korean food - togi

had korean food with my classmates today. Location? Mosque Street in Chinatown. Ironically, we were having korean food along a muslim related street in a traditionally chinese town.

i paid the most - $30. I paid $10 more, since i ordered a plum drink ($4) and my bean paste seafood soup was $15.50. A whopping $6 more than the ramen. It was a restaurant, thus the price was around the standard mark. But i feel i could get more value with my favourite Simlim stall.

This is the signboard. Opposite is CTC Travel


The appetizers including the usual kimchi. The latter is less sour than the simlim counterpart.


My friend's seafood ramen


We shared BBQ pork dish. The staff came to cook for us.


My bean paste seafood soup. $15.50+$0.50 for rice. I feel it was overpriced.

even was the recruitment talk at NUS Business School. There was an administrative problem where SoC students didn't get registered into the reservation system. Thus, i had no name tag. The crowd was unbelievable too, the whole LT was full of unemployed people. Many of us had to sit along the aisle.

there was a year 1 student who asked a question at the end. I truly felt his presence was unnecessary, because he still has 4 years to go. Asking why Citibank had this or that policy is just inappropriate - it is a recruitment talk, for god's sake. Don't be a smartie and show off your eloquency and knowledge of financial affairs at the wrong time, dude.

Full of unemployed talents


And... yes. The brimming crowd.

in the buses world, i read another SMRT bendy bus caught fire in Marsiling. It was reported in Shin Min, then scanned into SGforums. The trailer section which houses the engine was badly burnt, including parts of the windows and ceiling. From the damage, SMRT may have to scrap it. However, they may reconstruct the bus due to severe bus shortages throughout their depots.

according to past sources, the bendy buses burnt were:

- TIB 900K (2001, scrapped)

- TIB 1110S (2003, burnt from head to toe. Scrapped, and it burnt so badly near the present RP site, that the bus stop beside it was gone too)

- TIB 1118X (2007, slight burns outside NUS SDE, repaired)

- TIB 1063U (2008, last 2-3 rows of seats burnt away, reconstructed and back to revenue service)

- TIB 1113J (2008, reported to have caught fire recently)

- TIB 1105H (this current case)

there is something obviously wrong with the maintenance and fire prevention design. During the last breakdown i witnessed, there were 2 fire extinguishers mounted internally, that are designed to douse fires in the engine compartment. The extinguishing agent is channeled through tubes lined across the fanbelts, etc. In burning cases like the current case, the extinguishers failed in their purpose.

it's interesting to note these points:

- The burnt bendy buses use the ZF 4-speed gearbox, instead of Voith.

- The same burnt ones had gear slippage in the past, but repaired. So far gear slippage problems are limited to ZF gearboxes. Voith gearboxes will simply stop working in the worse scenarios.

- May be a batch problem (as seen by their registration plates), so better maintenance in terms of monitoring and frequency is needed. Otherwise these buses become burning chariots again and again.

another bus broke down

this time in the afternoon, just after i was done with blogging and ready to get out of my house.

instead of breaking down at the bus stop, the engine failed while the driver was making a turn from Marsiling Lane into Marsiling Drive. So the bus was in an awkward position, occupying slightly more than a lane. Heard the driver restarting the engine a few times, then trying to move. But the engine only roared, like revving in neutral mode.

went near to have a look, and saw Uncle Boo at the driver's cabin. So i stayed around to chat with him while he was waiting for the mechanics to come. He had to direct the next few buses to pass with care, since there wasn't much clearance for heavy vehicles.

4D!


The traditional Mercedes Benz bus dashboard.
The battery and fire hazard indicators were lit with beeping sounds.

the mechanics came, checked the gearbox oil and what not. Then using some Fluke and electronic meters they adjusted some stuff at the articulated section. The bus was movable after that, but had to be driven back to the depot. So we bid goodbye and uncle followed the mechanic's van back.


something is terribly wrong this semester at work. There are many viral outbreaks, already 4 as of this week (15). Luckily, the semester is ending soon.

normally, once i found out the root cause, i'll obtain a hashed value of the executable and pass it to P for blocking at domain wide level (entire SIT and affiliated domains). But the latest discovery caused mayhem - tests had to be postponed as the computers were effectively made useless. Plus the executable file varied in date/time and size, so the hashing method was useless. Command prompt was deleted too, so no way to delete off the bugger. I suspect there's another one undetected, so i'm tracing it down when i go back on sat.

at this rate, we will be busy catching worms and wearing bio suits in the lab. Instead of working on more technical and pressing issues.

