Do They Know It's Christmas?

This song is written by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure in 1984 specifically to raise money for Ethiopian famine relief.

This is the Christmas song ever, simply because it's so touching. This is what Christmas is all about, giving and helping others.


(Let it run first, then play again)

Christmas is fast approaching. I just love Christmas simply because it freaking awesome.

Imagine just because of the Christmas spirit, we would have friendly smile between strangers, the sound of familiar Christmas carols, a tree with twinkling lights in a sea of brightly wrapped packaged presents.

Of course real meaning of Christmas spirit is not for the gifts, but the warm feeling you get just being around your family members.

This year as usual I wrote to Santa Claus.

---------
Dear Santa,

I have been a good boy all year.

The only thing I ask is fuck this siao ren away from me. Screw this annoying cockroach til he bleed to death.

With him gone like Saddam Hussein, there is peace and joy in the world for everybody!

Love,
Nick
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A small lane of art-deco style shop-houses, tucked behind the Raffles Hotel, Purvis Street has seen a burst of new eateries, each with their own distinct flavour.

There is this beef noodles at this little coffeeshop stall beats many restaurants in term of mouthwatering. Being a true Singaporean, I happily indulge in the our national pastime; eating


(Thinking what to eat)


(Hock Lam street popular beef kway Teow)

I order my soup beef noddle with tendons.

(Beef slices are cooked just right, with spare parts like tendons and tripe making the soup more tasty)

Bear order his dry beef noddle

(Gravy is thick and flavourful with crushed peanuts to go along)


(At $5 per bowl, it's not cheap.)

Verdict: 4/5

After dinner, we took advantage of Christmas lighting at Orchard road to take some great photos. Both of us used to hate taking pictures couple years back.

But now, we love every moment of it. Man will not stay young forever.

Just look back our old pictures in one year, two years or ten years time will be priceless.


(Buddha under bodhi tree, Bear under Christmas tree)


(Outside CK Tang)


(Using camera's self timing functions, we're able to take pictures of ourself)






(Paragon Shopping Centre)


(Bear knows how to pose pattern. Like squatting position)


(Bear and tree really bend it together)


(Outside HMV)


(Centrepoint)


(Ask Bear to take background showing all the Christmas light, he takes like this)


(Camera's self-timing really useful. No need to ask stranger to take for us)


(Ask Bear to stand in the middle of the road, he refused.)


(Ngee Ann City)




(Between Wisma Atria and Wheelock Place)

It will not be the end of this shoot. We'll be back.

The secret diary of Zoe Tay

My dearest diary!

I can't believe this!!

This year for the Stars Award, I did not even get nominate for the top best 20 female celebrities. Have no award, no interview, and no one even bothered to mention me.

Kan na sia, I'm Ah Jie of Medicorp.....the Queen of Caldecott.

I still remember how I forgot to take my pills who behaved like a mad woman last year. How Christopher Lee and Fann Wong kanna suay by me..jia lut jia lut.

LOL...Heheee.



This year I have been severely warned, one of my leg was leash to the chair tightly so I can't go up the stage to make trouble.

Never mind, I just swallow my pride for the time being.

My company warned me not to talk nonsense but they forgot to warn Huang Yiliang. Hahaha.



He taunts Lin Mei Jiao year after year like a madman. Knew him for many years now and one thing for sure he's a very petty person, has a narrow heart. Huang Yiliang was telling the whole world that he is now married, with a new found love. He's even better than me in babbling rubbish.

I hope next year Lin Meijiao win for once, let her prepare her speech and suay him back on national TV.



Then this Fiona Xie thanks his Thai boy boy saying, “Without you, I'm nothing”. Lol.....I had to stop myself from laughing.

Her parents must be using their fists to pound their heart. Bring her up for nothing. What do she mean without you, I'm nothing? Without her parents she is absolutely nothing.

Anyway, I look much stylish and much prettier than her.

My colleagues have no sense of occasions at all, bringing out their personal buffs into the limelight instead thanking on their win.

Another one is Christopher Lee.



Talk until wanted to cry. I know must be his hit and run incident; drink driving. Yet to go to court. When I see him, I will tell Ming Soon, worst case go back JB sell Soon Kueh. Not sure how my great rival, Fann Wong will react.

All of them so drama, they must learn from my stunt from last year Stars Award.

I win nothing this year, but still I'm the prettiest and still are Queen aka Ah Jie of the television world of Singapore.

Luv,
Zoe Tay.

My friend Ah Toh who sells fruit once told me, he hates customers from Bangladesh and PRC .

He said that they chose fruits, like choosing life partner.
Want the cheapest, want freshest, want the best of the best.

Finally today, I was able to fully comprehend what he meant. In its broadest sense, the term kiasuism brought to a whole new level I ever seen.

