Tell us something we don't know can?

Today, right on the cover page, the caption in bold red says "President Nathan poised to serve 2nd Term" .... YAWNZ...for something that is so obvious, you need to waste the front page?!? I think you could use the space better for things like where got the cheapest petrol or the best char kway teow or sth....frankly, with the rules that the PEC sets, I wonder who can ever get in lo...i think even if ex US President Bill Clinton wants to apply for a cert, not to mentioned the current one, i think both also will be under qualified...

I can't help it...AGAIN...

Disclaimer: The following article and picture are taken from Yahoo.sg... credit should be given to them, not me. link:http://sg.news.yahoo.com/050811/1/3u60l.html

My comments in bold...really just my humble comments dun sue me plz...can't even afford peanut shells now...

Riot police break up demonstration of four people in Singapopre



Riot police broke up a rare demonstration by four people demanding greater transparency and accountability in Singapore's state-managed pension fund and other government-linked agencies.
>> Of Coz rare demonstration la! That's why must send entire Riot police down mah...cos they rarely got chance to do live riot exercises leh.. must be an opportunist like the police u know?
A dozen anti-riot police wearing helmets and knee-high protective gear and carrying shields and batons formed a phalanx outside the offices of the Central Provident Fund (CPF) as a commanding officer approached the demonstrators.
>> Two things. Either they have too much manpower in the police force OR they scared they cannot handle 2 guys and 2 girls holding placards...guys..the phrase "show of force" has been brought to a whole new level...
"You are committing an offence of public nuisance. If you don't disperse you will be arrested," the officer told the protesters as business people and employees watched in the central business district.

The four protesters, among them an office administrator and the sister of an opposition leader, Chee Soon Juan, voluntarily dispersed. They denied being part of any political group.
>> Chee Soon Juan sister...no wonder got so much police la...heck lo...if chee soon juan himself appear, i think the entire police force will be there in an instant..sigh..this guy...dunno to laugh or feel proud of him...(no pun intended, seriously)
Police later asked them to hand over their protest materials -- T-shirts and placards -- as part of an investigation to determine whether they had violated any laws.
>> Sure have violate laws one la...the placards confirm never go though censorship board wat!
The two men and two women assembled at lunchtime outside the CPF building in the business district. They said they did not need a permit and staged their protest for about an hour.
>> these people obviously never hear of speaker's corner. You think your grandfather house arhz? any how and any where stage protest...Do not need permit still kenna busload of police?
Under the law, any public protest of at least five people without a police permit is deemed illegal. The protest took place as Singapore was in the midst of official celebrations of its 40th anniversary of independence.
>> Sure decrease to 4 liaoz...die..like that hor...a family of 4 how arhz....still can go kai kai notz??
The protesters hoisted placards calling for greater openness in how the government handles public funds used for retirement pensions, overseas investments and the building of subsidized high-rise apartments.

A police officer said they had received a telephone call from a "member of the public" about the protest, prompting them to send in the riot police.
>> HARZ! see? Member of the public is in quotes lo... Singaporeans the most bo chup in the world, this kind of thingy you think they will even bother to call meh?? I think they more busy trying to see how they can get 4D then call the police. Must be CPF ppl call one lo...
Monica Kumar, 45, one of the protesters, said they had been insipired by public outrage that followed revelations last month that the chief executive of Singapore's biggest charity, the National Kidney Foundation (NKF), was being paid 350,000 US dollars annually.

The scandal sparked an online petition signed by more than 40,000 people and forced the NKF chief executive, T.T. Durai, and the entire board to resign.

"In reality, the NKF is reflective of the entire system in Singapore where public matters are run in a non-transparent and non-accountable manner," the protesters said in a statement.
>> this is scary..what if it's true? I mean, after all, our PM earns more than double the US president lo. US$1,100,000 vs US$200,000 (source: Asian Wall Street Journal July 10 2000) i neber anyhow come out with figures horz...
The statement called on the Housing Development Board and the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC) to open their books for public scrutiny.

GIC manages more than 100 billion US dollars in funds and invests globally.

"We call on the government to make Singapore more transparent and accountable, starting with the state organisations mentioned above," the protesters said.

