a Geriatric's tale

So here I am, at the foot of her clinical bed, watching her have a lunch of chopped liver and carrot rice porridge, when suddenly it occurs to me that it is already end June and she will be turning 80 in a couple of months' time.

 

It is a sobering thought.

 

A very sobering thought.

 

See, turning 80 years of age is a huge thing in Chinese tradition, and it is not uncommon for families to organize huge, extravagant birthday dinners for the Elder, where in attendance will be the children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, old friends, neighbors and much of the extended family.

 

But for her, this elderly lady spooning porridge into her mouth, I'm afraid it will be a much quieter one.

 

She has no grandchildren. She has no great-grandchildren. She has an extended family, but they are however distant, and she has no old friends or neighbors whom she can send an invitation to.

There is a spouse, but I don't know whether her spouse will celebrate with her, and neither am I sure whether he remembers.

 

Now, some might argue that it really is not a big deal as it is with the geriatric elderly who are truly living all alone by themselves, with no kith or kin.

I agree.

After all, she does have a child- a son- and it is no doubt that he will commemorate the special day with her. 
 

But what if I told you that for nearly all of her life, she had never expected herself to be this way, and that it was only four years ago, that she got the slightest hint of what her 80th birthday might be? What if I told you that up to four years ago, she believed, very firmly, that her husband, her son and her adopted daughter would  forever be by her side, that they would always be together as a family, and that there'd always be the four of them for birthday celebrations and the like? 

I'm aware that there is an aging population out there, that there are many elderly living alone, and there are also, sadly, elderly who die alone. I'm aware that this is a concern of many a social service worker and governments, but this is really Miss Brown's own story- and high time it is that her tale, however shocking, however sorrowful, be told.

 

What it may do, what it can do, whether it will be dismissed, whether it will be sympathized, I don't know, but every voice, every life, whether great or ordinary, is as valued as the other, and this story is exclusively hers- as much she has told me, as much as I have experienced together with her.

Strolling Sights: Joo Chiat.. again

I suppose I could go all touristy and take a picture of the famous colourful homes along Koon Seng Road, or I could walk up and down the entire stretch and snap happily away at some of the shop houses with their distinct architecture. 

But I'm the sort that, whenever possible, prefers to capture scenes from an alternative point of view- a view that is not often harked about, a view that locals and individuals who know the area best will see, a view that defines the 'hood for what it is more than what the tourist books say.

So here we are...

Let's just say that I went around for quite a bit. A bit of Dunman Road, a bit of Haig Road that crosses into the lovely houses towards Tanjong Katong Road and a bit of Carpmael Road.

 

 

the Cycling accident

 

This picture of Daffy and Blue standing side by side has been in my computer for more than a month. I snapped it the morning after the accident. That was nearly five weeks ago, and to date, I've not had the confidence nor the courage to write about it, not until now. 

 

An accident is an accident is an accident. 

 

There are no words to mince when it comes to incidents like these.

 

It does not matter that the Co-Rider did not fly off the bike from the vehicle's impact but merely fell straight down on to the gravel road. and got away with nothing more than a sore shoulder, a bruised forearm and a big abrasion near the elbow. 

 

It does not matter that the Co-Rider did not injure any other part of the body, not even the head, and that within half an hour, against my nagging advice, hopped back on the bike and rode all the way back home.

 

It is still a d*** f**ked-up scary s*** incident to happen, and I'm not going to water the incident down in any other way.

 

You know how people say that everything seems to slow down when traumatic s*** happens?

 

That at that very moment when it takes place, it seems to be unreal, that it is not happening to you, that it seems to be happening at a distance away, or that it seems to be unfolding in front of you as if you were watching it take place in a movie?

 

IT IS TRUE..

 

IT IS VERY, VERY TRUE.

