2MERRILL

DON'T RETIRE?

Retirement comes to everybody, it is sort of a mandatory proclamation that when people reach a certain age they must step aside and go home. In the UN and its allied agencies like UNICEF (and others) you  have to retire at 60 or 62 (depending on when you joined the organization). But if you think of it, if anti-discrimination laws hold, people have the right to keep working as long as they can and want.

English in the USA

The US government must make a greater effort to get foreigners to speak English.

ENJOY BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE

After 9/11, some folks began to enjoy doing some things “now” that they had planned to do later.

Amsterdam - Bicycling Capital of the World

Talking about carbon emissions and that concern global warming. Industrial cities can take a page from Amsterdam - bicycling capital of the world

Who does have it first? One-upmanship

The story of oneupmanship.

Rich but Sad

is there a strong correlation between wealth and sadness?

ARE YOU KEEPING YOUR COMMITMENTS? DO YOU HAVE THE COMMITMENT STICKNESS FACTOR?

One good technique that HR professionals can do is test how good new recruits are at making commitments. Perhaps, understanding a bit of the interests of interviewees may give a good perspective of how committed a person may be.

RACISM AND DISCRIMINATION - The UNICEF Experience

In Bangladesh, I had a great job with very nice expatriate and local staff and racism was never an issue. In fact, since I joined UNDP in Sri Lanka in 1972, it was nice to see how expatriates worked with locals and racism appeared never to be an issue. Although I must say that, some local staff was more qualified than expatriate staff. However, as I learned later in UNICEF Bangladesh, that balance of expatriate/local was a necessity, but local staff does not understand that much very well. Moreover, I also understood it better on taking the UNICEF assignment in Bangladesh.

RACISM AND DISCRIMINATION - The Personal Experience

I took part in a number of swimming races and road races (marathons) but never took part in the racial tones of the human race, but was a participant of it in direct and indirect ways.

A CHILD DROWNS IN SWIMMING POOL

Just two weeks ago I published swimming away as the best sport on planet earth. In that essay I cautioned that kids attract to water and as such it is important that they are able to swim. I also saluted UNICEF for having Learn-to-Swim programs for children in some developing countries to save kids from drowning. It was sad to hear on May 3, 2006, that former Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker had to cut short a vacation from UK and return to the USA because his his 7-year old grandchild had drowned in the family swimming pool. Of course, hundreds of similar sad incidents go unreported on TV and major newspapers when it happens to ordinary people.

Houses with outdoor swimming pool should fence and gate the pool area so that no child is able to enter unless an adult opens the gate and stays there all the time when kids are in the pool. Of course, they should also be closely supervised in other places of water recreation.