Whats a good place you recommend ?

*shrug* I'm not too sure about this part, but I do know that if I'm able to bring in about a million dollars (SGD) into the country, the PR part might not be a huge problem. So ... shall it be the stock markets, or the casinos, hmm?

I've printed out a PDF copy and am now wondering whether I should also laminate it. Even though it's a re-print of the same article from a UK newspaper, for me, this is a historical milestone.

Actually, I'm also wondering why "Today" published this one. If anything else, it's a pretty good choice for an article. What really surprised me is that, 1. it took up a full page, no cutting it short or anything, 2. they commissioned original artwork to go along with the article. It's not Page 1 news, and it sort of just popped up in the middle of nowhere.

I wonder how many people have actually read it and went out to find out more. We might yet have more SG members here!



It's a sure thing that most thinking citizens know, deep down, how fragile their situation really is. Heck, from young, we are taught about our lack of natural resources - no valuable minerals, not enough water, not enough land for food. We were taught that "people are our only resource".

It took me kind of long from there on to realise the simple theory, that if you increase the population for a given area, the GDP numbers will "grow", simply because a larger population demands to consume more resources. Add to that, a high-tech, consumeristic lifestyle, which adds further to resource usage, and hence, "economic growth".

Sure, it's probably sort of "cheating", but it did work for some time, didn't it. But now, the population density is reaching rather ridiculous levels. From 3000 people per sq km, to 4000, 5000, and now way over 6000.

It's getting really, really crowded. I can't stand to venture out on weekends to the usual shopping places nowadays (Orchard Road, etc). The roads are getting strained. It's not gridlock yet but at morning/evening rush hour we're "almost" there. Any little accident, vehicle breakdown or just one of those !#!@#$ trucks watering the plants at the roadside at an inappropriate time, and the balance can be tipped.

Well, I don't know about Terminus. Will there be an R. Daneel to guide us along?? Second Foundation'ers?

BR,

Looks like your diesel situation can be a "preview of things to come". The only good thing is that East Malaysia isn't as population-dense as over here. It's not as crowded, and not so reliant on diesel-powered trucks as a place like Singapore is.

These past few weeks, I've been going from my office to a customer location in Tuas. All along the expressway (AYE), is an endless row of trucks, of all types. Container trucks, vans, pick-up trucks, lorries of various sorts, all diesel-powered.

And the food trucks. Long, diesel-powered trucks bearing the logos of NTUC Fairprice (local equivalent of Walmart), Macdonald's, Delifrance, Singapore Food Industries, and whatnot.

If there is a "diesel situation" here, you can spell out TSHTF in full.

And many if not all of these diesel vehicle drivers like to idle their engines while they go for lunch, a cup of coffee, and so on. Smelly, and a helluva waste of a valuable resource - just to keep the aircon running.

I've been fortunate to travel to Singapore on annual trips since the early 90's. Back then there were very few air conditioned busses. Over time, more and more became aircon busses.

Last time I went just about all of them were air conditioned. I bet if flights are still affordable in 20 years I'll find once again very few busses are air conditioned.

It's really quite amazing to go to such a wonderful tropical place where one can avoid the heat and humidity nearly all the time, but I wouldn't get too used to it because the era of air conditioning in Singapore may soon be a fond memory.

EastBay

Problem is, most of the middle to upper class people around here are already used to air-conditioning. I still can't believe the number of people I meet/know who complain about not being able to sleep at night without one! (And my housemate happens to be one of them!)

And to think that these people are actually living in a hot + humid environment. God forbid that the lights go out at night, lest we actually sweat in our beds!

UBS (UBSN.VX: Quote, Profile, Research) revealed a $10 billion writedown and an emergency injection of funds from Singapore and the Middle East, making it the biggest victim of the U.S. subprime crisis to date among major European banks.

Singapore is taking 9 percent of UBS in a deal that mirrors actions taken by U.S.-based Citigroup (C.N: Quote, Profile, Research). Citi expects to write off between $8 billion and $11 billion and has secured funding from the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority.

Reuters

I saw ABC's 20/20 tonight and was impressed with the segment on Singapore.

Singapore

Its funny how we often think liberty is what makes life good, but Singapore shows that developing a society of good habits, punctuality and law abiding people has its benefits. I am looking to visit this place!

I recall years ago, seeing mail come from Singapore and was impressed at the uniformity of the letter packaging, they were among the first countries to use plastic warp, rather than rubber bands on letter bundles and it leads to much better machine sorting potential, and it makes it easier to load into mail trays.

Its a severe society, but it leads to good things. I often wish our business and government people were more like those in Singapore. I find so many Canadians and Americans are not focussed on their job and seem happy to turn out crap. I have seen so many co-workers chisel from the employer - time, office supplies, even unnecessary sick days.

