Mindspeaker Returns

I dream that one day, I will be like the owners of Youtube, Facebook, Friendster or even Plenty of Fish. I dream that I’d have my very own website to call my own. All I need is an idea. And I think I have that idea already. All I need is to take steps everyday to make it come to fruition. I’ve already created a logo for my website. It gives me something concrete to look at. To concentrate my dream upon. A tiny step, but every journey begins with a single step.

And one day that journey will end when my dream becomes a reality.

First things first…

I’m baaaaaaaaaaaack!

Ok…now that we’ve got that out of the way…let’s talk about the thing that made me want to blog again. Parenthood.

I’ve read about Ridj having a baby (congrats again!) and I can’t help smiling as I read about him being sleepless and all that. Brings back such happy memories. I’ll be the first to admit that my wife takes most of the burden of waking up in the wee hours of the morning as my baby breastfeeds throughout most of her current life. She only stopped at 1 1/2 years old. So…it was my wife who had to wake up whenever my baby needed some fuel. However, since my baby enjoys a cocktail of breast milk and formula milk, I make the formula milk (sometimes hehe).

A little sidetrack…

A friend of mine (A fellow father. I really can’t remember who) was having a conversation with me about his baby. It went something like this…

Me: So do you get sleepless nights?

Friend (the father): No. My baby’s great! She never wakes up in the middle of the night!

Me: Really?! No way! So damn lucky sia! 

Friend (the Mummy): Excuse me! She wakes up at least TWICE every night. Its you who never wakes up!

Friend (the father): Huh? Really?

I couldn’t stop laughing back then. His baby was at four months old!

Well anyway…back to my story. Being a parent is seriously the most wonderful event in my life (apart from being married and having a wonderful wife). It gives you something to look forward to. You are given a very important responsibility. This little bundle of joy depends on you. Really, really depends on you. She needs you there to feed her. To clothe her. To make her laugh (this one I’m really good at!). To hug. To kiss. To talk baby talk to. To smile at. To smile with. Unrequited love cannot completely exist between a woman and a man. That stuff is just for fantasies. It can only exist between a father/mother and his/her baby.

You give her everything you’ve got. You buy her clothes even though you need to buy new ones yourselves. You buy her toys just to see wide eyed appreciation. You show her new things / animals just to see her stare at it in amazement. You go out of the way to bring her to a playground just to see her light up and shout "Play! Play! Play!". You carry her in your arms even though you’re so damn tired after a hard day’s work. You feed her and she sometimes spits it out, but you still do it. You clean her up after she soils her diapers (I really do it, ok). You do silly dances (till you’re out of breath. Sometimes I end up hurting myself when I trip or knock onto something). You make silly faces. You make funny sounds. You discipline her. Then you feel bad for disciplining her. I remembered my cikgu telling me that it hurts our parents more than it hurt us when they hit us. I didn’t understand what he meant back then. But I do now.

You feel so happy whenever she learns something new. A new word. A new bodypart. Head. Hair (She will say haaair whenever she is asked to point to her hair). Shoulders. Eyes. Nose (crinkles her nose). Ears. Teeth. Tongue (sticks out her tongue repeatedly). Chin (chhhh…). Stomach. Hands. Fingers (wiggle her fingers). Elbows. Knees. Toes. She can smile on demand now. She can wave to others. She can blank kiss. She can jump (without jumping). All numbers are two. Draw any number and she’ll say two. When she wants to fall onto her bed she’ll say two…two…two and then jump. She knows cat. Dog. Bird. Fish (fffshh…spitting saliva all over the place). She goes all soft and loving whenever we sing "I love you" as in the Barney (I HATE BARNEY!) song. She actually pulls us (me and my wife) together close to her and hugs us as we sing the song.

Well…if I’m going to write about every single enjoyable thing that a parent feels watching his/her baby grow up then this post will never end. So I’ll wrap it up now.

Having a child is a blessing, a gift from God. It brings more happiness and meaning to our relationship. We truly feel that we share our lives together. Nothing in this world compares to the joy that a child brings. Sure…everything is getting more and more expensive as time goes by. Life can be difficult at times. But this little bundle of energy and joy makes living a whole lot better

This message was brought to you by: MCYS (haha…just kidding!) 

All this while I’ve been waiting for iTunes shop to come to Singapore. What I didn’t realise was that I don’t have to wait for it at all! I can simply buy songs or shows from the US iTunes shop. i didn’t realise I could do this. They actually sell online gift cards for iTunes. So I got about 20 US worth of gift card and started downloading stuff (legally for once!) from iTunes.

Why did I start doing this? Well…its all because of HEROES! My father-in-law bought some HEROES dvds, but they weren’t the complete set. I was still missing about 6 episodes. I’m not going to wait till Channel 5 finally shows these last 6 episodes. My daughter’d probably be able to talk by then! So I decided to find out whether I’d be able to get them from iTunes. It was! So the next step was to find out if it is possible to buy the shows off iTunes. After abit of prodding around, I realised that it was possible! I downloaded these movies at $1.99 US an episode. Spent about 12 US dollars on them. Its a whole goddamn lot cheaper than buying them off the shelves. Yeah sure, you’ve got the subtitles and all the other stuff with the boxed set, but what happens after you watch them? You keep them in your drawers where they gather dust. Might as well buy them without all the frills. Even if they gather dust, it doesn’t hurt that much

Now that I’ve got the six episodes, the only thing left to do is to WATCH them. Yeah…haven’t had the time to do that over the weekend. We had a quick tour of Geylang bazaar last Saturday, where we saw a girl who looked like she was drunk when she got her hair coloured. It was as if somebody just splashed different coloured paint onto her head! I would rather shave off my head than go out with hair like that! Then there’s this guy who had his hair all bleached out and he had black spots all over his head. He looked like a ladybird. Some people are freaking…freaks.

Can’t wait for tomorrow. We’d go all out on our shopping cos it’d be payday!  

Channel 5 is really a lame channel. Its funny how they talk about being the first to show movies or series when other channels have shown these shows long ago. Their monopoly is not very effective and kind of comical when people have cable nowadays. Gone were the days when they could boast that they show movies earlier than their Malaysian counterparts at RTM.

Nowadays, other Star World, HBO and many other channels are showing movies and series far earlier than Channel 5. One good example is the series "Heroes". I can’t believe that Channel 5 is having trailers for "Heroes". And they’re proudly announcing the fact that they’ll be showing "Heroes" in November. By the time November comes, I’d have watched the entire series.

For people who have been catching "Heroes" on Star World, the series would have been well in advance by now. As for me, I managed to watch it on DVD. My father-in-law got the whole series on DVD. Don’t ask me how he got them.

I knew he bought them a while back. But I never got around to watch them. I saw some parts of the series on Star World, but I never really watched them cos I didn’t really take note of the time slot that the show was in.

So yesterday…I found the DVD set while I was waiting for time to break fast. I popped the first DVD in and watched. We ended up watching the show till about eleven! It was that good. It was that riveting!

I can’t imagine having to wait from one week to another waiting for the series. I can’t imagine having to put up with stupid advertisements. I’m just glad that F-I-L bought these DVDs! I don’t have to put up with all that nonsense. And, unlike the Hikmah series, I didn’t even fast forward any scenes cos I just wanted to absorb every single storyline and every single character in full detail.

The series was really, really that good. If I were Channel 5, I’d bump off whatever other stupid late night shows I have just to play "Heroes" NOW! Ditch the Desperate Housewives. Enough of Ugly Betty. Its just a long-winded "The Devil Wears Prada". Lost can get lost. Ok maybe CSI can stay. But everything else must go NOW. Not in November. No.

I can’t wait to get home to continue watching the series tonight!

It happens all the time. Whenever there’s an earthquake in Indonesia, we’d be getting the tremors. And whenever we get tremors, there will be people recording the tremors on their handphones. These video recordings would then be sent to Mediacorp, which then shows them to us during the News.

And so it happened yet again yesterday. The newscaster (Neena Mairata) talked about it. And there were the interviews. Yes…the interviews about how the "victims" felt the giddiness and how everything was swaying all around them. I mean…is this so important that you need to put it up on the news? Yes we know there’s tremors, and what do tremors do? They make you feel giddy and things start shaking all over. What do you expect? Tell me something I don’t know!

Then they proceeded to show the various videos showing the effects of the tremors. Cutlery shaking. Chandeliers shaking. Even keys on the window grilles shaking. For added effect, they overlayed a blowup of the keys at the bottom right of the video, just in case you couldn’t see the shaking keys! And finally, there’s the customary fish tank with mini waves caused by the tremors (Fish: Hey look Ma! I’m on TV yet again!).

Do we really need to see this? Do we really need to know yet again about how some housewife felt when there’s tremors? Do we really really need to see the blow up of the keys on the window grilles? Do the home owners realise that potential robbers now know that they leave their window grille keys on the window grilles?

