Taxi Strike

A friend tweeted that above picture and I didn't think much of it as I was very very busy that particular afternoon.

Before you know it, it was the end of another work day as I headed home. The streets were quieter than usual but I didn't realise anything amiss. The only strange thing was there were no taxis in sight. I waited for almost 20 minutes before I was able to flag one down (usually a cab shows up in less than 5 minutes. Waiting for cabs in my part of town is virtually unheard of).

As I got on, the cabbie said that we couldn't go via the usual way as there is a strike by all the taxis in town. He risked taking my fare as he cannot afford to lose money on the RMB 200 daily taxi rental.

We talked more and I learned that the cabbies were unhappy with the town government for doing nothing to crack down on fake taxis and that it is affecting their livelihood.

Fake taxi are essentially cars that look exactly like a regular taxi except that they don't have a meter installed inside. Most of the taxis are car retired by the taxi companies and one can be bought for as little as RMB 16,000 (SGD 3,200).

I supposed prior to the province-wide anti-vice sweep, there is enough business to go around to both real and fake taxis but now that the sweep is ongoing, taxis, both real and fake, are left to fight for that last scrap at the bottom of the barrel.

So when survival mode is turned on, the real taxis now turned their attention to the local government.

Here's the ironic kicker, real taxis don't use the meter either and so essentially makes them no difference to that of the fake counterparts.

Out of 50 taxis that I took, I'd be lucky to hop into one that voluntarily activate the meter. Most taxis has a piece of paper pasted over the fare display.

Our conversation in the taxi was cut short when two other taxis came up alongside to intercept my cab. They were yelling at my driver why he was still taking passengers.

I got off the cab to allow them to quarrel in peace as I walked the rest of the way home.

I didn't get a receipt for the cab fare.

The meter wasn't turned on.

*shrugs*

- Voxeros

Philippine Independence Day In Singapore

There has been quite a big ruckus kicked up over the Philippine Independence Day celebration in the heart of Singapore's shopping belt recently.

Some people were quite upset why they couldn't do it on their own turf and have to have it here.

Er.... because it is too costly to fly everyone back to celebrate and then return here again? Duh.....

I also beg the question. What is wrong with celebrating in Singapore? It is afterall a joyous occasion and what better than to share the joy with others?

What is with the hostility?

My friends and I had a discussion recently on this issue and here is my take.

As much as I welcome them to hold their celebrations here, I would hope that one day, we can also have a Singapore day in Manila and share our joy too!

I think it is an awesome idea to bring some colour to the place and also an excellent opportunity to learn about another culture. After all, Singapore is a melting pot of races and nationalities from all over the world. No?

Besides, it is only for a day. How much inconvenience and/or grief, if at all, can one day of celebration bring? We tolerated, every year, an entire week of inconveniences e.g. road blocks, road diversions, squeezy public transport, loud deafening noise, otherwise known as the Formula One race. No?

Then there is the bigot who claimed that such an event is an act of war on us. Really? War? What is this guy smoking?

Anyway, I hope the authorities will haul this idiot's ass up in court for inciting unwarranted hatred. Should lock this guy up for a couple of weeks to let him cool off. Time out corner you go, spoilt little brat!

The way I see it, the good people of The Philippines are welcome to hold their event in Orchard Road. Just make sure all licensing, permits and the relevant laws and regulations are adhered to. Would appreciate the extra hand to clean up when the event is over.

Other than that?

Happy Independence Day, Philippines!

Mabuhay!

Image Credit: http://singaporenewsalternative.blogspot.com

- Voxeros

Microwave Poached Egg - The Second Attempt

• JayWalk Online (11 Apr 2014) - Microwave Poached Egg - The First Try

Following the first disastrous attempt, I decided to give it another shot after reading and studying the comments on my facebook entry (of the same topic) what could have gone wrong.

So here's what I did on my second try.

I continued to use room temperature water as I still think "cold water" in any recipe refers to unheated water. Otherwise, they would have specified refrigerated water or spell out the temperature to which the water should be, which I find is a tad overboard.

It's a cooking recipe. Not a science laboratory experiment, mind you.

And no. I am not going to use a pipette or burette to get the mug (not measuring beaker) to fill up to 1/3.

Next, I pop the mug with the egg (unbroken yolk) into the NukeBox on high for 60 seconds.

I started the countdown as I nervously watched the mug spun nonchalantly on the carousel.

50 seconds, just a tad short of the full minute, there was a loud POP!

I was thinking "oh great!", we have another eggplosion (term courtesy of Desiree).

I was suprised to see that the microwave was clean with no mess. I picked up to see the mug, half expecting to see nothing (and thus begin the mystery of the disappearing egg).

