I can't get it up !!

No, it's not what you think. You've got a filthy mind!

It's my middle finger.
I started suffering a medical condition termed as tenosynovitis about 2 months back.
What we layman  call a Trigger Finger.


My left middle finger occasionally locks into a bent position and it hurts like hell.
It takes a lot of muscular effort to try and straighten it back up.
Alternatively, I can pry it open with my other hand but this hurts a lot more, especially when it 'clicks' back into position. Oowwww!

I went to the doctor this morning for a blood test review.
The diagnosis was that the trigger finger wasn't caused by any infection or rheumatism, nor a reaction to the statins I am taking.

So the next best course is to get a jab of cortiscosteroid into the joint.
But this can only be done at NUH hospital Hand Surgery Unit and not at the Polyclinic where I went this morning. Appointment for that procedure is pending.

Strangely, the cause of trigger fingers is still unknown medically.
They can only treat the symptoms and relieve the pain or do minor surgery to release the pressure on the tendons. If the injection of steroids doesn't help, then the final course is surgery.

Here is a clip on how they do the trigger finger surgery. DO NOT WATCH if you are squeamish!
My stomach churched just from watching it. You have been warned.

Bring or take, what's the difference?

My sister and her husband recently bought a fish farm at Lim Chu Kang.
Already it has generated so much excitement from friends all asking to bring them there for a visit.
Bring them there?

Take me there! I wanna go!  (pic stolen off my niece laura-lynn)

This piqued me to start writing this piece about the wrong use of words again.
Many are confused over the difference between BRING and TAKE.
More so in our multi-cultural environment as bring and take can be used interchangeably in Chinese or Malay, from which many of us adapt its grammer resulting in Singlish!

When to use bring or take should be seen from the speaker's perspective.
Bring usually involves another person and an object to be moved TOWARDS you (the speaker).
Take involves an object moving AWAY from you.

Here are some simple examples.
Please bring me the file. (movement towards you)
Please take this file to the manager. (movement away from you)

Will you take the children to their tuition classes? 
Will you bring the children to their tuition classes? is wrong. Here you don't say bring as the movement is away from you. This is usually where most people get it wrong.

As I said, bring or take depends on the speaker's point of view.
The same scenario can be either bring or take depending on who says it.

You say, Please bring me the accounts records.
She replies, Ok, I take it to you in a while.
(note she doesn't say bring it to you because she's speaking from her perspective).

Use this simple rule of thumb and you usually won't go wrong.
Just remember when you order MacDonald's, it's take-away not bring away,
though it's the same in Chinese!


But...there are exceptions!
That's just to add to your confusion, however,  that's another story. 

Useless Signs

I've started a new page for collating USELESS signs that can be found in Singapore.
What I want to show are signages that are redundant, ridiculous,  ignored or just simply useless.

I don't mean signs that have wrong translations like hand chicken for sale (hand phones), or singlish or bad grammer, which are commonly found at most heartland places, but genuine signs that might as well not be there. These are signs that actually have a meaningful purpose, except a lot of the time, it's simply ignored.

I am doing this just for laughs and not as a social commentator.
I'll lead off by showing some examples.
I would love to get more contribution from others as well.

25 July 2011

Another commonly ignored sign.

Life would be that little bit better if only everyone  do their part.

21 Jul 2011

At the MRT bicycle park.

In other countries, you are REQUIRED to slow down.
Here it seems to mean there's probably a school somewhere around here?
Ignoring this sign can be so fatal!

19 Jul 2011

No swimming on the grass at the HortPark.

At the MRT stations train platforms.

I have yet to see a single parent not taking the baby-stroller onto the escalators.

The most ignored signboard on the road.
Imagine the amount of money spent to put up thousands of these signage everywhere in Singapore !

You can't 'pay' when you exit, whether it's the correct or incorrect fare!
Technically,  the bus deducts the maximum amount when you board
and returns you the unused balance when you exit!
The bus gets extra money from you if you don't tap out.

I am more gracious than you are !

It such a telling statement of the level of graciousness we seemed to have arrived at.
I feel really sad indeed.

A recent survey by the Singapore Kindness Movement, as reported by the Straits Times on 4th July 2011, showed that 43% of Singaporeans perceived that they are more gracious to others, while they feel that only 15% are gracious in return!

Click on picture to enlarge

We Singaporeans seem to have lost our souls in the quest to move ahead technologically.
Perhaps, sub-conscious social engineering over the years have made us into selfish uncaring digits in the great machinery of enterprise.

Today we are measured by our status, by our country GDP, profits, KPIs, scholarship awards, etc.
People feel that they have 'made it' once they are on their way towards their 5 Cs (Cash, Car, Credit Card, Country Club Condo).  Ideals about family, others and country seemed to be placed on the back burners.

