Funny Spoof Ad on Ra-fa

I will like to share this video about a funny spoof ad on the pronunciation of Rafa Nadal.

I can't post it here, but here's the link however
http://sports.espn.go.com/broadband/video/video?id=3695015

Enjoy!

Trying too hard is sometimes a turn off

Things are nice and good when they are sufficient and in the right amount. However if you over-supply a certain quantity of something, it starts to get annoying and a rather turn off. I'm referring to Singapore.

First, we look at the country down under with their landmark icon - The Sydney Opera House, and decide that Singapore has to have a landmark building. The Esplanade was built, a building also known as the Durians.

Then Singapore looks at their ex-colonial masters and saw a beautiful thing known as The Eye - a gigantic ferris-wheel. So we built one far larger and call it The Flyer. Now we've outdone them!

Then we look over the causeway at our neighbour who sells us our water and notice that they are doing well with their one casino - Genting Resorts. We shall have TWO! That's when the Marina Bay and the Sentosa Integrated Resorts begin their construction. Yes, we win the battle of the Casino.

Oh wait a minute, they have a Sepang circuit for the F1 Grand Prix! That is way too hot in the heat of the day. Let's have a night circuit in Singapore. Oh space constraint. Let's make it a street circuit and put it in the city. That will definitely attract the crowd! And we can cordon off all the streets and make it difficult for Singaporeans to travel into this area. If all else fails, there is the ERP. Beep! That will be $2 deducted from the cashcard in Hamilton's car. Yes that was an international success.

The F1 did well, now let's get the MotoGP into Singapore as well. That will certainly put us head and shoulders above our neighbours!

Wait a minute, F1 and MotoGP is not enough, how about introducing the World Rally Championship here as well. Now the fans can't complain we are not "Fun" enough.

For goodness sake....sometimes, more is less. Please do not try so hard.

My Christmas Wishlist

It's already the 7th of November, and Christmas is just around the corner! Well a couple of corners actually, but we'll get there, soon.

I present to you here my Top 5 Wishes for Christmas for the year 2008:

5. Barack Obama as President of the United States of America! (Oops, just realised it has already been realised.)

Okay a new no. 5.

5. A new high-paying high-flying job

4. An Ipod touch


3. The global economic recession comes to an end

2. Winner of $500k in the gameshow "Don't Forget The Lyrics"


And...............*drumrolls*

Numero Uno.....

1. A new right leg

Super Bo Liao Stuff

When you are bored and looking for a laugh, one of the best sites around is stomp.com.sg
And I can tell you why. Because most of the contents that people post up on it are so bo liao (boring, rubbishy, nonsensical) that you feel like laughing through your gritted teeth. Well there is a small fraction of the stuff on it which are really funny though.

First I come across this really popular post about some guy who refuses to give up his seat for a pregnant lady on board the train. http://singaporeseen.stomp.com.sg/singaporeseen/viewContent.jsp?id=41059
Is it necessary to take a photo of him and post it online?

And then there was this other one about the neon lights blowing off, leaving the original words "Hougang Plaza" becoming "Gang Plaza". http://singaporeseen.stomp.com.sg/singaporeseen/viewContent.jsp?id=41175
Come on, this is So Super Duper Bo Liao...

Tons of other bo liao stuff in there, ONLY check out when you have nothing better to do. I just happened to pass by, I have tons of better stuff to do. lol.

Sports around the world

Have been catching up a lot on sports recently since I started having the Sports Channel as an addition to my cable tv channels. It's expensive to subscribe to the Sports Channel, but given a big sports fan like me, it's definitely worth it (except for the Golf Channel)!


First, on motor racing. In the F1 motor championship, Lewis Hamilton has become the youngest champion in history, albeit barely. He cruised home in 5th position in the Brazilian GP at Interlagos, just what he need to beat closest rival, Brazilian Felipe Massa, by a single point. Hamilton became the first Briton to win the title since Damon Hill in 1996.
Ferrari won their 8th constructor's championship in 10 years, garnering 172 points, ahead of their rivals McLaren which managed 151.


In tennis, Jo-Wilfred Tsonga claimed his 1st masters series title at the BNP Paribas Paris Masters with a 6-3 4-6 6-4 victory over David Nalbandian. Buoyed by the 15000 home crowd, he played a tight game against the Argentine, who is the defending champion for the title when he beat Rafael Nadal last year at the final. The win gave JW Tsonga a place at the prestigious Masters Cup Final at Shanghai.


In the Rugby League World Cup, a faceoff between Australia and England turned into a pummeling for the English as the Kangaroos thumped them 54-4. It was an awe-inspiring display by the Roos, with Greg Inglis and man-of-the-match, Billy Slater, claiming 3 tries each. It is a really embarassing result for England. Australia is hot favourite for the title after the win, following their 30-6 win over neighbours New Zealand in the previous match.

In football, there were numerous shocking upsets by the small clubs over the big boys in the English Premier League over the weekend. We saw the bottom club, Tottenham overcome the top team, Liverpool 2-1. It was the first loss in the league for Liverpool this season, and only the second win for Tottenham. Credit to Harry Redknapp for the miraculous turnaround.
Then Stoke beat Arsenal 2-1 to set alight "crisis talks" at Arsenal, following their 4-4 draw to Tottenham previously.
Hull City fought bravely but still succumbed to Manchester United 4-3.
At Bolton lifted themselves off the bottom of the table as they defeated the latest nouveau riche club, Manchester City 2-0.

These are the latest sports which I've been catching up on, and although I did catch parts of the Iskandar Open (golf) which took place over the weekend in Johor which was won by Retief Goosen, I am not so passionate about the game.

Signing off, from Doni Sports Centre.

Still stuck on crutches

Yeah still stuck on crutches despite almost going on to a month now. About slightly more than 3 weeks actually. Went to see the doc today and he said I damaged my anterior cruciate ligament as well as tore my right meniscus. Well now I have something similar to Roy Keane. He damaged his anterior cruciate ligament before. Take that Alf Inge Haaland!