2 events

1. bus broke down

this bus was 1 trip earlier than the one i took home. Apparently the doors opened and couldn't close; the doors were freely swinging back and forth as though they ran out of gas. Yes, literally since the doors were not fully electric ones. Since the braking system was designed to be fully engaged when the doors are open (note: this is an example of inter-locking brake system), the bus was dead on the spot. Can't even move an inch, similar to the SBS buses such as the wheelchair Scania K230UBs.

so in 30 minutes, the mechanic from the depot came. He took out all his tools from his lorry, which had 4 compartments, started to tinker with the rear of the bus. He thought he found a leaking air pump, trapped the holes and the driver tried closing the doors. Nope, no response.

another 30 minutes passed, he gave up and called for towing. Meanwhile, he started to dismantle a portion of the front bumper. Off came the registration plate and a block of wood, probably an area where the tow can attach to. The tow uncle came, spent another 45 minutes fitting his tow under the bus, jacking it up and pulling it back to workshop.

just after the bus was fully jacked up, the tow uncle went into the bus and tried closing the doors.

and the doors closed as per normal! The brake was released with a gassy sound, and the tow end jerked a bit because of reduced axle pressure. Then tow for what? Maybe the mechanic had his reasons, lah.

conclusion? bendy buses are hard to maintain, hard to tow back. And i discovered the mechanic kept washing his hands using some detergent and water. The moment he was done with washing, he took his tools and played around. -.-...

Notice the doors


The bus behind nearly got stuck cause' of insufficient clearance


Dismantling the front bumper for towing...

After so much of adjustment, finally lifted the bus

2. pc crashed

actually i didn't crash it. Few posts ago, i was talking about turning off my server and transfer its job tasks elsewhere. So i decided to setup a new file server with data redundancy on my PC. Armed with 2 new 320GB drives, using the onboard RAID, i switched from AHCI to RAID in the BIOS.

booted Vista, and it crashed with the usual blue screen. No solutions online, thus had to reformat. If you have a modern chipset that offers AHCI and RAID, please please please use RAID. The modes are not switchable once you installed your Windows.

then i tried to clone my server's data drive to my new RAID array. Symantec Ghost refuses any operation from/to the array, since the latter was disabled in all screens. After some hair pulling, i realised the RAID controller didn't fully initialise the array with a master boot record. Had to use my Windows XP installer, pop in the floppy containing the RAID driver, create a partition and return to Ghost.

now my PC has 4 drives, 2 running in RAID 1. The other 2 are my existing ones. The server has completed its job, and powered off for a good rest. Probably giving it to my eldest niece when she is ready to use it.

RIP - Server hostname SUN01. From Pentium 200MHz, through many upgrades, to current Pentium M 1.73GHz. 2002 - 2008

new bus service for train commuters in the north

COMMUTERS living in the north can soon take a new bus service to work instead of squeezing with MRT crowds. SBS Transit service 128 will begin its first trip next Monday, starting its journey at Yio Chu Kang MRT and ending at Tanjong Pagar MRT.

The new service is part of a plan to let bus services duplicate parts of mature rail lines that face heavy passenger loads, giving commuters more travel options.

These services were scrapped previously when the MRT lines started operations.

Service 128 will make stops at 13 MRT stations along its route, with stops in between stations as well.

The service will run four trips each during the morning and evening rush hour.

Besides service 128, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) said in a press statement on Monday that the number of premium bus services has grown to 76, from 42 in January.

Premium bus services offer commuters a fast and direct journey from the heartlands to the Central Business District, with few stops and a guaranteed seat.