 

Otherwise, how does one explain the fact that after five weeks, I can still easily relate to you what it was precisely that happened, and I can still spell it out for you moment by moment- from the time that I saw the back of the car appear so close in front of me, to the time when I saw my Co-Rider sitting red-eyed and dazed on the road?

 

We had been on our way back, heading down Dunearn Road from Woodlands Road. For the entire afternoon, we'd chugged our way up to the Woodlands Jetty via Sengkang, Ang Mo Kio, Lentor Avenue and Yishun, and it was already evening when we made our way back past Marsiling and Woodlands Road.

 

Was it because we were tired?

 

I don't think so.

 

Was it because these things just happen?

 

I don't know.

 

But we were passing by Turf Club Road near where the stables used to be, my Co-Rider was a short distance in front of me, when suddenly this vehicle turned out from Turf Club Road, but instead of trying to turning into the last lane, as I suppose one is usually meant to do, he tried to cut three lanes to the first, and that was when his right headlight hit my Co-Rider.

 

I saw it.

 

I saw how the car made the turn, saw how the right side of the car lined up exactly in the same position that my Co-Rider was biking along, saw that the right headlight illuminated him perfectly, figured out what was happening, and screamed. 

 

Just at the very moment that he dropped off the bike and sat there on the gravel road. 

 

It is at times like these when instinct takes over and you just do what you're supposed to do. You know, it's funny, but if you were to ask me what it is precisely I did, and why I did it, I wouldn't know. And if you were to ask me whether or not I was doing the right thing, I wouldn't know either! 

 

I guess I didn't stop to think.

 

I just moved.

 

First I placed Daffy carefully on the ground- no use throwing the bike down- signalled the oncoming traffic at the traffic light to wait, guided my Co-Rider to the roadside kerb, did a quick check, shifted our bikes to the side, did a more thorough check some more and followed it up with the discussion and recuperation.

 

Let's just say that the discussion went smooth.

 

We hung about the area for half an hour, breathing, washing the scrape with water, blotting it with tissue paper and putting on a plaster. Co-Rider checked the bike, adjusted the bike chain, determined Blue was good and clear, and hopped back on him for the ride home.

 

Of course, a scrape is a scrape, so out came the Betadine, the big plasters and the muscle rubs but hey, the two bikes were standing steadily side by side in the morning, with their owners a little shaken but yesh, also okay.

fine Dining and Influencer marketing

She was a lovely lady whom I happened to meet at one of the gatherings that I sometimes attend. Over coffee a few days afterward, she shared her story with us and how she'd come thus far.

We chatted for a couple of hours, parted ways after that, and sad to say, didn't have an opportunity to meet again.

I haven't kept in touch with her either.

Not because we disagreed or anything like that, but because the solutions we felt were necessary needed far more effort than the short-term, quick-fix solutions she was hoping for.

She was hoping for a quick sale of her fine dining place.

We were suggesting that the business overhaul some of her present marketing and PR efforts to engage the right market and raise its value before going for a sale.

I think she was a lil more tired  of the whole d*** business than she would openly admit.

Someone else might have boldly shared their lamentations to anyone and everyone willing to hear, but not this lady, not this dignified, well groomed lady with a special-enough background.

Honestly, I do empathize.

If you come from a background that has had a good reputation and established certification in fine dining, it is going to be very difficult to understand why, even with the right influencer marketing strategy, you're still losing out to the casual dining sphere.  

I shan't specify which cuisine it was but let's just say that it was something very close to her heart, and she believed that she had the structure and everything down pat to the details. Her chefs had excellent skills and even better background experience, her dishes were expensive, yes, but the ingredients were of the finest quality and she did not compromise on quality nor on flavour or presentation. Add to that, she shared, she offered diners a comfortable, simple, uncluttered place with modern décor that catered to groups big and small, and she had dishes on the menu of both the casual and fine category.

So why, she wondered, was it not gaining traction with the right customers? Why was it that, despite her best efforts, the customers she desired were not turning up at her establishment, and instead going to the very casual ones?

