Visit to Marina Barrage



Water Wally!!! Notice the brown water on the left (reservoir) and the blue water on the right (sea)?? Gulp!!

Background
Built across the mouth of the Marina Channel, the Marina Barrage creates Singapore’s 15th reservoir, and the first in the heart of the city. With a catchment area of 10,000 hectares, or one-sixth the size of Singapore, the Marina catchment is the island’s largest and most urbanised catchment. Together with two other new reservoirs, the Marina Reservoir will boost Singapore’s water catchment from half to two-third’s of the country’s land area.

The Marina Barrage is the result of Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew’s vision nearly two decades ago when he envisaged damming the mouth of the Marina Channel to create a freshwater reservoir.

(Related: "Who's Water Wally?")

The Bad Idea Bears from Avenue Q ... on the Election

Yaaaaaaay!!!!!!!



The Bad Idea Bears from Broadway's "Avenue Q" talk to people about the upcoming election.

vicky christina barcelona (2008)



woody allen's latest film ... thoroughly enjoyable!

Pensive....



tried to search online and on "frogs and toads of singapore" on wildlife singapore (Warning: Not for those with amphibian phobia, aka "Batrachophobia"!) for help to id the funny looking fella.. but to no avail... (Update: The fella is listed there! It's the first one on the list!! Seems like the specimen I had was a tad bit dehydrated compared to the chubby moisty one on the website!! :p)

finally joined Flickr: Frog and Toads/Discuss (never knew such a site exists!!) and .... lo and behold! I GOT AN ANSWER!!!

Kaloula pulchra - The Asian Bullfrog (aka Banded bull frog or Asian Painted Frog and even Chubby Frog)!!! :O

Interesting Facts: Known to have immigrated from West Malaysia during the 1800s.Very common seen island-wide, especially after heavy down-pour.

Size: 7.5cm

Diet: Invertebrates

Activity: Nocturnal and terrestrial-burrowing

Habitat: Disturbed forest, agricultural areas and urban areas

Tip: When selecting an Asian painted frog, make sure that it has a good weight, clear eyes, no abrasions or open wounds, and is behaving normally (???).

"Don't be fooled by its bulky size. It can still climb trees very well." :O x 100

Oktoberuns!



I can't figure out why but i just feel like running this month.. and the more i run, the more i feel like running.... i think.. i think.. i'm turning into... Forrest Gump!! hahahaha....

and who can forget that memorable running scene from the show..



from Wikiquote:
"That day, for no particular reason, I decided to go for a little run. So I ran to the end of the road. And when I got there, I thought maybe I'd run to the end of town. And when I got there, I thought maybe I'd just run across Greenbow County. And I figured, since I run this far, maybe I'd just run across the great state of Alabama. And that's what I did. I ran clear across Alabama. For no particular reason I just kept on going. I ran clear to the ocean. And when I got there, I figured, since I'd gone this far, I might as well turn around, just keep on going. When I got to another ocean, I figured, since I'd gone this far, I might as well just turn back, keep right on going. When I got tired, I slept. When I got hungry, I ate. When I had to go... you know... I went."

Update: My sis just reminded me of "Run Lola Run"... gosh I LOVED the movie!!!! made me wanna get up to run and great soundtrack too!!

I'm watching Avenue Q on Broadway!



yippee!!

Wakeboard World Cup Singapore 2008



these people defy gravity!!

The Funeral of Mr JBJ

the crowd was solemn and respectful.. after all, most people, like me, were there for a simple reason... to honour a man who showed us, and the rest of the nation, what true courage really was.. who lived a life of integrity... and conviction... and with the fear of God... who truly believed in standing up for what he believed in... no matter... and for the weak ... and "voiceless".... beyond all (the ugly of) politics, his life will always remain an inspiration to us all...

Thank you Mr JBJ..

Mourning the passing of JBJ (5 January 1926 - 30 September 2008)


"He has done so much for Singapore. But what have Singaporeans done for him?" - quote taken from the weblog of Siew Kum Hong.. a line the Nominated MP heard said at Mr JBJ's wake..

