SINGAPORE SHORT STORIES

First, we have NKF. Then we have Ren Ci and Reverend Ming Yi. Now we have City Harvest Church! This morning, while thousands of Singaporeans wake up grudgingly, to leave for work after a long weekend, officers from the commercial affairs department arrived at City Harvest church. Individuals from the church were interviewed, sorry not for offers to join the commercial affairs department, but to help with inquiry of possible financial irregularities! It is believed that 12 people linked to the church were questioned in connection with the case, including Kong Hee, the founding member of the church and its pastor. Hence, another episode of finanical irregularities at a popular social/charity instituion unfolds! City Harvest Church is a high profile church. It was started by Pastor Kong Hee together with his wife, famous award-winning singer Sun Ho. Recently the church has made news with its stake in Suntec City properties.

Singapore, has for the first time, in its sporting history, tamed its nemesis giant in table tennis: China! Yup, our country has finally lifted its first table tennis world title in Moscow on Sunday (yesterday) night! Kudos to the formidable display of grit, determination and belief of team members Feng Tianwei, Wang Yuegu and Sun Beibei.Mighty China was beaten 3-1 by our female trio in the final of the World Team Table Tennis Championships! The match was not telecasted live on Singapore televisions hence it caught many Singaporeans by surprise when the results was released. Like myself, I believe many Singaporeans did not even know that the table tennis world competition has been held. As anticipated, our nation's triumph has drawn mixed reviews. As you have known, our winning team is not Singaporeans at all, but all China-born foreign talents who have now become new citizens. I believe it does not matter whether it is our China-born players who win the award or our lo

Many parts of Singapore's beaches become tainted with the crude oil split by an oil tanker after its collision last week. The relevant authorities are busy clearing the affected seas and shores of the oil slick and to restore the beaches and the affected biodiversity in parts off Chek Jawa to their original conditions. This episode again highlights the vulnerability of Singapore to external events from our neighbours. Let me just point to the few examples how our country could be affected environmentally from such external forces: a) Air: Transboundary air pollution, air laden with lots of smog and particles can deteriorate Singapore's Pollution Standard Index and cause suffering of health and economic losses with every wide-spread clearing of the Indonesian forests, as we have seen in the past episodes. b) Land: Whenever there is a major earthquake affecting the region, Singapore can feel the tremors. c) Water: The latest oil slick can be considered to be of the th

Today is Vesak Day I republish two highly popular past posts for your reading sake: Karma Nirvana

This is amazing! Imagine today is the day of your graduation. The day when the many hours of work and effort you have put in, throughout these years of study have finally reap fruits. You wear your graduation gown with pride and invite your parents and friends proudly to your graduation ceremony. Finally, one of the biggest days in your life arrives. You are among the graduating cohort, sitting in the auditorium waiting to collect the certificate you have been studying all along for. You busy yourself with adjusting your graduation gown before you step in on the calling of your name, ready for camera poses and to the proud applause of your parents, only to find the greatest shock and humilation of your life! This is what happened to Parthiban s/o Ganesan! When he stepped on the stage, to the horror of his life, the emcee read his name wrongly. It is already quite embarrassing to have your name read wrong. Imagine when the wrong name is read as a CHINESE SWEAR WORD! Watch t

Are you looking for a job? If you are looking for a job and have the passion to serve, you may well want to join the civil service like my friend did owning to the good work-life balance as well as benefits. Civil servants will get a half month bonus in two months' time and a one-off $300 payment! This is on top of their performance bonuses and their year-end bonus!