LTA chief executive Yam Ah Mee said the LTA will continue to work with operators to make sure that more of such services will be available.


what's shocking - LTA apparently lost their bearings and claimed that Yio Chu Kang is in the north. So where will Sembawang, Woodlands, Bt Panjang be? Super-north of Singapore? Or we should call ourselves Malaysians because LTA has considered the area to be part of Southern Johor?

those people suffering are those in the super-north. Imagine you board from Marsiling or Woodlands to find all the seats taken, then stand for 16 stops to Raffles Place. Or try to take a bus down town, to find no buses that goes to Shenton Way at all. Add in the daily congestion from the checkpoint and the feeder buses are all choked because most of them run around the checkpoint area.

LTA is still not getting their transportation basics right. SMRT is now helping LTA screw it up further.

where are the 66 new SMRT buses? Oh, one came to Singapore. During the maiden trip, the shiny and green bus broke down on BKE and had to be towed back to workshop. Totally embarrassing. Sheesh.

i'm full of sarcasm in this post because MOT/LTA/SMRT has disappointed the masses again and again. The professional management of SMRT is fast becoming a liability and a thorn in the public transportation landscape. Take note, all the big guns reading.

all about buses

heard from SGForums that there will be another redeployment among SMRT bus fleets. From some old birds who are more familiar (eg, they know that TIB 425 R runs on Service 61, yeah you should get my meaning), it's actually an undeployment because it reverses much of the movements done in April.

i don't care about this micro redeployments - i hope SMRT/LTA can put up the 66 new standard length buses on revenue service soon. Newspapers proudly reported SMRT's CEO and her historical background and the "Better by Bus/Train" initiative in the past 2 months. Together with the initiative, they put big marketing dollars on incoming WAB Mercedes bus and launched it at University Cultural Centre of NUS.

the new fleet was supposed to arrive a month ago. Now? Nowhere to be seen. No press statements explaining the delay either. Not sure which organisation is holding things up, but it only goes to show the inefficiencies in either SMRT or LTA.


on another juicy news, a Service 168 bus captain lost his way from Bedok/Tampines to Woodlands. Apparently he missed the exit at Woodlands Ave 2, went to BKE, Woodlands Rd (?!) and ended up at Bt Panjang. There was a staff van guiding it, which was supposed to guide him from Woodlands Rd to BKE to Woodlands, but instead, went from BKE to Bt Panjang.

slap head... and know what?

passengers onboard tried in vain to persuade the captain to follow their directions, yet the captain insisted his way. Will passengers bring him to some funny places and rob him? Even if i don't factor in the nationality of the captain (Singaporean or Chinese national), i feel like laughing and crying. I believe the passengers onboard were fuming though.

reminded me of a similar incident a month ago on Service 161. Another captain also missed the exit, but he was familiar and smart enough to follow the signs at BKE. He got out at Woodlands Ave 3 and went via Marsiling MRT towards Woodlands interchange. I was inside, watching TV mobile while the captain apologised to everyone at the two MRT stations.

168 - yat lok fat. Literally, fat until Bt Panjang. Time to wack the captain and the guide.

new SMRT Buses from may (finally)

the 1st wave will have 66 standard length omnibuses from Mercedes Benz (EvoBus). If SMRTB exercises their option, another 66 buses will join the fleet.

information from SGforums, photos from a person called "TIB1018B" and information from another person called "sv966". Present bus photos from another guy called "TIB1224Y" (sorry to use it without permission). Lots of funny names here, sorry.

this time round, a Malaysian based company (Gemilang) is providing the wheelchair-accessible bodywork for the Mercedes chassis. Gemilang also provided the chassis for SBS Transit's 500 units of Scania K230UB. So, expect the general design to be similar. Means, lesser seats compared to conventional buses.

due to regulatory requirements, the bus emission standard is Euro V. As mentioned, it is also wheelchair accessible (WAB), which is the first for SMRTB. However, even if SMRTB exercises their option to bring the total order to 132, it is still below the 40% WAB requirement mandated by LTA.

with the entry of 66 buses, i hope SMRTB will

1. increase the frequencies of key trunk services - 61, 67, 171, 190, 851, 960, 963, just to name a few

2. introduce more basic (read: not $3-4 express) services that serves the northern sector of SG

(photos courtesy of TIB1018B)

If SMRTB chooses the TIB registration plate, the range will be
TIB 1258 A to TIB 1323U if the order is followed

Yeah, just to contrast the front.