"In an age where a million dollars are demanded to serve the nation, JBJ parted with a million dollars to serve his people." .... from Jacob's weblog

Indeed, very few among us can claim to know him beyond what we read in the local press, whether it is fair or otherwise... let alone care about what he does; or try to support or encourage him in his work... I was surprised to read that he faced and lost the first political defamation suit against him way back in 1976.. and was sued again and again and jailed and bankrupted all the way till he was finally discharged in 2008!! Read: JBJ through the years... wow... talk about determination!

Personally, the closest encounter I ever had with this iconic figure was the brief chat i had with him many years ago, when he set up a booth just outside City Hall MRT, near to where i was working at that time, selling his first book "Make It Right For Singapore".

I bought a copy and he was quick to give me his office number, on top of autographing the book, when i asked if I could email him afterwards if I had further questions.

Through someone who knew him, I went on to also buy his second book, "The Hatchet Man of Singapore" a few years later.. it was a pity that this time round, i didn't get to speak to him, even though the book came autographed.

Though he is gone, his life, thoughts and ideas deserve a place in our history books..

Singapore has lost someone very special.. and very important... and who will always deserves our utmost respect...

“At times I feel tired and say to myself:
“Don’t you think you should give up now?”
But that is only momentary.
It is followed by the thought that
if I have started on a job and
as long as I have the health and strength,
I will have to go on with it.
And there are people who look to you
especially when you walk the streets of Singapore.
It is just my conviction that when things are wrong,
and if there is anything I can do to put them right,
then I should do that.
I think every citizen should feel like that.
It is a citizen’s duty.

“I did not have many properties
but I had to sell a bungalow
in a very fashionable area in Singapore
to pay the judgment obtained
by Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew.
Having sold that, three years later
I bought a small apartment,
and then I had to sell that too.
All in, I had easily about 12 to 13 suits to pay off.
Some people say I was a fool.
All I can say is I do not regret it because,
to me, life is not all about making money
and acquiring wealth.
Life is doing something for the people around you.”

- Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam

RIP Mr JBJ.

• Read also: Condolence Letter from Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Demise of JB Jeyaretnam (-__-)

Some more balanced reporting (Thank God for the Internet!):

• A Singapore Hero by Wall Street Journal
• Singapore opposition leader dies by BBC News
• Veteran Singapore Politician Dies by Reuters

* Photo copyrighted by Lim Soon Chung. See gallery of her great JBJ pics.

Tainted!



Will snacking office workers and students be able to get through these tough times? Stay tuned!!

happy mid-autumn festival!

i've been enjoying mooncakes, pomelos and lanterns.. have you? :)

I Like DHC Balloons! :p


managed to catch the DHL Balloon before it closes end of this month... it's actually a lot more enjoyable than the Flyer, albeit a lot shorter (10-15mins vs. 30mins) cos you can feel the "takeoff" and the wind in your hair, instead of feel like you are just in a grimey fishtank going round and round.. haha.. :p

its not cheap at $23 to go up to 150m (but still cheaper than the $29.50 of the Flyer) but i kinda feels its quite worth it.. then after that you can proceed to eat charcoal steamboat or hainanese chicken rice (or both! which is what i did! p) at the New 7th Storey Hotel, which you definitely need to do if you haven't already tried it, before the authorities demolish it (so sad!! :( ) for the downtown line one (or something like that).

Singapore Flyer - Teachers FLY FOR FREE!



view was quite nice but if i had to pay (thank you Singapore Flyer for the free flight!!), i'll probably wait for the Sands IR to be up first so there'll be more stuff to see.. anyway, take the 7pm ride, its probably the best.. it's the so-called "sunset" time when the sky turns a beautiful blue, u can still see the clouds and the office lights have yet to be turned off... a friend of mine tells me the Moët & Chandon Champagne Flight is worthwhile too. bring your loved one.

The Moon on 20 Aug 2008



the moon again, one of my favourite subjects.