I can't resist a dig at LTA when I see one

Reported on Channel News Asia Website:

SINGAPORE: After more than a week in operation, the Electronic Road Pricing along the northbound Central Expressway have improved traffic flow.

This was the conclusion supported by figures released by the Land Transport Authority to Channel NewsAsia.

It was on 1st August that motorists began paying ERP charges on the CTE going north.

Motorists travelling on the CTE on weekdays from 6pm to 8pm have to pay between 50 cents and a dollar.

This move by the LTA was to smooth out traffic flow during the evening peak hours.

And it seems to be working.

In the first five days alone, the speeds of vehicles were recorded at between 58 and 65 kilometres per hour, compared to an average speed of below 40 kph before the evening ERP was introduced.

LTA says this is within the limits of the optimal speed range for expressways.

Naturally, the drop in vehicle traffic meant other motorists were taking alternative routes to avoid paying the ERP.

So Thomson, Upper Thomson, Marymount, Serangoon and Upper Serangoon Roads have been experiencing slightly heavier traffic flows.

But the LTA says the conditions on these alternative roadways remain manageable.

The average speed on these carriageways is generally above 20 kilometres per hour, which is above the optimal speed range for arterial roads.

LTA adds that towards the end of the first week, some of the traffic flow on these roads even dipped a little as some motorists went back on the CTE. - CNA
--------------------------------------------------------
Noticed the sentences highlighted in bold? First, they say the ERP ease traffic flow, then at the last statement, they say that the traffic flow dipped even with ERP, which means, ERP STILL DOES not prove it is responsible for improving traffic flow yet. So don't say that it works lo...singaporean's not silly u know?

Come on la...even secondary school kids who do physics experiements knows the importance of taking a range of values over a period of time to average the results and to eliminate any fluke results,especially so for ERP which affects a larger number of people, hence more time is required to monitor the traffic. So instead of happily announcing that ERP works, do monitor the road situation for another few months before publishing your findings la...LTA do have smart people working there right?

ALSO, LTA says that the optimal speed for expressways is >50km/h and for smaller road is > 20km/h, so that means if you want to go home faster to eat with your family, pay LTA to enjoy eating with your family, if not, just crawl at 20km/h and eat your cold dinner alone.... so PRO family leh...see LTA so smart.... family is precious, that's why must pay to enjoy eating dinner with family.

Discount Hoax! Mwahahaha (it's not me)

The person who started the sms on 40% petrol discounts during national day ought to be thanked. He/She made us realise how Silly singaporeans can be, monkey see, monkey do leh.... I've personally seen long queues outside petrol stations during the 4pm-8pm time frame...

on forums, it had come to my attention that some dissatisfied drivers actually created a scene at the petrol stations...but really...wake up la these people, it's their fault lo...again..monkey see monkey do, never check the facts, some of these cars queueing includes BMWs and Mercs...why? own too big cars cannot pay for expensive petrol liaoz right?

BUT, in light of the current petrol situation, (every announcement regarding petrol prices is always an increase, never a decrease), i can personally understand how some of these drivers are feeling. All the biting of the bullet of ever increasing expenses must have caused desperation to believe something as unbelievable as a 40% discount in light of crude oil hitting an all time high of USD$64/ barrel.

The GARment ought to do something...every single one of us sillporeans know it's possible to do something to cushion the prices...or risk having sillyporeans do silly things like queuing for imaginary discounts...

My 2 cents worth.

PIGGY>> Oink oink eating broad beans and feeding turtle with a broad bean and lots of shells. Thinking back, why my stupid turtle is not that stupid enough to have queue for the petrol as well. however, my stupid turtle got so excited and panic for a moment when he saw the long queue. He was so stupid that he called his friend to verify about the 40% discount. Haiz, want to own a car to fetch piggy ard and have to worry about the petrol price. orh, so sweet! (Disclaimer: It belongs to piggy and piggy view alone as I do not agree on some of the things she said.)

Wah cannot like that OnE....