Well the doc says that I have to go for Physio treatment to get my leg straightened and fully mobile before he can fix my ligament. So that's another 3 weeks before I see him again, and he has given me a 21days MC. Well I'm not sure whether that is good news or bad news, but it seems pretty bad. And I'm not sure what my boss and colleagues might think, especially now is busy season.
Guess I will be stuck at home for the next 20days, or maybe more.

On another note, I am totally engrossed in the Discovery Channel series: Man vs Wild, and Bear Grylls is absolutely awesome, gross and mad. Check the series out if you haven't, cos I think it's a series that every REAL MAN should watch. It teaches you survival techniques when you're lost somewhere, and these tricks can come in VERY handy when you are in the same environment. So far, the environments that I have seen him in are the Sahara desert, the snow covered lands of Siberia, the forests of Zambia, and many others. How do you survive in all these harsh conditions without the right knowledge and techniques? Boy this guy is reallllllll good.

However, the kind of stuff that he puts into his mouth, well almost 99% will think that it's real wild, mad and disgusting, but maybe put in the same situation, you will go for it anyway. Well this guy eats larvaes, scorpions, salamanders, yaks, yak's liver, yak's eyeballs, and tons of other stuff.....RAW! He even rips the meat from a dead gazelle a la leopard style! Just imagine.

Well I will recommend it to everyone to watch this show if you haven't already. It's Awesome!

Fan Chan

Watched a real wonderful movie on tv yesterday night, screening on filmart on Central. The title's Fan Chan (My Girl). It's a 2003 Thai movie about the life of a young boy.

This boy, Jeab, lives on the other side of the street, away from where the other boys live, and hence they wouldn't allow him to play with them. He then hangs out with the girls and becomes best mate with Noi Nah, this young girl who is his neighbour. The actor and actress for this 2 characters are real cute and good looking!

Yeah so this story goes on about the kind of games they play, and the growing up life of these children. It is a real heartwarming and feel-good movie complete with some humour as well as tear-jerking scenes. Hate to admit it, but I was moved to tears. And to top it off, the theme songs were real catchy and nice as well, with lyrics which were quite relevant to the movie. Ahhh....it really brings you back to those days when you were young and innocent, and you really wished you can travel back in time to relive those wonderful days.

Look for it if you can find the movie (with subtitles) and hope you enjoy it.
Ah, gotta get Prasart to find that dvd for me!

Breathe - Telepopmusik

On a weekday morning...

Oh how nice... it's raining cats and dogs (and cows with melamine milk too) on a tuesday morning right now, and here I am sitting, not at the office, but at home!
Yeah how great it will be when you can take a day off some time during the weekdays, laze around at home, and just enjoying the peace and tranquility...Ahhh.....
Now for that specialist appointment I have at the hospital this arvo....

Crutch

Was having a game of tennis with Niankai as usual on a fine Saturday when I do not know how exactly but I injured my right knee. So with his help and an ambulance, I was sent to Changi General Hospital, which is about 3 min from my house. That's near....
After having an X-ray, the doc said that he is unable to tell the problem, and I have to return to see the orthopaedic on Tuesday. Meanwhile I just have to hobble around with a pair of crutches.

Now with the pair of crutches, it is possible to see kind/helpful people as well as other not so nice people around.
Nice people are like my colleagues who offer to help me buy lunch, offer to carry my bag, or some strangers who offer me seats while I'm waiting for a cab. Wow, I get special privileges!
Not so nice people are like those who quickly rush to enter the elevator and press the door-close button when I hobble up to the elevator, to have the door close right before me. Great people aren't they!

Revisiting "Noble Palace"

Tonight my family had dinner at this small cantonese restaurant at Eastpoint shopping centre, which was near my house, and I was swept by a feeling of nostalgia, a "Noble" nostalgia if you know what I mean. Haha.

It was a small to medium size restaurant serving cantonese food. Getting in was not so much of a problem even though it was crowded. We ordered a few dishes and waited.

Well the first problem appeared. We had this pot of chinese tea, and after it emptied, what you usually do is tilt the lid of the teapot so as to inform the waitress to refill it with hot water. One waitress came over and brought the teapot away to be refilled, but it didn't come back. Instead it ended up on the next table. So my father had to inform them about this, and the waitress was still laughing heartily about how she had fumbled up this easy task.

Then my father was quite irritated that the food was served quite slowly, and the portions were quite small. There was no option for large/medium/small, all the dish portions were a standard, small.

And then as encountered before in a far far away place called Noble Palace, the dish which I ordered did not arrive! We were almost done with dinner but there was no sign of the dish. And the thing was, the waitress cancelled out the dish on the receipt to symbolise that the dish had arrive, even though it did not. Anyway, my father indicated to the waiter/waitress 2 times about this but still it drew a blank.

I was smiling to myself as I recalled this incident some time last year which ended in some drama. Hence I was keeping my cool while watching my father sweat over this. I wanted to tell him to take it easy but I thought that maybe it was better to just keep quiet, lest the tea ended somewhere else.

So he stood up and went to the cashier to foot the bill before the dish arrive, with a great feeling of displeasure (this is an understatement). Anyway, I was at least glad there were no big dramas. Haha, what a "Noble" feeling!

the dark knight

Finally had a chance to catch the Dark Knight on the big screen yesterday before it ran out. Was anticipating much from it, after Barney highly recommended it to me. And other heard good reviews from some others too.

I feel that the performance of Christian Bale was pretty ordinary, but it was the villains who shone brightly. Of that, Heath Ledger gave a stellar performance in the role as the Joker. Absolutely brilliant, although the make-up department was not fully functional I guess. The make-up of the Joker looked much better in the previous episodes, and it seemed like they had not much budget to apply sufficient make-up.
However, the emotions, actions, words and.....in fact the whole performance by Heath in the Joker was pretty brilliant and he really made you feel frightened by his appearance.

The guy who acted as Harvey Dent aka Two-face, can't remember his name but the same guy from Thank You for Smoking, was quite brilliant as well, not to the standard of the Joker, maybe cos he only had half a face left, but still a stand-out nonetheless.

And I did notice that the actor who played the Mayor of Gotham city was actually the leader of The Others in the series, Lost. I kept picturing him going to eliminate some people with gas attack or rifles or something like he did in Lost, but then he didn't.