Fascinating stuff.

As for my baby, she’s more interested in the Weather. Somehow or other, she’d stop what she’s doing immediately and focus on the TV whenever she hears the weather jingle. I think she’s hypnotised by it! Or maybe she has friends in Dubai or Taiwan? 

On another note, I was pleasantly surprised when I realised that the mosque I went to for Zuhur (afternoon) prayers had started giving out porridge after the Zuhur prayers. Usually they’d give out porridge after the Asar (late afternoon) prayers. I never thought I’d be able to get the porridge as I normally perform Asar prayers at home. That’s nice :) 

Pheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeyewwww!

I’ve finally been released from the shackles of having trainees with me. At one point, I actually had up to THREE trainees with me. What a handful. I can’t squeeze them all inside the staffroom, so I had to hole up in the lab. Personally, I prefer hanging out in the staffroom as I get to talk to the teachers around me.

And as a result of me having trainees, I really wasn’t able to blog. One of them has this irritating habit of popping up to me and asking me questions on every single thing imaginable. Really, really lacking in initiative. I just wish her all the best in whichever school she’s in now.

Anyway, enough of all that talk about trainees. I’m back and I will blog more often from now on!

The Lucky Draw
So what’s been happening lately? Well…for one thing…for the first time in my entire life, I won in a lucky draw. Yeah and its the FIRST PRIZE too! I spent three years working as a teacher in my previous school. Three years…didn’t win a lucky draw prize during Teacher’s Day dinners. And every other time. Entered so many competitions, didn’t even manage to win a consolation prize. But in my first year as an IT Trainer, I ended up winning the first prize hahaha….

How I wish I had that kind of luck during my wife’s D ‘N’ D many months back. The first time was an LCD TV! What I won was nothing as significant as that, but to me, getting the first prize was just thrilling! Just imagine…out over 80 people, I won the first prize! Freaking wow! I’ve actually gotten over it by now, but just typing this out makes me feel blessed once again

Baby Blessings
Speaking of blessings, my baby’s making huge progress in life. She’s had her first steps and she’s been starting to babble. The babbling’s just nonsense, but its a precursor to continous speech. In addition, she’s able to point out at certain things such as CAT, BIRD and FAN to us. I made sure that she’s pronouncing the words right. No meow-meow for cat. Its just CAT.

Hikmah 3
On another note, we’ve finished watching HIKMAH 3. Yes…not HIKMAH 2 which is trundling along on Suria. All 40 CDs cleared within the space of two weeks. How did I manage that? Well…I’d fast forward the parts where I deem irrelevant to the storylines that matter. I can’t stand having to sit through the ramblings of all these bit part actors on TV. Sometimes the segments can be so insanely boring. However, when you rent the VCDs you have the pleasure of not caring about whatever is happening to whoever that person is. I don’t know and I don’t care. I only need to know about what’s happening to Adrian, Arman, Adit, Bu Ratna, Ana, Marla and Amanda. And let me tell you…there’s lots of eye candy in HIKMAH 3

Ramadhan
And finally, its Ramadhan once again. My aim is to be more proper with my fasting. Fasting is not just about abstinence from food. Its about controlling yourself as well. I’m ok with not eating or drinking. But I have to be more careful of what I say. Sometimes swear words come out from my mouth without even me realising it. I hope that I’d be able to stop this bad habit. And I’d like to perform my terawih prayers with my wife too.

Selamat Berpuasa kepada semua Kaum Muslim serata dunia!

From the looks of it, I think I’ll be posting once a week from now on. At least till my trainees are gone. I really don’t have time to blog when they’re here. I don’t know why. The workload’s still the same whether they’re here or not. We’re not dividing our work amongst ourselves. They have their own work to do too. I guess I prefer to blog in privacy. There’ll probably be more entries when they’re gone. When that will happen? I don’t know…

Anyway, the weekend that passed was a wonderful, wonderful one. We did so many things as a family. I’ve been feeling kind of detached from my in-laws. I guessed its because I usually feel useless when I’m around them. They’ve helped me out a lot, but I can’t seem to find anything to do for them. Not until now.

My sister-in-law got engaged on Sunday. So…since last Friday, I’ve been helping out at the house. Cleaning up the house. Fixing up broken things. Running errands. Moving around furniture. I even got to drive my father-in-law’s car for a few times. He’s kind of protective over it cos he just bought it. However, he handed me the card thingie (the car has no keys!) and asked me to pick up some relatives. I was kind of nervous driving the car cos I really didn’t want to scratch it or anything. I half expected him to go down to inspect his car the moment I returned. But he didn’t hehehe…

On Friday night, I checked my email and realised that a secondary school friend of mine was getting married on Saturday. He wasn’t able to call me up as he only had an outdated number of mine. Luckily there’s Friendster. I saw his message and called him up. Told my wife about it and we slipped out of the house for a while on Saturday to see the last of my secondary school guy friends getting married. 

Then there’s the engagement ceremony itself. My wife made up my sister-in-law. My mother-in-law sewed her engagement clothes. I was the photographer. We can actually open up a business here!

It was actually an engagement for my sister-in-law cum birthday party for my daughter. So after all the engagement festivities were over, I used my dad’s car to drive over to Swensen’s to get my baby’s birthday cake. It had all the Disney character’s, Mickey, Minnie, Donald and Goofy on it. It looked soooo pretty! We brought it back home and got everything ready. Plopped my baby in front of the cake. Everyone who was there sang "Happy Birthday" to her. She actually giggled at all the attention she was getting. Everyone was so delighted to see her smile that they actually sang the birthday song again hahaha…so funny! We bought a big cake so everyone got a taste. It was Cookies N Cream (my favourite) and Sticky Chewy Chocolate (my wife’s favourite). So delicious. That was money well-spent.

We both took leave on Monday to recuperate from the festivities the day before. Woke up late and then had breakfast at Long John Silver’s. Then we opened up a bank account for our daughter and put in all the money she got from her birthday plus her Baby Bonus.  Then we went off to Underwater World at Sentosa. We figured that it would be nearly empty since its a weekday.

How wrong we were! The place was packed with tourists! And if we thought that Singaporeans were ugly, wait till you see PRCs in full force! They’re already irritating individually…but when they are together as a group, all hell broke loose. My wife wanted to change my baby’s diapers and she was queueing in front of one of the cubicles. When its her turn, she picked up my baby from the pram and as she wanted to get into the cubicle, this PRC just pushed her way in! Unbelievable huh? I think they ate too much White Rabbit candies. That’s why…

Anyway, we enjoyed ourselves, with or without PRCs. My baby was in awe of all the fish she saw. I even carried her flat on her back so that she could see the fish above her. We even let her put her hands in the pool so she could touch some of the fish there.

And just in case you didnt know…you don’t have to go to the Maldives anymore to feed stingrays! Yes! There is a place for you to feed stingrays. I touched them. But I didn’t feed them. Must pay $3 to feed them. Maybe when my daughter grows up…

After that, we went back to have dinner at the Seah Imm hawker centre. Then we went back home. What a jam packed but wonderful weekend

Hello? Anybody there?

Still waiting for new posts huh? Wow. Thank you.

I’ve been so busy lately. My company sent me two trainees to learn on the job. I’d teach…they’d observe. Then they teach and I observe them. In the end, I’d tell them where they could improve in their teaching and classroom management.

It would take at least 5 years for mainstream teachers to end up training new teachers. I get to teach new trainees within 5 months working as an IT trainer. Either I’m very good or my company just wants me to do more things.

So for the past month, I’ve been teaching, discussing and planning lessons with my two trainees. The good thing is that there’s less teaching on my part. However, I’m not able to blog. Must set good example ok…

Today, my trainees are teaching somewhere else. So I get to finally blog about something. I get to blog about the fact that I can now blog. How interesting hehehe…

Now let’s see…what can we blog about? Hmmm…my baby’s going to be 1 year old soon. How time flies. She was born premature. 1 and a half months premature. She was so tiny when she first appeared. But that tiny baby is now a healthy bouncy baby girl. She’s starting to stand on her own now. Well…sort of. She’d stand up and hold onto something. Then she’d let her hands go and sway to the left and right before she’d fall on her butt and giggle her way into my heart.

You can be fabulous at what you do. And that can make you happy. But nothing in the world can make you happier than when your baby smiles at you. She’d light up the moment she sees me. She’d smile the widest smile she could muster. 4 cute little teeth peeking out at me.

No matter how tired I am, that smile of hers makes my day.

We bought her the most beautiful birthday cake that we could afford. I can’t wait to celebrate her first birthday! Happy Birthday baby

I’ve been reading alot about Starhub wanting to raise its prices. Basic subscription will go up by $4 and the Sports package would go up by $10. That’s an extra $14 I have to pay every month. Looks quite small huh…but multiply that by 12 and you get $168. Multiply that by 100 people and Starhub would be getting $16800 per year. But I don’t think only 100 people are subscribing to the same package as me. It should be a whole lot more than that.