I think in Singapore, it would be so much more productive, they expect good work from all their citizens and they would not tolerate some of the street crime and the general laziness and gross language that persists in Toronto. Toronto used to be a very clean city, but we have slipped a couple of notches on that score.

Maybe all American cities should look to Singapore for public control techniques, especially with respect to mass transit.

Good. I'm glad you like this place. To be a really strong genie -- you need to inherit everything about it -- including being a slave to the lamp.

No human rights. Capital punishment. High population footprint and density (try living in a 12 to 16 storey apartment no larger than 800 sq feet for a family of 4), high taxation (USD$30000-60000 for a 1.3-1.6l car, etc), no laws on minimal wages, no wage rights, no employment rights, and 20% of the population gone OUT and yet the net population increase is much MORE than what you experience across your mexican border. Oh, you have no space to grow your own veges, and there is no meat roaming around. Please don't play politics -- they sue you to the dungeons.

It's "work at OUR given rates or else another 2000+ engineers will be considered". Think 1930s style of depression employment. Hmmmm did I mention an annual 0.2-0.3% increment in wages?

All food is imported, with a bulk of it from our north "friendly" neighbour. 80% of energy from burning NG piped from Indonesia (who incidentally is still playing reindeer diplomatic games by denying the sale of SAND for our construction and reclamation works.

The list goes on. Unless you're a business person to exploit the human resources there, there is very little to gain coming here. I don't know what plant syrup you've been fed, but I sure wish I had that since I was born there.

Questions?

Denny,

You'll love the place. We, my family and I, go there once or twice a year for a week or two each time. We stay with the locals and feel perfectly safe jogging and walking around anywhere. There are really no 'bad' areas.

It's super clean and tidy. No litter. No graffiti. No crack heads roaming around. No meth labs. No armed gangsters lurking at the light rail stations. The people are generally as friendly as anywhere and you don't have to worry about getting mugged. Taxi's are cheap and the clean and safe busses are even cheaper. The light rail system is maybe the best on earth.

I got sick there once a few years back. A flu of some sort. I went to a neighborhood clinic and they immediately fixed me right up for $sg20.00. No waiting. I'm talking blood test, med's, and, of course, the examination. Even with my fairly decent medical insurance if this happened in the USA I would have been out at least twice that much.

Don't believe all the liberal propaganda. Singapore is fun, safe, and friendly. You will find Singapore to be a dreamland compared to (most cities in) Canada or the USA.

This is because much of modern work is meaningless, and pointless.

Like this scene from Office Space:

Peter Gibbons: The thing is, Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care.
Bob Porter: Don't... don't care?
Peter Gibbons: It's a problem of motivation, all right? Now if I work my ass off and Initech ships a few extra units, I don't see another dime; so where's the motivation? And here's something else, Bob: I have eight different bosses right now.
Bob Slydell: I beg your pardon?
Peter Gibbons: Eight bosses.
Bob Slydell: Eight?
Peter Gibbons: Eight, Bob. So that means that when I make a mistake, I have eight different people coming by to tell me about it. That's my only real motivation is not to be hassled; that, and the fear of losing my job. But you know, Bob, that will only make someone work just hard enough not to get fired.

channelnewsasia.com
In a massive new investment, the government will pump in another S$20 billion on new rail lines and extensions islandwide, Transport Minister Raymond Lim announced Friday [25 Jan 2008]. This is over and above the S$20 billion the government has already committed for the on-going Boon Lay extension, the Circle Line and the Downtown Line.

The rail update is the second in a series of three major policy announcements in a sweeping review of the land transport network. A bus system overhaul was announced last week. When the plans come to fruition in 2020, there will be one MRT station within five minutes' walk in the city, in a network that will be comparable to cities like New York and London, and surpassing Hong Kong and Tokyo.

There are currently 138 kilometres of rail lines. By 2020, authorities hope to double the network length to 278 km and expect it to carry three times as many journeys, from today's 1.4 million a day to 4.6 million in 2020. Two new lines will be built - the Thomson Line and the Eastern Region Line. Existing lines will also be extended. The North-South Line will be extended 1 km to serve the Marina Bay area while the East-West Line will be extended another 14 km west into Tuas. To avoid long waiting time and crowded trains, there will be 93 additional train trips weekly during the morning and evening peaks.

- As I have written earlier, it's a great initiative, but from a peakoiler point of view, I do wonder just what these new trains will be running on seeing as how the expected completion date is 2020.

I read from the CNA article that by 2020 the MRT will be considered a citizens 'other car'. What on earth will their 'first car' be?

It does seem like the infrastructure improvement planning is well intentioned, but the long-term vision is weak... much as it is in the rest of the industrialized world.

An even more interesting question is where they will get the energy to run all the air con units that make all the high-rises livable.

The expansion is cool though. I lived in Singapore for a while and never felt like I needed a car. In fact, it would have been more difficult to have a car.

The units on the higher floors are usually quite windy. I'd worry about the lifts (or elevators, as the Americans call them).