Today is Vesak Day and it is a sacred and important day to Buddhists as they commemorate the birth, enlightenment and the passing away of Buddha. Vesak Day falls on Friday this year in Singapore and hence Vesak Day also marks a long weekend for many Singaporeans who relish the opportunities to go for some overseas holidays with their families on this rare long weekend of the year. One country, loved by Singaporeans,which cannot be really visited at this moment in time will be Thailand as it is just reeling from the effects of a large political turmoil. So for many Singaporeans, they have explored the turned to the alternative of vacationing in Malaysia and other Asian countries. For many others, they will be staying put in Singapore as to them, today is just an additional day of rest. There is quite a galore of activities this weekend from book fairs at Suntec city, to food expo at Singapore expo as well as the many family celebrations carnivals all around the island. Our favo

Today, 27 May 2010 is Eat with your family Day, a day initiated by the Singapore government. As Mary was packaging her bag to leave for home an hour earlier than the usual knock-off time on this special day. Her boss asked her "Where are you going?" Mary replied: "I am going home to eat dinner with my family. Today is 'Eat with your family Day' " Mary bosses remarked swiftly: "You can put your bag down, I treat you as family too, come to my office, I got something to discuss with you and after that, we will celebrate 'Eat with your family' day together!" Mary was shocked! She has clocked in hours and hours of overtime for free under her boss, to the extent of skipping meals every night, just to rush work for her. Mary shouted: " Amy! Today is 'eat with your family' day! Do not be unreasonable! I do not treat you as family at all though you said you treated me as one!" With that, she stormed off angrily, leaving he

How time passes! Now is coming to June 2010 and half a year is almost gone. Time always passes so fast and the onus for us is to fully maximise and optimise the use of time. I always see some delinquent youths hanging around with their pals, smoking, drinking, making a scene or a fool of themselves at the void decks. It is real sad to see them behaving as such. Most of them come from dysfunctional families or their families have neglected them. It is imperative that these youths find constructive use of their time. They may be happy to go lucky now, fooling around with their friends but they would most likely regret when they come to finding work if their qualificatons are not as high as others. They will be at a losing edge.

I was out just now and saw a bigger cat bullying a smaller cat. Angered to witness this scene, I chased the big cat away. Why was I angry? Well, I draw parallels of this cat fight with the harsh realities of the world where some rich people can be really arrogrant towards the poor.

I watched in full captivity the live telecast of the State funeral of the late Dr Goh Keng Swee yesterday. Thousands of people had braved the elements just to pay their last respects to one of the greatest sons of Singapore over the past week. Looking at Dr Goh’s funeral session which was attended by many distinguished guests, his family, friends and loved ones, and all paying tributes and offering eulogies to Dr Goh, the epiphany which has eluded me for some time now returned, overwhelming me: the epiphany on what life is all about. Life is all about creating value to others and the society. Dr Goh was well-loved and respected by Singaporeans for he has not only cared for the society, he has created tremendous value to Singapore by helping make Singapore what it is today. Dr Goh Keng Swee has also touched the lives of many Singaporeans. At your own funeral, what would you like to be remembered as to your loved ones? For those who have been stuck in the corporate rat race chasing

Today, Singapore bade a teary farewell to one of our founding fathers, Dr Goh Keng Swee at his state funeral. Eulogies were delivered by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew, Chairman of Temasek Holdings, Mr Dhanabalan as well as the grandson and grand-niece of the late Dr Goh at the ceremony in the Singapore Convention Hall which commenced at 2.30 pm. The state ceremony was solemn but fitting to the great man who has made a enduring and significant contribution to Singapore. Much has been said about the Dr Goh in the past week. Dr Goh has touched every segment of Singapore and made a significant impact on the lives of many. There is lots of things we have to learn from Dr Goh. For me, the one lesson I learnt from Dr Goh is to be curious in life and lead life to the fullest! Time is of essence. Everyone has the same 24 hours, but what distinguishes Successful men is the way they use this same resources which is TIME! In this era, this is a myriad of