Looks like the current Volgren-SMRTB fleets

Yup, looks very close to SBS Transit's WAB

technical specifications (courtesy of sv966):

- Chassis: Mercedes Benz OC500LE

- Engine: OM 457/906 hLA, Euro V

- Airconditioning: Konvekta (Denmark)

- Electronic destination sign (EDS) system: LAWO/LLE (Denmark), orange LED

The previous batch of LAWO EDS used in bendy buses are going to unreadable soon - the top section was cut off, the flip dots were covered in dust. The bendy bus in the previous post uses Transit Media, much cleaner BUT the flip dots are laggy.

The 300 is cropped.

Both are not nice. Hope this batch will be sealed to prevent dust from accumulating.

- Minor stuff: classic rectangular cool air vents similar to the Habit bendy buses, red/black chairs, on-board and alighting voice announcements (imagine DOORS CLOSING. tu tu tu tu tu tu), no driver window, blah blah blah. The rest you can experience them in May.


once again, thanks to the various copyright holders. Hope you are generous enough to allow the usage of the photo(s), for the good of the public =p

letter to Minister

i've been wanting to write this letter for months. At the SGDi, all the emails of the PTC board members were removed. Not sure why, but this doesn't reflect well of PTC being a people's transport council. So, i changed the recipient of the letter. Anyway, here it goes. Pardon the little grammar errors...

Dear Sir,

I am taking a bold step by writing this email. Nevertheless, I sincerely hope you are able to spend a couple of minutes reading on. I am a bus enthusiast and a member of “Friends of SMRT”, currently an undergraduate at the National University of Singapore.

In the public transport enthusiast circle (Singapore Buses @ SGForums), words were going round that SMRT Buses (SMRTB) is affected by a chronic bus shortage situation. Various members of the public has lent further strength of this rumour by giving feedback and even posting pictures on SPH’s Stomp.

“Peak hour crush on bus services 190 and 960” – 3 Jun 2007 - Link
“SMRT: We’re monitoring overcrowding on 960” – 11 Aug 2007 - Link
“He waited for over an hour to board his bus” – 12 Jan 2008 - Link


I believe with confidence that the SMRTB management has been working on overcrowding through innovative deployments of the bus fleet. However, remedy efforts have not changed the big picture on the whole. Certain SMRTB services such as 67, 190, 851 and 960 have been affected by the high-load factor of commuters during peak hours since last year. I would like to humbly offer my analysis.


Insufficient buses to cater to demand
The last new fleet of Mercedes buses was delivered to SMRTB in 2004. Commuter demand should have risen since then, and new buses should be injected into revenue service.

Hitherto, there were no purchases of new buses. To deal with the overcrowding situation, SMRTB has brought in a handful of existing buses from City Shuttle Services (CSS). These buses came from the withdrawn CSS route 608. Now, the ex-CSS buses are plying routes in the north-western corridor, such as route 178 and 187. Existing buses were transferred to other high-demanding routes to cope with demand.

However, this represents another problem – the ex-CSS buses frequently break down, causing untold inconveniences to commuters. I personally observed a higher breakdown rate on these old buses as I am residing in Woodlands. This has led to a question of whether the buses are still roadworthy for revenue service.

Meanwhile, while SMRTB has ordered new buses, the delivery will only start at the end of the year. The current demand from many services under its charge has overwhelmingly outstripped supply.


Severity of the situation
There are insufficient statistics to ascertain the extent of overcrowding on SMRTB’s routes. So far, enthusiasts have discussed bus deployments, but no quantitative measurements on quality of service.

In the past, events requiring mass deployments on special shuttle services, such as the Air Show 2008, and major route diversions such as NDP or Singapore Fireworks Festival, many SMRTB city routes came under great strain. Route managers attempted to assign more high capacity bendy buses from various depots to these special/city routes to alleviate overcrowding. But, such a move presents a “see-saw” effect. Other routes, such as feeder routes that still require these buses were affected to a certain extent.