But poor, old Starhub. They’ve been holding out on raising prices all these years and they have no choice but to do so now. I don’t see the reason though. They’ve been posting profits, so what’s the deal with that? How do they get away with raising prices when they are already making money? Are they monopolising their trade?

"How dare you say that!"  says Starhub. They’re not the only ones in Singapore providing such services anymore. They’re NOT a monopoly! Subscribers are free to move to other scintillating companies such as MobTV and Singtel’s IPTV (coming soon) if they don’t like Starhub. So…nope Starhub is not a monopoly!

I’m very amused by Starhub’s PR exercises. They’ve been repeating these words on various newspapers. Its like a cut and paste job. Same words all the time. But some questions remain unanswered. Such as:

Currently there are no other alternatives to watch EPL, La Liga or Serie A unless we watch them on Starhub. So to me….and to all the subscribers, that constitutes a monopoly. We don’t have a choice. We have to subscribe to Starhub if we want to watch these leagues. And if Starhub wants to raise prices, we have no choice but to pay for it. That’s a monopoly. No way you can say that its not.

Maybe I should sign up with Malaysia’s Astro and hook it up at my parent’s house at JB. Then we’ll go watch the matches on weekends there.

Starhub is pure rubbish. I’m cancelling my subscription unless the hooha that the New Paper has been creating causes them to backtrack. This is no mild threat. I’ve already cancelled my cable modem subscription with them. I’m using M1’s broadband nowadays. Its cheaper and it still gets the job done. So I don’t mind cancelling the tv subscriptions as well. Luckily I didn’t sign a contract with them… 

I used to allow people to comment on my blogs. I even had those tagboards. So I’ll get comments from lots and lots of people about what I’ve written…

But the reason why I blog is not because I want to get comments from people. No offence to my readers (if there’s any out there haha), but I’m not interested in your comments. If you have a comment, go write about it in your blog.

Most of the times, there’ll be people who write in useful comments. But there’ll always be someone out there who gets a thrill out of flaming others. They’d stalk your blog. Pick on your entries. Criticize your thoughts. Make fun of you. Insult you. All under the warmth and safety of anonymity.

If you don’t like me…just say it to me to my face. Writing comments on my blog won’t change things. I won’t know who you are. If I did something wrong to you and you’re so angry with me that you can’t sleep at night, tell me who you are. I’ll try to work things out. I promise. But if you’re not going to tell me who you are…then there’s nothing I can do.

I don’t pine for comments. Some people do. Not me. I used to write for the crowd in the past. But that’s not why I started blogging in the first place. That’s why I decided to stop blogging for awhile. 

The truth is…these are my thoughts. I didn’t write them down to please others. I wrote them down because this is how I feel. There’d be some anger, some happiness and sometimes, there’d be nonsense. I’m not out to impress anyone with my knowledge, creativity or wittiness. If you happen to read them and enjoy my entries…then I’m happy to know that. If you don’t like my thoughts, then just go to other blogs. There’s so many blogs out there. I’m sure there’s going to be others that you’d like.

I’m an introvert. I keep my thoughts to myself. But I still need an outlet for my thoughts. I need some place to vent my anger and frustrations. I also want a place to store my memories. I’d like to look back at this blog one day and laugh and cry at the good and bad times in my life. I’d like to reflect back on the things that were important back then.

So what if I look back and realise that my entries are not the award winning kind? Who cares? I just want a place to call my own. I take this blog as an extension of my thoughts. When you think or talk to yourself…you do not have people commenting right?  

So that’s why there’s no comment box.  

I believe most laymen would not be familiar with this phrase that is bandied about in schools in Singapore. The phrase is Innovation and Enterprise, or I & E for short.

I & E simply means to get students in Singapore to be more innovative and entrepreneurial. Singapore has been known to produce the best textbook memorisers, but we are sorely lacking in the entrepreneurs column. Basically, our students are robots. If its found in a book, they can do it. But if it has to do with thinking out of the box, or book for that matter, they can’t do it.

The government wants our future generation to be brimming with new ideas and produce new innovative products. We want the next Hotmail, MySpace or Youtube founder to be from Singapore. So who do we turn to to make this happen? Why, the teachers of course!

Aren’t teachers supposed to be good at everything? Aren’t they good at Maths, Science, English, Social Studies, Arts & Crafts, Music, Health Education and PE? So they should be good at I & E too what…Just one more thing to think about. Can la…

Now the reason why I’m writing about this is that in every school in Singapore, there’ll be this one day which is called the I & E Day. On this day, pupils showcase their innovative and entrepreneurial side. Parents can then come down and see the fantastic ideas that these students come up with. 

Now…as teachers are supposed to help nurture these ideas, most of the times, the ideas are nothing to be proud of. I’m not trying to put down the teachers, but seriously, why are teachers, teachers? Do you think they’d be teachers if they are entrepreneurs? How come these people who are supposed to impart their knowledge in I & E are not entrepreneurs themselves? Wouldn’t it be like a case of the blind leading the blind?

That’s why, when you go to these I & E carnivals, it looks like a mini pasar malam. You’ll have people selling food. You’ll have game stalls. Yeah sure they are making money. But what’s so innovative about selling chicken nuggets? Or throwing balls into hoops? I don’t think the government wants to create Pasar Malam people right? There’s already one too many people selling food in pasar malams.

One thing for sure though…you won’t see the next YouTube. I & E is just another idea from the upper echleons of the MOE. They push their ideas down the throats of the people on the ground and they expect these ideas to work, as always. 

Here’s an analogy. One day…the government wants all the students to be able to fly. MOE has to create flying pupils. So how? MOE comes up with idea. Ok…got idea already. Buy lots of feathers for ALL pupils in Singapore. Hand them to the teachers (who don’t know anything about flying) and hope that these teachers would be able to make the pupils fly at the end of the day (They’d better…we pay so much money for the feathers already!).

Personally, I think that if you want people to become innovative, they need to meet with real-life entrepreneurs. Let them listen to these people. How they think. What are their motivations. How they come up with ideas. They’re the ones who should be planning I & E carnivals with the students, not teachers.

Leave the teachers in peace. Let the teachers go mark books, plan lessons and do all the other things that they are qualified to do. Don’t expect the teachers to be good at everything.    

Note: To all the teachers out there…I’m not flaming you. That’s the last thing on my mind. I’m saying all this because it sickens me to see you people having to do everything in school. We’re like jack of all trades, but a master of none. If you don’t do a good job, it would reflect in your work appraisal. This sucks. I wish all this would change one day. But looking at the kiasu attitude adopted by the powers-that-be, I find this to be a pipe dream.

On the flip side, if you enjoy nurturing innovative students, then good for you. I’m not against you. My best friend is a fantastic teacher. Appeared in Contact magazine some more. And I’m happy for him. However, I’m speaking for all those who are not good at it, but are forced to do it nonetheless.

Enjoy your holidays while they last.

Yet another cyclist story…but its one with a twist!

But before that…I’d like to add on to my many grouses about cyclists.

There’s a ramp at my house which slopes up from the walkway from the road up to my block. Now this is to make it easier for ALL wheel bound things like bicycles, prams and wheelchairs. The thing is…by right, you’re supposed to wheel your way up or down when you’re at the ramp. However, most cyclists refuse to do so. Most would simply cycle their way up or down the ramp. Well, we put up with it. However, it really makes me angry when some of them refuse to get off their bikes and speed all the way up the ramp! Can you imagine how scary it is?

These people go straight from the walkway up the ramp without braking at all. So if you happen to be in their path, you better move away fast. On the other end of the spectrum, you have the slow ones. These cyclists would painstakingly pedal their way up the ramp while we have to walk patiently behind them. The problem with cycling that way is that if they were to lose their balance, they may fall backwards and hit us.

Ahhh! Cyclists! The bane of my existence!

But then again…as we were on our way to work just now a cyclist actually made my day. She was like the role model of all cycling aunties in Singapore! She actually cycled onto the grass when her path was blocked by us at the walkway! No incessant ringing of bells! She wasn’t speeding! And get this…when she reached the traffic lights, she actually got off her bike and pushed it across! She actually did that! Oh my God!

If only every single cyclist was as wonderful as her. Singapore would be a nicer place to live in…for all of us pram pushing parents. Hooray for the nice cycling auntie!  

I’ve never learnt how to use Video Editing programs in my life. Whatever I know about these were gleaned off Windows Movie Maker and Powerpoint. Yes. Powerpoint. I knew what transitions in videos were because I learnt about slide transitions in Powerpoint.

So I was surprised when I was asked to create a Video Editing manual from scratch. I told them that I knew nothing about it. But they asked me to learn. So I said ok. Who knows…it may be helpful one day.