Sorry no mention of Bale's performance as I didn't think great of it. But the movie was great nonetheless.

And a side note. Was at a kopitiam with my colleague for lunch today. So while we were eating, the har gow he ordered arrived and was served by one freak-head woman. He put it, oh sorry, she put it on the table and left. So my colleague wanted some chili sauce to go with it, and he quickly turned to her and said "excuse me, can I have some chili?"
And the woman turned back sharply and shouted "WHAT?!"
we were both stunned for a second.
But luckily I was wearing some amulet that could shorten the stun-time, and recovered and shouted back to her "Why So Rude?!"
And she went "what" again and widened her eyes and marched towards me, with my colleague looking at me with his eyes that seems to be telling me "Wahhhhhh..........you are a winner"

Work is tiring

I had been resisting for 3 weeks to follow in my friend's footsteps in making a blog post to complain about how working life is tiring, but still I succumbed to that favourite SG habit - complaining!

Oh well, it's tiring!

Basically, I wake up at 7 every morning, wash up, read the paper while I have breakfast, and leave the house at 7.45am. Reach workplace at 8.25am, then work until 12pm+ then go for lunch. Arrive back in office at 1pm+ and continue working till 6.30pm+ or sometimes around 7pm+, then reach home 7pm earliest, or usually about 7.30pm. Rest for a bit, then have dinner, then rest for a longer bit, maybe watch some tv or like right now, do some blogging, and then go to sleep at 11pm.

I practically don't really have as much freetime as I used to have, to do whatever stuff like watching movies or playing pc games. Sigh...

Hey those of you reading this and sniggering away, it'll be your turn soon! Watch out man, I only started some time before you, but hopefully, fingers crossed, I can end this routine earlier than you!

Yawnz......

No Space for Complains

Ever had this scenario, when you complain about some matter and you are shut out of your complain by someone? I shall talk about mine.

I have these nice REAL Polo Tees by Ralph Lauren [Just a side story: After you go travelling in Bangkok, people tend to assume that whatever branded stuff that you own, are counterfeit products, especially with the large variety of fake Ralph Lauren Polo Tees in MBK Centre. That's why the stressing of the 'REAL' at the beginning of the paragraph, just to tell you it's not the 199baht, which you can bargain to 180baht, products selling in Bangkok.] Anyway, so back to the main story.

I put this one particular Polo Tee together with the rest of the laundry to be washed. My father usually does the laundry at home. So today I was doing the ironing of clothes, which is usually done by me, I noticed that there was a small purple spot at the front of the Polo Tee. Okay it's not too obvious, so I thought it should be ok. But horror of horrors, when I turned it to the back, I saw large purple spots on it, and I fainted! WTH! I don't know what caused the spots but I suspect it might have been the softener. [Side story again: This has not been the first time that my laundry has appeared with spots of other colours on it, and strangely enough, these spots seem to appear only when my father does the laundry, and they seem to only "attack" my clothes! Or maybe they do stain other clothes but that I do not pay attention to.]

So I was pretty resigned to fate that my nice expensive Polo Tee was going to be stained for the rest of its life, maybe something like the life of a rich man who suddenly committed an offence and was put behind bars, and suddenly find himself with a stain on his life. So later on, I complained to my Mum, and as you may know, complaining is one of the favourite pastimes of a Singaporean. So the conversation goes something like this:

Me: You know, I found a large purple stain on my Ralph Lauren Polo Tee!

Mum: 你这么厉害，你自己洗啦！[translates as: If you think you are so good, why don't you wash it yourself!]

Ok, Short & Sweet. A big full-stop to my complain.
So is there no room for me to complain in my own house?
Sometimes we are not trying to blame anyone for anything, but we just try to speak out our hearts so as to feel more comfortable, and that was certainly no relief for my comfort at all.
Well my Mum's next sentence was a heart breaker too.

Mum: Is it a fake Polo Ralph Lauren? [which explains why I told my first side story]

Sigh................

The latest commoner's woe: ERP

That's right! After the recent hike in food prices and oil prices, and the 7% GST last year, the emotionless Transport ministry had to join in the fray and pile more misery at this gloomy time on the people by activating more channels of income - activating 5 more ERP gantries and raising the ERP charges. Hey Transport minister, Thank you very much! *sarcastic tone included*

I think this is ill time to be doing this, and no doubt do many Singaporeans think the same. Even while many people question the motive and are really doubtful of the claim by the LTA (Land Transport Authority) that car speeds in particular roads are really slow, they inputs are ignored. Well, first of all, the include waiting times at traffic lights into the calculations, and in this country where we can claim to be Numero Uno in the most number of traffic lights per mile of road, this would definitely be so! Come on, use your brain!

Then in the papers, there was a guy who worked in the clarke quay area who did his own recording of car speeds in the area, and took pictures of the roads at peak hours, and his study showed that it was completely unnecessary to raise the ERP charges at that area. Even his submission of his study to the LTA was unable to retract LTA's decision. "Disappointing! " I say. "Elitism!" Others claim.

Then what about the business of surrounding areas? This decision definitely would affect them, Big Time! At a time of rising inflation and stuttering economy, this ERP decision will put off people into travelling downtown, and hence reduce the business of the shops in the area. In the long run, these business will go Kaput! All that will be left are food stalls, and maybe only the popular ones, and perhaps some other shops which are a necessity. Shops that sell stuff that can be found somewhere else, well I think it's time to say goodbye! In this sense, retail will suffer, and hence tourism too.

In so many years as a Singaporean, this is the first time that I feel that many big & bad decisions have arise in such a short period, particularly pertaining to transport. The people feel irked by these things, and it is not hard to hear criticisms from the news to the coffeeshop. I think Mr transport minister should come out to explain these decisions, from the hike of public transport fees, the erecting of gantries as and where, and the raise in ERP charges. We need a proper and reasonable explanation.

"Disappointed & Upset!" I say, falling short of calling for his replacement

politically motivated?

I just shifted to a new apartment, and though the facilities and environment aren't as great as the previous one, at least I don't have to sleep in the living room anymore, and it's near to the mrt station. Gets a bit noisy though with the sound of trains running by, and of buses (my old place was quite a distance from the bus stop so I couldn't hear any buses). Well, pros and cons.

