almost there

12 days more. not to chrismas, but till my stint a ndp ic (national day parade in-charge) is over, and i have to say that i can't wait

i've met pilots, wizzos, geriatrics, young uns, families, (what passes off for) pop stars, tankies, commando free-fallers, incompetent administrators and celebrities amongst others during my tenure. I've played administrator, confidant, good cop, bad cop, nice guy, hardass, co-ordinator and motivator. an interesting experience no doubt, but one that i am not too anxious to repeat.

all it took was several pan-island crossings today to realize how overworked i've been recently.

overworked, but thankfully, not under-appreciated.

space filler: video conferencing

meet junior the apple guy. here he is demonstrating the perils of making a stupid face in front of a photographer.

un-fuckin'-believable

only in singapore.

i guess it could happen in other parts of the world, but as of now, i'd like to think that something this inane couldn't happen anywhere else.

according to the straits times:

"A year-long search for a new brand name to help sell major developments in Marina Bay has ended with a final decision.
And the winner is... Marina Bay.

The URA (Urban Redevelopment Authority) paid consultancy Interbrand $400,000 to come up with an idea brand for the area. In the process, it consulted parties such as developers, retailers, restaurant owners and tour operators. Some 400 possible names had been mooted. Previously, the area had variously been dubbed "New Downtown", "extension of the CBD" and "Marina Bayfront". But as it turned out, the right name had been starting everyone in the face all along."

what i am trying to understand, is how such a large amount of money (two-thirds of a peanut in fact [see previous post]), could be put towards such a fruitless endevor. ah beng blogger rockson tan said it best when he exclaimed:

"Must be this overseas ang moh advertising company know how to make the Gahmen give them money to come up this kind of fucked up idea, still can say well done. If is only local company, sure kena fuck by Gahmen for this idea. Ang moh can be very smart, gong wei sibei kiang (mouth very clever). Make you suck his cock already you will still give him money and say thank you for letting me suck your cock sir, want me to suck another time?"

don't get me wrong, i have nothing against caucasians (i just thought the above quote was side-splittingly funny), but what i do have a problem with is the inherent attitudes of locals towards white people in general. it's hard to understand why many locals still think of caucasians as being a "superior race with superior ideas". it may be a throwback to colonial times, but it's still bloody stupid.

almost as stupid as paying $400,000 for nothing.

NKFed

thanks to talkingcock.com for the comic strip.

also, some new additions to singlish...

NKF: (verb) - to cheat, to report lower or higher figures with an intention to cheat, to report false figures. Eg. Ah Beng NKFed his salary to impress that ah lian he was after without realizing that she NKFed her vital statistics by wearing wonder bra.

NKF: (noun) - an organization whose modus operandi are dubious. Eg. Ah Lian left that company because she found that it is an NKF.

TT Durai: (verb) - to secretly take and take money from company, to secretly maximize entitlements or privileges. Eg. Ah Seng regretted not TT Durai'ing as much as possible from his ex-company before he was sacked.

peanut: (noun) - a unit of currency equivalent to S$600,000. Eg. The jackpot for the Toto this Thursday is 2 peanuts (S$1.2m).

in times like these, i wish i were paid peanuts.

space filler: illuminate

light... every photographer's best friend

space filler: worked to death

you can only work so much

back in green

lunch!

too tired to blog, so i'll just slap on this short pr piece i had to write for my battalion newsletter:

I’m not going to lie and say I was looking forward to coming back for this latest in-camp training. However, I think it would be safe to assume that most of my battalionmates shared my feelings of relief (that it was a low key, 5 day in-camp), frustration (that it clashed with the many things we needed to do out in the ‘real world’) and last minute panic (“Do I have everything I need? Where the hell are my boots? Must remember to bring phone charger!” and of course the perennial “SIAO LIAO! Can pass IPPT or not?!?”) We all know the crap that we go through during ICT (in camp training), so instead of bemoaning over it’s bad points, let me try to think of things that made it worthwhile for me.

My first introduction to 6*7 singapore infantry regiment during the last high key in-camp in 2004 was bewildering to say the least. Having gone abroad to study and work after my ORD (operationally ready date) from the 7th mono intake of 6SIR, it was strange to come back and be around people who were familiar in so many ways, and yet so different. I have to give props to the people at SP Coy (support company) for making it easy to return and face the culture shock of the SAF after being away for eight years.

This ICT was a far cry from the last. Faces once unknown were welcoming and familiar, and the strangers I was once surrounded by were quickly beginning to resemble a large extended family. It was nice to continue where we had left off; the previously girlfriendless armskote man finally found a significant other at work, the medic has changed his job for a better paying one and the entrepreneur had traded in his beemer for a new car. Even the discovery that one of my bunkmates has never held the hand of a girl, was reason enough to keep us up for hours as we devised schemes for him to get over his shyness and find that special someone.

Most of the specialists, many whom I met for the first time, had just graduated from university and returned, boosting the strength of the company and restoring leadership to the ranks. Also candidly noted, was the blurring of the line between specialists, officers and men during the downtime after training. Not from the loss of respect, but more from the bond that has continued to develop after ORD and into reservist training.

Three years done and ten more to go. The apprehension that I once had has long since disappeared. I won’t stop griping about how much of a hassle ICT is, neither will I look forward to it, but having a new family in 6*7 will definitely make the next 10 years easier to bear.

erm...

thanks for the heads up, but i wasn't planning on going in anyway.

outdated

i am in shock.

just discovered that i can't play the sims2 on my beautiful powerbook because the minimum requirements call for at least a 1.2GHz G4 or G5 processor and while i have 1.5GB of ram to speed up my aluminium baby, my processor only clocks in at 1GHz G4.

what kind of world is it when you can work on 60mb files in photoshop and yet can't run a bloody game where characters walk around doing jack and mumble in some unintelligible goobledegook. and the worst thing is that it only needs a 2GHz processor on a damn pc.

it bothers me to think that things are getting obsolete so much quicker these days. who knows, in a couple of years, we'll be buying new phones every 3 months and needing a new computer every year just to check email.

it boggles the mind *shudder*