Another increase in petrol prices...might as well dun drive la like that, petrol is close to 2 dollars a litre liaoz leh....that translate to roughly 70 bucks for 35 litres...70 bucks leh!! last time( not too long ago) was only ard 40 bucks only lo...daylight robbery really...

my wireless network is up and running...connected an Aztech ADSL modem to a Netgear wireless router... freedom..can now msn while in toilet liaoz mwahahhaa..... =p will take a pic of the router when i have the time...

Singaporean are patrotic...only if they live by the main road

Did you all notice that for some mysterious reason that elude me, those flats facing main roads seems to have patrotic singaporeans because every single one of them hang out their flag...while those that are tuck deep inside the estate only have a miserable few dangling out the flag...

Logical conclusion: Gahmen must have placed patrotic people to stay in flats near the main road just like they have % allocated for chinese, muslims and tamil per block so that we have pretty flats clothed in red to look at and the gahmen can proclaim "see Singaporeans very patrotic!"

Frustrating week...

WARNING: Rantings ahead...read at your own...er...perils

Yep, it has been quite a frustrating week. Piggy have been doing so much overtime that I dun think i can remember as clearly as last time the number of pimples she had on her face already and this has caused a terrible sense of frustration in me (not that i bothered to count anyway =) ).

Telephone conversations will not help allivate the situation! It makes things worse cos 3 general situations arises from it.
One. She is already half-asleep on the phone
Two. One of us will snap under the mysterious influence of frustrations of not understanding each other babbles
Three. I have no idea what to do

I think working life can take a toll on one's relationship and that is exactly what is happening to us now...I'm positive that we are not the only one to be in such a situation...i'm pretty sure there are others like us....but each have to find their own unique way to adapt to the new situation as every one of these relationship is special...

I guess the only way is to wait patiently for the weekends to come...things are always better in the weekends...or whats' left of it as school term is starting soon...

Matriculation Fair & more....

This whole week was dead busy due to NOC deploying a booth at SRC to increase their exposure to the freshmeats..ops..i mean freshman...

I have never, talked so much in one day until now,
never, lost my voice from talking until now
never, know what it is like to stand for 4 hrs straight until now

BUT, on a positive side,

I have learnt that,

NUS have a NPCC unit ... I must have been sleeping all these years in NUS...,

SOC seems to have the least amount of freshmeats, sorry, freshMAN among all the faculties,

there are all types of people that make up NUS freshmeats ARG! freshMAN!! I mean, got smart ones, dumb ones, cocky ones and the classical blur like sotong ones,

there are many types of people who are interested in NOC programs, the anything-also-sign-up types, the blur-blur-kenna-conned-till sign up types, the i-sign-you-get-out-of-my-face type, the potential businessman-of-the-year-look type

Cooking day II

Ok..did a little research on cooking stir fry beef with celery...

so got me self some sliced beef, some sticks of celery and cornstarch...



With it, i started frying the celery with a little bit of olive oil...then i threw in the beef, having marinated it with a bit of seasame oil and corn starch. After frying them together, i poured in a little bit of cornstarch solution and continue to fry them till the solution thicken and the beef cooked. Like this:



Initial Verdict:
Frankly, I have absolutely no idea how a good stir fried beef with celery is suppose to taste like. However, I kinda hated the celery because it still seemed a little raw to me and it's taste too strong that it overwhelms the flavour of the beef, which was too mild...other then that, i guess i didn't spit it out means it's a success =)

Tapestry

USS Enterprise D



Did I tell anyone that I am a Star Trek Fan? Esp the old TNG(The Next Generation) series. One of the reasons why I like the TNG series was because the shows always have a hidden moral agenda to it, abeit though provoking at times. In the case of the episode I watched yesterday, the story line was about regrets in life and the story goes as such...

The captain of the Enterprise was injured during an away mission and was in a near death situation as he was rushed to the ship's sick bay. While receiving treatment, he died and in his afterlife, he was greeted by Q, a powerful being that can do anything. Q told him that he have died and he is giving him a second chance to right what he regretted during his entire life.

A 2nd shot at life, in Q words. And so Captain Picard did just that, righting the regrets of his youth, changing the cocky young fellow he once was as a cadet just out of the Academy. Yet, after all these changes, he found himself as a lowly officer in life, no longer in the captain's chair, nor having a shot at command. He was just another officer in starfleet, doing mudane lab work.