The problem is that I don’t have the software. However, that’s quickly resolved by downloading the trial version. I also looked up the Internet for some resources on training for this particular software. I don’t think that’s enough, so I’ll probably go down the library to find out more about it.

Just thinking about video editing reminds me of this weird uncle-in-law of mine. He’s one of those "empty vessels makes the most noise" kind of people. Talks a whole lot. Brags a whole lot. So how does he tie in to this entry?

Well…he likes to take videos of special occasions such as weddings or engagements. Round about five years ago, he made a big fuss about wanting to take photos of my (back then) girlfriend during our engagement. He told her not to waste money on professional photographers. He said that he could do an even better job than them. Plus…it would be free! An engagement gift from an uncle to his niece.

The photos never came. Fast forward about two years later to our wedding preparations. We decided NOT to have him as our photographer or our videoman. We booked our own photographer and videoman at a wedding exhibition. I told my wife to tell her uncle "Tell him that I insisted on having my own videographer and photographer. It was MY decision, not yours". 

I was right. He did kick up a big fuss. He told her that we’re wasting money unnecessarily. But since he could not do anything about me as I’m not part of his family, he couldn’t stop me from getting what I wanted. However, he insisted on recording our wedding and that his video would be superior to the one I paid for.

The video I paid for came in one week after we wed. Everybody enjoyed it. In fact, I just watched it again with my younger brother, who came to watch it with his fiancee last week.

What about my uncle-in-law’s video then? That superior video? The one that’s free? Well…three years have passed since my wedding. I have a fully furnished house. I have an 11 month old daughter. But the video’s still not completed yet.

Yes its not completed. In fact, I don’t even think that he’s started! Two Hari Rayas ago, when we came to his house, he brought us all to see splices of the video that he was working on. I didn’t see a work-in-action project file. I didn’t see video clips being put together. I didn’t see transitions. There were no transitions! All I saw were a folder, with all the different files. He’d double-click on one file and we’d see one short clip. Then he’d show us another file and we’d see yet another clip. He told us that he almost completed it. Almost. That was two years ago.

I’m not a fool. Maybe he could fool his own brother (my father-in-law) and sister-in-law (my mother-in-law), but I know the difference between a project file and separate video clips. The only thing that stopped me from pointing it out was that I was still new to the family. I told my wife about it when we went home. She wasn’t surprised. Back then…two years ago, she was still waiting for her engagement photos. She told me not to expect anything from this uncle of hers.

And so she was right. No free, superior video. He bragged to my own aunties, uncles and my parents that he had captured lots of videos of my side of the family. They waited until they probably forgot about that promise.

The worst thing is that…this is not the first time that he’s done this. He’d do something and lose interest. Then he’d go scooting off to do something new that caught his eye. In the end nothing gets done.

Some of my wife’s uncles and aunties, who already have two, three children are STILL waiting for their videos. I wonder if this uncle-in-law of mine still has these clips which were probably done over ten years ago. The sad thing was that some of them didn’t get other videomen for their weddings because they trusted their own brother. Memories gone in smoke just like that.

Thank God for MY videoman. Maybe I should contact him and ask him for tips on creating this manual that I’m supposed to be doing…  

Nothing much is happening at work, so I’ve got time to reflect…

Life’s getting better. I’m getting paid less but job satisfaction is high. My family life is also better than ever. I now have the time to spend with my wife and my baby. In the past, I’d be spending nights slogging it out…planning for the next day’s lessons and marking books or papers. By the time I’m done, my wife and my baby’s asleep. By the time I wake up, they’d still be asleep. I only get about five minutes to say good morning and kiss them before I go off to work. It breaks my heart to leave. When you see your kid smiling at you…with her toothless grin. If you have kids, you’ll know what I mean. 

Nowadays, I wake up later. I go to work later. I come back earlier. I have less things to do. I get paid less as I said earlier but I think its a tradeoff I’m willing to take. What’s the point of having lots of money but no time to spend it?

It reminds me of this conversation that I had with someone I know. He lives in a swanky condo. But he works like hell to upkeep his lifestyle. He tells me that he has no time to use the condo facilities. He’s usually at work. By the time he comes back, he’s too tired to use the facilities. He says that his maid probably uses the facilities more than him.  

Money’s important, yes. In fact if I’m given the opportunity, I’d love to earn more. But not at the expense of losing family time. I want to be a part of my family’s memories. I don’t want to be known as a great provider of money, but sorely lacking in the availability department. I’d want to spend my life with my wife. I’d want to be in on my daughter’s life. I want to have memories with them, not just of them.

I can’t wait to get back into her loving arms and I can’t wait to get back home to see that toothless grin  

I’ve been soooo busy for the past week. I had to conduct an IT course for some teachers so I basically had no time at all to surf…much less blog. But I’m finally free now. So here goes…

There’s another Pasar Malam (PM) near my house yet again. And as usual, you would see the same old things being sold. And it amazes me why there’s so many stalls but they sell the same things. Have these guys heard about this thing called competition? Market saturation? I walked around the PM and I think Guiness should come down for there seems to be a record going on down here. This PM could probably win the "PM with the most Keropok Lekor Stalls" world record. 

Seven! Yes…at last count…there were not 1, not 2…but 7 stalls selling the same thing. Competition indeed! 

As a tribute to these people, I’ve decided to have a short writeup about PMs. Its called…

10 Things You’ll See At A Pasar Malam Near You!

#1: Malay Food Stalls
There seems to be some sort of criteria for Malay Food Stalls. If you can’t sell these things:
(a) Keropok Lekor
(b) Goreng Pisang
(c) Roti John
(d) Burger Ramly
(e) Hotdog (Cheese, Black Pepper, Plain)
(f) Cempedak Goreng
(g) Otak-Otak
(h) Ayam Panggang

Then don’t bother setting up a stall. Somehow or other…the stall owners seem to think that everybody in Singapore only looks for or eats these things when they go to a Malay Food stall. As a result of this…they don’t mind setting up as many stalls as they like in a PM. Seven ok…and two of the stalls actually are set up back-to-back!

And if you happen to buy food like the Ramly Burger or Roti John, be prepared to be flooded by a triple sauce combo of plum, chilli and mayonnaise. They pour it over your food like there’s no tomorrow. They’re so good at it that they make perfect curly-wurly swirls on your food, forming some sort of psychedelic colour scheme on your choice of food.

I think the people who produce these sauces are like billionaires by now…judging by the amount they could sell to these 7 stalls alone.

If you happen to not like sauces on your food…tell them beforehand. They normally assume that the whole world LURVES a plum, chilli and mayonnaise cocktail.  

#2: Chinese Food Stalls
You didn’t really see them that much a few years back. But, just like their Malay counterparts, they sell the same things too. They sell:
(a) Chicken nuggets
(b) Fishballs
(c) Chicken drumsticks (These are probably bigger than the ones in KFC)
(d) Water Chestnuts

I don’t really take a look that much at these stalls as I don’t eat Chinese food. But they all look like they sell the same things. How would someone choose one over the other like that?

#3: Customary Drinks Stall
These stalls probably make the most money. Since there’s so many food stalls around, the income received would be spread thin. However, this stall seems to be taking most of the moolah for drinks. After you walk around the PM…or after eating all the food…you’d need drinks. So you get to choose from these:
(a) Soft Drinks (cans): Put in a tank of ice so the soft drinks are always cold…until all the ice melts off. Then you’ll just get lukewarm Cokes, 7ups or Cherry Ades. Yucks!

(b) Soft Drinks (bottled): These are old-school bottled drinks. You have to use a bottle-cap opener to open up these bottles. I remembered that these were around when I was a kid. I don’t know whether they kept them THAT long or they imported it from some country that still uses this kind of packaging. Probably the latter. I hope…

(c) Sugar-Cane: They’d have these authentic sugar-cane drinks making machine. You put the sugar-cane at the top and squeeze out the juice which comes out at the bottom of the machine. I always wonder whether I could get these machines to torture people I don’t like. Just put their fingers through the machine. See whether got juice come out or not heheh…

(d) They’re young. They’re Thai. Your wife or girlfriend won’t scold you if you have them. You want many-many also your wife or gf won’t scold you. You can even pick and choose them…while your wife or gf looks at you approvingly. Sometimes you wife or gf may even want to join in on the action. After you lick the taste of the sweet liquid off your lips, you can even nibble on their white, soft and supple flesh.

Yes. I’m talking about young Thai coconuts. $1 each. So cheap some more….

#4: Cotton Candy Stalls
Cotton Candy used to be freaking wonderful. They’re huge. They’re bright. You could hide your face behind one. You could get your face, hands and sometimes hair all sticky after eating them. You can buy one humongous one and share it with your girlfriend. Can pull off one chunk and feed to one another. Then can accidentally kiss when got no more cotton candy (macam Lady and the Tramp).

