so we all went for the crab and avacado salade which was lovely except for the caviar, which I can't stand. For the main course you could have sea bream or veal. I went for the veal and was actually relieved to be told that it was out and would be replaced with more conventional beef. It was all of a really high standard and presented in a delicate and precise way. For desert we all went for the souffle and they all arrived perfectly and simultaneously.
On the other evenings a smaller group of us went out and tried different areas of town for drinks and entertainment. The first night we spent in the marina near the office gazing out at the mental casino. Imagine three skyscapers with a cruise liner stuck on the top and you get the idea. The second night we explored some of the standard ex-pat bars along the Singapore River and on the third night we visited the Arab quarter and later on I went for an exploration of China town.
There is a real incentive to drink cocktails in Singapore because they are the same price as a beer but actually I grew to like the local Tiger beer. There is something very pleasant in having beer from an iced pint glass while baking in the heat at midnight.
This strange place in South East Asia where the sun shines but where English is the dominant language, they drive on the left and even use our plugs will not appeal to everyone but I enjoyed my time there immensely. I was desperate to see J and H again but sad still to leave and I'd like to return.
But first there is the matter of an 11 hour flight with a 16 month old next month. Still, at the end of that flight we shall be in San Francisco so it is a good problem to have and you won't hear me complain. Too much.
It's also absurdly expensive and although my business class ticket was equally absurd you do at least get something in return. From the moment you arrive you get a separate queue and the satisfying sight of a bright orange label "priority" stuck to your luggage . You then proceed through the Fast Track security channel and are soon safely enclosed in the lounge. I wasn't very impressed with the lounge but that is probably because we were spoiled by the new facilities BA has at Terminal 5. Everything was there - champagne, beer, wine, sandwiches, cakes and the like - but it looked rather corporate and generic.
If that sounds pompous and picky that's because it is. It's just still a little new for me and everyone wants to fit in and the best way to fit in is usually to appear jaded and fed up. Still I was really excited when it came to going on the plane, which was the Airbus 380 double decker monster.
Decades ago aviation advances meant that we could fly supersonic from London to New York. Given its dreadful envirnomental impact it is perhaps no bad thing that Concorde flies no more. But something was needed to make plane travel a little more exciting than the prospect of having to find a quid to go to the toilet on a Ryanair jet flying to an industrial site many miles away from your intended destination. The A380 was surely going to be it.
And it is a wonder to look at - a little bit like a beluga whale from the front, strange and not appearing to be from this world. The bit I missed though was going upstairs - the connecting bridge simply glides up or down to your destination floor which makes perfect sense but means that once you're in it looks like any other aircraft and some of the magic is gone.
The business class seats are huge and could comfortably seat two John Prescotts. The service is excellent and the food sublime. No reasonable human being could want for more on a flight but even we esconced in business class luxury gazed longingly at the front of the plane. The first class on the A380 is spectacular - it is not a seat you get but a suite with a separate bed and seat. On the Emirates service you can even take a shower in the sky.
There are some who take the James song literally - 'If I hadn't seen such riches I could live with being poor' - and sat bitterly bemoaning the fact that in first class you get Krug whereas you have to put up with Piper Heidsieck in business class. Two old crones I heard complained that the beds were uncomfortable and the designer 'should be shot'.
Don't worry - to keep me real I had only to think of the next flight I will take. Economy class to San Francisco with Harriet. Every time I thought of it I shuddered and downed some Piper Heidsieck and was damned grateful for it.
However, even the suite class passengers must be glad to get off the plane after 13 hours. Thankfully the label had done its job and I had picked up my bag and was out of the airport in ten minutes. My taxi driver gave me a history of the Changi airport and explained that it had all been constructed on reclaimed land. The motorway leading from the aiport to Singapore proper was long and straight and no matter whether his story about it being an alternative landing strip in emergencies was true it filled in the time and helped me to start adjusting to the accent or more precisely the speed at which people talk.
I checked in to my hotel and realised immediately that J could never come here. I was on the 20th floor and there looked to be a similar number above me. The internal lifts were transparent and even I preferred to keep my eyes fixed on the control panel. One of the big disappointments about leaving Field View was losing our power shower and the new one in London is frankly attrocious. But this hotel took the power shower to a whole new level - there were two showerheads built into the fixed unit and a separate freestanding shower just in case. It certainly blasted away the cobwebs and I set off for the office.
When I took over as the head of the front office model validation group I decided I had to visit Singapore. We have had a group there for several years and no one from the management team has ever been to see them. I wanted to give them the benefit of access to me in person and try to make them feel valued members of the group. Since we are setting up another group in New York too I shall be doing quite a bit more of this.
Singapore was chosen as a lower cost location but it has proved popular with some of the London managers who have chosen to relocate there. Quality of life is usually cited as the reason and provided you have the means I can see some of the attraction. You can have maids, cooks and nannies, pay low taxes and enjoy hot weather the year round. The main downside I could see at work is that because of the time differences people seem to work late to ensure they can have meetings with London and meetings with New York are really out of the question.
Still, every day we ate out at a different restaurant, first Chinese then Indian then Thai and then Japanese. It was comparable in price to our in-house restaurant in London but vastly superior in quality. On Thursday we went out for a team dinner. My local manager there is French so I suggested we tried a French restaurant and he obliged by picking Au Petit Salut.
For years I just turned up to work dinners, ate and left but now I was the one who had to pay for everything and scrutinise the costs. The restaurant was staggeringly expensive and the policy would just about cover the set menu. No one could be persuaded to try the escargot so we all went for the crab and avacado salade which was lovely except for the caviar, which I can't stand. For the main course you could have sea bream or veal. I went for the veal and was actually relieved to be told that it was out and would be replaced with more conventional beef. It was all of a really high standard and presented in a delicate and precise way. For desert we all went for the souffle and they all arrived perfectly and simultaneously.
On the other evenings a smaller group of us went out and tried different areas of town for drinks and entertainment. The first night we spent in the marina near the office gazing out at the mental casino. Imagine three skyscapers with a cruise liner stuck on the top and you get the idea. The second night we explored some of the standard ex-pat bars along the Singapore River and on the third night we visited the Arab quarter and later on I went for an exploration of China town.
There is a real incentive to drink cocktails in Singapore because they are the same price as a beer but actually I grew to like the local Tiger beer. There is something very pleasant in having beer from an iced pint glass while baking in the heat at midnight.
This strange place in South East Asia where the sun shines but where English is the dominant language, they drive on the left and even use our plugs will not appeal to everyone but I enjoyed my time there immensely. I was desperate to see J and H again but sad still to leave and I'd like to return.
But first there is the matter of an 11 hour flight with a 16 month old next month. Still, at the end of that flight we shall be in San Francisco so it is a good problem to have and you won't hear me complain. Too much.
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