Well lots of interesting news recently, but still no news of Mas Selamat. One that made the headlines was that of Anwar Ibrahim being accused of sodomy, once again.

Was this a politically motivated action? Some, or rather many, believe that this is so due to the timing of the accusation, just as Anwar is about to compete in an upcoming by-election. Even the US believes so, and has one of its spokesperson warning the government not to make politically motivated arrests. This has definitely not gone down well with the ruling government, who now appears to be trying to eliminate its strongest opposition through underhand means. This particular case brings back memories of Anwar's first arrest due to sodomy charges which he has maintained his innocence, and many still believe it was a set-up.

A parallel can be drawn to a scenario in Taiwan during Chen Shui Bian's second presidential election. As he was riding down the street during a campaign, he suffered a gunshot wound from a mysterious assassination attempt, but survived. This gained him many sympathetic votes, and drew many conspiracy theories about the assassination being staged. Well the Malaysian situation may not be exactly the same, but this event can be similar scenario for Anwar who can gain many sympathetic votes out of this situation, if he survives another prison sentence.

This can be an interesting development to be observed.

An Ant's Life

This is an interesting story about ants.

In a laboratory, there is a colony of black ants. The queen (purple) only produces black ants. They live peacefully within the colony.


Then one day, the scientist in charge of this colony introduces a red ant into the colony. This red ant is aggressive and strong. As part of nature, the black ants are inclined to repel the intruder. But as this red ant is aggressive and strong, it is able to repel any attacks easily.


Very soon, the red ant feel very comfortable about its new home. There is ample food for itself as it did not need to fight for every small bit of food which it used to do back at its red ant colony. It can easily bully the other black ants for food, and it earned the favor of the Queen ant as the Queen felt that this red ant is a foreign talent (FT). So the Queen granted the red ant a space in the colony.


One day the red ant disappeared. All the black ants are very happy that this intruder who had come and take away their "shine" is gone. Life can be back to normal again. But they are sadly wrong. The next day, they got a rude shock.

The red ant came back with two other red ants! Being part of nature, the black ants decide to repel the invaders. But as before, the red ants swiftly thwarted their attack, and left the black ants bruised and battered. The Queen is very glad however, as she feel that these new ants are strong and talented. She welcomed them with open arms, and decide to grant them a bigger space for accommodation. The black ants are naturally dismayed that not only do they have to work harder to find more food, they have to sacrifice some space for these red ants in a colony which is already very small.

The next day, even more red ants entered the colony and made themselves comfortable in this new place. Naturally, the black ants are unhappy and decide to repel these new intruders. But there are just too many of these strong and aggressive red ants that the black ants feel they have no chance against them at all. So they decide to launch a complain to the Queen about this, but it was swiftly put down by the Queen who praised the red ants as FT and are integral to their colony. Some of the black ants become disappointed and decide that it is time that they leave this colony to find life elsewhere as this colony does not belong to them anymore.


The next day, the Queen woke up to find almost half the black ant population gone, only to be replaced by red ants. And she wonders why.

A case of too much, too soon

Malaysia yesterday raised the prices of petrol nationwide by 40 percent and resulted in widespread unhappiness with the BN. This move is supposed to help Malaysia save billions every year in terms of subsidies which had kept Malaysian oil prices one of the lowest in the world. However, no doubt, this is a move that will incur the wrath of the common folks who felt they had their carpet pulled from under their feet. And at a time of rising inflation in all sorts of goods, having the price of this important commodity raised by 40 percent at one shot suddenly is like getting hit by a cyclone after getting hit by an earthquake.

This will no doubt be a big risk move by BN following their recent election loss, and in the short term, it will seem to be a outright suicidal move that could see a bigger shift in popularity to the opposition. However, if the central government is able to pull this off, I foresee that Malaysia's economy will do really well as the move will save it billions of dollars which can be put into its reserves to strengthen the economy and propel it to a more prosperous future. Otherwise, the situation can end up like the one which threw Indonesia into a turmoil about 10years ago, and most likely, "some heads will roll".

This makes me wonder why didn't the Malaysian government implement this in tiers instead of raising the entire 40 percent at one go? What I mean is that they could have raised the prices of petrol by 10 percent for a few months, and then another 10 percent and so on, instead of making citizens feel the full brunt of the price hike at one go? Or could this imply that 40 percent is the first tier, and further hikes are still on the horizon? This could be logical considering prices of petrol are still cheaper than in Singapore, and Singaporeans will still be willing to make the tour across the causeway to get cheaper petrol from the kind Malaysian government which has scrapped the plan to ban Singaporeans from buying petrol within a 50km radius from the border. Nonetheless, this was a necessary move that would become unsustainable as there seems to be no quick end to the rising oil prices.

Recent Happenings

Today is (today is not over yet, so I should use the present tense) a dark & gloomy day for Singapore football as it was humiliated by Uzbekistan 7-3 in the world cup qualifiers. That exposed a really leaky defense in Avramovic's team, but at least it showed that the attack was in existence as it managed to put in 3 goals against one of Asian football's giant. We'll just have to pull ourselves together in the next few matches to get a spot in the world cup. And meanwhile, we're like approximately 5days away from Euro 2008!

Got my university exam results a few days ago, and I am more pleased than I can ever be. Had a few mini-shocks actually. First was that I expected an A for my honours thesis, but only got an A-. Damn! But was really pleased with the B+ and B for Macro 3 and Econometrics 3 respectively, so I am really happy because the exam was so f*cked up that I thought I was going to get a C. Screw those foreign lecturers who can't teach properly, teach very little but set very difficult exams. Poor attitude I must say. They should have a screening procedure to eliminate bad lecturers, and send them home or maybe back to training school where they belong.
Haha I'm blasting them even though they gave me a much better result than I expected, but then I would have scored much better had they taught much better, and set exam qns which requires more intuitive thinking rather than qns that require you to memorise stuff and do simple but long & tedious calculations. Who the hell wants to calculate the roots of a time series equation manually when you can use a computer nowadays?! Geeez...