Having realise that by changing the person he once regretted he was in his youth to a person not wanting to take risk, he was lack of passion and focus in life, drifting from job to job, not seizing the opportunity to make it big, to get noticed.

But the story ended, naturally with a happy ending as he was allowed to go back in time again to set things "right".

And so...the moral of the story portrayed in the show, according to what I feel, is that,

"We should not regret what we did in the past, because who we are in the past is a projection of who we are going to be in the future. We should just look ahead and be the best that we can be."

Piggy Day

Achkz...Piggy was complaining that I don't write about her in my blog...and of all times to complain she have to do it during the Tv Premiere of Minority Report...so...sigh...This post shall be dedicated to her then...(but even if she doesn't bug..i will too...) today was quite a crappy day spent together...before going out we had a crap session over the phone on where to go...and later we went to East Coast park for a run...Again! I was feeling crappy so decided to do a "crap-a-jog" event but end up getting stomped on my piggy...


After which, decided to go Marine Parade to shop and i've decided to crap again n piggy stomp on me again...mmm but at the end of the day all is well...except for my right waist...kenna injured somehow....tsk tsk
But anyway, I shall risk my reputation and dignity to say the following:

I LOVE YOU PIGGY! and have a happy Birthday~

*Disclaimer...if u ppl reading this find it hard to understand, it's okay...it's not meant for you ppl to understand anyway... =p

NKF Fiasco

I guess the topic on everybody's mind now is regarding the recent lawsuit involving SPH and NKF over an article written about NKF. As all of you know, NKF dropped the suit a day after it started as it has , in my opinion, opened a can of worms that they can't seem to seal shut now...

Right from the start, especially my close friends, know that i'm a strong avocate against NKF, not for their spending but for the very activity that got them fat reserves - Fund Raising. Call me a convservationist but I really detest their way of raising funds, donations are meant to be from the heart, and given willingly, not dangle carrots like condos and cars so that people will donate...come on..it's charity not a national lottery... and equally bad is their plan to ask kids to help with their fundraising with prizes to be won for every XXX amt raised...what kind of message are we driving into our kids here? Charity is not about getting rewards..it's about contributing wholeheartly and willinging to do good...not to aim for that MP3 player if I can hit the quota...

But having said all that, I really have to get credit to NKF for their contributions to society, especially to those kidney patients and now, the cancer patients...Also, I have to get credit to their Management for such a bold and radical strategy to raise funds. I understand that NKF started out as a poor organization, making tough decisions on who to save when resources are low, and because of this, they decide to make it a point not to be finacially strapped and vola, you have a revolutionary charitable organization in place(which similar org needs to pay GST one?) with millions of dollars of reserves...

Unfortunately, I guess the board lost their main purpose which is to save lives after seeing so much money at hand that perhaps they got greedy? Which ever the reason, the patients under NKF care should not be the ones to suffer for their mistakes...I just hope someone will take over the helm and make their accounts more transparent, transfer a higher weightage of their income to saving lifes and gaining back public confidence...don't let the innocent ones suffer...

Sugei Buloh

Okay...i'm gonna cut a long story short by posting my BEST pic I took during this outfield trip...ready?


Reflections

Yar, that's my best shot..I've another nice one but too lazy to post it...no idea why but seems that I've not been able to produce good pics lately, lost that "feeling"... *shrugz*
All well..time to zzzz.....

Things of great value in the Office...

Here are the various things that I can't live without in the Office during our iNOC project, in order of importance....

1. Our Board of Requirements

As you can see, this whiteboard is covered with words and diagram and little schematics on what should and should not be included in the system that we are building...sigh...I always wonder how the heck we managed to get used to the entire gook of words....

2. Our Trusty NOC Server, Database Diagram, powered speakers

The robust server that I used to write almost thousands and thousands LOC for the system, together with the A3 size database diagram, they are an immesurable tool for my ease of coding...of course, the speaker comes in handy when I wanna hear songs during those hours of coding...

3. Notice Board Behind my cubicle

This notice board serves as a doodle board during peaceful times and now as a dartboard during coding time...A dartboard for all the bugz and logical flaws discovered along the way to completion....

