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Father's Day message

An open letter to my unborn child....

Dear son, Yesterday was father’s day. I had celebrated another father’s day without you. Do you know that it is actually embarrassing to celebrate father’s day without you. You may be wondering how come daddy and mummy got married for nearly two years and we still haven’t called for you. Please be assured that we love you and would very much like to have your company. Let daddy explain to you. We didn’t call you in the first year because we would like to settle a few important issues like why your mummy liked to squeeze the tooth paste in the centre instead of at the end of the tube. After we settled the important issue of where to squeeze the tooth paste, your mummy complained that the kitchen and the toilet were dirty. You may wonder what the toilets and kitchen got to do with you. Son, it has everything to do with you. Mummy did not want your food to be prepared in an old and presumably dirty kitchen. Son, you will spend the first few years of your life making a mess of yourself. Your mummy will have to clean up after you, and she thinks we better renovate the toilet as well, as you and her are going to spend a lot of time in the toilets. Because renovation needed money, daddy had to give up the notion of buying that 500cc new golf driver that daddy had been eyeing for a long time. So, when you grow up and stare down at the toilet bowl in the toilet, imagine you are peeing into the 500cc golf driver that daddy always wanted but never had. We always want the best for you, son. According to an East Asia survey, Singapore is the best place to have a baby. In another survey, the finding showed that a lot of youngsters here would like to be borne “white”. Although daddy cannot make you “white”, 1 out of 2 is not too bad, right? Mummy always worry that Singapore is too competitive for you and would like to register you as a Malaysian. Daddy thinks the decision on citizenship is better left for you to decide. Daddy will just write “nationality undecided at the time of birth” at the citizen column. Son, daddy would like to let you know that not a single day passed without thinking of you. In fact, on father’s day yesterday, daddy woke up a bit early to have breakfast with your mummy. After which, we took a walk at the park near our home. Well, you may ask daddy what that got to do with you again, right? Well, calling for you is not as easy as picking up the phone and dial o-r-d-e-r-b-a-b-y. Daddy needs to put mummy in a good mood so we can call for you together. There is a lot of hard work involved. So much so, after calling out for you, we were usually left gasping for breath. So, when the next time you hear heavy breathing coming from our room, don’t ask why. We are calling for a little brother to keep you company. My son, by now, you probably knows how much we love you. If you can hear daddy now, all daddy’s effort on this year father’s day had not been in vain. We look forward to see you in April 2007. If you forget to bring your kukujiao come April, it is ok. You just have to work harder on your listening skill and forgetfulness when you grow up.

Smile, it is TGIF!

The week is coming to an end. This week, we in the land of Singa should end it with a smile. A smile that is Unikly Singapore, in tandem with the latest govt buzz to "Welcome the world with four million smiles". This latest govt campaign is created to welcome the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Group meeting in Singapore in the coming September. Singapore is a 3M country, not to be confused with 3M the "sticker tape" company. Singapore 3M is ahemm...mo dei (no land), mo yau (no oil) & mo yan (no human resource) and i take my hat off to the govt for their creativity in coming out with this latest "product". We are effectively selling "smiles" and for the chinese you know what that means. "Selling smiles" is synonym with the products that bar hostesses hawk in karaoke lounges. So, one up for the marketing of Singapore Inc.! The IMF & World Bank come and go... but deep within, we do have reasons to smile. Those on my short list are.... Singapore Zoo spent $250,000 to rehab "Chawang" the elephant which gored its trainer last year. SZ could have just shipped Chawang to another zoo. According to the zoo, Chawang is very rare as its tusked are crossed. Glad to hear our zoo residents are treated like stakeholders instead of just mere exhibits! Hougang & Potong Pasir residents can rejoice as they, die2 will get their lift upgrading come 2015, as promised by the government. In the meantime, they must gwai gwai queue behind other PAP wards. Without the promise of upgrading, the govt need to change the "smile" campaign tagline to "4 millions smiles excluding those in Hougang and Potong Pasir". Hahahaha...can still watch some matches free...courtesy of RTM1 in Channel 39. As the commentaries are in Malay, can brush up my rusty Bahasa Melayu too. Kill 2 birds with one bola!! In my dreams i smile a lot...as i always (day)dream i am like the towkay above, closing deals in the comfort of my limo with a handphone!!