Oh and some days ago I saw this lady, no offence to her but is she brainless or is she trying to commit suicide? I couldn't figure, cos she brazenly stepped in front of an approaching double-decker bus to pick up a coin she dropped on the road. C'mon lady, I am not prepared at that moment to witness some bloody horror scene, and she made me had that urge to run forward to grab her off the road. But where're the brains I wonder. This reminds me of an analogy used by my lecturer, Tim Higgins, "picking up pennies in front of the bulldozer", a phrase he used to describe the guys from Long Term Capital Management (LTCM). Well LTCM provides for some interesting read if you search them up on Wikipedia. But I can now figure why that seems rather familiar at that moment....

Fund Raisers

Singapore's mediacorp has a fund-raiser for China's Sichuan earthquake this evening. This is admirable, but when you consider that a disaster has struck Myanmar as well, and Myanmar is a much poorer country than China and hence requires financial aid much more than China, holding a fund-raiser for Myanmar would seem like a more reasonable thing to do.

So why is it that they hold fund-raisers for China instead of Myanmar? And we see that the total amount of funds raised through all sorts of events for the China earthquake is much more than the hurricane that hit Myanmar. If you look at it, China is right now such a prosperous nation, that if their citizens were to each donate $1, they would have $1.1 billion! That is much more than the single-digit million that Singapore raises.

I suspect that this has to do with relations. Having more contacts and business relationships with Chinese clients is, I suspect, one of the main reasons for holding such fund-raisers. This is to let their clients know that we care for them. This is similar to businessmen sending gifts to clients to make them happy. Whereas there may be less business dealings with Myanmar, and hence no such need to hold fund-raisers for Myanmar. This is a realistic world, we must understand.

Also, one can suspect that as Myanmar is controlled by the military junta, funds raised by various organisations may not reach the people in need, but end up somewhere in the coffers of the junta. This could be a reason that put people off donating sums to Myanmar.

Nonetheless, I feel that to be fair, Mediacorp should have a fund-raiser for Myanmar as well, as they really need the funds, much more than their Chinese counterparts.

My Tennis Kakis

My usual Saturday past-time, having a game of tennis with my kakis. Had a real good set of tennis doubles match last saturday which Niankai and I won 6-4 3-6 6-3. Great times!

Me, the poser. Ha...

The Doubles Team!

JR and his super sliced serve!

Champions of England once again

Manchester United is crowned the champions of the English Premier League once again. It was an emphatic victory, made sweeter by the fact that we did not end level on points with the hated Blues, which only managed a paltry draw with Bolton while Man Utd managed a sweet 2-0 victory over Wigan. The victory was never going to be in doubt, with Cristiano Ronaldo scoring a penalty and Ryan Giggs, the one and only Ryan Giggs, wrapping up with a second. And all the Blues are going home with, are sad faces and a broken shoulder for Captain John Terry.
Bye Bye Terry, take all the time you need to recover, and we'll take the Champions League trophy from you meanwhile...

On the other hand, I was really upset with Inter Milan for failing once again to wrap up the Scudetto with a simple win over Siena at home, by drawing! Fans have high hopes you know. And holding such a big advantage, they had to let it go down to the wire in the last match. That is pathetic. They were so dominant throughout the match and should have done more to seal up the win, which was REALLY disappointing. With all the home fans out with banners and flags and champagnes ready, they had to go out and not win this easy match. Now, a bad and familiar feeling is overwhelming me as I remember a few seasons back when Inter was the leader, but was pipped at the last day by a loss to Lazio which allowed Juventus to grab the title. That really sucks. I do hope history is NOT REPEATED.

Unbelievable Upsets

I just ended watching the match between Radek Stepanek and Roger Federer, where Stepanek won 7-6 7-6. Ouch! What an upset for the world number 1. Sad.
And the other match I watched 2 days ago also saw a MAJOR upset with the clay court specialist Rafa losing to Juan Carlos Ferrero 7-5 6-1. Subsequently, Ferrero lost in the next match.
Also Nikolay Davydenko lost to Tommy Robredo whom he had won against for the previous matches, but this time on clay, the spaniard proved to be superior. It was a REALLY tight match, 4-6 6-2 7-6(7-4). The spaniards seem to be better on clay??

A player whom I see who has potential is Simone Bolelli, a 22 years old Italian player. He was the finalist in the Munich open but lost to Fernando Gonzalez. Watched him play against Andy Roddick, and although he lost and made many stupid mistakes, but he seem to be able to progress far in future.
Without the number 1 and 2 players in the competition, will the number 3: Novak Djokovic win this tourny? hmm...

Man Utd 4-1 West Ham!!!

Woohoo! What a wonderful result that now puts Man Utd 3 points ahead of the much disliked Chelski. Now I hope K.Keegan & his Newcastle team can halt Chelski's run. If they don't, it will be next week's match against Wigan which will be the decider. Let's do it and win the double!
We have to make Chelski pay for the FA cup by winning the Champions League in Moscow. SWEET VICTORY!

And Another match that I'm keenly interested will be the Milan derby tomorrow. 3 match to go, and Inter are currently 6 points ahead of roma. But if Inter can get a winner tomorrow against the rossoneri, we can seal up the title! So this is a very crucial match, one of the most important derbies. For milan, they want to win this match to stay in the race for a 4th spot for Champions League qualification against Fiorentina, BUT seriously, who cares whether they get a 4th spot anyway! I hope Inter win tomorrow, and Fiorentina extend their lead against Milan to boot them out of the UCL. Forza Inter!

Jeon ji hyun NEW ASIENCE Ad

This latest one has more scenes of her, and is gorgeous!

Jeon Ji Hyun's Asience Ad

This Shampoo ad with Jeon Ji Hyun in it makes me want to use the shampoo! Ha..

Entertainers

People say that politicians are good actors, and as good actors, they have to provide good entertainment. This is certainly served up when Malaysia's first parliament seating since the election turned out to be a real entertaining one, comparable to those seen in Taiwan, with a name-calling show by Karpal Singh and Bung Moktar Radin. Lim Kit Siang also provided a very vocal showing. All these contributed to the entertainment value of watching parliament.