But now cotton candies have been caged up in silly little plastic containers. So nice and orderly. They have been domesticated. So boring…and sometimes these stalls don’t even have the cotton candy making machine anymore. We used to be amazed at how the cotton candy materialised right before our very eyes as the Uncle made them. Now…we only see them in plastic containers. Bring back the machines! Bring back the machines!

Eh Government…you want Singapore to be more romen-tic right? Then force ALL cotton candy makers to get back to their roots and use the machines. Confirm we will end up with more babies.

#5: Mattresses and Pillows
I don’t remember seeing these at the PMs in the past. But somehow people think that there is a huge demand for pillows and mattresses at PMs. I think its a GREAT idea. Have you ever bought pillows and bolsters from some swanky shopping mall? Have you ever brought them home from these swanky shopping malls? They never have a plastic bag that’s designed for bolsters. The cashier will probably tie up your bolsters with raffia string so that there’s a handle for your bolsters. Then they plaster one big SOLD sticker there too. Imagine walking around with that. Imagine taking the MRT or bus with that.

So you see…its probably wiser to buy pillows and bolsters at your neighbourhood PM. (Profitable Plots song playing in the background) I did. (Kena nudged by wife) We did. (Kena stare by wife) Ok she did.

It’s the same quality (maybe even better) and you can haggle for a bargain some more.

#6: T-shirts, Baju Butterfly and Towels
Think pirated stuff.  Copyright infringements. A normal mortal’s paradise but Disney’s nightmare.

You can get T-shirt brands of all kinds here. Adidas. Nike. Fubu. No Fear (Is there even an authentic No Fear t-shirt?). Von Dutch. Von Dutch. And more Von Dutch. Quiksilver. Stussy. Last time when I was a teenager, we could only get Quiksilver and Stussy at Flash and Splash. Now at PM can get. Cheaper too.  

Then there’s the fake jerseys. Manchester United. Chelsea. Arsenal. Inter Milan. AC Milan. Bayern Munich. Real Madrid. Barcelona. You want it. They’ve got it. But I think that the quality is not so good. This one I have to admit…they look fake. I’ve never bought these at all. Don’t know whether they look authentic or not. Wait I buy….then if people spot…paisey!

Disney or Cartoon Characters: You can get T-shirts of every cartoon character imaginable. From Garfield to SpongeBob Squarepants. You want to make your wife or gf happy…buy her baju butterfly (the thingie they go to sleep in..eh not ALL women wear baju butterfly ok. Sorry huh ladies!) with their favourite cartoon characters. I got my wife a Strawberry Shortcake baju butterfly and that made her very happy.

And when she’s happy…I also later very happy. Romancing Singapore! Yeah!

#7: Odds and Ends Shops
This shops are like those 1.99 shops and DIY shops combined. They sell everything everything under the sun. If you need anything for your household. Come here. Screwdrivers? Have. Door stoppers? Have. Pins and needles? Check. Pot handles? Have. That metal thingie you can dig your ears with? Got. Cheap batteries? By the dozens. Toys for kids? Have…

So you see…the stall owner cover all bases. There’s something for the kids. Something for the parents too. Its a place for families…these shops. So if you’ve already run out of places to visit in Singapore (e.g. Go Zoo until Ah Meng can recognise you from afar already), then you come to these shops la…Fun for the whole family!

#8: Furniture Shops
This is another amazing thing. Whenever I think of going to the PM, my priorities would probably be (a) Food (b) Food (c) Food (d) T-shirts (e) Food. But furniture???

I’d probably go to places like Courts for that right? Or maybe even more established furniture shops. But PM? PM? Furniture? PM? Can you imagine this scenario…

House Guest: Wah your sofa very nice to sit on. So soft and comfy one! Where you buy huh? Courts huh? I heard their furniture all very stylo-mylo now!

Me: Erm…I bought it at Pasar Malam. 

House Guest: Huh? PM? How come you buy at PM sia?

Me: I dunnola…I was thinking of buying some Keropok Lekor…suddenly I come across this furniture stall in the PM. Then I like the couch. I buy la…

House Guest: Really? Then you pay by cash there and then huh? Or do they have NETS or credit card? Got installments like Courts or not?

 #9: CD Shops
Now these shops don’t only sell CDs. They sell VCDs, Karaoke CDs and DVDs too. The price is not bad. A lot cheaper than the mainstream video shops. You may even find some old favourites. Kids would love the VCDs they sell here.

#10: Shops Selling Handphone Casing
They have all types of casings for all types of handphones here. There’s the silicone (how come silicone can be that flat and thin huh? I thought they’re supposed to be round and…booby?) types and the crystal (crystal ok…don’t play play!) casings. The real handphone shops are lagging so far behind that they don’t even try. I’ve never seen silicone and crystal casings at real Nokia, Sony Ericcsson or Samsung shops. Only the boring old leather casings. Buy handphone so expensive….so stylo-mylo looking…then cover it up in a black casing? You from which year? 1994 is it?

And these shops sell the latest ok. Latest.
I happen to be using the W880i. That’s like a few months back…when the advertisement for it was still on TV. Got it. Not bought it ok. Free. And no contract one. No I didn’t steal it. Father-in-law gave it to me. He got a $500 handphone voucher. He’s got two of these actually. Cos he’s a businessman and he uses two $200 per month lines. At the end of every year he’ll get $500 vouchers for these two lines. He’ll use one for himself and he’ll give the other one to some other family member. It happened to be my turn that time. So he bought the W880i and gave it to me. Apa lagi? Ambik la…Rezeki jangan ditolak. Mahu jangan dicari.

So since its such a valuable item given to me by an important person, I decided to get a cover the moment I got it.  I went to my PM (they had it at another part of my estate that time) and just absent-mindedly looked around for a cover for my handphone. I never expected to see one for my handphone. It was really new back then. But I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that they ALREADY have covers for my handphone.

Crystal some more. But wait…I thought crystal’s supposed to be scratch-proof? Nevermindla…as long as my handphone is scratch-free can already…

THE END

So that’s it. My list of 10 Things You’ll See At A Pasar Malam Near You! So long sia the post. Never wrote anything this long before. See la…one week never blog. Lepaskan geram. Amik kau!  

The Bankrupt Mat

Biar Papa Asal Bergaya

Well…I’ve read them and this is what I think.

Its easy to fall into this consumerism trap. Its easy to get excited with all the hoo-ha of starting a new life. In this new digital age of ours…where everything is instant (from emails to iced tea), we want everything there and then. Instant gratification.

Everywhere you look nowadays, you see someone holding a brochure and inviting you to listen to them and sign up for the newest offer that credit card companies could come up with. I’m always amazed when I see people actually stopping to listen to them. Me? I just wave them off.

Been there. Done that. I put up my hand when they talk about people who are saddled in debts. Yeah…I’m one of them.

Renovation loan. Furnishing loan. Credit cards. Loans for this. Loans for that. You name it. I’ve got it and I’m owing money for it. The only thing I don’t have is a car loan. How come? Cos I really got no money for one.

Now…it really is easy to bring up this matter to the public. Its easy to come up with lists of examples of how the Malay community is ’showing off’ money thats not theirs. But not everyone is doing this to show off. Some of us just want to have the best for our new family. I don’t go around inviting people to my house to let them see my crib.

Instead of being blog critics…let’s all try to find solutions to these problems.

So how? 

Step #1: Stop!
First step is to tell yourself to stop it. No more loans. No more using of the credit cards. The moment you close the gaps in your expenses, you’re getting better already. Yes its not easy. You get bombarded with ads on TV asking you to buy, buy, buy! Newspaper ads from Courts, Dell, AudioHouse and every other company implore you to buy their newest thingamajig. And if you can’t afford to pay in cash, no problem! Courts offer you up to 60 months of repayment plans. That’s 60 months for them to get interest from you. Whoopee!

Ask yourself. Do you really need it? Or do you just want it? Most of the time its just lust. Yeah we all lust for other things besides humans, you know. Take your time. Never buy something impulsively. If a salesman tells you its the last day for the sale…tell him nevermind. He’s more interested in his commission than in you saving money during the sale. Go home…and be happy cos you didn’t waste money on something you don’t really need.

Step #2: Family Ties
If you happen to be deep in debt over your credit cards…this is the hardest one. The reason is they have the credit card companies have soooo many different ways to charge you. They have the yearly interest. Then they have the late payment penalty. If you take cash advances from your card…they’ll also charge you. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

So…if you don’t have credit cards, good for you! Avoid the credit card people like the plague. You don’t want to be in their trouble unless you are very, very sure that you can pay off all your credit card expenses within the same month. NEVER ROLL OVER YOUR CREDIT DEBTS.

If you already have them…and are drowning in rollover debts, here’s what you can do. Admit your silly mistake. Be humble. Go to your family and ask them for help. Of course…there’ll be some oohs and aahs and some scoldings to endure. But after all that…your parents would want to help. They still have a stake in your life. They want to see you have a happy family and they want to see their grandchildren live happy lives too. Being older and wiser…they’ll be able to help you find ways to solve your problems.