Hitler And ERP Woes (Singapore)



hahhahahahaha....

A luxurious weekend getaway for a steal



a laidback getaway at a great price... a couple of drawbacks though.. hard to explore around the area unless you have your own transport (there is some rabbit park nearby and of cos port dickson town itself), the swimming pool could be a lot cleaner, and while the food at the hotel is great (love the pizza!!), choices around the area are limited (of cos, unless you have your own car, again).. :) get more details from me if you need.

The Transformation


check out this funky musical instrument case!!

Painted by me but design is by Norwegian cartoonish Øistein Kristiansen (see website - can you believe this incredible artist is actually based in Singapore?? :))

Beijing Olympics!


so much muck at the Qingdao venue that swimmers and sailors will be stuck for sure! (see more pics)


Construction workers stand on scaffolding erected to build an Olympic exhibit as the city is covered with smog and pollution, a month before the opening of the Olympic Games in Beijing on Tuesday, July 8, 2008. (AP / Oded Balilty)

and the air is still so bad competitors will collapse from their running, jumping etc.. will Beijing be ready in time??

'How to encourage your child? Use your imagination.'

in case u haven't seen it, the video that (probably) inspired our NDP2008 video..



as Alex Au of Yawning Bread puts it.. "It's a powerful ad that reminds us how imaginative genius can easily be mistaken for madness and be dismissed, or worse, suppressed. "

Oh Great Leader we obey thee



original painting by eeshaun (www.eeshaun.com)

supporting local artists! :)

Daniel Powter - Bad Day



i know it's kinda soppy but hey, it brought a smile to my face and might just do the same for you.. :)

and besides, according to BBC UK, it "has been the most played song in the UK over the last five years"... not bad, huh?

Toy Shopping @ China Sq (Sunday 13 July 2008)

eager to do my patriotic bit at boosting the domestic economy, i trudged down to China Sq last Sunday, shortly upon receiving my mid-year Civil Servant bonus, and threw it all (well, not exactly) into the following cuties...




it's all for a good cause, i say.. :p

Outdoor Photography Course - Day 1



theme is "Colour".. which is kinda hard when we are asked to shoot within a 200m stretch of secondary rainforest.. haha.. oh well, i love my snail pic.. :)and if u look carefully enough, i do have a nice range of colours in my photos..



and we were also given opportunity to shoot "Textures & Shapes" in B&W.. more snails!!! :p

Update: Anatomy of a Snail

Toys, toys and more toys (Singapore Toy & Comic Convention 2008 @ Suntec)



Bought a piece of the wall from Gloomy Bear creator Mori Chack's booth.. toys were all sold out by the time i got there but they started to sell chunks of the wall instead, with the artist's autograph, for $10 a piece and my, was the queue long! :p i can't believe mori chack is actually here! i've been such a huge fan since 2002!! :p


Couldn't resist buying the Bandai Gundam series of BB Warriors - Romance of the Three Kingdom.. hope i have time to assemble them all together..


and i still have all my Keroro toys to assemble... :O..

and guess what?? I managed to buy the Friends With You's Wish Come True toys made by Strangeco!! whee... they are so cute!! and apparently they jingle too when they rock from side to side!

breadou



someone put a 'breadou' on my table today.. luckily i already had lunch and wasn't hungry... it's quite spongy and cute and smells nice.. :)

update: showed it to mum and she told me to keep it properly in case daddy accidentally eats it for supper.. wahahhahaahaha... she knows him so well... :p

Southern Ridges Walk (5 June 2008)



over-photographed... but still nice... :)

if u need advice on walking the whole route from end to end, u can email or msn me.. we did the 9km walk starting from Clementi Woods, got really lost somewhere in NUS literally going around in circles, then bounced down the whole winding length of South Buona Vista road, strolled through the picturesque Kent Ridge Park, had fun playing in the wonderfully manicured Hort Park, saw the often over-shadowed but nonetheless quite pretty Alexandra Arch Bridge, clanked the whole metallic length of the seemingly never-ending but supposedly only 2.4km canopy bridge called the Forest Walk (The forest walk consist of a series of interlinking grated steel walkways joined together to form a continuous linked hilltop walkway towering over the tree canopy tops), ending up at Telok Blangah Hill Park slightly past dusk, in time to witness the really-quite-beautiful Henderson Wave basking in the twilight, before charging through the rest of the walk (Marang Trail - basically a forest walk) in darkness using our headlamps, and eating dinner at VivoCity, some 5 hours later..