Procrastination costs me RM120

I am indulging myself in some Ipoh old world charm come early next month. The old ACS gang and some x-MGS girls are getting together for a gathering at Destress on 8 July. Last count...about 80 of us. If any of you guys and gals out there who were from ACS/MGS cohort of '83 (Form 6), please don't feel shy... come, come and join us!

Was going through the AirAsia website when i saw this GREAT offer of RM9.90 AirAsia ticket from IPOH-JB flying on 11 July. After discussing the plan to fly with SO, i went online again to book the tickets the next day. Niamah! 24 hours and the ticket price up went by 700%.... to RM69.90 each. For two persons, i am paying additional RM120, OUCH! Procrastination hurts!

Aliens in my fish tank

Last week the plague hit my fish tank. Before i start yakking about what had happened, allow me to introduce my watery friends... cardinal tetras, a happy family of 50 red nose rummy tetra, about 13 of them black tetras, 9 of them

and a couple of congo, bottom-feeding catfish and my pet Harlen, the up-side down catfish. In Singapore, we like to do upgrade: handphone, homes, even religion as Rev Kong Hee of City Harvest would have told u... My fish tank was a plain vanilla type with a few stones and a sand base. Last weekend i decided to do an upgrade for my fish tank. I added some plants, prawns, air stones and more sand to increase the substrate base. I constructed a garden with the plants and stones for my fish when incident struck.

My cardinals started to go kaput on Monday. I changed the water, added in some Chinese tea, substitute frozen worms with dry pellet (sinking type), isolated the sick fish and say a l'il prayer before the dying finally stop on Thursday. About 40 cardinals and 2 rummies perished...just like that. The cardinals and rummies were given by my friend KK and he only visited the Sunday before. Very paiseh leh... as he commented that i had done well with his fish and I had to text him on Thursday to break the bad news to him...

I managed to identify the disease through searching the internet . My finding shocked me! My fish had died of a terrible disease very much like what happened in the movie Alien when the parasite alien popped up from the gut of its victim. The fish died from parasites that burrowed through its intestine and attached itself to the fish muscle tissue. The sick fish body would turn whitish and became crooked before finally dropping dead.

The following is the abstract from the internet... The disease cycle begins when parasitic spores enter the fish after it consumes infected material, such as the bodies of dead fish, or live food such as tubifex, which may serve as intermediate hosts. Once in the intestinal tract, the newly hatched embryos burrow through the intestinal wall and produce cysts within the muscle tissue. Muscles bearing the cysts begin to die, and the necrotic tissue becomes pale, eventually turning white in color. I am glad i manage to bring the situation under control. But the crisis is not over yet as i have not identified the cause of the infection. I am sharing this with anyone who keep pets and probably have sad experiences on the demise of their pets in the past.... and hopefully bring a closure to this sad episode. You can pay your pak kum to my fish who had gone to the big tank in the sky by feeding my electronic pet at the bottom of this blog.

Zie Zie must try...

Cocka "Z" tag challenge, here i come!!! 1. Zeppelin...this is not. But if you have the urge to ride some hot air (beside the one from your boss) you can try the hot air balloon ride near to the open field next to the 7th-storey hotel ...psst FF, are you listening? 2. ZZZZZZZZ....my state of mind when the actions are happening LIVE in Germany. Niamah, Starhub (the cable co witht he sole right) is charging $15.50 for the privelege to watch the World Cup 2006. Even free also don't want lah...my beauty sleep is more important. Anyway, not that crazy over soccer! 3. Zircons are not only the oldest minerals on earth, they also show another interesting feature. Their oxygen isotopic composition has been interpreted to indicate that more than 4.4 billion years ago there was already water on the surface of the Earth. Who says blogging doesnt increase your general knowledge? 4. ZARA...a fashion store in town where i spent a lot of time in following my wife on her shopping trips. This is the only place where my wife will let me ogle gals, so i would leave her alone and not pester her to leave... 5. ZERO...wish everyone will have more of these in their bank account by end of the year! 4D idea for the weekend...4972! Don't forget my 10% commission if the numbers come out! 6. Zara...a potential applicant to the Malaysia Book of Record (MBR). She will be in the good company of Amber Chia & Datuk Michelle Yeoh. Read about her exploits in Zara's Mama & MBR in Teh-C ! For those with sons, if wont hurt to be friendly by dropping-by Zara's Mama blog. But my guess is, it is aready too late cos ZMM has tons of followers!! 7. Zombie...reminds me of Michael Jackson's Thriller music video. I missed his BAD's days! 8. Zakat..is the tithe the Muslims pay to the mosque... not to be confused with Zakar, which means penis in malay. So, be careful how you address the Encik Zakaria in tis world! 10. Zhonghua...also Tionghua or Choongwah in dialect...which loosely interpreted as "Chinese in the Centre". This is a hangover phrase from the olden Chinese empire which see China as the centre of the universe...and others as uncultured barbarians. BTW Zhonghua is also a brand of Chinese cigarettes that retail at RMB 50 (SGD $10, RM 23) a pack. It is the Davidoff equivalent in China. Offering Zhonghua ciggies to Chinese is a good ice-breaker...But caution hor! Offering ciggies in Singapore is an offence!