Now why ain't many people watching the Singapore parliament? It is so boring, hours long, and sometimes members of parliament fall asleep themselves in parliament as well. It would be real entertaining if the Singapore parliament can introduce such entertainment factor into it, and we could expect more audience then. The politicians will also keep themselves awake as they would not want to be called sleepy pigs by the opposition. Now that's a show!

Change of topic. My macro econs lecturer/tutor is such a sucky prof that I wonder if his cert is a fake. Anyway, as the final exam is coming, I kindly emailed him to ask for some tips about the exam, as there was no past yr papers to refer to, so we have no idea as to the direction we should head towards. Without some guidance and hints, we would be like bobbing floats in the midst of an open ocean. I waited, he didn't reply.

Okay I thought. Was reading through the mid-yr exam solutions and had some questions about it. So I decided to email him. Was thinking of sending an email to screw him, a bit like how I did the bald manager or the guy selling the sliced-fish noodles but milder since it's an email, but then decided against it since he would be grading my final exam, so that would be a disaster.
So instead I sent a sarcastic email which usually works to get a response. And the reply to the hints and guidance was: I've already mentioned that the final exam would be comprehensive and includes everything we've covered in this course.

Hey thank you! What a wanker

To Become Paris' New BFF

Hey peeps! Haha was rather bored of studying, so randomly looked for stuff and found this page where Paris Hilton is searching for her new BFF. So this the thing, anyone can participate and send in their videos (although this contest has already reached round 7 now) and people can vote for them and the top 20 finalists can make it onto the MTV show where Paris will pick her new BFF! That's Hot!
The page is http://parisbff.com/
Lots of dumb videos in it and kinda time-waster, but hey, ain't that what Paris is known for?

For those clueless about BFF, it stands for best friends forever!

One of the most talked about videos in SG right now

A Cab Driver and Civilian scolding *fck* off to each other.
I must agree with the many other comments left on youtube that the person who's filming this video is super-annoying. He should film himself and put it online instead, think it would be funnier

singapore censorship! is funny u must see!!1

Some mindless video about singapore censorship. Alright la, not really funny. But I can see my ex-classmate, zihan, at 39sec, haha!

Lost

It was another day spent doing almost nothing. Well, actually only did two things today as far as I can remember.
1) wrote and sent my CV to Barclays. Tis a big one, and hope I can get this job.
2) Was supposed to begin exam preparations, but found out that Season 4 of Lost is out. So I spent the whole day unraveling what has happened so far, all the mysteries from Season 3, and began an 8episode mini-marathon of Lost Season 4.

Well I would say that Lost is getting more and more complicated, but the more you watch, the more the picture becomes clearer. And many twists in the stories that keep you wanting to find out more. Season 4 is getting exciting ( I don't want to be a spoiler so I shan't reveal anything) but the survivors finally seem to be able to get off the island. It seems likely that season 4 might be the last, but you never know, with a story like Lost. Also, the flashbacks of the characters in the series have begun to switch to flashforwards as we see what happen to them after they leave the island, and this is where surprises will grip you.

I have met many who didn't like the confusing storyline of Lost, but for people like me who began watching from episode 1 of Season 1, this is becoming more gripping and interesting. Looking forward to the coming episodes!

Skool's Out!

Oh boy! I still can't believe it's the last day of school already! Last day of the semester for me, last day of my undergraduate days, and I'm not sure if it'll be the last day of studying in an institution for me. But wow, time really flies! Next week on, it'll be the reading week and then on to exams and graduation. I'm not sure if I should be looking towards graduation or not. But well, this last semester of school has been really boring I must say.

After spending 2 years away, you come back to an institution where old friends have mostly graduated, or are busily mugging away at home/in library (while I carefreely stroll around campus), or have moved on and have found their new groups of friends, or have totally forgotten who you are. And for those whom I have really been that close to begin with, I've found it hard to reacquaint with them since they might put me in a potentially embarrassing situation by saying "No I don't know you". So then, the lack of many friends to hang out with this semester, plus the droppppppppp in quality of the arts canteen food have led to the dearth of a fun-loving and joyous Don. I think I've transformed a lot since returning from Australia, becoming as much part of the worker-ants lifestyle of the NUS students as well as retaining part of the relaxed and take-it-easy attitude person who is unable to fit back into the fast paced mad rush of the others.

In a nutshell, I say that this last semester sucks and I want to graduate and get out of here. Now to find that company which would hire me....

Californication

Spent the entire day watching Californication and it was a totally engaging series, but I wouldn't recommend it for the conservatives or the faint-hearted.
The story line was pretty good, and David Duchovny's acting as a writer trying to get back onto his feet was a pleasure to watch. Some pretty humorous moment include two grown men fighting over a packet of tampon, and scenes of Duchovny vomiting in his ex's boyfriend's painting. There were definitely many great scenes to catch but I'll leave it as that.
Was touched by the romantic moments in the show between Duchovny trying to woo back his ex, and the scenes of their daughter moving to stay with her father as "the man has nothing". Madeline Zima caught my notice too as this cute and bubbly lady, definitely with a good figure, who was attracted to Duchovny's character.
Well then, about time I got some eye-shutter. Good night, and You stay cool, readers!

End of the book of blood, sweat and no tears

Yeeha! Finally submitted the much horrid and stressful item known as the Honours Thesis yesterday. It's been a long time coming, and put much effort into doing it for the last 2-3 mths. Had been waking up and sleeping to my HT everyday for the recent month or so. So felt an immense relaxation and joy when I finally handed it in to the department. All that's left is the hardbound copy to be submitted next wed. YesssshhHhh~!

Right now, catching up on stuff that I haven't had time to do before, like watching Hustle and other stuff. Been also watching episodes of Little Britain (yes again) on the BBC entertainment channel on cable, and Lost which is airing on Ch5. And more time to surf the net and do time-wasting stuff, but not for long, before the exam arrives.