My parents and parents-in-law helped me here. They were disappointed in me. Sure. But they also wanted to help me solve my problems. They helped me close my credit cards. Now I’m paying them off. Instalment free. See? No need credit card also can get instalment free loans.  Thanks Mum, Dad, Bapak and Mak. You helped me retain my sanity.

However…what if your parents can’t get you out of the quagmire you’re in?

If your parents or your other family members can’t help you…then go to a loanshark.

Just kidding

Step #3: Get A Personal Loan
This is the exception to Step #1. If you tried step #2 and you are unsuccessful, try to get the next best thing. A loan like that of James or EzyCash. Although they still have interest, its less than the 24% that credit card companies charge. There are no hidden charges. And the amount you owe the banks will start going down steadily and surely. Use the money from the loan to pay off the credit cards. Kill off the credit cards first, then tackle the others. However DO NOT use this money to buy other things ok! Its strictly for paying off the credit card loans. Nothing else.

Step #4: Get A Repayment Plan
Once you are behind in your payments, the banks will call you everyday until you make payment. They don’t care if you’re working, or if you are busy. They just want to know when you are going to pay them. When this happens, its easy to get overwhelmed. You just want to switch off the phone. But do not ignore them. Tell them the truth. If you can pay them, tell them when. If you can’t tell them that you would like to pay them back but you are not able to do so. Ask them if its possible to have a repayment plan. In this way, you’ll pay a specific amount until you have finished paying for the card and then close it. There will be an interest but usually they will lower it from the 24% per annum. In this way…the debt amount will surely and steadily decrease. As long as you make the payments, they won’t bother you anymore.

Step #5: Counselling
If steps #1 - 4 does not work for you, consider getting counselling. Go to the Credit Card Counselling website to find out more. They have regular talks which brief you on the actions you can take to solve your debt problems…even bankruptcy. I went to one of the briefings and I got the idea for Step #2 from them.

And that’s it! Its not easy at first ok. Its not easy to tell your parents. Its not easy to admit that you have problems. But the problems have to be solved somehow. Swallow your pride. Admit your mistakes and learn from them.

If you are able to somehow avoid in borrowing…then good for you. Just don’t tut-tut other people. Don’t have to predict doom and gloom for the others. Let me know how you buy your HDB flat huh? I’ll be interested to know how you manage to avoid paying interest for that. Oh and banks pay YOU interest for saving money with them. Is that ok too?

Its no good telling people what’s Haram and what’s not. We all will answer to God one day.

If only Vesak Day happened to fall on Friday. Then we’ll all have long holidays. Some people decide to take leave or fall sick on this day. I have no choice but to come to work. Its because my school is having enrichment IT lessons today. I don’t want to leave my kids stranded if I don’t turn up so here I am. Since the kids have finished their lessons early, I let them indulge in a little Web Surfing while I do some blogging.

The truth is…my mind is not really on the enrichment classes today. My PC is being delivered to my home in the evening. I can’t wait to get my hands on it! Gone are the days when I would trawl down to Sim Lim Square and pick up different computer parts to fix. I don’t have the time now. So…I decided to just plonk on a ready made PC. Easy Peasy…

My old PC has been really acting up. It would crawl excruciatingly and when it can’t take anymore processing, it would scream out in endless beeps. Drives me crazy!!! So I’ve decided to retire that damn thing for good.

Oh 5 o’clock…hurry up please come!

I haven’t been blogging recently cos I’ve been sooo busy with work lately. But I don’t mind…its positive work. I know I’ll be appreciated and I enjoy it so much!

In the first two weeks of the holidays, I’d be teaching different children IT courses. Since its a break from their normal classroom routines, the kids are always delighted to attend. I can’t help but smile when I tell them I’m teaching them something fun or interesting and their eyes just light up with excitement. I could never do that with mainstream teaching. I just can’t. I’d have too many other things on my mind to worry about what to teach the kids. That’s why I salute those teachers who could do a damn good job, on top of all the other shit that they have to do. You’ll always hear me criticizing the teaching profession, but you’ll never see me criticize the teachers.

On another note…I never watched Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest till yesterday! When the third movie came out…I wasn’t really interested. However, after watching the ending of Part 2, I just can’t wait to watch the third one. We were planning to watch it today, but we decided to chill out at home instead. Maybe some other time.

Enjoy what’s left of the holidays everyone!  

I read with trepidation last Friday in the Today Paper that they were going to pilot some scheme where cyclists and pedestrians will be ’sharing’ the walkways.

Sharing? That’s not a word that cyclists actually know, you know. 

I’ve talked about it before. I had to put up with cyclists who do not give way. Who expect the right of way at all times on the walkway. They even expect my wife, my baby (in a pram) and I to move aside (even if there’s really no more space left on the walkway). They really expect us to move onto the grassy areas while they whizz past.

Sharing space sounds like a wonderful idea. Except for one slight problem. The walkways are usually very narrow. There’s usually enough space for two people to walk side by side. So usually, there is space for one pedestrian to go from A - B and another pedestrian to go from B - A. Now this is already a perfect unspoken rule for us pedestrians. However, some people choose to break this rule. Someone who is walking from B - A would purposely walk in A - B’s path. The reason being that there is a metal grating on B - A’s path. These people truly believe that the metal gratings would give way under them if they were to step onto them. So nevermind…as long as we’re ok…other people die…nevermind.

So…in view of that already present problem of space…I don’t really know how we’d have to give way to cyclists too.

Now…there’s some areas that actually create special paths for cyclists. These paths are separate from the pedestrian walkways. The ones at East Coast Park, Pasir Ris beach and Bukit Batok areas come to mind. Why can’t they just implement this system islandwide?

They say that they’d have cycling wardens for the pilot in Tampines. How that would actually change things….I have absolutely no idea. There is no space. No space! Having wardens would actually crowd the area at the walkways even further. 

I know Tampines. I studied there for 13 years. I know how crowded Tampines can be. The people who come up with these ideas obviously have their heads in the clouds. They do not live there. They hear a problem and just come up with the solution. But they are not the ones who have to implement the solutions. They are not the ones who have to experience the solutions at first hand on a day to day basis. 

The divide is becoming greater. The rich people are becoming more and more disengaged from the masses.

Just the other day…Suzanne Jung was telling us on National TV that she just learnt something new. She proudly chirped that She just realised that the last three numbers in the postal code actually identified the block number of HDB blocks! Now that’s something you won’t learn everyday. You’ve got to be in a competition (like her) to learn that fact. You definitely won’t be learning THAT if you happen to be working in Singapore for the past few years.

Thinking about the fact that Singapore is entirely enveloped with HDB flats, I am surprised that she doesn’t know that fact. You mean…all this while she only walk around District 10 and 11 huh?

I’m just saying this as another example of the rich influencing the whole of Singapore. They do not know the masses. How are they supposed to come up with the solutions when they can’t identify with the masses? 

Its going to be a case of "Let them eat cake" here one day…

The last few days of school are really hectic for me. Teachers, HODs and even the VP is piling up work for me. Somehow or other, all the meetings and competitions happen to fall at the end of this very week! So I have to help polish their presentations and competition materials.

So far…I’ve completed 2 big projects. I’m doing another 2 at this moment. Then there’s another 2 to be completed by tomorrow! Yikes!

The nice thing is that…they’re singing praises for my work. One of the HODs just now came up to me and told me that the P has been saying that she really appreciates the work that I’ve been doing so far. Its been adding value to the school. I was feeling a little down in the morning…thinking about the amount of work that needs to be done. But I felt energised the moment I heard that.

After I finished the work done for my VP, he praised me too. Then the Maths HOD praised me as well after I showed her the work I did for her.

Wah…kena ‘angkat’ so high man hahaha!

I truly enjoy my job. Its what I’m good at and I’m glad I can do what I love doing

Oh wow! They now have classrooms of the future! The Today paper has the headline "Chuck the Chalkboard". I was thinking that’s kind of funny cos we already chucked the chalkboards a long time ago. In fact, by the time I did my contract teaching (way back in 2001), schools were already using the whiteboard and markers.

I guess the newswriters must have really haggled for a long time to come up with a suitable headline to ‘throw out the whiteboard’. Maybe "Whack the whiteboard", "Wah liao no more Whiteboard" or "Wipeout the Whiteboards" may work.

Chalkboards are so passe hahaha!

Anyway, good luck to the teachers. I pity the stubborn old dinosaurs who already have a hard time just logging in to a PC. I wonder how they’d react to having to prepare lessons with podcasts.