For example, route 960 is frequently overcrowded on weekdays and weekends. During peak hours, additional split shifts were put on service. While my previous feedback in Aug 2007 saw the addition of 1-2 more buses to the route, some buses were swapped with non-articulated ones. In the end, the situation has remained largely the same. For a popular city route to the northern corridor, the frequency has been stagnant at 10-15 minutes for years. Comparatively, SBS Transit’s city routes has generally better frequencies. SBS Transit is also more proactive in combating congestion, such as the continuous tracking of buses on congested routes, and buffering congestion by injecting spare buses at the right bus stops when situations call for them.

Of recent, the escape of the JI fugitive has caused congestion at Woodlands Checkpoint and the surrounding main roads. SMRTB has diverted affected routes to avoid Woodlands Centre Road wherever possible. Still, the feeder route 903 that serves my residential area is badly affected. Commuters waiting at the 2nd, 3rd and 4th stops after the interchange have no chance to board buses that were filled up to the door steps, leading to extremely long waits of minimum 10-15 mins per missed bus.


Suggestion
I read with excitement that SMRTB have ordered new fleet of buses in the coming future. Plans in the Land Transport Review also gave northern residents a glimmer of hope in the improvement of bus transportation in 2 years time. However, in the meantime, commuters have to put up with the chronic overcrowding situation on many SMRTB routes.

Therefore, I would like to suggest 2 possible solutions:

- SMRTB enters into a leasing agreement with SBS Transit, to operate the latter’s buses on SMRTB routes, to increase frequency, especially on city routes.
- SMRTB transfers a number of high-demand routes to SBS Transit until it has the ability to provide a satisfactory quality of service. Buses on transferred routes can therefore be used to increase frequency of other SMRTB routes in the short term.

SBS Transit has introduced more than 300 wheelchair accessible double and single decked buses since last year, with at least 300-400 in order. It is almost certain SBS Transit has a surplus of buses for now, as a large number of old buses that are to be scrapped in 2008 are extended by another 2 years. In the recent SMRT disruption between Pasir Ris and Tanah Merah, SBS Transit has comfortably supplied 30 buses under SMRT’s request. In my opinion, SBS Transit is well positioned to help solve SMRTB’s overcrowding problem now.

Sir, I feel that SMRTB will not exercise these solutions unless there are strong motivations to do so. However, many commuters would be happy to see an improvement on the ground. I thank you for reading this email, and I look forward to a truly effective transportation landscape for Singapore in the years ahead.



Yours sincerely,

Ng Zhi Ming

will i get thru this?

how to solve my inefficiency problem? Need someone to help me with it. Nana? lolz..

the police ops is affecting transportation around my area. Just now at 10.30pm, i decided to lose 15 minutes of my precious time taking an extra round on 903 towards Woodlands Center. Wanted to see for myself the traffic. It was still darn jammed up, vehicles backing all the way up to the junction between Woodlands Ave 3 and Ctr Rd. For those who doesn't know where i'm talking about, that is the junction at Marsiling MRT.

so how did it affect transportation? Because the section of Woodlands Ctr Road from Woodlands Ave 3 to the roundabout is blocked, all intratown services 911, 912 and 913 plus 178 and 856 bound for Yishun had to get stuck for a good 15-30 minutes before they can execute wrap-arounds and seek escape routes back to interchange. With the current bus crisis SMRT Buses is having, service will be affected.

for Woodlanders, it is interesting to see wrap-arounds happen. During a heavy jam, drivers just change route details on the EDS and watch for cues from on-site service guys:

- 903 avoids turning into the circus. Goes into Marsiling Rise and back to usual route

- 911 turns right into Woodlands Ctr. But it turns into Marsiling Rise, then takes on 913 route

- 912 either turns right into Woodlands St 13 (912--> 911) or turns right into Marsiling Rise (912--> 913) or turns right at the mosque (912--> 903)

- 913 turns left into Woodlands Ctr towards Marsiling MRT. Either assumes 911 or 912 depending on demands.