Oh and I saw Daniel Bennett at the train station the other day, Singapore's National football team player. He's a good player and performed pretty decently for the team, which led to Spore qualifying into third stage (I think) of the world cup qualifiers. That's pretty awesome.
But one thing for Singaporeans to ponder about is the focus and direction of the country's sports scene. It must be said that the way conduct sports is similar to Singaporeans conducting business. How so? I may explain

The impatience to win, has led them to disregard nationality issues, and conduct big-scale, sorry, massive-scale imports of players from other countries who have shown quality. This is done thru enticing with the carrot. For the local players, they have mostly been overlooked, and I would have thought that a country should and would train local players to be successful, but unfortunately, country says no.... The quick fix method is to buy/import, not train and cultivate, where the former would be cheaper in the short-run but expensive in the long-run, while the latter is vice versa.

Regarding local players participating in overseas competitions, the onus is also on the player to raise their own cash/funding so that they can take part. So you're practically on your own. No money, no trophy so no reward. They said they are tired of sponsoring players who can promise medals and in the end they don't bring back the gold/silverwares. Do they think sports is like business when you can buy a piece of land by just offering the highest bid? Even the best player may stumble one day. So then, what? Impatience is not the way to go.

If we have to win the worldcup or whatever cup by having an entire squad of imported players, I'll rather not win anything. This is not the English Premier League.

Roddick def. Troicki Sony Ericsson Open 2008

A totally unbelievable and almost impossible shot produced by Roddick

Djokovic-Nadal 2008 losing racket winner

An amazing point by Djokovic after dropping his racket and still coming up with a winner!

Watch out when you eat your next packet of prawn cracker!

Watch out when you eat your next packet of Nong Shim prawn cracker!


It was reported in the news yesterday that they discovered a rat's head in a bag of prawn crackers. Subsequently, the products are being pulled off shelves. So you gotta beware of what you eat.

It's really scary the foodstuff they product these days if you think about it. Recently there was the gyoza (dumplings) scare in Japan when they resulted in severe food poisoning for many people. Then there was Prima Deli in Singapore, where many people suffered severe food poisoning due to the existence of the salmonella bacteria in the food products. And then there are the many reports of fake eggs, fake milk powder produced in China, which are made of carcinogenic agents.

Gosh, the world is really turning unsafe. I think I will have to stick to eating safe things, such as shark's fin, bird's nest, abalone, caviar and truffles for my meals everyday...

And I will not be held to ransom to put up anyone's name on the next post just because of a pink pokka dot tie. So don't think about it!
Hi Jared, how are you doing?? :)

HK's Funniest Person 2007 - Vivek Mahbubani - Chinese

This Indian speaks Cantonese!
Damn right, it's funny, and he has the Russell Peters style.
Haha, check it out for yourself...

Random ramblings

It's tuesday 10am! And I am supposed to be in school at 8am for my Micro III lecture, but I don't know why I'm still at home. Haha.
Well sort of evaluated that the lecture was not worth waking up at 6am and traveling more than an hour to school for. He mostly just repeats what is on the lecture notes, which I'm perfectly able to read on my own. The only thing interesting about him is he hails from the cold and not so developed part of Russia called Siberia, and speaks with a French accent which I like to imitate.
"You zee, zis is ze way we doo, ya.." - translated as "You see, this is the way way we do, ya"
Hahah

Glad to see comments on my chatbox from Daryl and Jay Shen. Hi to you guys.
It's great to hear than one of them has gotten my beautiful room D107 and the other is finally going to resign from the junior job at a Japanese restaurant which made him wash many many dishes a day. Oh well, miss you guys, and best of luck! I miss my pizza mates!

Celebrating 100years of F.C. Internazionale

F.C. Internazionale celebrates its 100th birthday on 9 March 2008. One hundred years of passion, a sense of belonging that involves millions of people. I am so proud to be a fan of this great club since the past, for now, and into the future. I am sure all fans of Inter will be happy for the team as well, as they celebrate a century of beautiful Italian football, and enter the next with a wonderful team and management and fans like me. The pride of the Nerrazurri!

The world is painted BLACK and BLUE on the 9th of March!

Election fever hotting up

It's mysterious that Mas Selamat is still at large after almost a week since his prison escape. Singapore is not such a big island, and the whole country is looking for him, from policemen to soldiers, to all residents who receive MMSs, posters and whatever forms of information, but he still eludes everyone. *Poof*

Well the Malaysian elections are definitely hotting up, with elections approaching on the 8th of March. Not that it has anything to do with me, but it's hard not to take notice due to the high coverage of this election in Singapore's media. There are daily coverages on the tv news, as well as in all forms of the newspapers. Somehow, I feel that the media coverage of the Malaysian election is even higher than Singapore's own elections couple of years back. I have analysed this, and derived few probable explanations for this result:

1. There are a large number of Malaysians in Singapore, and we want them to be in touch with their own countries. Also, the news reported that there are a large number of foreigners in Singapore now, and the majority of them are from across the causeway. And wanting to add on the list of hubs that we already are (e.g. medical hub, aviation hub, education hub, meeting and conventions hub, country with the most hub hub etc), this time foreign talents hub, we have to attract them by covering news of their country so they would feel at home here.

2. Another possible explanation is that competition was weak, meaning there was a lack of challenge from the opposition parties, which made the elections pretty one-sided, so there was no need to report much about it.

3. Due to the subdued nature of open political discussions, media reports of our own elections were hence, subdued as well.

4. It is cheaper to send our journalists to cover the elections in Malaysia than to send them to cover the one in USA. Hence we have such great coverage with all the journalists interviewing the many contenders for the many different seats. Also, it would be a good holiday for the journalists, to be able to take a break and travel to Malaysia on a company-paid trip.

For now, I would have to continue receiving coverage of the Malaysian elections through all the media coverage.

Prison Break....at Whitley Road

Two days ago, a drama occurred along the Whitley Road Detention Centre when the leader of the terrorist cell, JI, escaped after he was allowed to go to the toilet. "Wow sounds easy..."

Despite more than 30hours of manhunt, up till now, he is still at large, on the run, despite having a limp on his leg. He must be real good, a chameleon I presume. Even though Singapore is such a small country, and jungles aren't plenty, he could still evade capture by the mass forces deployed to capture him. Is there a chance that he could have already escaped to another country? Or perhaps he is in disguise and walking among us?

This might be scary thought but it could happen, and residents are urged to be careful.
More information at: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/331726/1/.html

The time for Change

On March 2, Russians will choose a new president.