Continued from earlier post As it turned out, the simple map we obtained from the receptionist was of not much use at all. The distances indicated on the map were grossly underestimated and though the map looked pretty decent, there were little actual street signs for us to make use of the map to navigate to where we wanted to go: Central World shopping centre. You would be calling me nuts to go there (as Central World has been reduced to ashes by the ‘red shirts protestors’ just two to three days ago in Thailand’s worst political maelstrom ever) but take note that our visit to Bangkok was made some months ago. Our journey through the unsafe street out to the shopping district was an adventure by itself and a highlight of our tour (please see this post ). We arrived at the T-junction facing Indra’s square shopping mall. From there, even looking at the map, we could hardly continued, it was too hard to navigate. We asked a tutu driver who was resting for help, it was reassuring t

If you are looking for a place to spend the last of your weekends, you may want to plan a day of Musuem hopping as 20 museums in Singapore will open their doors free-of-charge to the public tomorrow in conjunction with the International Museum Day 2010. For more information, visit this link .

BREAKING NEWS!It was reported that at least 160 people were confirmed dead in an Air India plane crash in southern India early on Saturday! The accident occurred when the plane coming in from Dubai overshot the runway of the airport serving the city of Mangalore in Karnataka state. At least 160 dead perished in the crash.

The photos of the hotel that we would be putting up looked nice and impressive as shown by the tour agents to us. We were also told that the hotel is within close proximity to the slew of modern shopping centres in Bangkok, so it is to our disbelief that the car which has fetched us from Sukhumvit airport in Bangkok, dropped us off at a hotel located in a super ‘ulu’ (remote) and dilapidated street. As it turned out, the hotel is a 3 star hotel, though it seems to be located at the wrong place, a street brimming with shop houses that will appear to be squatters in Singapore’s housing standards. Welcome to the first day of our (my Dear and I) Bangkok tour! It was a culture shock to us! Being brought up in impeccably orderly and clean Singapore, we were quite shocked to find that we would be staying in this hotel for the next 3 days! We looked around for the shopping centres which were ‘alleged’ (by the tour guides) to be ‘in close proximity’ but there was none. Anyway, we decided to j

After the Thai government has acted decisively to contain the months-long political turmoil in Bangkok, normalcy has returned slowly to Bangkok, though pockets of tension and aggression by the red shirts protesters continue to smoulder. What is left of Bangkok is a city in tatters with burnt buildings and damaged public infrastructure. This red shirt political maelstrom is akin to Thailand’s 9-11 just as the Central World shopping centre in Bangkok is akin to the twin tower in 9-11: Central World shopping centre was destroyed by fire set by red shirt protestors and it was reported that the burnt building has to be torn down as a result. I have visited Central World shopping mall with my wife some months back. This shopping mall, one of the largest in South East Asia is really nice. We had great meals there and enjoyed shopping there. But now this shopping mall, destroyed by the fire set by the protestors, is gone, and what we have left is broken memories and debris…..

When my wife and I took the Tiger Airlines some months ago, we were quite surprised that the prices of snacks, drinks and food such as nasi lemark were priced much higher than the average sold in our heartland markets. However a Sunday Times article I read some weeks ago, seemed to justify the high prices of these food. The modus operandi of the aircrew and the airline for these budget airlines are different from their ordinary airline counterparts. The pays of the aircrew consist of a variable component which comes from the commission of the snacks, beer and gifts they sell to passengers. A plate of nasi lemak on Tiger airlines and other budget airlines costs $10. This is in part attributed by the mark-ups for the sales commission and to justify the cost of the extra amount of plane fuel needed to transport the additional weight of food in the plane. After reading the article, I find the latter ‘fuel’ reason justifiable and this is rarely thought by others when it comes to justify

When my Dear and I were in Thailand just some months ago, we enjoyed ourselves very much at Central World shopping centre, one of the largest shopping centres in South East Asia. We enjoyed good Thai food at the restaurant, and my Honey bought her Naraya bags at an outlet there. The shopping centre is fantastic and I even took a photo of this great shopping centre in Bangkok. After we came back, the red shirt protestors mounted their strikes and protests Intially, it was peaceful though glory as bottles and bottles of blood from the protestors were drawn and spilt on government grounds. Gradually, the protests grew more and more violent, leading to the crackdown yesterday and my lovely Central World was burnt! It is a pity! Just take a look at the Central World before it was burnt: It is real sad that Thailand, a land of smiles has degenerated into a cauldron of boiling tensions. I believe the protests will still continue for a while with pockets of tensions, rioting