It didn't make sense, she shared.

"'I'm not just offering the best of (region) cuisine, you know. I'm also offering (trending street food) and it is not expensive. The (region) food is expensive, yes, but the ingredients are specially flown in and prepared exactly the same way as they have always been prepared for (privileged customers), so of course it cannot be of low price. But the (trending street food) is similar to elsewhere."

The fact that the ROI from extensive influencer marketing was lower than hoped for befuddled her even further. It wasn't possible, she said, that she had targeted the right market and yet... they were not turning up. Not only were they not turning up, they were going elsewhere! To places that offered... very casual food in very casual atmospheres!

I guess this is one of the misconceptions people sometimes have about influencer marketing and the like. It is often perceived, thanks to the efforts from the fashion industry (!) that luxury products, fine foods, and jet-setting lifestyles can bring in the millennial and Gen Z marketing with the efforts of  influencer marketing and social media strategies.

But sometimes- sometimes- it doesn't always happen that way.

Let's go back to what Marketing really is. If I recall correctly, marketing and advertising is about convincing a person to spend money on something that they believe they want, or need. It can be a new shampoo, or a shirt, or a pair of shoes, or a piece of jewelry. But because no one company has an unlimited budget and unlimited time, we embark on target markets and target consumers. We arrow our campaigns, our brands, even the message of the brand into the heads and hearts of specified consumers whom we want to spend. On the flip side, then, would not the said target market have an obvious lack that the business, with their marketing efforts, determines to fill?

Thing is, the lack can get rather glaring... making reality more practical than what we see on the Instagram pics, and even way, way different from what we see.

We don't want to go into whether this is true or not- after all, we could be wrong- but it is not hard to take a glance at some of the spending trends and do the sums. 

It is also not hard to look at some of the money diaries and determine what the difference between yearning and reality is. 

A solemn realization it might be, but if one does, it is easy to come to the conclusion that whilst xennials, millennials and Gen Z all work hard to enable comfortable lifestyles and products of good quality for themselves and their loved ones, it is a journey getting there. 

They aren't afraid to say that they're not there yet. In fact, some of them have boldly glamorized the "road" to there, plushing up the commonplace stuff and their normal, ordinary lives into a distinctive lifestyle of their own.  

After all, if some of the top influencers in their glam shots, their exotic locales, their delish food, their jet setting lifestyles, and luxuries can openly claim that there is more to that than meets the eye, and that they work hard for their s***, then companies marketing the finer things in life will have to take more than a couple of blogposts and a couple of Instagram pictures from everyone else to get their friends and followers to come.

waffles @ Gelare

 

Heard of the messy bun?

Well, now meet the messy waffle.

Yup, this messy looking, sprinkled, scattered waffle was exactly what happened when I walked about the food circuit near the fountain at Suntec City on a Tuesday evening.

For the very simple reason that classic waffles at Gelare are half priced on Tuesdays.

It didn't matter that I'd eaten dinner half hour earlier and it didn't matter either if I was on some sort of diet plan that technically permitted desserts only on weekends.

When you're still hungry, when waffles are half priced, and when you just don't care, you just go for it.

I wasn't expecting this much an amount of Milo powder though.

Really, I didn't.

Sure, the menu had said that there would be Milo powder and chocolate flakes and crushed Oreo cookies with drizzlings of chocolate sauce and all that, but to see one mountain of Milo powder, and one more mountain of  crushed Oreos heaped upon the dual scoops of Rocky Road Chocolate ice cream quite took my breath away.

And it was lovely cutting up the waffle into little squares, scooping out a bit of the ice cream with my knife, placing it in the center depression of each square, sprinkling a little of the Milo powder on top with my fork and eating the whole square at one go.

I didn't finish everything, by the way.

There were still quite a bit of chocolate flakes left thereafter.

consideration, Sir, consideration

So I'm sitting at a table in Hanis along Victoria Street, and I suddenly realize that this is the very same table I sat at all those months ago when I came here to meet with someone.