But no.

There it was, sitting nicely and almost pretty.

It wasn't completely cooked as there is still about 10 to 15% of the albumen still in its uncooked transparent form.

I let it sit for another minute to let it cooked in the heated water. I don't want to pop it back in again, lest I risked the real eggplosion.

Skimmed off the uncooked portion of the egg, throw it on a toast, leaf of lettuce, sauce as a "glue" to prevent the egg from sliding all over the place, a dash of mushrooms in truffle oil, sliced tomato for garnishing, take a photo et voila! Hipster meal!

- Voxeros

Microwave Poached Egg - The First Try

It all started with the above facebook post from Ellen.

Having my fair share of *ahem* experimenting with the microwave oven, I have come to learn never to put an egg in the microwave without first poking a hole in the yolk.

Hence, I got curious with this recipe that specifically says to keep the yolk intact.

So. Step 1. I got ready the slice of bread and lather it with a layer of mayo. Didn't have lettuce in my crisper and so I guess the end product would turn out slightly different. *shrugs*

Step 2. Egg. Checked. Mug with 1/3 full of water. Checked.

Step 3: Break egg carefully into cup WITHOUT breaking the yolk. Checked.

Step 4: Into the microwave on high for 1 minute. By the way, that's my Vietnamese coffee brewing on top.

Eh. How come the picture in the recipe is a Jupiter planet, mine is Saturn? Here's the problem. The transparent liquid in the middle is water or uncooked egg white?

Well, the recipe DID say that it is permissible to pop it back into the microwave to nuke it for an additional 10 secs to have it a little bit more cooked.

I was thinking heck lah..... a bit more cooked better lah. What is another 10 extra seconds on top of that 10 extra seconds?

And to quote my dear friend Ellen.....

dibabom.

The egg flew out of the cup and the egg white was plastered everywhere.

So Ellen, buy that air ticket and fly over. The microwave oven is not going to clean itself.

Afternote: Undeterred, I am going to give it another try this weekend. Perhaps with a hand on the power knob the next time round.

Click Here To Proceed To ->

• JayWalk Online (15 Apr 2014) - Microwave Poached Egg - The Second Attempt

- Voxeros

MYP Award Ceremony 2014

On to the next decade as we are into our 11th year of the Maximise Your Potential Ceremony.

While we do not have the type of stellar growth that Uncle Tony's Willing Hearts project has, we are nevertheless happy with the way we are.

Read on for Adrian's letter to everyone with details of the ceremony.

Do come down and join us. RSVP, please.

+++++

Dear friends,

The Maximize Your Potential (MYP) programme is into its 2nd decade, 11 years to be exact.

You are invited to join the 11th MYP award ceremony on 12th April 2014 (Saturday)

Time: 10:00 – 11:30
Venue: Geylang Methodist School (Primary), 2nd floor Library.

Our guest speaker this year is Byron Teo. Byron, a “newly-promoted father”, who ran the Standard Chartered Marathon in Dec 2013 and raised $2,061 for RunForFunds (RFF) which supports the MYP programme.

He will share some pearls of wisdom to inspire our MYP recipients.

Come, meet and inspire the MYP recipients you have sponsored via the Run For Funds (RFF).

Your support has made a difference to more than 70 young lives in the past decade.

Visit the RFF facebook to recap those magical MYP moments: https://www.facebook.com/RunForFunds.

Please email, whatsapp or SMS me to RSVP (for catering purposes).

Thanks for your continued support of the RFF movement.


Blessings,

Adrian

+++++

- Voxeros

Rain Rain Rain

 

• The Standard (31 Mar 2014) - Hailstone Havoc

Had this been deliberate, it would have made an awesome indoor display. This is Festival Walk in Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong, recently acquired by Singapore's Mapletree Investments.

 

The Hong Kong Drainage Services Department called it "once in 200 years". I am sure he hasn't been following Singapore news in recent years.

Given that Hong Kong encounters severe weather on an annual basis (read: typhoon season), perhaps they are more astute when it comes to making such a statement? I am willing to place a bet to say we won't have to wait another 200 years to encounter yet another mega storm.

We've certainly learned our lesson when our own big mouth then-Minister of Environment and Natural Resources said that the big flood of 2009 was "once in 50 years", only to have another subsequent mega flood shortly after.

The dumb folks at PUB trying to dumb (no pun intended) down the Orchard Road flood of 2011 to that of ponding. Riiight.

What I am trying to say here is this. Ladies and Gentlemen, meet the mighty force of Mother Nature. I think it is naive of us tiny humans to think that we can actually yield it into submission.

I think the main reason of us getting into all sorts of natural disaster troubles is that we do not respect Mother Nature enough. We belittle the wrath of destruction that Mother Nature can bring.