Recent disturbing signs of this 'graciousness' include the infamous "get out of my elitist uncaring face"  diatribe by the daughter of a senior civil servant, and the recent call by "Samantha" for heartlanders (esp those from Bukit Batok, hey that's me!) to stay of out Holland Village.

Acts of self-centeredness can be seen daily at the MRT train stations, bus terminals, supermarket checkouts and even on the roads. My pet peeve is the tissue paper packets 'chope-ing' seats at the food courts.

I also notice a trend nowadays to put the all blame on the 'foreign talent' workers and expatriates working here. It's so easy to blame others for not getting your own way.

I just feel so sad over all these hypocrisy.
I feel so helpless with the whole downward spiraling situation.

Sigh sigh sigh.

You never know what you're gonna get.

".... like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get". (Forest Gump)

I went on a vanity exercise last Sunday and did a bit of egosurfing.
Egosurfing is what you do when you send your own name through the web search engines, what some folks say "Have you Googled yourself?"

What I got back were pretty much expected.
Most of my entries on my blogs and Facebook and my reviews of hotels in Tripadvisor.

Even then, it was still a pretty amazing feat.
I can still remember those days when we used Netscape and did basic searches with Gopher and Archie... ok,ok, I'll stop talking of those days! Sigh, it comes with age...

Then for amusement I thought, let me try searching the National Archives.
Maybe I can trawl something there?

What returned truly surprised me.
The results brought back snippets I assumed would just be forever locked within  my own personal memories.

In the National Archives, I could find only once when my name turned up.
This was in The Straits Times of 24 Oct 1977 when the results of a photography contest was published.
I was placed 4th in the Adult Section (sounds pornographic today haha!)

BUT the most amazing thing was that it was able to link my name to my father and father-in-law and brought out articles that I would never have thought survived to this day.

There were actually quite numerous articles about my father since he was linked to the dramatic and arts scene circle back in his days. Mostly about the plays he performed in those days, but here's one that was about his career.

Straits Times, 12 July 1967

The most mind blowing find was about my father-in-law.
How did it ever make the connection I will never know.  You'll get a blast over this one!
It was from the Singapore Free Press (now defunct) of 17 May 1960.

The article was an interview with my father-in-law, Mr Francis Teo, who after 12 attempts managed to get his 1st born son!
What were they thinking in those days? Guess he really was a staunch Catholic.
My wife Juliana is ninth from the right of the row of girls in the picture.

Search engines like Google and Bing today use such powerful mathematical algorithms that nothing appears to be hidden from it and it can tie in the minutest details and link it to your query.

I dread the day when privacy is a long forgotten word.

Try egosurfing the National Archives yourself, you never know what will turn up.

Singapore Quarry and the Chia Eng Say connection.

Strangely, small coincidences seem to keep popping up in sequence for me.
It all started with the KTM railway closure. (click on link to go there)
Visiting the Rail Mall led me to Fuyong Estate and to Jalan Asas.
This then led me onwards to the old shortcut to the Singapore Quarry Park.
At the quarry park there is a plaque that reads "A Quarry story of....Chia Eng Say..."

The plaque at the Singapore Quarry Park.

Click to read the Ode mentioning Chia Eng Say.

Then just last night, I chanced upon a blog by a Kevin Lee mentioning a disused 'nameless' road running by Rail Mall train tracks. He wondered why it was there.
Wow, just what are all these coincidences ?
I realised the common link to them all is Chia Eng Say!

The original Chia Eng Say Road ran beside the railway truss bridge.
Now abandoned and covered with detritus.

A brief background to the man, the road and the quarry

Chia Eng Say Road was a private road built by the quarry company for access to their quarrying operations. It was the only access from Upper Bukit Timah Road to the quarries and ran parallel to the former KTM railway line. I can still recall trucks with their load of huge granite rocks rumbling along the road, off to some construction site somewhere in developing Singapore.

The road ran through a Chinese kampong known to us 'locals' as Kampung Chia Eng Say.
The kampong has been demolished and the homesteaders have been resettled in HDB housing, I presume. How sad.

Two of my old schoolmates used to live in that kampong, Quek Chee Ling and Wong Bee Leng. Alas, I've completely lost contact with them after our school days ended.
I can recall visiting them often at the kampong, especially during the times when the Chinese wayangs played during some religious celebrations.
I used to lived at Fuyong Estate that was just beside the old quarry worker's kampung.

A footbridge ran from Chia Eng Say Road over the KTM railway line.
This gave the kampong folks and quarry workers direct access to Upper Bukit Timah Road.

The cul de sac at Jalan Asas. The playground on the right was where the old kampong was located.

The secret shortcut to the quarry at the end of the cul de sac.