ATM Card Skimming

Today Straight Times reported the first case of ATM card skimming case in Singapore. I nearly fell off my chair this morning reading it. Got diagram some more on how the scam works! I knew ATM card skimming cases happened in Malaysia and HK, but it took a while for the fact to sink in that low-crime Singapore is not immuned. Well, it seems crime has also got onto the "Globalisation" bandwagon. Blogger Mike reported his card kena eaten sometimes back and i thought that was an unrelated isolated incident. Well, i was wrong! So, what are the measures we can take to prevent from falling victim to this scam? Beside going high-tech with a new generation of chip-implanted card, I have a better idea. Maybe we can go back to basic...using human teller. Kill 2 birds with one stone... increase security & safety and at the same time nip the 5% unemployment problem in Singapore. But we don't have to tell the consumers and no one is wiser!

Human ATM Prototype 1... maybe need to work on the sitting ergonomic a little This concept can have other applications as well.... Photo Kiosk...sharper images & better quality photos with instant consultancy!

Coffee Vending Machine...Personal service at a fraction of Starbuck price!!

Jalan-jalan on a friday evening

Friday evening, went pak toh with SO at our regular haunt at Jurong Point which is very near our place of work. Dinner, we ate at Pizza Place...a small cozy corner just opposite Crystal Jade Lah Mein. Was at CJ last week, we waited half an hour for a 15 min meal. What to do, suddenly had this craving for their onion oil Lah Mein. SO went shopping for bag, was browsing at this shop selling NODA's bags. For a fashion-challenged guy like me, i couldn't help but noticed that these Japan-imported bags are very chic looking and come in reasonable price range of $50 to $80. We didn't buy any as SO couldn't find anyone that she really like. If you ask me, i would have bought the white colour one on the top left hand corner ($60). I like it funky look. Hahaha just for comparison, if i were to buy a bag, i would probably look for one of these above... men or issit just ME that is boring and colourless? Hush Puppies...offering 70 percent discount and we bought some stuff for SO's nieces. I still can't figure how you size kids' wears. SO's nieces varies from 5 to 10 years old. But the clothes she bought for them look like more or less the same size to me. I advertised in both Yellow Pages and Green Book (above). After seeing the above pic...I better cancell my Green Book advertisement next year since now i know what people do with it! I discovered a national conspiracy at Jurong Point basement...people are siphoning Singapore currency out of the country by remitting their SGD$$ overseas... ...and the scary thing is, it is legal... and there are queues of people everywhere doing it! Even our Singapore Post is doing it...albeit as an agent! Post Office opening until 8 pm...unheard of when it was a gahmen agency...well, privatisation has its benefit! Da Vinci Code...the biggest conspiracy of all! In this movie, there are mutants everywhere you turned. i see mutant Magneto masquerading as a holy grail searcher, Sir Leigh Teabring; Dr Octopuss (Spiderman 2) moonlighting as Bishop Aringarosa when he is not wreaking havoc as a multi-tentacle menace and Ron Howard, leaving his Happy Days behind, is venturing into Doom Day with this dark and controversial movie.