Trying times, are they versatile right to the core?

Ticket is settled, AirAsia one-way flight to Melbourne International Airport on the 13th February 2009. Now left the accommodation (still waiting for offer letter) and acceptance (yet to accept). Then *Boom* time flies and I'll be there in Monash University, Caulfield. Can't wait. Much ado I've anticipated the surrounding of the University. No doubt people whom I mix would be by the highest possible rate to be Asians. The Australians would less likely mix with the Asians. Admit it, the issue of racism is not a Malaysian issue but a world pandemic. That's one of the main cause Mr. Obama mounted an astounding victory in the US 2008 Election. Voted for his skin and not for his policies. Many might disagree with me but the facts are clear. There are still no any stimulation plan that is sufficient to counter the growing destruction of the financial crisis. All the while Mr. Obama had just stated "he will" ; "try to" and etc. that doesn't gives us a very clear picture of his major plans to curb the growing concern of a financial meltdown looming anytime during early 2009. What's more when the current situation is proving the date of "judgement day" to arrive as predicted. As I've told Kar Kien while we were in the LRT during our way back from Petaling Street on the 19th November 2008, that what ever companies that we see today, the weak once will be perished during the year 2009, and what ever left in the beginning of 2010 are the really though companies. At first I expected automakers such as General Motors (GM) and Ford might withstand the financial crisis invasion, but looking recently with reports after reports of them begging the US congress to allocate funds from the 700 billion stimulus package for their survival had changed my perception immediately. Moreover GM was never in a very healthy look since the early 2000's. Standard & Poor's, as I've read had degraded GM to BBB+ during the early 2000's which means they're bonds are of near junk bond level. And by the mid of 2005 or so, GM had been degraded to total junk bonds. Recollecting the entire episode since the sub prime mortgage loan crisis or low-doc crisis that had spurred a spiral or domino effect to the entire financial markets landscape, I with no doubt that one day we might hear the collapse of a once mighty automaker player, GM. Unemployment rate in the US had been slowly meeting all time high. Couple of months back, Australian, Rudd government had just announced the lack of workforce and declared that Australia is willing to receive unskilled workers to feed their growing economy appetite, and just a day ago, 20th November 2008, Australia was reported to be on the brink of a might-come recession. So far the third largest economy, European Union, had declared an overall fallout to recession. Previously Singapore was the first to fall into recession with double quarters of contracting economy size. The general method to indicate a recession is when a country reported two (2) consecutive quarters of economy contracting. Downsize in Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The whole world is submitting to the treat of the financial crisis. Malaysia as they say might not be affected as bad as the Westerners however, we are still stabilise for the moment only and not long as we are equally dependent to the US economy. China, one of the growing giants of Asia was also reported to be cutting out jobs. If China, a country that had reported double digits of growth since 2000, after liberalising its economy under the premiership of Deng Xiao Ping, and now in the year 2008 reporting a cutting of employment due to its single digit growth would utterly means the whole world is coming to a World War Three in the form of economical crisis. Crude oil had fallen to $USD 55 from a skyrocketed all time high $USD 147 in the month of July. The Malaysia government had initiated their 5th time of petrol ceiling price reduction to RM2 after an all time increase of 40% to RM2.70 in the month of July to combat the overstating crude oil price ($USD 147). Our minister overlooking the petrol prices are had recently declared that our federal government coffers is earning a profit form the overall price reduction. This means we are paying a higher premium for petrol. Consider this example: When crude oil price was $USD 70 per barrel, our petrol pump price was at RM1.92. Since now the crude oil price had fallen to $USD 55 per barrel, wouldn't it be logical for us to pay a petrol pump price that is lower then RM1.92 instead of RM2. The government is taking a very prudence stand to slowly reduce the petrol price not significantly but by intervals to show that the incumbent government is working extremely hard to reduce the rakyat's burden. However I believe the crude oil price per barrel will continue to fall to an all time low because people are more conservative in their spending. The American market for petrol had seen a significant immediate drop. However since demand was dropping, report stated that Oil & Gas players are still continuing investing much of their cash to locate new areas with oil utilising the equipment provided by the oil & gas exploration industry players. With the demand from America drops, GM will need to re-engineer it's products to be more petrol efficient as people/consumer are now more prudence in their spending. Nevertheless, I believe the real testing time for all these companies is during the year 2009. Their resilience to financial meltdown will be tested to its core during 2009. Honda had slashed their estimated profit for 2009. I wish them all the best.