Who exhibit the Kampong Spirit in Singapore? To find out the answer, we need to look at the 80% of the Singaporeans living in Housing & Development Board flats. To this large group of Singaporeans, void decks are definitely not something unfamiliar to them. Whenever I pass my void decks, I will always see the same senior citizens and neighbours sitting at the benches in the void decks. Their presence there seems to be a permanent fixture of our HDB landscape as I can see them, the same faces, every time I leave for work and return home…so much so that I think these senior citizens or I should call ‘void deckers’ have come to master the time-tables of my family and I, as well as for other families. It is understandable why these senior void deckers are there at almost any time of the day. With their children working, they may feel bored and instead of sitting at home facing the cold confines of the walls, they would rather venture out of their home, to the void deck just below

Our internal security officers are currently in Jakarta to assist in the investigation of a possible attack by terrorists on Singapore. The Indonesian police has found a map of Singapore MRT network during a raid on the residence of a terrorist, with Orchard MRT station circled, this led to some speculation that Orchard MRT station is being targeted by the terrorists. While the circle on the Orchard MRT station does not indicate much and a thorough investigation into the case is necessary, Singaporeans must continue to be vigilant to foil an attack on our rail network. Our vigilance does not extend to our trains only. All our public facilities and infrastructure could be prone to terrorist attack too. With the advent of technology, terrorists could easily use application like Google Maps, Google Streetview to plot their attacks. We live in modern day where information is easily available. And this availability of information to the wrong person for the wrong use is dangerous

If there is a place where Singaporeans do not want to be young in Singapore, it would have to be in the Singapore Mass Rapid Transit (SMRT) trains. Why is that so? Well these days, the trains are so packed that getting into them proves to be a challenge, any hour of the day. I still recall that I could easily find a seat on the MRT train on weekdays but not so on these days. Priority seats are seats in the MRT trains which are supposed to be reserved for the elderly, the pregnant women and people with special needs, however these are always been misused by ordinary passengers. It is only once in a blue moon that I witness passengers hogging these seats give them up to the elderly standing in front of them. If you are an elderly who is refused a priority seat, your only consolation is that these “hoggers” do not find you old or elderly! Being a regular commuter of the train, sometimes I witness very interesting encounters, others I experience personally. I still recall once

The Navy Open House will be held this weekend from 22 May to 23 May 2010 at the Changi Naval Base. I enjoy such open houses of the Military as these provide valuable opportunities for members of the public to know more about the operations as well as the work of our Navy. There are hardly many places for outings in Singapore apart from the many shopping centres, places of interests, places of natural attractions and restaurants, hence such events do help to add some spice to our ordinary lives. It will be great if the Navy Open House incorporates some elements to commemorate the late Dr Goh Keng Swee who had just passed on last week. Here is the link to find out more about the Navy Open House 2010.

It has been some time since I visited Orchard Road with my Dear, so yesterday,we spent few hours walking down Orchard Road, taking refuge from the bristling heat in the comfortable air-cooled malls, "shopping centre hopping" from one shopping mall to another. Orchard road is not only a fantastic place for shopping, it is also a place to watch some interesting streetside busking. There were quite a number of people hawking their wares, from selling tissues papers to ice-creams which were quite common in Orchard Road. My Dear and I also caught sight of an old woman selling quite unconventional items on Orchard road: packets of Milo and some other dry snacks laid out neatly on a mat. It seems that these were her only possessions left that she wanted to sell to earn some bucks for a living. There were other buskers like a blind man playing real soothing music, earning living from donations of passers by. There was also a most unconventionl busker as you can see from the photo bel

More and more students in Singapore are taking part in the Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi (HSK). This test gauges how competency the candidates are in the Chinese language. The test results are recognized internationally and students are tested on their listening, written and cloze passage skills. If you have taken the HSK test, you can check your results here .