Who was Chia Eng Say?
Mr Chia Eng Say was what we would call an entrepreneur today. A multi-millionaire businessman from Fujian, China, who established businesses in Penang and Singapore in the early 1900s.
He apparently lived in Katong with his large progeny, believed to be 7 sons and 15 daughters in all!  Old newspaper announcements of the past had several reports of his sons and daughters being married off with grand dinners held at his mansion at Katong.

The Chia Eng Say Quarries
Chia Eng Say obtained the rights to mining the granite on the mid-western area of the Bukit Timah Ridge in the 1930s. There he started quarrying operations at two separate but adjacent sites facing the 8-1/2 milestone Upper Bukit Timah Road. The two adjacent quarries eventually merged into a single quarry. They were initially known as the Chia Eng Say Quarries. 

How it became known as the Singapore Quarry was simply a matter of convenience.
Chia had set up several subsidiary companies to run his quarrying business.
The major company was called the Singapore Quarry Co Pte Ltd, and this was the firm that undertook the actual mining.
After Chia Eng Say died in 1943, the business was usually referred to as Singapore Quarry.
The name became pegged to the actual quarry site itself. Thus, the Chia Eng Say Quarries became simply known as the Singapore Quarry.
The quarry was closed when the Singapore government ordered all mainland quarrying of granite to cease in 1970.

The private road, Chia Eng Say Road, located beside the railway truss bridge, became disused over time and was later expunged.  In the 1980s, NParks recovered the land as part of the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve. The quarry was to be converted into a nature park.
A new access path to the nature park quarry was formed from disused sections of the old Chia Eng Say Road.
The old name of Chia Eng Say Quarry was then replaced officially as the Singapore Quarry Nature Park.

Kampung Chia Eng Say
Chia Eng Say also built homes for his workers nearby, using the unallocated land that was beside the quarry adjacent Fuyong Estate. These were basically squatter land with temporary occupation licences given to Chia's company. Thus, colloquially, the kampung came to be known as kampung Chia Eng Say.

Chia Eng Say's legacy lives on
Besides being mentioned in the ode on the plaque, his name is now firmly entrenched nearby.
When the old shophouses at Fuyong Estate were re-developed into the Rail Mall, the little service access road in front of the shops was widened to a 2-lane road and the name Chia Eng Say Road was transferred to this upgraded stretch of road.

Trivia: In 1937, Chia Eng Say won the tender to supply all the granite to build the (old) Supreme Court building. The stones came from this quarry.

The service road in front of Rail Mall is now named after Chia Eng Say.

  

Below is an overhead aerial view of the Singapore Quarry
with the defunct Chia Eng Say Road leading up to it.

In those days.....

Yesterday I took a last look at the old railway bridge at Upper Bukit Timah Road.
This bridge is due to dismantled soon, with the return of the railway land to the Singapore government.

The visit also brought me back to the old housing estate where I used to live back in the 1970s.
Called Fuyong Estate and located just bedside the KTM truss bridge. I lived there during my teen years.

This is a small freehold estate of around a hundred units, sandwiched between the old Diary Farm and the now defunct Singapore Granite Quarry. It lies on the western ridge of Bukit Timah Hill. So while I was heading to the bridge, I dropped by the estate just to see the old home and reminisce.

I could watch trains passing everyday from my house.

What was a once a simple estate of single storied bungalows, semi-detached and terraced houses has now morphed into a sad jumble of independently re-designed and re-built buildings. While there are still some single storey units, most have been redeveloped into 2, 3 or even 4 storied hulks. Some look so monstrous beside its puny neighbours.  I guess the owners are maximizing their land use. The old village atmosphere is completely lost now.

I used to live at no. 71

No 71 is at the top of the slope on the left.

Rail Mall which fronts the main Upper Bukit Timah Road was redeveloped from a row of old shop houses.  I still remember vividly the old neighbourhood provision shop and the laundry (dhoby) shop now taken over by modern MNCs like Cold Storage and Coffee Bean. Looks much better now actually.

One of the things few people ever realise is that the row of shops that now makes up Rail Mall was one of the last few places in Singapore that had the old 'bucket system' of sanitation. 'Night soil'  buckets were carted off manually everyday by the sanitation dept  in their '36 doors' lorry as we called it.
(look up Night Soil in Wiki, you'd be surprised Singapore is mentioned prominently, full of shit, haha)

I recalled that the old shortcut from the estate to the main road ran past the back lane of the shophouses and woe be you if you encounter the night soil carrier at that time! The dilemma was that you either held your breathe and continue quickly through the backlane or make a 500m detour.

The backlane. The sewers are all modern now.

The old shortcut which was just a dirt track in those days.