- 178? Not sure. As for 856 towards Yishun, it is the one that's impacted the most. Because a 15-30 minute delay means the entire schedule is screwed. I don't know how the route master settles such delays.


speaking about the crisis, scores of people complained about the Air Show's shuttle service. It only showed SMRT Buses' inexperience and insufficiency to deal with big events. Hope they will buck up and speed up the delivery of the hundreds of buses soon. Otherwise, it's time to petition to PTC to force SMRT to temporarily hand over the cash cow 61 or 190 to SBS, to relieve the stress on other heavy routes.

buses brief - SBST fleet renewal

recently everyone would have observed SBS Transit's new fleet of double deck buses.

Very visible at YCK Interchange - 72 and 76 has lots of them

No, this is not the WAB model - B10TL that came before B9TL.
Recognized by its loud radiator on the right

although the common name would be WABs (Wheelchair Accessible Buses), these double decks are technically known as Volvo Olympian B9TL. The bodywork is assembled by ComfortDelgro Engineering (CDGE), which is a subsidiary of ComfortDelgro. If you're not aware, SBS Transit is part of CDG too.

the B9TL, being the latest generation of buses in SBS Transit and Singapore presents these new prominent features:

- Climatic controlled airconditioning by Denso (?)
- Fully wheelchair accessible with wheelchair ramp, zero-step entry
- Outswing "plug" doors for smooth exit
- Vogelsitze passenger seats for comfort
- improved driver's cabin in terms of seat and space

- EURO-3 emission standard
- electronic transmission; 6 speed gearbox by ZF, or 4 speed gearbox by Voith

the buses are registered in the range of SBS 7300P to 7499A, meaning a total order of 150 initially, with option of 50 more (already exercised).


SBS Transit is not stopping here! It has ordered from Scania, another whopping 500 new single deck buses, codenamed K230UB. The purchase is to primarily replace the aging single deck Mercedes MB0405s and Volvo B10M Mark IIs that are running around Singapore since 1988-1990.

Going off soon to the scrapyard - Scania N113

Many have already been scrapped - Volvo B10M Mark II

Going off soon to the scrapyard - Mercedes MB0405 (Alexander bodywork)

Going off, too - MB0405 (Duple Metsec bodywork)

for the Scania K230UB, the bodywork will be produced in Malaysia, except for the demonstrator buses that are already built by CDGE. The demonstrator buses will be out very soon, so watch out for them.

Getting ready for revenue service

K230UB's rear

some trivia, the only 2 bendy buses in SBS Transit disappeared a while ago - both were sold to Bayes Coachline Fleet in New Zealand as school buses. o.O

things are going very slowly at SMRT Buses. It's hard to understand why they have not expanded their fleet since 2004, despite increasing demand for popular services under their charge. The worst thing they have done is to close down City Shuttle Services (CSS), then transfer the really old fleet to SMRT Buses. Some people don't even know where to press the bell!

they put up a tender for 66 new buses, which will most likely be from Scania. Mercedes Benz will be preferred since their engines are robust, but these are expensive stuff. No matter which brand, these buses better come quickly.

day out shopping

i planned to wake up at 9am, but still unable to even as i programmed my aircon to turn off at 8.30am! In the end i snoozed till 12pm =x

today was a day i hopped around in many buses and trains (watch in horror as i recap with bus registration plates intact):

- Sv 903, TIB 1140E to Interchange
- Sv 960, TIB 1063U to Bugis
- Sv 33, SBS 0035B to Clarke Quay (transfer)
- NEL to Chinatown (transfer)
- NEL to Dohby Ghaut (transfer)
- Sv 106, TIB 1087B to Suntec
- Sv 36, SBS 2727A to Airport
- Sv 858, TIB 585L to Woodlands
- Private car back home (phew)

i'm not mad, but i'm a mild bus enthusiast who remembers more details. I can tell at most, the bus plate number by its advertisement or engine noise (limited to Woodlands services), that's all!

anyway, my first stop was at Chinatown, to buy some toiletries. It's indeed cheaper than buying from Watsons. Just accumulate or buy a significant number of items to feel the difference.