I am not saying that we should all just give up hope but instead fear it more than we are doing right now. That would keep us on our toes and be ever vigilant in anticipation of crisis. While I cannot guarantee that will eliminate all losses, we could at the very least keep them to a minimum.

Had we been more diligent with the maintenance of the drainage system at Festival Walk, we would have prevented the "waterfall". Complacency has been our downfall many a time in history. Too many times are we experts on 20-20 hindsight.

It's time to stop this bad habit.

(Click Image To Enlarge)

- Voxeros

Chicken Climbs Tree

This incident happened on the evening of 25 Mar 2014 in the NanNing City of GuangXi. It was an anti-vice sweep targeting street walkers trawling the parks in the evenings.


Many were arrested and this particular one climbed up a tree to avoid capture.


I find this picture the most amusing of the lot. Look at the number of people gawking at her! I don't see how she is going to Houdini out of this!


Quite an artistic shot this? No? Anyway, do check out how dangerously high she has climbed.


Ahh..... the legs are starting to tire or perhaps she was going to pee like the suicide attempt girl in my earlier entry? --> JayWalk Online (10 Nov 2009) - Bizarre Suicide Attempt In China


Even squatting will be tiring after a while as this girl is attempting to sit on the branch instead? Frankly, capture is inevitable and so I am not sure what she was thinking. Perhaps she was hoping to frustrate the cops into giving up?


Looks like the local cops this week all no need to buy 4D/TOTO liao.

At the end of it all, she had to come down and be arrested finally.

The twist to this whole saga was that when they established her identity, the cops realized that she was in actual fact, a man!

Wow.

There is an old Chinese saying 狗急跳墙, 人急生计 (The panicked dog jumps the wall, the panicked man hatch a plan).

In this particular case, one may have to adapt that 鸡急爬树 (The panicked cock climbs the tree).

• 易网新闻 (26 Mar 2014) - 南宁民警深夜扫黄 站街“女”上树

Image Credit: http://www.netease.com

- Voxeros

Thoughtlessness

So it was lunch time and I got a call from one of the Asoks that they are waiting for me at the carpark downstairs to go to lunch together.

I half gasped as I instinctively looked at my watch. I totally did not realise it was lunch time already.

Anyway, I dropped what was doing and galloped down the stairs as I do not like people waiting for me.

I got to the carpark and Crown Prince's car was there and ready to move out.

Let's see.

There's an Asok in the driver's seat. Shotgun was empty as the other Asok was squeezing in a cigarette while waiting for me to show up. Crown Prince in the backseat absorbed in his ebook (he was lending us the car and so he was merely hitching a ride). Another colleague in the back seat....

.... and there.

A baby seat.

Then I sit where?

That really pissed me off.

Not because I was bumped off the car but....

DID I REALLY HAVE TO SHOW UP BEFORE SOMEONE ACTUALLY REALIZES THAT THERE IS A PROBLEM IN SEATING CAPACITY?

WAS IT SOOOOO DIFFICULT TO ANTICIPATE THE PROBLEM?

REALLY?

What pissed me off was that NOBODY bothered to move a single cell of their brains.

So what happened next, was that I just told them coldly that I lost interest in joining them for lunch and walked off to the street stall outside.

I tapao-ed Fujian dumpling for a mere RMB 3.00 (SGD 0.60) and accompanied by a glass of milk from my fridge.

It was a good lunch.

I hate brainless people.

So that's that.

Had it been me in that situation where I was one of them waiting for the last person to show up and there isn't enough seat on the car. I'd gladly give up the car and offered to walk or take a cab with the last person to the lunch venue.

Now. Was it so hard?


Image Credit: https://bk.taobao.com

- Voxeros

Checkpoint Breach

• The Online Citizen (09 Mar 2014) - Second Security Breach At Woodlands Checkpoint In Less Than 2 Months

I am not going to go into how this is the second border breach blah blah blah.

I was watching the CCTV clip and three things came to my mind.

Three things not right.

First, were the police officers. Noticed how everyone just standing around not knowing what to do?

Were there no SOP/drills to handle such a scenario?

Why did everyone appear to be clueless?

What about the second police officer who took out and extended his telescopic baton? Then what? Only know how to wave wave menacingly without any real commitment. NATO. Wayang only.

Come on! Smash that goddamn window already!

Mind you, this isn't a mere trying to sneak into the country. This was a blatant broad daylight in-your-face breach of our sovereign border. I'd say smash that bladdy window and shoot the bugger (to wound/disable) already! At such a close range, hard to miss then accidentally kill right?