This was how it was done even up to the late 80s.
Salute and respect to those workers!
(Picture from National Archive database)

A letter to my MP

This is a letter I wrote to Mr David Ong, the Member of Parliament for Jurong GRC which I sent today.

Mr David Ong (davidong@bukitbatok.sg)

Member of Parliament

Jurong GRC

Dear Mr Ong,

Re: Pavement cyclists and Pedestrian safety.

I am one of your constituents living at Blk 203 Bukit Batok.

I noticed that the Park Connector project from Bukit Batok to Jurong East is nearing its completion. The track is completed and signage has been mounted.

This will make travelling between the towns much more pleasant and perhaps safer for cyclists and pedestrians.

After mulling over the issue for some time, I would like to offer some of my personal feedback, not just specifically on the Park Connector (PCN) but on pedestrian safety and cyclists in general in Bukit Batok.

I do not own a car and neither do I cycle, so I am basically a pedestrian. Unless I take the bus or the train, I usually move about Bukit Batok on foot. The most difficult thing about walking in Bukit Batok is the danger posed by pavement cyclists. I must clarify that I am not against cyclists per se.

Unlike Tampines New Town where cycling on pavement is legal, cyclists in Bukit Batok technically still come under Rule 28 of the Road Traffic Rules (1981) where it is prohibited to ride on the pavement. 1^st time offenders can be fined $20 for the traffic offense.

Officially under the Road Traffic Act (Chap 276, Sec140), bicycles are considered as vehicles and are required to be ridden on the road abiding to all the relevant traffic rules and regulations.

But in reality, the majority of cyclists in Bukit Batok ride on the pavements. Many of them do this due to their fear of being on the road with other bigger vehicles, for their own personal safety, or simply due to the fact that they are ignorant of the cycling prohibition rule.

I have seen cyclists showing utter disregard for traffic lights, pedestrian crossings, riding along shop corridors and even taking their bicycles onto escalators. Then there are those who constantly ring their bell to impose their ‘right of way’ along pavements, never mind the safety of pedestrians.

With all disregards to etiquette and rules by cyclists, pedestrians like me are most vulnerable on the pavements.

Even waiting at a bus stop poses a great danger to commuters.

The way our road pavements are designed, the path leads right through the bus stop shelter.  Many years ago, a raised floor or bollards prevented bicycles from accidentally going through a bus stop but these were removed to make it more user-friendly for the physically challenged. 

The downside to this is that it became a boon for cyclists who now have an unhindered ride straight through without consideration for commuters’ safety.

The new PCN along Bukit Batok Ave 1 is a prime example.

Even though the PCN cycling section detours behind the bus stop shelter, cyclists routinely disregard this safety path and continue to cycle through the bus stop. Some even without slowing down at all despite signs that say “Dismount and Push” which are completely ignored.

Bukit Batok Ave 1 Park Connector

The other thing that I await in trepidation is that under the Jurong GRC 5-year plan, there is a proposal to build a new Bicycle Park at the Bukit Batok MRT station south end.

From the preliminary sketch plan, you can see that the exit from the Bicycle Park leads out onto, and connects directly to, the pedestrian pavement and not to the road.  This is an implicit open invitation to cyclists to ride on the pavement itself.

It seems it was designed to benefit cyclists without considering pedestrian safety. Something is not right here.

(Copyright Jurong GRC Town Council) - Scanned picture used for example.

Can I suggest that before you launch the PCN officially, and before you build the Bicycle Park, a bit more thought be given to the safety of pedestrians?

We need a more holistic approach to the whole matter.

Besides just building the infrastructure for better connectivity, we need to educate the public, the pedestrians, the cyclists, the motorists and other road users.

Once a suitable PR or education programme is completed, we should then enforce basic rules and regulations for its proper usage.

In the area of educating the public, we can start with some sort of awareness programme in schools, in commercial places and factories within Bukit Batok.

Many of the offenders are foreign workers who may not be aware of the pavement restriction.

For motorists driving through Bukit Batok town, consider signage to warn them about giving space to cyclists (who should be educated to ride on the road instead). It’s all about courtesy to each and every road user.

I am not suggesting that enforcement of Rule 28 be heightened immediately. This will only result in more accidents for cyclists if enforcement takes place without education and thus will serve no beneficial purpose.

Unlike the way Tampines estate is trying to resolve their problem, my opinion is that we should tackle the problem at its root, i.e. teach cyclists the correct manner of safe cycling on the roads. Make Bukit Batok town a bicycle friendly estate but we should tackle the problem head-on rather than spend money on creating parallel bicycle tracks. Bicycles belong on the road, thus cyclists and motorists should be made aware of this.  In the absence of a national awareness programme, let our constituency take the lead.

We can educate motorists to give space to cyclists by putting up signage like “Look out for cyclists”, “Give 1.5m space” “Cyclists ahead”, etc.