 

It's unfortunate; nothing came out of that meeting, and nothing came out of all the other meetings we had as well.

 

Otherwise, it really would have made an interesting partnership.

 

Said prospect ran teambuilding stuff armed with a camera and was looking to up the game. What we offered, in simple terms, was an exercise bordering on simulation scenarios where team members had to, under the direction of trained personnel, work with each other and get their a** out from there. It was a combination of future tech, present day corporate management theories, good training methodologies. The tech,  the scenarios, the gear, the on-site talent, as well as the off-site talent was all with us.  

It seemed a great thing to work on together. Prospect would get in the clients big name and small- which we were told were already there! We just had to make a great pitch, convince  work out with them their objectives and outcomes and then structure the program together.

Prospect's expertise + Our expertise= New Business

 

Pretty good, right? 

 

For a while, it seemed like we were going full steam ahead. We chatted about it, discussed about it, decided who and how it would be done and went so far as to discuss who we might bring it to.

 

But somehow, when the time came to really get down and work through the contractual details, including co-consideration, the Prospect suddenly began to hem and haw. First, there was this important outstation project that had to be gotten out of the way, and then after that, there were other things to look at, which would inadvertently push the partnership back "indefinitely" by a couple of months.
 

A decision had to be reached.

 

We reached it.

 

And we haven't heard from Prospect since.

I guess the discussion has fallen by the wayside for now.

Whether or not it will be taken up again at another time, I don't know, but this time, I know we'll be sure to speak of consideration early in the game. Look, I know business talk. I know of business strategies that don't always put both on equalized favour. But I also know of strategies where one strength complements another's weakness, and vice versa. One side has a gap that needs be plugged. The other has an offering that plugs that gap. One side gets business in. So does the other. It is a game that both play, and both win.

It isn't about sharing, and sharing, and sharing.

Yes, I know about the sharing economy. I know of things where a firm with a special set of skills partners another with his or her own special set of skills and they work out some sort of deal that usually involves shares and lots else (in the future). Investment of time and money on either side is thereby perceived as "consideration"... and in order to sustain, the element of funding comes in.

But I'm also aware that getting funding, even seed funding, takes time, and I'm sure co-working spaces don't come free. Not with their snazzy bars and lil open-concept offices, nice chairs, coffee machines and all.

No, it's not entirely about sharing, not so I think. For a bit, yes, maybe, one can offer a lil more than the other, but any one who has been in the game long enough will know that it is not sustainable, and it gets even tougher as the game continues. If you ask me, it is about both sides providing extra value to the business.

I guess I'm a stickler for what works.

In every partnership, there is always consideration. From business partnerships to boyfriend-girlfriend partnerships to marriage partnerships, the element of consideration is never far away. It can be small, it can be big, but it has to be agreed upon. Agreed upon by both parties, put on the table by both parties. That cannot be escaped from.

My question is thus, if you can't put consideration (and it's not alot, mind!) on the table right at the beginning, that's already not very much a business mindset, no?

And more importantly, how much then of the contract does it eventually hold?

kueh kuehs!

It isn't every day that I have pretty, delish small bites of such likes for lunch, but today I happened to find myself in the centre of Downtown, where, not being familiar with the dining places and needing to rush for a meeting right after, I simply settled for whatever caught my eyes first.

 

 

I'm visual, yes, and I could have poke bowls and salmon sashimi bowls and salads and sandwiches and chips- there were plenty of them everywhere- but all the places were packed and I had no where to tapao them away to.

 

Of course, I could have had curry chicken with rice from the very same place where I bought these lovely, pretty kueh kuehs, but the thought of so full a curry dish consumed right before a meeting didn't seem to whet my appetite, so I convinced myself that as petite and small as they might be, they would do, because they had glutinous rice, coconut, pandan, gula melaka, and kaya, they were convenient, fun to peel apart, and they were main meal and dessert all rolled into one. 