On March 8, Malaysians will go to the polls.

On March 22, Taiwanese will elect a new president.

On Nov 4, Americans will choose a new president.


S.Korea just sworn Lee Myung-Bak as the new president.

As well, Raul Castro has been named as the new president of Cuba.

This is really the time for changes around the world.

Let me end this post with an article by Fidel Castro:



" 'Change, change, change!' they shouted in unison," he wrote. "I agree. 'Change!' But in the United States. Cuba changed a while ago, and will continue on its dialectical course. We will never return to the past, say our people. 'Annexation, annexation, annexation!' the adversary responds. That's what he thinks, deep inside, when he talks about change."

Edison Chen's apology for the photo scandal; 陳冠希最新道歉片段

Hougang declaring independence

Well, some of you may get a shock when you read the title, but don't worry, it's not true...

You see, recently, Kosovo declares its independence from Serbia. And this was widely supported by 18 members of the EU, and the US, while Cyprus, Romania and Spain have done the wise and right thing by explicitly refusing recognition of this illegal move.

Well, think about it. If one day, example Hougang, gets tired of being part of Singapore and decides to declare independence from Singapore, what will be your reaction? Can you imagine trying to visit your grandparents in Hougang and having to pass through customs? Or having a whole new set of rules over there?

And the disgusting part is Uncle Sam supporting that move and putting in humanitarian peacekeepers to keep up that independence even though nobody thinks it is legal? How will you feel? Well it's certainly not a good feeling, even though Singaporeans might just ignore it and let the govt handle the matter.

Oh well, why don't the whole world come together and support say California breaking off from the United States of America next time...

A funny remark

Well well, time flies! The Chinese New Year is here and gone, well almost. It's already into the second month of February.

Recently, I saw on the newspaper an article about the ERP charges entering the heartlands, and the transport minister was quizzed by another MP for the reason. Among one of his replies, he said that Singaporean drivers travel quite a lot compared to their counterparts in other big cities. He said that Singaporean drivers clock 21,000 km per year compared to L.A. (19,000+km) and Tokyo (15,000+km).

Well, Excuse me, but first of all, where did he get this statistic from?? What's the backing?
And if that's the case, that means on average, a driver will drive about the entire length of the PIE EVERYDAY FOR 500DAYS! And there ain't even 500days in a year! so everybody stays in jurong work in changi airport? or vice versa?

C'mon, most cars don't even travel that much, and Singapore ain't that big a country. Are you adding the distance covered by taxis? Well that shouldn't count since those are public transport. Hmm and I definitely think that Americans travel mmuch more than Singaporeans due to the distance between places in the BIG land of yankees. So I can't understand.

And he said the govt ain't trying to make money from ERP charges, but then the gantries continue to increase, and they remove road taxes (obviously you need to make money from somewhere else to cover the loss of road taxes). If you do a check, you can see how much they actually make from the ERP in a year. And most people actually believe that the number of cars are not actually going to decrease even with increased ERP charges, but they still increase the charges anyway.

This minister really needs to remove the blindfold from his eyes, go take a ride around the country on public transport and see how it works. I really can't see how he can go about talking so much about this and that without really coming down to the ground from his hot air balloon way up in the sky.

If there are angel and devils, then the angel would come in the form of the finance minister with his $1.8bn goodies for the people. It's really a good welcome for the bonuses and stuff that we're going to get after a bonanza year last year! Although I thought more could be distributed since the govt surplus was $6.45bn last year. But nonetheless, it still is a good thing for everyone.

And they say we should take public transport...

Well the global theme right now is to go green right? Which means to cut down on Greenhouse gases by reducing private cars on the road and switch to public transport. Sounds like great. Brilliant. That's an ideal!

NOT!

If you have not taken the public transport in Singapore, then I say stick to the car. Although Singapore is such a small country, I always used to tell my foreign friends that I take a minimum of an hour to travel to school, sometimes when it gets bad, even 2hours. And they were shocked. They always thought that with the size of Singapore, travelling to anywhere should be a zip. Well that's true when you are driving a car. But the bus system really puts you down, down, down......

Haha, recently, NUS came up with a discussion forum www.nussu.org.sg/151 for people to contribute ideas on how to improve the bus 151 which travels from Hougang to NUS. It's really a forum where people complain about the punctuality & frequency of the bus. Plus the dumb terrain on the school compound makes it difficult to have a bendy-bus nor a double-decker. Oh wow, so the bus is always packed as it serves, just to list a few schools along its route, NUS, SIM, NP, HCI and NJC, and you can't even increase it's capacity?!

Last wed, I tried for the first time to take this bus to school, with the ignorance of a person doing something for the first time. I always thought the bus was rather swift when it travels from NUS to Hougang, so it should be the same the other way, what's more it's 11am, past the peak hour. Well, I was ghastly wrong. The bus took at least 20min to arrive which already made me wanted to head home, and the bus was pretty packed. That was not a good first time.

Now the government encourages citizens to take the public transport, and penalises car drivers by erecting ERP (Electronic Road Pricing) gantries on many many roads, and now the prices of fuel have gone up too. But then since the price of fuel increases, so does the price of public transport. Now what?

The LTC or whatever relevant department should seriously review the state of the bus system and improve it, BEFORE trying to encourage users to switch from private vehicles to public transport.

Well right now, I say, the better deal is to stick to driving a car to school which would take probably half an hour (of comfortable seating may I add) to more than an hour on public transport.

Fascination with Italia

Yes!!! It's fascination with Italia, and it's happening in U.K.!
First it was England, the "almighty" England, when she hired Fabio Capello as the coach of the Lions. Fabio, who has enjoyed great success with many big clubs such as Real Madrid and Roma, is going to face his first test when England plays Switzerland in an upcoming friendly.


Then it's the Irish! The F.A. of the Rep. of Ireland are looking for a new manager for their team, and the favourite choice is from......? Italy of course! Giovanni Trappatoni, a long time manager of the Italia national team, and also enjoyed a great spell in Fiorentina before they went down few seasons back, could be a good candidate to bring Ireland to success in coming competitions.

Watch out, the managers of Scotland & Wales!