Dear All,
Here is an unconventional Christmas
greeting I received from a friend in financial industry, which I find it
meaningful and would like to share with you all.
X'mas is just one day away and the past
year was truly an eventful one, and I believe none in this industry will ever
forget what we experienced and witnessed, which made last year a really tough
one to many of us but what lies ahead could be even
tougher. "Unconventional" looks to be the theme with so many
unconventional events happened, which led to even more unconventional
government measures. The below should also be considered somewhat
unconventional in the X'mas greetings from me but I still would
like to share it with you ........
Yesterday, the Christian fellowship
had the traditional gathering before X'mas when they shared homemade food
with all other colleagues. I'm not a Christian but, like previous
years, did attend the gathering and had the chance to watch a brief
video of a man
called Nick Vujicic - a man
without limbs. I learnt about him from paper a few weeks ago. (If you know
about him, you may share the same feeling and, if not, this link should
let you learn more about him - www.lifewithoutlimbs.org).
It is amazing to leant that there are
people with the courage and determination to face the kind of
challenges in doing even the simplest things that many of us take for
granted everyday, like walking or picking up a glass of water with our hands. A
couple of decades ago, there was a young Canadian with bone cancer in his leg
who tried to complete a trip across Canada by running a Marathon a day with one
of his legs an artificial one to raise funds for cancer
research. Physically, he didn't make it as he was forced to stop after
less than 5 months and passed away in about a year after he started. That
young Canadian, named Terry Fox, was 22 when he started his journey and passed
away a month shy of 23. While he physically never finished his trip, he
has "completed" a journey, one of the greatest in Canadian
history and really a journey of hope by bringing many many others to
follow his footsteps. One of those was a fellow Canadian Rick Hansen, who
suffered from spinal cord injury and was paralyzed since 15. From Mar-85 to
May-87, he rolled his wheelchair over 40,000km
across 34 countries, incl. the Great Wall in China - I was studying in
Canada when he had his heroic return to his home country and raised $26m in total. He's still working
feverishly now on spinal cord injury related programs and initiatives (www.rickhansen.com). Yesterday, I
watched this video of Nick, 25 according to his web site (www.lifewithoutlimbs.org), who
candidly talked to some high school students about his experience such as being
teased by his school mates when he was a small kid. He's now full time
preaching Christianity and giving talks to inspire others - and I'm
sure he did, and am sure with great success. His messages were clear and
simple - there are always hopes ahead of us and so long as we never give
up, we can always overcome whatever obstacles in front of us and achieve what
we aimed for and we should always be opening our hearts to love and care
about others. He also shared a touching experience he had - Some time ago,
he was in a gathering with friends and when that gathering was almost
over, a 2-1/2-year-old girl started hugging everyone in the gathering.
When she faced with Nick, she reckoned that Nick has no limbs to hug others
and, after wondering for a couple of minutes, the little girl put
her arms at her back and "hug" Nick with her neck - kind of
"necking" him. I can envision that moment and it was indeed amazing
and touching to learn that a 2-1/2-year-old knows from her heart how to embrace
others with equality and respect. The world may be tough, but there are
always nice things around us to joy about. Nick was in HK late-Nov / early Dec,
and that's why he was featured in newspaper article and our CEO William
actually had the chance to give him a hug!
We may experience one of the toughest
moments in decades in our industry (and in many other industries), in my
view, the challenges that we face are negligible comparing to those faced
by Terry, Rick and Nick. I hope these stories may help inspiring you in
weathering this difficult time and there is always a better tomorrow ahead of
us.
X'mas is around the corner and it is a
moment of sharing and I hope the above won't bore you too much and, as usual,
in my more conventional X'mas greeting message, I would like to truly
thank you once again for the kind support to my works and those of my
colleagues over last year and the past many years. It is your encouragement and
support that form part of the "nice things" around us and drive us
forward. In return, we will try our best to offer you more interesting and,
hopefully, profitable investment ideas in the years to come.
I would also like to take this
opportunity to wish you and your family:
A Merry X'mas
and a Happy, Healthy and Wonderful New Year!
All the best wishes,
Jeff Harteam
2008 X’mas HK.