You can view the article at the community by clicking here or you can read it below here. I put it in quotes, but I did write it, just for easier reading:

Hi everybody, I just joined after reading the book ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad for Teens’ and heard about the website. I was born in Ukraine in 1990 and moved to Florida in the US in 1998. I am currently living in Hong Kong, China (I’m all over the place). I tried reading the original Rich Dad Poor Dad book a few years ago but I found it a bit difficult to understand. I recently finished the one for teens and found it a very enjoyable and educational read.

Enough about who I am though. I have just recently, with the help of my dad, put money into the Hong Kong stock market, (I have about US$300 invested there) but right now it’s not really going anywhere, as a matter of fact I seem to be losing some money, but that’s how it works anyway. But prior to investing, I started my own soda reselling business. This is how it works (I got the idea from Warren Buffet), I buy an 8-pack of Pepsi or Coke from a grocery store for roughly 25 cents a can, I then sell those cans to my friends in school at lunch for a 100% profit (I make 50 cents from selling one can). After about a year of selling sodas at school (I started selling less per day as time went on (too busy)) my total amount of money made from this business venture is almost US$300. I used most of this money by putting it into the stock market plus some money I got as gifts. I guess it isn’t a lot but it was a good lesson, you need to work pretty hard and have the time and patience to sell the sodas. This is a pretty good business for me and I get money pretty easily, just bring the soda to school, sell it and get the money. Some of my friends even pay in advance (like for a month of soda). So these are my two main assets. I also have a website http://illya.sizzly.com where I display Google Adsense which also gives me money for practically doing nothing (I get money from people who click on the ads). I also don’t have many liabilities but of course I have some like the computer, iPod and stuff like that.

Wow, this is getting long, sorry for boring you guys out. So now to get to the main point. The thing is I am not raking in that much cash from these assets. You might say I am greedy, I hope I am not, but I think there is more that I could do to go on my path to financial freedom that just this. Actually, I am becoming more and more conservative as I get older. I try not to waste my money on things I truly don’t need (doodads) and stay away from going to expensive restaurants. My friends think I am cheap because I never buy stuff, I think it is just that they don’t understand the value of money. Their parents give them tons of cash each month and they go out and spend it on what I like to call useless junk that they will use for a month or so and then forget about. I think this is wrong, an idea I take from my dad who is also quite conservative. I just think that wasting money on things you truly don’t need (sometimes things you don’t even really want, things to look cool) is a giant waste of money and this needs to be taught to not only adults but to children during their lives.

So my question to you guys is, are there any other good ways for a teenager my age to get passive income. I am too young to work here in Hong Kong so that’s not a chance, but there have got to be many other ways. Thanks everybody for actually reading this somewhat long post and I hope to enjoy myself here at the Rich Dad community.

Illya Lapko

These are the lines that I have to memorize for school from the Shakespearian play ‘Romeo and Juliet’. I am doing the prologue, I guess I picked the easiest one. Here it is:

Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life;
Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
Do with their death bury their parents’ strife
The fearful passage of their death-marked love,
And the continuance of their parents’ rage,
Which, but their children’s end, nought could remove,
Is now the two hours’ traffic of our stage;
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.

This is the ultimate game addict’s toy. Plug the little LCD device into your machine, using USB, and it displays messages. If you get an important email, or instant message, or whatever, you can have the entire screen for Doom but still see what you are missing.
www.thinkgeek.com/computing/display/7448/