 

And as long as they made my lunchtime happy.... :D

 

war stories @ National Museum

I've always loved museums, and I've never needed a reason to visit one. But life is such that sometimes you get special reasons to make the trip to the museum a much more anticipated one.

 

This wartime exhibition, held from September of 2017 to the March of 2018 at the National Museum, was a good enough one.

 

It might have been held in a single gallery space at the lower levels of the new wing, but something about this exhibition distinguished itself from the others I'd previously seen.

 

For one, there was hardly any mention about the forts, the significant events, the battle plans and the whole Fortress Singapore account. And there was even lesser mention- if not at all- about wartime atrocities, the Kempeitai and Sook Ching.

 

If they were trying to avoid the topic altogether, I don't know, maybe it wouldn't do to conflict with the other permanent exhibitions dotted around the island, but what I got was a factual narrative of the Japanese Occupation during that time.

 

I found it interesting.

 

Because far from the oft-mentioned themes that make up the whole story of WWII, what I saw and heard in this exhibition reflected very much the day-to-day life that swirled and sailed its way like an undercurrent in the middle of all the notable happenings.

 

These were things that went unmentioned in relation to the more regular themes, like military defence and strategy and POWs and prison camps and military intelligence, and yet, these facets of life must have always been there.

 

No doubt, there was a bit of information on anti-aircraft guns and  taking cover in trenches and motivational speeches and sandbags and the like. But there was information on the cabarets and Chinese opera theatres and other entertainment outlets during that period. And there was information- in the form of newspaper advertisements- about Cantonese and Mandarin movies shown in cinemas during thos years. Surprising, but yes, in relation to the war fun and all, there were movies in the years leading up to the Occupation, and there were even movies and entertainment activities in the middle of the Occupation.

 

On one side, mounted on the wall were cases displaying the uniforms worn by the British troops, which, I thought, seemed really huge and heavy. The boots looked chunky, the fabric of the uniforms looked thick and rough, and then there was all this equipment they had to carry about with them- water canisters and pistols and mess tins and backpacks.  

 

On the other side, there was this wall that displayed posters- what we'd call really large memes today- with graphical pictures and block lettered impactful statements probably meant to rally citizens and maybe tired-out, exhausted troops.

 

It wasn't all from the British perspective though.

 

Not in this exhibition.

 

There were displays showcasing the Japanese side too.

 

In one clear display case was a radio, complete with knobs, dials, built-in speaker and all. In the case next to it was the signals and communication equipment that the Japanese used. There were notebooks, really small ones, used by the Japanese as personal journals and record diaries of sorts. There were hand-drawn A5 sized maps used by the Japanese to indicate the land topography of Singapore, and in one of the display cases was an A4 sized messenger bag supposedly used by the Japanese message delivery boys.  

 

I thought the bag looked similar to one that I bought in Dongdaemun a couple of years ago. #fashionrevisited

 

There was quite a bit about the day to day.

Further away from the glass cases was a set showing what it was that people in Singapore ate during the war. There was a stove, a wok on the stove, a few enamel utensils, a spatula, and in the covered wok, which you could lift the lid, were two models of sweet potatoes, tapioca and yams. I don't remember whether there were vegetables or not. I suppose not.

 

It was a simple, effective, straightforward exhibition.

You didn't get sad, scary stories. You didn't get first hand accounts from victims, or second hand accounts from family members. There are exhibitions for that. It wasn't found here.

 

Here was a more balanced approach- one that showed you the facts of what living in a war was like. It was, in short, a story of individual survival. 

See, there was the civilian part- the entertainment part, the movies, the food, even the clothes. And there was also the soldier part- for every military personnel is a individual soldier- with their pictures and journals and gear and uniforms. 

What it was, I felt, was how one would view the life story of each and every person in this period, up close. These were things that belonged to someone and had possibly been used by someone, and through them, they were telling us about the lives they had lived. They were telling us about the person whom they had belonged to, and who had used them.