There are some motorists who actually believe that cyclists should be off the roads. They should be educated to share the roads in a safe manner within Bukit Batok.

We should educate cyclists to ride safely on the roads, keep left, observe traffic rules, use safety gear, etc. I know of many cyclists who are completely ignorant of the fact that pavements are off limits. This is partially due to the very lax enforcement by the authorities, which seem to have a live and let live attitude instead. But we are sending the wrong message with this attitude.

We should educate pedestrians too. Even to give way to recalcitrant cyclists, as there will always be those who will ride on pavement for their own selfish safety as against riding on the road. Though it’s wrong, they prefer to accept the risks without considering the danger to others.

I remember when I took my driving tests decades ago; the emphasis was always “Pedestrian First”.  Their safety is of utmost priority, even when they may be in the wrong like jaywalking or crossing against their favour. Flesh against metal is a no win situation.

I appreciate your time in reading my rather long feedback.  For everyone’s safety, I believe that sustained and persistent education, coupled with the proper facilities you have built, will result in a safer environment for all in Bukit Batok.

I remain,

Yours faithfully,

James Tann

I attached a sample video of a safe cycling programme.

Nyan Cat is meaningless?

You say you can't understand the Nyan Cat video in the last blog?
Just a waste of 3-1/2 minutes of your life? No purpose at all?

OK, maybe the best explanation comes from Molly from Rocketboom.
After she explains the Nyan Cat meme (and Vocaloid) to you perhaps you would care to listen to the latest vocaloid clip as well below. Enjoy.






I really like this vocaloid version of Honey with an all star cast of anime characters.
(Much better than the original Mandarin version by Cyndi Wang!)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Vocaloid (ボーカロイド Bōkaroido) is a singing synthesizer application, developed through a joint research project between the Pompeu Fabra University in Spain and Yamaha Corporation, who developed the software into the commercial product "Vocaloid".
The software enables users to synthesize singing by typing in lyrics and melody.

Vocaloid is becoming the de facto voice in robots being developed in Japan.

Chain email and parlor tricks

You've all probably received it once or many times before - Chain letters.
Except now, it's via email. 


Make x copies, forward it to xx people, put your name at the bottom... sent it within 3 days, 7 days, 2 hours...or else... accident,  bad luck, doom doom doom..... Do it and get God's blessing, fortune etc etc etc.
It's amazing how people fall for these things so easily.


I received an email in response to one of my earlier blogs. 
This was on how the mind perceives things. 
Can you read this?


Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a ttoal mses  and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istief but the wrod as a wlohe.


The above passage was an internet meme that went viral many years ago which was later debunked as nothing more than a parlor trick, much less as research from Cambridge. 


If it was true then you should be able to read this easily...
Bblaaesl pryleas pnmrrioefg sllaimy aeoulltsby dvrseee clbrpmaaoe tteenmrat.
See? Not so true right? If you still want to try, the first two words are 'baseball players"


The problem with the internet is that people tend to believe what they read, especially if it's from someone they know or with a big name attached as  the 'source'.


By the way, here's the latest meme making it way around the www. Enjoy.

Have your bloody steak and eat it

There's one local website which I visit only if I am totally bored or really scraping the bottom of the barrel.
This is the so called 'citizen journalist'  site called Stomp by The Straits Times.
I make cursory visits to this site as it's nothing more than another tabloid just like The New Paper, which I place in the same category.
Stomp seems to attract ridiculous and stupid postings more than anything else; and mostly by gripers and whiners with replies from readers tending to be downright rude or vindictive.


Anyway, recently there was a complaint by someone who apparently went to a neighborhood food court and ordered a medium-rare steak.
What he got, in his opinion, was a raw steak which the chef had refused to re-cook it for him.
Hence, complain to the world via Stomp. Details here if you want to know the whole boring story.


This was his serving as photographed by him (taken off the Stomp site)

How do you tell if your steak is cooked the way you want it?

I was taught a neat trick by a friend who worked as a cook in a restaurant some time ago.

Use this simple method which he said was used by the cooks themselves.  

1. Press the steak with your finger to gauge the firmness.
2. Compare the firmness by pressing the fleshy 
part of your palm just below the thumb.

Rare

3. Make an 'O' ring with your finger

Medium Rare

Medium

Medium-Well

Well done.

This is not a foolproof method, so take it with a pinch of salt.

The cooks' experience counts for a lot.

And please, don't go fingering your dinner in front of your guests.

BLOODY STEAKS?

Some people get queasy when they slice into their beef and see blood oozing from the meat.

Well, surprise, surprise!  

The red juice that's oozing from the meat is NOT blood.

The liquid is actually mostly water containing a purplish colored protein that's found in meat tissue called myoglobin. When exposed to air, it turns bright red. 

