Danny Tan is Unlocking His Private Holdings

While his brother, Vincent vacates the head honcho seat in Berjaya Corporation to Sonny boy, Robin; Danny is now moving swiftly to unlock the value of his private land holdings via a massive corporate exercise through Dijaya Corporation.

No one really can put a finger as to why he aborted the private placement of new Dijaya shares.

Suffice to say, he has now unleashed Plan B. This is an internal exercise to seek capital from its shareholders. Through this exercise, he will transfer all his private land holdings for RM250 million in cold cash and the rest through a RCULS arrangement.

So, shareholders will now be given this option: Four rights issue for every 5 existing shares held at RM1.20 and a 1 bonus share for every 4 rights issue subscribed.

So, what does it look like?

The time must surely be ripe for Danny to milk Dijaya shareholders once more.

Will Such English Teachers Make the Grade?

The teaching of English via the internet is not something new. Many teachers have set up web-sites and have continuing success teaching English to speakers of other languages world-wide.

Let us look at one of them providing an advanced certificate in Teaching of English as a Foreign Language.

This company, known as TEFL Express conducts a 120 hours internet coaching which apparently is a preparatory course for you to become a teacher of English and to help prepare you to ace the ESOL examination administered by Cambridge ESOL Examining Board.

The course, judging by its outline, will provide exposure in most areas of English. Once you have proved yourself successful, you will be awarded an Advanced Certificate and can then proceed to teach English world-wide.

Essentially consisting of a core module;5 main module course and two specialization modules, you can study at your leisurely pace with the caveat that you must complete it within 100 days from the start of the course.

Let us look closely at the course outline in gist.

The core module (mandatory) is ‘The Principles of Teaching English’-basically language understanding and grammar points.

The 5 units encompass grammar, lexis, pronunciation and functions; the 4 learning skills and classroom management.

Of these, there are 2 specific units focused on preparation to take the Cambridge ESOL examinations.

The specialist modules to choose from include:

> Survival Teaching
> Young Learners Teaching
> Professional Teaching

As education today is getting more sub-standard and driven largely by fee income, my fear is without the required class-room teaching practice, teaching quality may be questionable. Can these 120 hour graduate really teach English adequately? Maybe some can teach at the most basic level.

Paper qualification is one thing, apparent recognition of skill is another. Performance is definitely key here.

Best Flash Mob

We have also emulated flash mob culture at KLIA recently.

This has been a trend for sometime now.

The best flash mob demonstration was rapturously done at a Central Station in Antwerp in Belgium.

Here, enjoy the video.

Hugo: Where Dreams are Made

This is one beautiful movie spun by master film-maker, Martin Scorsese, about an orphan living in the railway station in Paris.

The story line is engaging and the sets are superb.

Most of the characters are well developed to give the film a rapturous, magical quality about it even though it depicts true life of early cinema in Paris.

Could have won the best film.

Still Believe in the Food Quality in Squeaky Clean Singapore?

I am sure that the franchisee would not deliberately put in unsavoury things into food.

But things happen.

So, when this lady customer found out about this cockroach in her bun, she was downright sore.

She did complain to the snack joint in Singapore but to no avail.

Right, now the complaint is with the Singaporean health authority.

I wonder what we would do in Malaysia when we find such things in our food.

For instance, there is this coffee shop behind my house. After seeing a picture of a glass of iced Chinese tea with a floating dead cockroach in it from a blog; to this day I have never set foot into this restaurant to buy a drink.

Then, there was our experience with a famous international 'poached potato' outlet. Along with the beef fillings in the potato, we found a toe nail. When we brought the matter up with the staff; being foreigners, they feigned ignorance. If I had a camera then, I would have taken a photo and hand the suspected food item and the photograph to the health authorities.

Thankfully, the joint has now closed.