What I saw was hesitation. It was very much the same during the Little India Riot. In my humble opinion, I do not think that our boys in blue froze at time of crisis. Perhaps what was more crippling was the worry of the consequences of their action(s) at that critical moment. It was a time where the situation calls for one or more of these officers to take action WITHOUT permission/approval from a higher up first.

I may be wrong here but it appears nobody wishes to gamble by sticking his neck out. What if the said officer were to be accused of "excessive violence"? Heaven forbids we discharge a weapon! Loss of job? Career hentak kaki?

During the COI of the Little India Riot, we saw that those who took positive action received commendation while those who cowardly dragged their feet trying to find someone to pass the buck first before doing his/her job got stick.

Something is not right.

• Today (11 Mar 2014) - Checkpoint Breach: Barrier ‘Did Not Work Optimally’

The second item on my list of "something not right" was the cat claws road barrier whose Gandalf purpose was to prevent any vehicle from passing.

From the video clip, we can see that it was working properly. There was no malfunction which suggests that there is no issue in the maintenance of this device.

The ICA claimed that it did not work "optimally" but it appears to me that it DID NOT WORK. PERIOD.

That brings us to the question if due diligence of evaluating this device at public tender time. Was there a lapse in competence and/or negligence when we awarded the relevant contracts to install this, which at crunch time failed to fulfill what it had promised to do?

Perhaps we need a COI for this too.

Lastly, it was reported that the cat claws punctured two of the four tyres.

Question 1: Why didn't the cat claws puncture all four tyres? Something in the design needs to be reviewed, which brings us back to point No.2. Was the due diligence on the product diligently done?

Question 2: With 2 of the 4 tyres punctured, how is it that we can't locate the chiongster until 5 hours later. Was it THAT difficult to chase a car with only 2 out of 4 healthy tyres?

We need a shitload of COIs this coming year.

- Voxeros

World's Most Expensive City

• CNN Edition: International (04 Mar 2014) - World's most expensive city is ...

So we have now become the world's most expensive city  according to the Economist Intelligence Unit's Worldwide Cost Of Living Index 2014 Report.

Essentially, it is an aggregate score of a basket of items, one of which is the price of a car.

So that kinda got me thinking.

WHAT IF.......

...we are to take the price of a car out of this aggregate score calculation?

The way I see it, the price of a car in Singapore is ridiculously expensive to the extent that it doesn't, imho, offer justifiable utility to own one.

Good thing we are a small island country where in time to come (soon), our subway system would be able to cover almost every corner of this land, sans the occasional breakdown here and there and here and there and here and.....

I am sure our Gahmen are already on hand to tackle the issue of frequent breakdowns for we, the voters will have a say in getting the right guy for the transport ministry. We will replace any incompetent minister with our vote and we will continue doing it every 5 years until we get the right guy.

With the ruling party getting only a mere 60% of the popular vote in the 2011 General Elections, the day where we have the option to pick an alternative candidate from the opposition pool may just be sooner than we think.

If the ruling party cannot find the right person for the job, then perhaps we should try someone else from alternative parties.

But I digress.

So coming back to the topic on hand. I was thinking since the average Singaporean CAN do without owning a car due to our relatively awesome public transport, sans breakdowns, why not take that out of the equation?

Oh. Some may say that owning a car gives you the freedom to go anywhere, anytime in comfort. Well, if you wallet allows it, take the taxi which would still be cheaper than owning a car.

Wait? What's that you say? No cab during peak period especially during thunder storms or near midnight? Well, if you can't sit back, relax and wait for the peak period to be over i.e. you die-die-money-no-object must get to a certain place, a certain time, there is always UBER Singapore.

• The Straits Times (21 Feb 2014) - Singapore Budget 2014: Duties On alcohol, Tobacco And Gambling To Rise
  

While we are cutting back on luxuries, perhaps we should also take into consideration giving up alcohol, tobacco and gambling, given the tax hike as announced in the latest budget recently.

When one is living on meager resources, one should be able to forgo the able three items that are already expensive even before the latest tax increase.

A dram, a shot, a glass or a mug is nice to have but not essential. Tobacco is bad for the health which will cost you even more when your medical bills start coming in later in life. And then there's gambling where it is well, just bad.

So, if we are to take out these items from the calculation, would we still rank No.1?

I would like to believe that we won't, albeit we'd probably still be in the Top 20.

My point in this entry is this.

There is no need to panic right now. Singapore is NOT THAT expensive to the extent that you can't survive.

You'll live. Trust me. Just need to keep your material pursuits in check and you'll do just fine.

Image Credit: http://i2.cdn.turner.com (CNN Edition: International); http://www.bloomberg.com; http://www.straitstimes.com

- Voxeros