4. The food that littered along NOC office

If you notice carefully, there are actually 2 spots where we will placed all our food supplies in times of dire need. There is an orange box nearest to me containig Julie's Peanut Butter cookies, thanks to Daniel...and erm...a confession...I've eaten like 4 packets of it liaoz... heh heh...to the far end, there is a huge stockpile of Food, biscuits, potato chips, sweets, you name it, we have it. Suitable for munching during stressful periods...last but not least, at the extreme far end of the room, there is a fridge, contains hundreds of mini choco bars and a slice of Jianhui's Birthday cake...

Last but not least....



Yupz, this is a picture taken during Jianhui's surprise party held where else but our very own NOC office...that's Kok keong on the left, followed by me, out Bday Boy and Sereen...

Good working place, good collegues and most of all, wonderfully nice friends around me...next time when I work, I wish I have such friends around me, at least work will be fun...

A little stroll in the park...

Hee Hee...today was quite an exciting evening...decided to trek thru Macritchie....in the late evening...heh heh.... by the time we almost reach back to the main area, it had gotten pretty dark and to make things worse, we trotted to an area where we saw a tombstone placed facing the reservior....quite a nice view for a final resting place but at that point in time, I was like "shit...encounter such things in the looming darkness...." and piggy wasn't helping much either by yelping occassionally about how I should not have stopped for so long just looking at some ridiculous tortises whom seem to be pampered by humans as they swam towards us with their mouth wide open...

Anyway, we gotten out of that place quite in one piece with much thanks to my trusty little torch. This is no ordinary torch, it's constructed with 5 LED bulbs that glowed a nice cool bluish-white in the dark, something similar to this...



LED Torch



Okay, and so... we got out of that place in the glowing darkness...it's pretty fun but I guess it would not have been scary if you do not have a yelping piggy beside you or if you go in a larger group...ke ke...piggy gonna hammer my head when she sees this...

Low low .... lowest?

Okay, this week must be the worst week of this semester....depressed like mad and I've still got more to be upset about....in pointers...

1) General depression (i've no friggin idea why but I am...)
2) Feeling damn lousy about this piece of land (many reasons to it...)
3) FYP readings are a total drag...
4) ASP.NET coding is driving me up the wall....

and as if all these are not enough, I have a multiple hit combo today...
5) Got a rejection letter from iDA ( surprising thing is, they use conquerer paper..pretty cool ain't it? now u know where all the money went)
6) Got a rejection letter from RSAF (masked by saying that all vacancies are filled..)
7) Some Bugger scratched my car. A long 3 cm scratch on my front right fender...
8)Petrol discount hit a high of 20++% at 6PM and i have just pumped this morning at 14%
9) Do not anyhow post the truth on your blog, forum etc etc or you might just be at the receiving end of a lawyer's letter(it's not me, no worries). What the hell happened to freedom of speech? Or is every single company in Singapore trigger happy? Defend your company and stop hiding behind the law...utter disappointing...

I'm on a roll man....rolling down the dumps that is.....I hope things turn around or I will never get out of this shit... or this shitty place....I need to get out of this place... throw you guys a song

Angel by Sarah McLachlan

Spend all your time waiting
For that second chance
For a break that would make it okay
There's always one reason
To feel not good enough
And it's hard at the end of the day
I need some distraction
Oh beautiful release
Memory seeps from my veins
Let me be empty
And weightless and maybe
I'll find some peace tonight

In the arms of an angel
Fly away from here
From this dark cold hotel room
And the endlessness that you fear
You are pulled from the wreckage
Of your silent reverie
You're in the arms of the angel
May you find some comfort there

So tired of the straight line
And everywhere you turn
There's vultures and thieves at your back
And the storm keeps on twisting
You keep on building the lie
That you make up for all that you lack
It don't make no difference
Escaping one last time
It's easier to believe in this sweet madness oh
This glorious sadness that brings me to my knees

In the arms of an angel
Fly away from here
From this dark cold hotel room
And the endlessness that you fear
You are pulled from the wreckage
Of your silent reverie
You're in the arms of the angel
May you find some comfort there
You're in the arms of the angel
May you find some comfort here

Sigh....