u can definitely do the walk at a much faster pace if you take less photographs and have less fun at Hort Park and don't stop to listen to the birds chirping in the trees.. but then, what's the point of doing the walk then?

this guy's blog has the description of the whole route and the sights along the way in quite an incredible amount of detail..

Singapore Arts Festival 2008 Closing Celebration : Hydro Sapiens by The Lunatics (at Bedok Reservoir)



Another cryptic performance.. but nonetheless quite interesting.. though i personally prefer the water-based performance during the opening celebrations..

Road Trip to Western Australia (08 to 16 June 2008)





Itinerary: Perth-Williams-Mt Barker-Albany-The Gap & Natural Bridge-Albany Windfarm-Williams Bay-Valley of Giants & Tree Top Walk-Pemberton-Margaret River Wine Region-Mandurah-Fremantle-Perth (1470.1km)

Plus took an additional two pretty typical day tours: (1) Perth-York-Hippos Yawn-Wave Rock(Hyden)-Mulka's Cave/The Hump-Babakin-Perth; & (2)Perth-Caversham Wildlife Park (Koalas, Kangaroos, Wallabies, Wombats)-Corrigin Dog Cemetary-Pinnacles Desert-Lancelin Sand dunes for 4WD off-road driving & sandboarding-Perth

a nice and relaxing (albeit more costly) break, vastly different from most of my recent adventures to less developed countries... i've got a lot of other pics, if you are a friend and want me to show them to you do msn me :)

Company Ilotopie- "Water Fools"



went for the opening show of the Singapore Arts Festival 2008 by French street theater Company Ilotopie.. though i didn't have a great vantage point (wrong side of the river and lens too short) and couldn't make out what was going on most of the time (which i found was probably the norm from the hilarious running commentaries cum interpretations the people around me were making.. haha..).. nonetheless, it was quite spectacular and unusual.. the sort of stuff i like... :) go see it if you can. at boat quay. free. tomorrow and sunday i think..

Moon Photography


i'm not sure why it looks different every time i photograph it.. this time i can see the texture of the moon more clearly... hahaha.. if you're not a great fan of moon pictures that's just too bad!! :p i think the moon is just so darn fascinating!!

More Celestial Images!


pic of sun taken this morning at 7am - the sky wasn't exactly this dark (i.e. its because i 'spot metered' using the sun) but it was really so flaming red! wake up earlier tomorrw and take a look!!

and i took the moon again tonight.. not as clear and bright but i've captured the 'viewing platform'! :p

Full Moon


just took this 15 mins ago out of my apartment window.. the moon was so distractingly huge in the night sky on my drive back along the PIE that i almost had difficulty keeping my eyes on the road...

according to this moonmap from this website, you can see 2 craters (Crater Tycho & Crater Copernicus) and 2 mares (Maria means 'sea', namely Mare Nubium ("sea of clouds") and Mare Tranquillitatis ("sea of tranquillity") in my picture! can you spot them?? you need to sort of tilt my pic a bit cos i think the other pic was taken in North America or somewhere..


according to all astrological predictions i see online, tonight as a full moon night is quite something indeed...