Oh how time flies, our National Day is coming once again! The National Day Parade (NDP) is Singapore's grandest parade and you would not want to miss this year's parade too! So apply for your NDP tickets right now! Application for this year's National Day tickets start from today! There are couple of ways of applying for your NDP tickets and I believe that the easiest way will be via Internet right at the comforts of your home! To catch the specutacular NDP show this year, apply for your tickets now with this link In the past, the application of NDP tickets is via queuing up at the sports stadium all across the island. Eager party-goers queue up for days just to be in pole positions to secure the tickets! I still recall the days when I was in secondary school queuing up for hours for the tickets at one of the stadiums, bringing books just to read up and pass the time. Is balloting for NDP tickets fairer than queueing up? To a certain extent, queueing up inevitably links rew

Oh how time flies, our National Day is coming once again! The National Day Parade (NDP) is Singapore's grandest parade and you would not want to miss this year's parade too! So apply for your NDP tickets right now! Application for this year's National Day tickets start from today! There are couple of ways of applying for your NDP tickets and I believe that the easiest way will be via Internet right at the comforts of your home! To catch the specutacular NDP show this year, apply for your tickets now with this link With the demise of one of Singapore's founding leaders, Dr Goh Keng Swee, I believe that the organizers for this year's parade will screen some video footages of the late great leader for the Nation to commemorate him on this special occassion. What is more, this year's parade will be held right at the doorsteps of City Hall, it makes the commemoration of Dr Goh Keng Swee at the National Day Parade even more fitting. To all the Leaders, Generals and Sc

It is good that the government has clarified that the weightage of mother tongues in the Primary School Leaving Examinations will not be cut down. While it is true that most of the primary school students these days are more conversant in English, it is imperative that our future leaders master their mother tongues. With the rapid rise of China and India as the major engines of the global economy and Singapore being located in the Muslim neighbourhood, it will only stand us in good stead, socially and economically if our future leaders master their mother tongues competently.

7 children and 2 adults were hacked to death by an assailant who later committed suicide. This was China's fifth similar case in less than 2 months where children at schools were attacked by rural dwellers such as farmers. In all these incidents,the attackers after committing the rampage committed suicide,hence today's latest incident was really a copy-cat version. There is no apparent reason or motive for such perverted attacks, but some have linked the attacks to stress from increasing urbanization. Violent and unusual crimes or incidents are getting more and more commonplace these days. Let us not mention the terrorist attacks perpetuated against the Western powers by the extremists, let us look at some of the unusual phenomenons and crimes around the countries: Hong Kong: The spate of acid attacks in Mongkok and other parts of Hong Kong; bottles of sulphuric acid were hurled down storeys of building, scalding many and disfiguring others Western nation: School killings too (

Are you ready to win the $5 million TOTO lottery draw this coming Friday? Well, for today's draw, someone, ya 1 lucky person has bagged the cool $3 million top prize! Do not be disheartened if you are not this super-lucky soul, you could be the winner of the $5 million TOTO draw this coming Friday? So how to win the coming TOTO lottery draw? Well, you would need to be unbiased and pick some numbers that are really unique. I can tell you for most people, their minds will still choose a few of their favorite numbers no matter how random they want their pick of the numbers to be. So how to choose more random numbers that fall outside the psyche of your brain? Well, the simplest and easiest way is to use an automated computer program. You do not need to invest in a lot of money to buy a lottery program or a TOTO program to generate your lucky numbers. If you have a computer, most likely you would have the Microsoft Excel Program and in that program, there is a random function which ca

