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- Denis Giles
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One very common feature at the presentation of the budget is a photo of the finance minister giving final touches to the budget papers. This is something that takes place every year and for the last many years since independence.
“As soon as a new finance minister is sworn in he or she takes charge of the final touch kit,” said an official in the finance ministry as he sat down for a cup of tea, outside Parliament House.
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- Denis Giles
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How often we are so impatient to see the results of some effort we are putting into some venture or other! We might have to study day and night and wonder whether it is worth it and whether we are wasting our time. “If only we could see our future!” we tell ourselves, “To see whether we are investing our efforts well!”
But that is not the way it is supposed to be. We invest our time, put in effort and the rewards come at their own time. Chinese proverbs are common and often have stories behind them. The proverb “pulling up a crop to help it grow” is about an impatient man in the Song Dynasty. He was eager to see his rice seedlings grow quickly. So he thought of a solution. He would pull up each plant a few inches. After a day of tedious work, the man surveyed his paddy field. He was happy that his crop seemed to have “grown” taller.
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- Denis Giles
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Most everyone is scared of the unknown.
When we board a plane, we are just a bit terrified, as we know that soon we will not be in control. When we leave our home in the morning, we spy a black cat and wonder what’s in store for us, even as we avoid walking under a ladder. Scared about unknown sounds, about news that earthquakes are becoming more frequent, and scared of a scheduled hospital visit and what it will reveal about that secret pain in your stomach.
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- Denis Giles
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Fifteen years ago on the death of Art Buchwald the famous humour columnist, my column replaced his in Dubai’s Khaleej Times. On reading more about the great man into whose shoes I had stepped in I found that the New York Times had interviewed Art Buchwald just before he passed away. The interview was called, "The Last Word" in which the interviewed person is allowed to express his own obituary. I watched with a smile as the grinning face of Art came on my screen and he shouted, "Hi! I just died!"
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- Denis Giles
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Yesterday I got a note from a reader, saying, “Bob, I long for the day when I won’t have any more problems!”
And I thought of Mr Pointed Ears!
Some ten years ago, a new dog, with long pointed ears, entered the colony I live in. Nobody wanted the new stray to stay in the premises, and so all the watchmen were kept very busy, chasing it out of the gates, but somehow it managed to outwit them, enter again and I marveled at its perseverance.