"Full Moon in Scorpio Ritual - May 19 - 20, 2008 - This Full Moon in Scorpio is an excellent time to make an important choice...will you allow yourself to fall into the trap of external reality and find the mundane world and the wishes of others dominating your life, or will you step forward and decide that you are driving your own chariot? Will you accept responsibility for creating your own life and step firmly onto the path of personal evolution? Taking control of our own thoughts, deeds, and actions will infuse us with inner strength and creative power that can become the driving force behind living a joyful and enriching life. Now is the perfect time to choose your path and create your destiny."

nonetheless, when is it ever NOT a good time to take responsibility for our own thoughts, deeds and actions?? haha...

guess it's the same with new year's resolutions, we always need to have a "special time" to start making changes in our lives.. oh well...:)

News Report: Superstitious Chinese link earthquake to "unlucky" Olympic mascots



these are my Olympic mascot toys (bought from my school trip to Xi'an and Chengdu last Nov) sitting atop my desktop computer, prettily and patiently awaiting the start of the 2008 Olympic games.... unbeknownst to them, accusatory rumours swirl around cyberspace concerning their inauspiciousness... who is to say what is to be believed or not..? afterall, the facts are spookily coincidental...

Hong Kong - Superstitious bloggers have linked China's earthquake disaster and other recent misfortunes to the five Olympic mascots seen on posters across the nation, a Hong Kong newspaper reported Friday.

Gossip sites are full of speculation that four of the five cartoon mascots have fulfilled prophesies of doom with one more, connected to the mighty Yangtze River, ominously still to come, the South China Morning Post said.

The five Olympic mascots are Jinjing, Huanhuan, Yingying, Nini and Beibei - and Jingjing, a panda, the animal most closely associated with Sichuan province where the earthquake struck.

Huanhuan, a cartoon character with flame hair, is being linked by bloggers to the Olympic torch which has been dogged by fierce anti-China protests on its round-the-world tour.

Yingying, an antelope, is an animal confined to the borders of Tibet which has been the scene of riots and the cause of international protests against China, the bloggers point out.

Nini, represented by a kite, is being viewed as a reference to the 'kite city' of Weifang in Shandong where China saw a deadly train crash last month.

That leaves only Beibei, represented by a sturgeon fish, which online doomsayers suggest could indicate a looming disaster in the Yangtze River, the only place where Chinese sturgeon are found.

Peking University sociologist Xie Xueluan told the newspaper: 'Chinese see major calamities as divine intervention ... The absence of religion reinforces this trend.'

Battle at Kruger NP



in case you're not one of the 31 million people who have viewed this on youtube... Winner of the YouTube's Best Eyewitness Video.. and now apparently National Geographic has bought the rights to the video for a rather tidy sum... oooooh.... :) there's even a website..

"Our pandas are ok"



... so said my travel companion to Chengdu and Tibet last year, over msn to me just two days ago... and this was also confirmed by the AP news report i find online... that's a relief, at least.. so huge and yet gentle is how i remember these lovely bi-colored bamboo chewing herbivores.. and of cos there were the frisky red pandas too, with their thick striped tails...

and as i type this blog entry, i hear the news blaring out from the living room tv, giving updates on the latest death toll in the Sichuan province.. 15,000... and interviews with the people who survived.. so many disasters, one after another, natural, manmade.. i can barely bring myself to read the papers nowadays... After the crackdown in Lhasa, then all that hoo-ha with the olympic torch, and then the myanmar cyclone and now the 7.8 richter scale earthquake.. and if that wasn't enough, i just read a report on the series of bomb blasts in Jaipur, a fascinating city which i visited just a mere 4 years ago on my month and a half long trip to the colourful desert state of Rajasthan in India.....

its hard to be optimistic about the future... but we must try i guess...

Look what my colleague found in her breakfast this morning!



and horrors of all horrors, she only found it after eating the 1st of 3 buns she had with her!! eeeks!!!!

where did she buy it from?

this bakery opposite the old Ginza plaza along West Coast Road.. i think it is called Clementi West St 2 .. she said it is not prima deli but "the other one at the corner".... ummm...

Some random pictures to add color to my blog


bet u didn't know i had such a huge collection of Patrick the starfish toys... hahahaha


and this was one of those mornings that i didn't care about leaving for work on time cos the sunrise was just so pretty...

and recently, i've been a little addicted to buying inexpensive toys from ebay... here's some of the new critters in my collection...