Maybe Mr Brown can become a training consultant and train teachers on how to podcast

I almost didn’t get it…

While waiting for a lesson, I happened to look at my hp and I realised that I had a missed call. I recognised the number and called it back immediately. It was one of those office lines that had extensions, so I knew I wouldn’t get the person who called me. It was a tuition centre. I had done some relief tuition there a few times, so I expected them to call me with yet another gig. I was wrong…

It turned out that the tuition centre wanted me on a permanent basis. I was so happy to hear that. I got to teach once again! As I said before, I love teaching, but I hate being a teacher. So I accepted it without hesitation.

I’m grateful that I’m given this opportunity. The added income would be very helpful. Hopefully, more good things will come in the future, God willing.  

I finally went to my best friend’s house yesterday. The last time I met him was when he got married. That was waaay back in 2005. Its been 2 years now. While I’ve thrown in the towel with MOE, he has blossomed into one hell of a teacher. I’m amazed by his achievements. He’s presented in front of teachers all over Singapore. He’s also featured in MOE’s magazine. He’s got it all.

But he’s balding and he has muscle spasms now. 

Apart from that, I’m happy that we met during reservist. I told him everything that’s happened in my life and we talked about the crazy fun that we had in our NS and NIE days. He told me to stay positive and that’s the only way we should live our lives. Its amazing how we lead parallel lives.

We both lived in the Eastern part of Singapore. We both got married to someone from the Internet. We both started watching Hindi (yes, Hindi) movies at the same time. We both support the same football team. We both started blogging at about the same time. Well…he started when I restarted actually. But it doesn’t matter cos he makes me laugh everytime. Even in his blog. Thanks for those entries. You touched me even when you were so far away. Such a wonderful, wonderful  person

Anyway…I’m back at work. Some people thought that I’ve resigned from my job. Some people thought that I took leave. And some people thought that I was very, very sick hahaha…

Nothing much is happening in school right now. Everybody’s winding down as exams are over. I’m supposed to conduct IT lessons today but they’re having an emergency exercise and coincidentally they decided to ‘burn’ down the computer lab that I’m teaching in. How convenient. So all I’ll be doing today is to surf the net and experiment with creating websites. Haven’t done that in a long time!

I watched "Just Follow Law" recently. Bought the VCD as I caught a glimpse of it at a VCD shop. I couldn’t help but laugh at how Jack Neo managed to compile all the stereotypes (or is it realities?) of the civil service in this movie. I usually can’t be bothered about local movies, but this one is SUPERB. If you happen to be in, or you are planning to be in or if you are no longer in the civil service, go watch it. You’ll laugh at how accurately it is portrayed. 

And watching Fann Wong acting like an Ah Beng is added bonus too

Am I a bitter person?

Well…I used to be. I hated the people around me. I hated having to live with, work with and interact with people. I hated the fact that I had to put up with people.

The problem is that people are everywhere. Short…tall…thin…fat…beautiful…ugly…both in looks and attitude. You can’t avoid them. So how? Just be happy la…

I guess my few days in reservist, brought back memories of happier times. I worked with wonderful people who made me happy. People who made me feel that I provide value in their lives. People who appreciated me. Going back to my old workplace woke me up from this nightmare that I lived in.

I’m glad that I’m no longer a teacher in the MOE. It made me a bitter person. I had the courage to get out of it. My sanity…my life was at stake. When I left and started working somewhere else, I still felt some bitterness. But going back to happier times removed the bitterness that remained. Thanks to the past, my future is more serene.

I’ve learnt to let go.

There will be time when people or things seem to conspire to make me angry. I will not let these things get to me anymore. I will learn to find solutions to problems. I will do all I can to remain calm and happy.

There’s alot of happiness in  my National Service days. My life in the MOE was full of anger and frustration. I tried to find light in the darkness from back then, and I can only see one. You are that light. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

Yes…its true that there’s too much hate and anger in blogs. I shall try to be the light in all the darkness…just like you.  

I haven’t been blogging for quite awhile cos I’ve been doing my reservist. I could have blogged at home, but if you realised, I don’t do that. Home Time = Family Time. I’d rather do my blogging during free time at work.

I had to go for a 4 day course during this reservist stint. Unlike my other previous stints, this one is at my new old workplace. It was wonderful. I got to meet old colleagues. I got to recall the best times of my life. My life would be perfect if I’m allowed to work there. But I’m not. So I’ve only got memories to play with now…

Anyway, as a fellow trainer myself, I was given a lesson in "Teaching Adults 101".  One of the trainers there was obviously in his element. It was as if he was BORN into this job. He knew his teaching content well. He had great rapport with us, his trainees. He knew what to say and when to say it. To me…he embodies the ideal perception of a trainer. I hope that one day I’d be as good as him…

And so it ends now. Back to reality. Back to my job. Unlike the past, I’m actually looking forward to my job after my reservist stint. I used to hate having to go back to teaching after my reservist. I’d have lost my teaching momentum. Most of the time the relief teacher would have done a lousy job. They’re retired teachers or people who never had a chance to teach. So most of the times, they’d cock up at the job.

Basically, when I come back, I’d have to clean up the shit that has hit the fan.  Fortunately, I’m no longer a teacher. I can just come back in and things would be just like it was before I left for reservist. Typing this down is actually putting a smile on my face right now heheh…

So here’s to more blogging entries in the future (barring any more reservist stints).

I saw a letter in the Today paper last Friday that mentioned bullying in school. Then another one in today’s New Paper too.

Both of these letters seem to suggest that teachers don’t seem to know or don’t seem to care that bullying is happening in their classrooms.

I guess its easy for the letter writers to say that teachers are not putting any effort into ending bullying cases. Yeah easy peasy. Tell you what…instead of writing letters to Today paper or whatever papers out there, why don’t you DO it instead?

Come and join the teaching profession. They’re showing the “floating pencils” and “dinosaur stomping” ads on TV again. It means that the Ministry of Education is recruiting! So if you feel so bloody strongly about bullying, come and join the teachers. Show all these bochap teachers how to do the job properly. Don’t just sit around on your asses and typing out letters and hoping that your letter can change the world.

Read this blog and see how “free and easy” teaching life is. In fact, I think the MOE should advertise this blog for their recruitment drive instead of showing us pencils that float in the air.

Something happened yesterday that put a smile to my face…

I was in a hurry to get a cab as I had rushed back home to take something for work. As I went to the taxi stand at Yishun MRT, I saw this Malay guy who was waiting in line. There was no one else around so I just stood behind him. Within seconds, a taxi appeared. As the guy was walking towards the taxi, some guy just practically DASHED IN to take the taxi!

The Malay guy was incensed. He shouted at the guy "Eh you know what’s the meaning of queueing up or not?!". And he added on a stare so menacing I think the other guy peed in his pants. He really kind of became smaller and whimpered away with a stupid doofus sounding "Ohhh…". All of a sudden he noticed there was a queue! He dutifully stood in line behind me.

Once in a while these fugly singaporeans get their comeuppance. It feels good too see it happen .

As I read this article: No Go For CPF Reversal Bid, I couldn’t help but remember what my ex-colleague said to me once.

"I’m the last batch of teachers from the pension scheme. After me, all the other teachers have CPF"

I’m not sure if she was from this same batch of people who want to revert back to the pension scheme. Long ago…back in 1973, civil servants were given the option to convert from the pension scheme to the CPF scheme. The GOOD thing about the CPF scheme was that you can actually use your CPF to pay for your housing! WOW!!!

So these people, thinking that the CPF is better than the pension scheme signed up for it. Now…they want to revert back to the pension scheme. Why huh?

Is it because with the pension scheme, they will get a monthly sum and lifelong free medical charges? That sounds a lot better when than the ability to pay for your housing loans.

Now I wonder…if these people are so desperately trying to revert to the old pension scheme, what about people like me who have no choice in the first place? 

Does this mean that the CPF is not as good as the pension scheme? Then how come we are using CPF now? So that I can pay for my house? You mean without CPF cannot pay for my house? Then what is it about the CPF which makes it better than the pension scheme huh? Its got to be better right? Since we’ve dispensed with the pension scheme and we’re all now using the CPF? Right?

*Blink Blink*

But how come those old people want to revert back to pension huh? And how come my ex-colleague is proud of the fact that she’s on the pension scheme instead of the CPF?

My wife’s been very reflective lately, thinking about life…and the afterlife. I don’t know why she’s feeling this way, but she’s getting me hooked to it too.

We never know when its time for us to go. And when the time comes, are we prepared to face it? What will happen to our loved ones? Our families and friends? I think about all this and I wonder…are there any friends of mine who have gone without me knowing? A nasty accident? A fatal illness? Suicide?

When I think of these questions, this Beatles song comes to my mind…

In My Life - The Beatles
There are places i’ll remember
All my life though some have changed
Some forever not for better
Some have gone and some remain
All these places have their moments
With lovers and friends i still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life i’ve loved them all

Though i know i’ll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know i’ll often stop and think about them
In my life i love you more
In my life i love you more

Some things may seem to be gone…but they still stay the same.
..Remember.Smile.Laugh..