Is it me or is it me? I am a far cry from who I use to be in the past, aka 4 years ago... I have become more outspoken and best of all, crappy... and I do love living in an environment whereby I can meet loads of people everyday...in person..it makes for a more personal experience...well but I guess for now I'm just wondering why no one writes comments on my blog....why? why? why? hee hee...ah well...super depressed today suddenly...dunno why also...sigh..maybe triggered by the fact that i'm still stuck in this piece of land that makes me feel upset....

Cooking Day!

Yepz..it's been a long time since I've cooked and today I've decided to clean out my fridge but cooking whatever I can find in it. And so, out came a pack of veggie, bottle of oyster sauce, pork, butter, onion....

And so, decided to cook the pork first...wat did i do with it? well, firstly I melted the butter, wait till it's sizzling hot then i added in the chop onions(in rings) and fried it till it is cooked, adding brown sugar to sweeten the broth. lastly, I throw in the pork and stir fry it...smells heavenly...when it's almost done, I added lemon pepper to it...gosh the aroma...*swoon*...anyway here's a pic of it...nothing much to look at, but my mum commented it was delicious...and if a LADY can comment that it is nice, it is quite a feat for me, considering my cooking skills is comparable to naught...




Meaty dish...drool~~



The veggie was next...frying vegetables is the easiest dish to do to make you look like a competent cook. first, you just heat the oil and throw in the veggie, oh, add in the garlic and fry it a while before adding the veggie, unless you are like me who detest garlic to the core you can skip this step. next, when the veggie is almost cooked, just add in oyster sauce, let it simmer for a while more and vola~ a dish that looks complicated(which chinese dish isn't) but by nature easy to handle...unfortunately, girls are the opposite....anyway...here's a pic....




yummy veggie...

Fee Hike??

Days ago, I managed to convince myself that Singapore is indeed a better place to live in compared to other countries, and after all, it is my birthplace and as the saying goes, nothing better than home. Yet days later, doubts have began to cloud my mind once again with the approval from PTC regarding the fee hikes in transportation.

What was the reason cited for fee hikes?
:: Improving Economy (really?)
:: Last hike was years ago (so?)
:: Increasing fuel cost(then why the profit?)
:: Increasing labour cost(so must milk more cash from other poor workers without rise in pay?)

Why are Singaporeans against fee hikes?
:: Singaporeans will always complain whenver there are fee hikes (who isn't?)
:: Profit made by the transport "companies" are in excess of millions
:: The economy is not as rosy as the press would like to portray
:: Too close to the extension of ERP increase
:: Most average Singaporean's are not having much pay increase( despite the call by the govt. to increase pay, interesting timing)

::Fallout::
The PTC, to me, is not really an independent council and even if it is, it must have been pretty much obvilous to them to use data from 1997 as a basis to increase fees. I think they need more coffee. General response from the public have been null, zipped, silence. Why? Typical Singaporean, just bite the bullet and move on. I hope no one is smart enough to capitalise on this weakness(or are there?) General public setiments must be "The govt is just there to milk more money, the rest of what they say are a farce" I can't help but TOTALLY agree and the govt. must do more to convience us otherwise, or, like the rest, I shall remain totally skeptical irregardless what someone might say. Gosh, it does make me mad typing all these out, better relax more before I contribute to the healthcare industry in more ways than one...

A post to keep things going...

mmm, it's been a long time since i've updated my blog. (A habitual laziness of mine, apart
from the usual excuse of having limited time everyday). Have another bout of tiring week ahead,
juggling both my work and HYP, or to some, FYP.

Well, managed to write a page or 2 in aspx form in preparation for our system coding which
is slated to be due in end July. Things are going slower than I would like but at least it
is moving...I just hope that we can finish what we planned by August...

Chartered is moving up and up! it has gone up to 1.27, half way to it's high of 1.4...will keep a lookout,
for those interested, there is chartered's stock performance...




I found a whitepaper while doing on my read up for my hyp, and it's 150 pages of it...in CHINESE...heck, I need a thousand years to read through all the chinese characters and another million years to understand all the strokes in the paper...well, at least I know the paper is about company merger, cos that's the only
word in English ...=p