Funny Money
Barter system was introduced to facilitate trading since early human civilization. Then money was introduced as the intermediate for payment for goods and services. Money has to meet these functions to be deemed valuable:
- A medium - Used as a medium in value exchange trading.
- A measure - Has a standard numerical unit of market value of goods and services. Divisible without losing value (Ex: gold bar divisible to gold coin. The value is based on the weight of the gold).
- A store (of value) - Money itself must have intrinsic value.
- A standard - It must be widely accepted as a standard way for payment of goods, services and debts.
The money introduced was originally commodity money, however, today’s contemporary money system are based on fiat money.
Time goes by so fast!
I was 20 when I came to the States. A friend of mine just celebrated his 21st birthday. I’m turning 23 in a few months. Sometimes, I feel like I am still 18. But there were times I felt so much older than my age. The job-entrance -delaying school system now doesn’t do me any good to prepare for the real world I am about to face in a short while. College leavers used to enter the job market on average age of 20 then. Now the average age is 23. Isn’t it more efficient and productive if we can finish a given task sooner rather than later?
I still have about nine more months until my big gay graduation day. There is so much more to learn about how the world function, not through textbooks but evidences surrounded me which hidden in the plain sight. I have no crystal ball to see the future. Nor have I the power to convince people to get ready for stormy years we are about to experience.
Ten Years From Now…
I have always thinking what I would become ten years in the future. Life is so uncertain. The only certain thing is that death will be the end of it. Or the new beginning of a new life, for that matter.
In ten years time, I will be at the very end of the longest commitment I have ever committed. It’s backed by a written agreement signed by me unthinkingly out of sheer promising future it offered. I was overjoyed then. But I’m not so sure now. I can’t back out of this commitment without paying the severence cost for the benefits I have received from the other party for their generosity to me. People said I’m lucky and should be grateful for the rare opportunity dreamed by thousands others. Well, I’m very grateful and humble for the given privileges. I’m living every moment of it.
Why Czar?
This is my first time blogging. Please have mercy on me ;-). Before I start, I’d like to explain why I chose Czar as my blog’s name. These are the definitions of “Czar”:
czar (zär, tsär)
n.
-
also tsar or tzar (zär, tsär) A male monarch or emperor, especially one of the emperors who ruled Russia until the revolution of 1917.
-
A person having great power; an autocrat: “the square-jawed, ruddy complacency of Jack Farrell, the czar of the Fifteenth Street police station” (Ernest Hemingway).
-
Informal An appointed official having special powers to regulate or supervise an activity: a racetrack czar; an energy czar.
I’m more interested in definition #3. It’s like a reminder for me to take charge of my own life. Shape it the way I want it to be. But, above all, I simply chose Czar because it rhymes with my name.
=)
>Czar your life<