It was a very beautiful thought.

Because it is a thought that is so often forgotten amidst all the memories and information about the Pacific theatre or the European theatre or D-Day or the Nanking Massacre or the Holocaust.

But we shouldn't forget about the ordinary. We shouldn't forget that in the ordinary and the mundane and the inaction, we find stories of coping, strength, resilience and survival- and that away from the dropping bombs and weaponry and all, in the cities, villages and towns, there were heroes, and heroines.

round and round in Tampines

If there's one great lesson I've learnt when I'm out and about on Daffy, it is that plans change all the time, and you can either make the best use of it and have fun, or you can grumble, complain, get angry and waste precious time lamenting away.

 

I prefer having fun.

 

Even though I think I'm entitled to a bit of grumbly lamentations to my Co-Rider when I'm hungry, and whose suggestion made me get stuck on an overhead bridge in the middle of the IKEA Tampines area with no place to eat.

 

See, we'd originally planned to bike to Changi Village via Simpang Bedok and the Changi-Selarang route. We got to Simpang Bedok from Upper East Coast Road, no problem there, but at the intersection after Simpang Bedok, it was suggested we switch destinations to the Giant and IKEA Tampines area instead.

 

So we made a left and went onwards, going past Changi General Hospital, then a long, long road, and then finally near Tampines Hub. How exactly we made our way to IKEA and Giant, I don't know, but suddenly I found myself in the wide, open space of Tampines North where new flats were still being built and where there was a Reebonz.  

 

Now, I don't usually get grumpy when plans change, but having all the way towards Tampines North and finding myself in the friggin' middle of nowhere, and being unusually hungry, hey, I'm human like that.

 

But thankfully the mood doesn't last long and so between Downtown East and Elias Mall, we chose the latter, which was nearer, and which, we were sure, would have some place to eat.

 

Off we went, turning here and there, before finding ourselves on a somewhat familiar road near Pasir Ris Wafer Park and Pasir Ris Farmway 1. Straight on, one more quick turn, and we were heading up the hill to where Elias Mall is.

 

I've never been here before, and maybe because the Mall is such a quiet, peaceful, suburban mall that I've always associated it with the nearby Pasir Ris Park. But it has its distinct charms- like the welcoming scent of durian, little shops, and hairdressing salons. We had dinner at a Mr. TEH TARIK, where I got one salted egg chicken with rice (it looked really appetising!) and the Co-Rider got black pepper beef. :) No pictures, I was hungry!

 

Dinner over, breather over, we decided on the Tampines route back to the East side, this time in the opposite direction, where I think we made quite a number of turns here and there- I don't know, I was following all the way- before heading up the Pasir Ris Flyover (a hill!!), into Tampines Avenue 8, Bedok Reservoir Road, and finally Eunos and Still Road.

 

Intellectual Property, and Thieves

It bodes me well to be real careful when writing this post.

If not, it has the potential of sounding like a rant and rave post- the likes of which we find on Facebook sometimes- but truth is, incidents of this sort happen a dime a dozen, and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only vic in this whole game.

The Media and Entertainment industry, given its name alone and what it is, is built upon the structure of Intellectual Property. There's nothing to dispute a claim as this- it goes back a long, long, long time ago. The level of Intellectual Property might be the same as a patent or trademark, it might be lesser, or it might be much more.

That doesn't matter.

What matters is that it exists, and that it cuts across all aspects of the industry. Many people assume that it is only the creative aspect, or that it applies only to the final work.

Wrong.

Very wrong.

It applies throughout, from the beginning to the end. The bottom line is very simple. Whichever part you do, whichever part belongs to you. If you do this single aspect of the whole movie, then that part belongs to you. If you're not the person doing this aspect of the whole movie, then it doesn't belong to you. Can you claim IP of the whole movie? No. Can you claim that you did this part of the movie? Yes.