That's why meat has a reddish colour. 

It's not from the blood which is only in the veins or arteries and is usually darker in colour.

But as it looks like blood, most people assume it to be.

Bon Appetit

Led down the garden path

Led down the garden path is an idiom, meaning deceived someone by giving him or her the wrong information.

In the English Language, there are some phrases or sentences that are also known as garden path sentences. It’s not actually used to deceive anyone but that the way it is written makes the person THINK in a certain way which will lead up to a dead end initially.

The horse raced past the barn fell, which I wrote in my previous blog, is one such garden path sentence.

The reason for the confusion is that our minds think logically when we read and we put together words as they form.

In other words, we are conditioned to think in a structured manner.

When we come across a garden path sentence, we get stumped because it does not make sense as we build the image in our heads.

Try this for example,

The cotton clothing is made of grows in the USA.

Doesn’t make sense the first time, right? 

Read it again……
still doesn’t make sense?

That’s because your mind is reading it as ‘cotton clothing’.

Now try reading it again as ‘The cotton’ instead. Get it?

As in...The cotton (clothing is made of) grows in the USA.

You were just led down the garden path!

I first learned about this language quirk when I was reading a Charlie Brown Snoopy cartoon. The cartoonist Charles Schultz quoted a Bible verse from the Book of Jobs: “Man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards”.  I couldn’t understand it at all for a long time and when I finally did, it appeared so simple that I kicked myself for my own lacking.

So don't feel bad if you can’t figure out The horse raced past the barn fell.

Here’s something else you can try to see if your mind fools you every time, or if you believe you are as smart as you think.

Read this….

FINISHED FILES ARE THE RESULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIFIC STUDIES AND THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS.

How many letter ‘F’ can you find in the above sentence. Count them and compare the results below… No peeking till after you count. Ok? It’s not a trick.

How many Fs did you find?

If you found 2 - you need your eyes checked. Use the above chart.

If you found 3 – you are just average and normal.

If you found 4 – you are above average.

If you found 5 – you are good.

If you found 6 – you are a genius.

The answer is 6.
If you didn't get 6, go back and re-count.
There are really 6 Fs in plain sight and this time you'll laugh at yourself.

Here are some more garden path sentences that will make you read twice (at least)

• 1. The old man the boat.
• 2. The girl told the story cried. 
• 3. After the student moved the chair broke.
• 4. Fat people eat accumulates. 
• 5. The complex houses married and single soldiers and their families.
  
• 6. The florist sent the flowers was pleased.
• 7.  The man whistling tunes pianos.
• 8.  I convinced her children are noisy.

The horse raced past the barn fell.

Youth is one of those awkward words in the English language, especially the plural form.
Is it youth or youths?

I was raised in the old school where we were taught that collective nouns are always without the s in the plural, e.g. children, but I accept that language evolves.

The word youth has morphed from my time to todays' internet era.
Youths is readily used nowadays, especially in newspaper reports.
I guess because of a new generation of reporters and journalists.

Though it sounds awful, youths is a correct form of the plural. It really depends on how it's used.

However, 1 group or a person is still youth and you don't say a group of youths.
If there are 2 or more groups, then you can refer to them as youths. e.g. the youth of Singapore and the youth of Malaysia but the youths of Singapore and Malaysia.

Awkward, right? ha ha.
Never mind, just use whatever you think is right.
The easiest way to differentiate is to see whether the persons/group can be counted (youths) or not (youth).

Still don't get it?  The sadistic me is enjoying this!
Wait till you get to garden path phrases like The horse raced past the barn fell or The army push bottles up the enemy.
Then you'll really be scratching your head.

.

Catholic Tradition or Epic Fail ?

Following my previous blog about St Theresa's Convent, my sister text'd me to say that another venerable Catholic school, St Joseph's Institution, also has the same anomaly.

That got me wondering and so I looked up the Catholic Directory for Singapore.
Guess what I found?

Catholic schools and churches with the following names:
St Theresa's Convent
St Joseph's Convent
St Anthony's Convent
St Magdalene's Convent
St Patrick's School
St Anne's Church
St Joseph's Church
St Gabriel's School
Holy Innocent Girls' School
St Stephen's....et cetra..

Wow, what happened?
Most of the above names are schools where English is the language of instruction.

Maybe, it is a Catholic tradition to give possession of the school to its patron saint? I don't know.
Though I was born and raised a catholic, I didn't go to a catholic school so I wouldn't know if that's a school tradition, or an error perpetuated since the 1st Catholic school, St Joseph's, opened in 1852.

Anyway, not to dwell on this anomaly as I really don't know the background to it, I'd rather comment on the proper use of the 's in English grammer.