Today is Mother's Day and I wish my mother and all mothers a very Happy Mother's Day! So how are you going to celebrate Mother's Day with your mother? For me, I have celebrated Mother's Day yesterday at home with my mum and family by buying some special dishes from some good eateries. Definitely we would explore the option to dine out for this special day, however we are not so particular about celebrating Mother's Day in a very elabortate matter just as what the shopping centres, commercial retailers and eateries would want us to buy in! Of course, it is definitely something that we can do to bring our mothers and loved ones out, to adorn them with gifts and good meals on special occassions. However, I do find that the celebrations of events like Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day, and more are getting more and more commercialized these days with heavy media blitz to encourage spending on our loved ones on these special days. Definitely, if we

I have decided that today's post will be about me and my motivation for starting this blog. I have been blogging since 2007 on this blog. Prior to the inventions of blog, I did keep a diary but have since threw it away since most of the entries were made during my National Service days when times were not pleasant anyway. I can say that I am a late starter for IT and the internet. During the times when internet was first introduced, I did not really have a chance to learn about it as there was no need for internet access at home. It was only through work matters by a strict but good boss in National Service that had me learn the Microsoft office skills the hardway: learning how to type, how to use the basic functions of Microsoft Word. Now looking back at those days, you might have feel the same like me that those functions are very basic, but do not laugh, to a starter and a novice to the computer and the suite of Microsoft office applications, learning how to use Microsoft word o

I have not read the book by Robin Sharma: “The leader without a title” but I can assure you that you lead people and manage things. One can be a C-level executive (Chairman, CEO, etc) but the leadership skills can be miserable. A CEO can talk about grandiose development plans for his staff on paper but it is useless at all if he does not know the actual ground feeling of the organization. Axe bad bosses, bootlickers and office-politic-kers is key to improve morale in the organization. If you are a boss, be sure to behave and act like a boss. You are not an employee. You would need to show care and concern for your employees under your charge and never show bias. You should not be shallow enough to be coaxed by bootlickers. You should be discerning enough to know who are playing office politics in your office. When an employee you like due to his or her ‘many concerted actions’ tell lies and dishonour others, you should properly investigate to do justice to the other party and not beli

As someone has said before, “Life is not about nature or nurture, it is all about choices”. Indeed the choices that we make everyday help shape who we are and what we are today. We can go so far as to say that not choosing an option in life is also a choice. For every option we face in life, we make a decision and a choice. Is it true that in life, sometimes one has no choice? Well if you look at the hundreds of people who drag themselves to work in a job which they have chosen in the past but which they dread the most as time goes by, or others who are forced into accepting a lower-paying and terrible job as a result of retrenchments, it seems that in life sometimes, one has no choice. Can they choose to quit? Logically, yes, they can choose to quit and end the sufferings in their jobs but the outcome will be that they will be without a job and their dependents will be without a breadwinner. The consequences will be immense and unfavourable. So to justify the maxim that life is a mat

The government will be setting up a new statutory agency under the arm of the Ministry of National Development. This new agency will be called the Council for Estate Agencies and its main role is to regulate the piping hot property and estate market in Singapore, curb errant property agents and to safeguard property buyers. I believe the government's move to regulate the property and estate market is a timely one in view of the high volumes of resale flat and private property transactions in recent years. For many, purchasing a home is the largest financial investment and important decision of their lives, hence it is only natural that the process of buying their home is a pleasant and fair one. For many buyers, when it comes to buying a house from the open property market, they have not much of a choice but to turn to a real estate or property agent to help in sourcing for potential flats and to faciliate the whole purchase transaction. We have heard of many errant property agents

Bangkok has been rocked by civil unrest amidst the protests of the thousands of ‘red shirts’ demonstrators in the streets of Bangkok since March this year. The tourism industry of Thailand has been severely affected with many countries issuing travel advisories for its people against Bangkok. Thailand used to be a country of smiles and a popular travel destination for many and it is hence it is really a regret that this good country blessed with no foreign occupations, natural resources and friendly people is now a cauldron of political and civil upheaval! My wife and I had our share of adventures in Bangkok. No, we did not visit Bangkok at the time where the ‘red shirts’ were protesting, neither did we join them. Our adventure was related to something that many Singaporeans have taken for granted: a liveable and comfortable cityscape. When I visited Bangkok the other time with my wife, what left an indelible impression on me and my wife was the ‘fantastic’ roads! I still recalled fond