The hawker centre beside OG, 3rd floor - Ocean and LeyWah are very competitive

The savings are substantial, you know

had my early dinner at the hawker itself, Koo Kee yong tau foo. I wanted to patronise the more famed stall (run by 3 brothers), but the sales were so good that they declared sold-out by 5pm.

then went to Suntec's eLife Mall to buy my mouse. I couldn't get $147.90, only $155 (!). Managed to negotiate for $150, but only by cash. Since i spent much effort looking (and walking), i settled for $155 via credit.

it was my 1st time using the Citi card, which i've been putting off as i'm not mentally prepared. Yes, not mentally prepared. I intend to set aside cash for the card charges... not playing with fire since debts can be pretty serious in terms of credit rating and damage to my own life imo.

next zoomed off to airport and did 2hrs of coding there. My Customer Portfolio is up soon; the Add and Update features is completed. Now left the Delete and Webmaster login features. Good training for my CS3214, although it was plain old JSP with MVC design, since it was developed in 2003. Will be releasing for preview soon, if anyone is interested.

just had kopi with Wenqun, GY and Eze. Had quite a fierce discussion on NTUC's Jackpots in AMK Hub, and heard abit on Estate duties. I still feel NTUC has a social responsibility to fulfill, and it is not doing that when it opened that Jackpot room in the heartlands. Especially when NTUC is very much linked to our ruling party in Singapore.

by and large it was quite a fruitful session, although i was feeling bored during the televised football match. No love for football.

simlim action

many people know simlim is the place to get electronic stuff. But most of them won't know there are so many carrot head choppers lurking around. And some dare you, the customer, to call in police because they know nothing can be done to them for selling water goods/lemons/incomplete packaged goods.

be alert and check! Some don't include GST into the quoted price until you pay the bill, or take some stuff out and attempt to sell to you as "accessories". Like batteries, pouches and what not.

today i went over to shop for the Microsoft Wireless Notebook Presenter 8000. I was in Skylet when i heard a woman saying something over the PA - "all security guards to level 2 NOW"!

then of course, many Singaporeans are busybodies (including me). Word passed around that there was a fight in a Level 2 shop. When i went out, the party has already dispersed to the security counter, where an indian lady was gesturing wildly. I guessed the shopkeeper tried to slap her from her actions. Cool.

in the end, i didn't buy the mouse. Fuwell was selling it at $165, but i remembered somewhere was selling for $147.90. I thought that 'somewhere' was in Funan, but what i found there was $179. Oh no, where did i see that $147.90 sticker???


on the way home i decided to carry out the duties of ticket inspector for SMRT Buses. Was complaining about 960's frequency last weekend, and after visual checking of 4-5 buses coming out from Marina Bay, i'm confident i can get PTC to investigate:

- 15-20 mins frequency, above guaranteed of 12-15 mins
- woodlands bound buses were typically overloaded after Bugis Village bus stop (crazy)
- further violation of overloading and standing on steps rule

SMRT Buses, good luck. I'm really pissed at the service quality yet you proposed a fare hike. Gonna make your corp comms dept suffer.

ndp preview

although i was sick, i went to city to look for a keyboard replacement.

my old keyboard had the same problem for the 2nd time. Gave up...!

The ENTER key gave way again.zzzz

my shortlisted replacement is Microsoft Reclusa, which is a gaming keyboard. However i'm more interested in the backlit keys...

Expensive pricetag of $119

nope, i was not very convinced to buy due to the pricetag. Wait for a few more days before deciding.

had a quick dinner at Food Junction (Funan), then walked to Esplanade hoping to catch the fireworks.

That's the best view i can get

The starfishes floating in from Clifford area

Fireworks atop buildings! UOB, NTUC Income and one more

Began at around 8.08pm

Too smoky la.

I thought it was over. 2 minutes later, another boom!

it's odd that the fireworks were fired from the same spot (it seemed). There wasn't any variation, such as lower tiered shoots across the landscape. The end result was a very smoky sky, which even obscured some portions of the fireworks.

then i planned to take 960 home, to test out on the frequency. As expected, it took 27 minutes for a bus to appear. This is unacceptable... so i wrote in to feedback. If SMRT Buses don't improve the frequency, it's time to suggest SBST take over key trunk routes such as 61, 106, 190 and 960.

even the train frequency sucks because they want to save cost. Vote PAP next season? Over my dead body unless MOT restructures SMRT Corp.