The best example for the proper placement of the apostrophe comes from the great poet Kingsley Amis when he was asked to demonstrate with a single sentence. He gave this....

• Those things over there are my husband's. (Those things over there belong to my husband.)
• Those things over there are my husbands'. (Those things over there belong to several husbands of mine.)
• Those things over there are my husbands. (I'm married to those men over there.)

Is it mine or yours? St Theresa's or St Mary's

I have this thing that's actually been bugging me for years and years.
I am sure it is wrong and yet I have not been able to get out of my malaise long enough to find out more, much less correct it or manage to do anything about it.
So I have been living with this irritation in the back of my mind all my life.

And what is this? It is St Theresa's Convent.

No, nothing personal against the school or the staff or her alumnae.
It is just the use of the name. Or should I say mis-use?

Even when I was a schoolboy passing the institution at Telok Blangah I have had this nagging thought that the name is wrong. After all these years, whenever I pass it now I still have that same feeling. Of all places, a school should not be called St Theresa's Convent!

And why not, you ask?   Well, it's simply incorrect, plain and simple.
Don't they have English language teachers who should have known that it is incorrect all these years?

Shouldn't it be rightly called St Theresa Convent?

Putting the 's behind St Theresa makes it the possessive of the proper noun, i.e. the convent belongs to St Theresa. But this cannot be as St Theresa died long before the convent was built and I am sure she didn't have possession of it at any time.

I searched their website but could not find any reason why the convent belongs to St Theresa. Often in the past, I had the thought of dropping them an inquiry to this effect but again never got around to that. haiz

So presumably, the convent was named after that humble nun, St Theresa. Therefore, it should be called St Theresa Convent and not St Theresa's Convent.

We honour famous people by naming  buildings, streets, places or even convents after them but it surely would be as a proper noun and not in the possessive syntax. It's like calling the Fullerton Building Fullerton's Building, or even horrors, as one Straits Times reader recently suggested renaming Singapore Changi Airport to Lee Kuan Yew Airport, it might then become Lee Kuan Yew's Airport instead!  
*(Lee Kuan Yew, the former prime minister of Singapore)

I hope to find some closure after all these years by speaking it out.
Any Theresians or English teachers reading this?

Closer at heart, I attend a catholic church called St Mary of the Angels. There, the welcoming ministers a.k.a the wardens, wear a sash proudly emblazoned with the words St Mary's.
I always wonder if that is also incorrect but I'll let that pass as they may associate their group as belonging to the Church, rather than being the name of the church, which then would be more or less correct. Guess it depends on how you see it.


Disclaimer: No Theresians were harmed in the writing of this piece. Any similarity to saints, persons or alumnae dead or alive is purely coincidental.

Don't say CUM !

I presume many will read this blog as a curious response to the word Cum in the header.

Wikipedia defines cum as:
A sexual term, meaning to orgasm

• Semen or vaginal fluid, produced in ejaculation
• A Latin word, which can be either the preposition with or a conjunction meaning when, because, or although.

I am actually going to blog about the 2nd definition (bummer, u say. haha)

Following my previous writeup on the difference between day off & off day, I just wanted to add to the growing list of mis-used words and phrases that are so often taken for granted here.

The latin word cum means with, but so often people here take it to mean And or Includes, which is wrong. Locally, you often see the word cum in the classified advertisements. 

e.g. Looking for Secretary cum typist, or people saying "I am having my breakfast cum lunch"

When you graduate cum laude, it says that you graduated with great praises (an honour) such as magna cum laude or summa cum laude. These are about the only latin references that uses cum nowadays.

So if you are placing an advert for a Secretary, you would phrase it as "secretarial duties cum typing".

On a funnier note, if you did graduate cum laude and if you don't seem to be getting responses to your online resumes for jobs, the reason is that most filtering computer servers will take the 1st definition of cum and mark your resume as pornography. ha ha.

Here's a clip from 'The Noose'. Listen to Babarella using the correct meaning of cum.

Rule of 78s - the pitfall of credit rebates.

I get the monthly Lifestyle magazine courtesy of the NTUC, which I hardly ever take out of its plastic wrapping.  It's supposed to be Singapore's Largest Circulating Magazine, whatever that means. I always know it as a booklet full of adverts instead of being a serious 'lifestyle' periodical.

But once in a while I do rip the packaging and flip through the pages. Something caught my eye in this month's issue. An article called "Small weekly payments" in their MoneySENSE feature.

In the article, the author was relating his experience of buying a HD TV on credit installments. The TV cost $6,500 but was being offered at $5,200, (saving $1,300!). To avoid the heavy upfront outlay, the writer opted for the installment plan of paying only $44.90 a week. With a tinge of regret and in hindsight, the writer later calculated that in the end he would be paying $8,620 which was 33% more than the usual price or 66% more than the offer price.