Today's news reported the sighting of many rats along Orchard Road. Well this is not surprising to me, as if you have read my earlier post , you would have known that I see these rats and mouses scurrying around in my estate from day to night, everyday without fear! Rats have become permanent features of my residential town and a permanent fixture in my memory. This is not good of course and it seems that I am living in a third world underdeveloped country. Why has there been such increase in rodents in our town and other parts of the island? A novel way to reduce rat population would be to stop feeding cats. Left to hunt for food, these cats will kill these rodents which compete with them for any morsel of food.

Since the 911 incident, the Singapore Mass Rapid Transit corporation has deployed a number of security officers at the MRT stations. The main role of these security officers is to help screen and identify potential terrorists by requesting suspicious looking commuters for a screening of their bags and luggage. I find that although such measures are useful, sometimes it can fall behind times. For example, I always observe that it is always the commuters who carry along with them heavy luggages or haversacks who are stopped and have their bags and belongings checked for explosive or other terrorist attacks. I can sense the frustration of these commuters as normally, they are going to the airport for a check-in to get to their travel destinations. Such a check can mar their sense of elation of a holiday. Notwithstanding the fact that the big bags carried by commuters can turn out to be explosive-laden bags by terrorists, ask yourself that which terrorist would be stupid enough to carry a

With so many men balding and suffering from hair problems like male pattern baldness, hair thinning, alopecia areata and many other hair problems, sometimes we encounter feel-good anecotes which will lighten up the stress suffered by hair loss victims, both male and female. Saying such as "God makes all heads, the ugly ones they bury in hair" will seem to serve as a consolation to hair loss sufferers. Also some people say that bald men are more sexy or more manly as they have more testetorone. But do you know that bald men in the past are highly sought after by women? You might not know and I am just as surprised to read this fact from a hair loss book. It was reported in the book that scientists have found that bald men were highly sought after by females in primitive socities. In these early societies, men who were able to provide much food for their families were considered 'hot assets' and this provision of food hinges on their ability to hunt wild games!

Singapore is a very interesting island. In a country where land is a premium, there are always new places of interest, built for social and economic interests which never fail to enthrall Singaporeans and friends from all over the world! The latest iconic place of interest is inevitably the Marina Bays Sands Integrated resort and the Helix Bridge! Marina Bay sand resort was officially opened on 27 Apr at the Chinese auspicious timing of 3.18 p.m. The opening of the DNA looking Helix bridge soon followed last Saturday amidst a fanfare of celebrations and fireworks! It has really been some months that my Dear and I have actually had a night’s out in the city due to our commitments. With some spare time, we went on our first date in several months to the newly opened Helix bridge! We exited the Citylink Mall from the Esplanade and took a slow walk to the Helix just located next to the floating platform. The floating platform was out of bounds to members of the public as there was some con

Today is Labour Day, a day to celebrate the hard work that every employee has put in, in his daily work. I would like to extend the celebration of Labour Day to each and every member of our (you and my) families who has provided us emotional support and the conditions which enable each of us, employee to focus on our work. Labour Day is hence also a day to recognize the efforts of our homemakers, mothers and parents who help to make the working of their employee husbands or children a lot more easier. This year's Labour Day falls on a Saturday and I hope all employers would enable their employees to clear this holiday on a later date. While we celebrate Labour Day, I only have this wish for employers that is to rid all sorts of office politics, favoritism, biases of bosses in the workplace as such a mood is debilitating to productivity. Having a boss who favours boot-lickers and penalizes employees who are more hardworking and capable is definitely detrimental to the organization.