The art of making money and losing it

What would you do if you one day woke up to find that your savings had gone POOOOF into thin air?

COMMENT

Mamaks are quite well known for their special relationship with money. As hardworking as we are, we tend to give special attention to our hard earned cash.

I remember my late grandpa keeping his monies safe by placing them underneath the folded layers of his sarong. My late grandma on the other hand carried hers tied inside the corners of her handkerchief. Dad locks his monies in his antique safe deposit storage. Mom hides hers in her bra. And my brother who despite being very successful in his career, flaunts his mamakism by tying up his neatly rolled cash with yellow rubber bands.

Coming from the same family, I too have a distinctive habit when it comes to money – I get excited over one ringgit notes.

This is what I do on a daily basis – I use big notes to pay for everything, trying to get hold of as many one ringgit notes as possible. Every day upon reaching home, I arrange the stacks of one ringgit notes I collected during the day – and which I swear never to use – in my cardboard box before putting it away somewhere safe.

I find saving money this way, easy and fun. Last month I saved RM450 and RM490 the month before. The best thing about it is that it is effortless and a good addition to my monthly savings in the bank.

I am sure everyone has their own way of saving – some make direct transfers from salary accounts to savings accounts; some have piggy banks; some keep ‘em tucked away under their pillows; hidden in their underwear drawers; while some deposit it into their Amanah Saham Berhad and Tabung Haji accounts; while others make investments.

No matter how we decide to save for a rainy day, sometimes I do worry that whatever I save will still not be sufficient to cover my needs in the future. Seriously, how does one budget for the rest of their life? And what happens if, due to some unforeseen circumstances, whatever we save vanishes into thin air?

It is moments like these that remind me of the untraceable RM42billion Malaysia seems to have lost.

Forty-two billion. Masya Allah! 4-2-followed by nine zeros. NINE ZEROS. Geez. That’s a lot of money. I couldn’t save that much money even if I get to be 200 years old. In fact, even if most Malaysians put all our savings together, we might not get any close to even RM1 billion, what more RM42 billion!

The thing is, as a guarantor to this untraceable RM42 billion, our government has made a big boo-boo. And now they might be forced to cough up billions to cover for the vanished sum. BILLIONS. Billions which by right should be spent on our well-being.

This money could be used to build public hospitals with state-of-the-art facilities in our neighbourhood. It could be used to improve our roads; sponsor our children’s education; improve public transportation in our district; reduce our utility bills and provide us with free Internet services.

My God, if we begin to list down all the things we could do with it, I can assure you it will be a never ending list!

The thing that boggles my mind is how RM42 billion simply vanished. Seriously how can that much money be untraceable? It must be residing somewhere. Someone should know.

I dunno about you, but if it was any of my one ringgit stacks which had gone MIA, I would have hung the people in-charge upside down to a coconut tree.

How about you? What would you do if one day you found your savings account statement showing less than what you remembered depositing?

Funny how RM42 billion went POOOOF into thin air… perhaps a rope and a coconut tree would help those in charge remember where it went.