I took an interest in the article because I previously worked for a major retailer who did precisely this kind of transaction, offering credit installments on purchases.

One thing that most customers don't realise, or are not informed of, is that the repayment scheme is based on what is called the Rule of 78s.  This is what most car loan companies, banks and finance companies use in calculating interest rebates.
I will not even try to explain it to you!

You'll probably be lost within the 1st sentence of the complicated formula. Look up Rule of 78s in Wikipedia if you really want a background on calculating your loan payments. 

In a very simplistic nutshell explanation, it means that you pay the interest on your loan before your payments start reducing the principal amount.   That's why you always lose out when you decide to foreclose the loan earlier than the term allows. There is hardly any interest rebate left to take back. What's left of your outstanding loan is most of the principal sum because you have only been repaying the interest portion of your loan first.

A simple example is your credit card bills. If you just pay the minimum monthly sum each month, you will realise that you are just paying interest for that month and there is hardly a reduction of the credit amount used.

Caveat emptor.

Father of modern Singapore

As I write this, my country is in the midst of a General Election. The populace will elect or re-elect a government in a few days time according to their vote.

In the press, on the Net and in the coffee shops, arguments and counter-arguments, points and counterpoints, insinuations, mudslingings and the usual campaign gimmicks are all the talk of the day.

One particular piece of writing on the Net caught my eye. This person described the venerable Mr Lee Kuan Yew as the founder of modern Singapore. Hmmm, I was wondering. Is this what is being taught in schools now? I don't know.

From my own pathetic knowledge of local history, I thought that modern Singapore was founded by Sir Stamford Raffles back in 1819?  Was I wrong? 
Then again, when I took History of S.E.Asia as an A Level subject, it was way back in 1972, but I still can recall certain facts vividly because of my interest in local history at that time. Or has history been re-written since then?

From my aging memory, I recalled something like this....

The region around us then (i.e. S E Asia) was divided and controlled by both the Dutch and British, who were bitter enemies at that time.
Stamford Raffles, the British lieutenant-governor of Bencoolen in Western Sumatra, wanted to impress his bosses, the East India Company. He sought permission from his superior, Lord Hastings in India, to try and establish a greater presence right in the middle of the Dutch territories. (very garang! especially because the EIC Court of Directors were against this idea, but he went ahead anyway)


Raffles considered places like Bangka, Karimon, Bintan and Lingga before finally settling on an island called Singapura.  All these places were within the domain of the Rhio Sultanate, now know as Riau, Indonesia.  (Trivia- his initial preferences were actually Bangka or Bintan.)


The Sultan of the Rhio Sultanate, Sultan Mahmud, had recently died and his throne, based at Lingga under the Dutch, was usurped by the younger son Abdul Rahman instead of going to the rightful elder son Hussein Long.

Through political intrigues, Raffles brought the elder Hussein Long to Tumesek and installed him as the Sultan to be recognised by the British, in exchange for trading and administrative rights over the newly founded trading port (Singapura). The date was 6 February 1819.


Mr Lee Kuan Yew was not the founder of modern Singapore. He happened to be the incumbent prime minister of the island when Singapore was kicked out of the Federation of Malaysia on 9 August 1965. By default, he became the head of the government of a newly independent country.

Full credit must go to him and his team of people in the immediate period following Singapore's independence as a soveriegn country and the most difficult task of continuing to govern without much resources.

In 8 years time in 2019, Singapore will celebrate its bicentennial of its modern founding and its 54th year as an independent country. We should celebrate our modern founding with as big a bang as we can.
200 years of Singapore!

I hope I will still be around then.

Photo by hjtann

A day off without having an off day.

Without wanting to sound too presumptuous, I just need to get it ‘off’ me. 
Every time I hear that phrase 'off day',  it makes me cringe a bit. 
It has become so much a part of our norm here that I am not sure if they really mean what they say or maybe it's just bad grammer?

I was just reading a friend's post on Facebook and she said, "off to work for Ipad 2 launch....even on off day :)"

Presumably she is going to work as she's  'off to work',  but she's also having an  "off day".

If you live in Singapore you would have no difficulty understanding what she just wrote, if we think singlish, i.e. she's going to work on her day off.

But having a day off  is completely different from having an off day.

A Day Off is when you get a break from work.

You don’t need to work, you don’t need to go to work.

Having an Off Day means you are not feeling well, feeling a bit under the weather, or just not at ease with yourself.

You are a bit ‘off”,  like in saying ‘the food is a bit off’, meaning it’s stale or getting bad, or at least not in the best of states.

So, if you have an Off Day, you are not doing too good, but having an Day Off may do wonders for you!

Having an off day? take a day off.