New guidelines on Fair Employment
I was reading this article by mrbrown regarding employers treating employees unfairly and the article above and here are my thoughts.

I simply don’t understand why they are trumpeting the fact that employers are no longer allowed to ask whether you’re married or not, whether you can speak Mandarin, whether you’re male or female etc. etc.

Oh so we can hide all that information from the employers FOR NOW, but can we hide them forever? Will it change the mindsets of the employers? So they’ll invite you to go for the interviews. Once they see that you’re a woman or gay or lesbian or cannot speak Mandarin or are pregnant, they’ll just go through the motion of interviewing you. And then they won’t select you. Its as simple as that. They don’t have to divulge why you’re not suitable.

In the old way, at least they slam the door shut BEFORE you go for the interview. Now…unemployed people can waste their money needlessly on transportation to the interviews and then get rejected.

The problem is not the hard copy of the questionnaires. Its the soft tissue in the area inside their skull. I don’t see this as a solution to the problem at all.

Its like this: After all the effort put in. Photocopy educational certs, testimonials, wedding certificate, birth certificate, paste passport photo onto application form (sometimes two!), write cover letter, produce CV, buy HUGE envelope to put everything in, buy lots of stamps to ensure that the envelope won’t disappear in the mail room. Then you wait and wait and wait for them to reply. Then you go for the interview. And you get rejected.  

I think employers HAVE to tell people why they are not accepted for the positions. Heck, some companies don’t even bother to inform the people that they are not accepted.

So what happens to the two photos I sent? Why don’t you return it now that you don’t want me to work for you? You keep for what? Put in your wallet is it? I could use it for my other applications. I don’t have to spend more money (since I’m unemployed) to take more passport photos. And return all my photocopies as well. That’s money too, you know. Or is it because you have to pay for the bloody stamps?

I’m not saying this because I’m unemployed. I’m saying this because I was there once. I spent many months looking for a job, going for interviews and getting nothing in return. Its very, very frustrating. There’s so many issues to deal with but nothing is being done about it.

And here they are…being proud of the fact that they’ve managed to get companies to delete the unacceptable questions from their application forms. Whoopeedoo! I did something good today!

Teachers being filmed. Happy slapping incidents. Phew! I’m glad I’m no longer a full-time teacher!

I wouldn’t want to deal with having my teaching methods scrutinised by millions of viewers all over the world. I wouldn’t want to deal with having to discipline pupils who beat up one another for fun. I’m just glad I no longer have to do these things anymore. I just teach kids how to use the PC and if they misbehave, I just threaten to stop them from using their PCs. This would generally shut them the hell up heheh…

Personally I feel that handphones HAVE to be banned in schools. There is absolutely no bloody need to have kids who hardly know how to cross the road properly to be lugging around handphones. Parents would argue that it would allow them to contact their kids during emergencies. Its funny how these very same parents forgot that when they were in school…their parents would call the office if there was an emergency. The school clerk would then notify the form teacher who would then bring the pupil to the office to call their parents back. No big deal. I don’t see why the kids of today can’t do the same. School offices still have telephones ok.  

There is simply no need for handphones in school. Here are the reasons why:

1. Kids do not know how to take care of their things. Pencils, erasers, wallets, water bottles go missing on a daily basis. So what would stop kids from losing their handphones too?
2. Teachers would have a headache trying to figure out who had ‘accidentally’ taken the handphones or find out where the handphones have been misplaced. And they have to do that while trying to coax the kid who’s terrified that he or she had lost their handphones.
   Kid: Mummy’s going to be angry with me. HOW?!
   Teacher (to himself/herself): Your pasal ah!
3. Kids would end up using their handphones for every other reason other than to call their parents, such as:
   - Taking photos of their friends who HAVE to show the PEACE sign and frame up their faces with their fingers.
   - Take photos of their friends in the toilet (this really happened ok!)
   - SMS one another. They’d cover their handphones with their bags under the table. They don’t realise that its obvious what they’re doing.
   - Video their teachers.
   - Video happy slapping incidents.

As such, I think that parents should forego this luxury item for their kids. It does more harm than good. If you really feel the need to buy handphones and give them to someone, pass them to me. Then I can open a handphone shop.

I was reading suganova’s blog about Public Apathy and remembered that I have more personal experience stories to tell of how ugly Singaporeans can be. So here goes:

Ugly Singaporeans Case #2:
Its got something to do with me and my wife. We were at Causeway Point to have dinner and go shopping one day. After dinner and shopping, we decided to get some McDonald’s Milkshakes. We got a seat near the fountain at the basement at Causeway Point and I went to buy the milkshakes while my wife took care of our baby.

By the time I returned, I saw our pram sprawled backwards on the floor while my wife is comforting our baby. I was shocked and asked her what happened. See…there’s two hooks at the back of our pram. We usually put our shopping bags here. Our baby would usually act as the counterweight to the weight of the bags so the pram won’t topple over.

However, whenever we picked up our baby, the pram would lose its balance and topple backwards, due to the weight of the bags. And that was what exactly happened. Apparently, while I was buying the milkshakes, my baby had started crying. So my wife had no choice but to pick her up and comfort her. Since I’m not around to hold on to the pram, it just fell backwards.

In front of passerbys.

In front of the people who were sitting beside her. In front of the two men who were sitting beside her. One man, in his thirties on her left. Another one, a teenager on her right.

Both looked up when my baby started crying. Both saw the pram as it toppled over the moment my wife picked up our baby. Both just looked on as my wife tried to stop our baby from crying while the BRIGHT RED PRAM LAY ON ITS BACK WITH THE SHOPPING BAGS ON THE FLOOR.

I purposely asked my wife what happened and loudly asked how come no one bothered to help.

As expected, these two able-bodied gentlebastardmen pretended not to hear me. Suddenly both lost interest in the pram and started to look everywhere else except the pram.

Amazing. Truly amazing.

I’m sorry to say this, but there’s nothing about our country to be proud of if people can’t even help each other. You can be the hub of this and the hub of that. You can be the star of all hubs, but it means nothing if we have no heart. NOTHING.

As of this moment, I don’t really have much to say. I used to blog daily. What the hell did I blog about? I don’t think my life is sooo eventful that something exciting happens everyday. So…I’ll talk about something that bugs me like hell.

The Ugly Singaporean. Yes. You’ve all seen him or her or them. Usually we just tut-tut to ourselves and that’s it. However, now that I’m a parent, I can’t help but be peeved by how inconsiderate Singaporeans can be. I’ve come across some Ugly Singaporeans. Here is one of them…

Case #1:
My wife and I were on our way to sending our baby to my mum-in-law’s place. We’d push my baby in a pram and walk there. We’d have to share the walkway with people who are on their way to the MRT. That’s perfectly fine with us. But then…there’s the cyclists. Yes. The "I-will-ring-my-bell-till-you-get-the-hell-out-of-my-way" cyclists.

They think that they have the divine right to the WALKway. Hello…its for people to WALK on, not CYCLE on. I don’t understand why pedestrians have to give way to these bastards. Its even worse that they expect me and my pram pushing wife to give way to them too. There’s already hardly enough space on the walkway as the right side is for people who are walking away from the MRT and the left side that we’re on is for people who are walking towards the MRT. So because of this trigger happy idiot, every single one of us pedestrians have to stop what we’re doing and give way to him or her.

It doesn’t matter that they are actually a hazard to us. They weave their way around us in full speed. If anyone just makes a sudden turn, he or she will get hit by these crazy cyclists. And as I said before, if we don’t give way to them, they’d ring us to death.

This is what they expect us to do. We…the pedestrians and pram pushers, should actually give way to their superior race of cyclists. All of us, including my pram pushing wife should actually move onto the grassy areas and make way for them.

I actually told off one of them one day. It went something like this:
Me: Eh get off the walkway la! Cannot see people got pram issit?!

Bell-ringing-biatch: Go where? Where am I supposed to go?!

Me: Go on the roadla! This is for people, not cyclists ok!

She then whizzes off on the pavement at full-speed, flailing her arms at me once she realises that I’m too far away.

See? They will always think that they have the divine right to cycle on pedestrian walkways. Arrggh!

Sometimes I wish that I could just kick their stupid bicycle wheels when they’re in full flight. I wonder how that’d look like. I have this delusion that if I were to do that, all the pedestrians around me would cheer and clap their hands in delight. They’d even carry me on their shoulders all the way to the MRT station…just as if I’d scored the winning goal in the World Cup.

I’d appear in the newspapers and be labelled a hero. But then, I’d be sentenced and jailed. As I walk into the prison gates, the warden will secretly smile at me and mouth out the words "You’re my hero" silently. I’d get the best treatment in there cos the prisoners would have heard of my exploits.

And when I break out of prison, the guards would look the other way. No need to tatoo escape map on my back, like in Prison Break. Just walk out only.