Making a disclaimer here, it is a thin line, and it being so thin a line, I prefer that good entertainment and good IP lawyers expound on it rather than me blabbering about legal statutes and theories I am no expert on. 

Mind, I say 'good', because good ones- despite charging clients shark-like legal fees- cut deals that form the basis for industry rules and guidelines. In other words, whatever judgment it is they get goes into the archive of do's and don'ts of the industry, and sets the motion for how working processes and approaches are like.

Bad ones obtain judgments that let thieves get away with their loot, and let them have the illusion that they can do it again, and again, and again.

If you thought the creative people abide by the pride and professionalism they have in their work, I'll gladly tell you that there are a surprising number of people out there who operate otherwise.

They are the sort who believe that they can simply wrap their blankets around a work and cart it off for their own use, or that they can simply manipulate themselves around the work however they wish to.

What makes them function this way, I don't know.

Survival, perhaps.

I know of someone who politely requested us for a shortlist of works relevant to a project specifics because they lacked certain capabilities. We provided the works and a whole bunch of relevant questions. What happened was that they simply thanked us, took the shortlisted works, passed it off as their capabilities to the prospect, and conveniently forgot to mention us.

That's not right, you know.

A portfolio is a portfolio. A sample of works is a sample of works. What's the difference? A portfolio belongs to an artist. A sample of works belongs to a studio. You can take the portfolio of an artist and go pitch for a project with it, and then after that, hire the artist for the project, thank you very much. But you cannot take Frozen, Avengers and Wreck-it-Ralph from Disney, lump it all into your pitch and say that these are your capabilities. In the same way, you cannot take The Sound of Music, Edward Scissorhands and Cleopatra  from Fox, put it into your pitch and claim that they're your capabilities.

Is it not common sense?

Put it this way, yes, it does, no?

But said someone didn't seem to understand it.

Anyway, rumors abound that said someone who tried passing off our shortlisted works did not get the project, and to date, hearsay also abounds that said client has not yet pursued new candidates as well.

There's another story.

This one is a lil more... interesting.

Let's say Person A has a group of peeps working under her. Now, these peeps have their capabilities but Person A wishes to  win this project and her peeps just do not have the directional nor workflow capabilities to handle the project. So Person A goes about hunting and she decides that she can work with this Person B who has sufficient capabilities to win the thing. So they work together, with moolah agreements and all.

Now, somewhere along the way, Person A figures out that being the primary liaison peep with the client, she's got a positional advantage and she should maybe try recouping back the moolah amounts she's forked out to Person B, so what does she do? She takes the work that Person B has done for her, hands it over to the (cheaper) peeps working under her, tells them to imitate it, and then at the same time, conjures up a whole bunch of stuff to let Person B know that goodness knows why but he f**ked up his part of the project, that the client's pissed off, that they're all in deep s*** because of his f*** up, that oh gawd, we're gonna lose this project on client's orders etc. etc. etc, all the while thinking that Person B will be shaken, cower, beg for an opportunity to redeem himself, which of course, Person A could then demand for some moolah back, or squeeze more value out of her moolah already paid.

Person B, however, has his own notions that such matters be managed the way the industry manages them, and so that takes place, Person B continues to work on the project the way that has been agreed upon, and the project makes a wrap.

I shan't elaborate further to what happens after the project wrapped, because this I'm pretty certain is still being broadcasted, and it will do no one no good to blabber more into it.
 
But it is a pity, I say, that some peeps in the industry have to utilize such tactics and measures to keep their status afloat. True, this is a wheeling and dealing industry, and goodness knows how much goes on behind the scenes.
 
Still, there is a foundation, there are rules, there are guidelines, there are industry norms, there are industry methods, and short of trying to outdo them all and learn from the wrong side, one might as well improve thine self, focus on their present work and build up their own capabilities such that competition be better off for everyone anyway.