I was at Seng Siong supermarket, by comparison with NTUC or Giant the price there is much cheaper in my opinion. “Live” prawn for example, in NTUC or Giant, it cost SGD29.00 a kg and Seng Siong sells SGD16.00 a kg.

There was this lady, by her heavy mandarin accent, I concluded she was a PRC. She asked the staff to give her 300g of “live” prawns. Job done, staff gave her a bag of 'live' prawns.

Now the amazing part................


(This the lady.......si buay jialut)

She put her hand inside the plastic bag, catch hold of each individual prawn and place it back into the water to make sure it swim.

She did it to every one of the prawn.
Catch, place into water and back inside the plastic bag.


(Can visualize what she does?)



After 5 min the staff asked her if she ready to weigh the prawns as they need to put the price tag on the plastic bag.

She said, “ Can wait or not”
This goes on for another astonishing 15 min.

Wau lau en, buy 300g of prawns only for a fiddling sum of less than SGD5.00/- and she did like this?

I dare her to go NTCU to try out her stunt, I bet my last dollar that the staffs over there would take a smelly dead fish to slap her, knocking some senses into her.



Also I bet she never shave her smelly armpit hair. If she does, then my testicles are square.

Most of my friends tell me that have stress at work esp Ah Lam. Keep complaining the amount of stress he's having is tremendous.

When a person perceives that she/he is unable to meet the demands and pressures that are placed upon them, stress arises.

Do I have stress at work?

Well, except for the fact that I have to guard a certain siao ren and damn disgust about having to work during the weekend and public holiday. Other than that, I think I have no stress at work.

Let's analysis....a typical day at work attending ship during daytime.

Normally, my day begins depend very much on what time is my vessel arrival and so today I'm at the Mariner South Pier at 8:15am as my vessel coming at 8:00am.

Then, I'll meet up whoever need to go up the vessel with me. Of course we liaise the day before and in this case a surveyor is coming with me. Book my small boat (launch) and off we go at 8:30am.


(There's my ship and those barges beside her are supply boat like supplying bunker)


(All the crews are of Russian nationality)

This is my first time onboard this ship, in fact 90 percent of the time is similar situation to this.



See the crews,...most of the time I ignore them. Anything I want or need I look for the Captain / Master. If Captain give me a hard time, then I have a hard time. By the way, hard time mean I have to stay longer time onboard only. It doesn't mean I'm scare of him.

Average time need to settle my work take about 45min.


(Can see our Singapore building at the far end?)

My ship can anchor in few area depending on vessel size. Lucky today it take just 15 min from pier to ship. If anchor at Changi, it take 1 hour to reach.

Time: 9:20am
Look for Captain, settle the formality; port paper, accessing departure time & etc......


(Captain is photocopies some paper for me)

Unfortunately, this Russian Captain do not speak much English so it took me an hour to finish everything.

Left vessel at 9:45am
Reach back pier 10:00am.

And what do I now?
I go back home and sleep.

So do I have stress my work?

I have done some bad things.
To be fair, everybody does.

I always wanted to clean up my Karma but I just don't know how.
But the opportunity presented itself today.

This morning at my house car park, I witnessed a big truck trying to maneuver into parallel parking unfortunately the truck driver bang the side of the parked car behind. In a split second, the truck driver drove off.

I saw exactly what happen in details.
I immediately sprang into action.
I reached for a piece of paper in my van.

Took a pen and wrote these 7 words, "I saw what happened to your car."
Then I tucked the note neatly under the windshield wiper of the damaged car.

Did I get the truck plate number? - No.
Did I recognize the truck or driver? - No.
Did I video tape or capture any pics from my mobile phone? - No

But still, I think the owner of the vehicle will feel better just knowing that I cared enough to take the time out of my busy day to leave a note.
.

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/245348/1/.html

Understand another man jumped track at Yishun MRT.

Another one bites the dust. It is now official that our fellow Singaporeans favorite past time is jumping mrt track.

MRT has been around for so many years as yet we have 4 people jumped the track in less than 2 months.

Let do a recap.

Yishun (05 Dec 2006)
Admiralty (02 Dec 2006)
Clementi (30 Oct 2006)
Chinese Garden (18 Oct 2006)

Just what is wrong with Singapore society?
Since all suicide were male, I believe there this are the 2 problems mainly.

1) Problem with girl.
2) Money problem

Whatever the reason, it takes a lot of courage to take one's own life but it take a lot more courage to live in Singapore (GST 7%, low employment, high costs of living, etc).
.

Lam has a weird eating habit.

For example when eating chicken rice; to him the chicken meat itself is not important. What matter was the rice and chili sauce.

So accordingly the world of Ah Lam, best chicken rice he ever had was at beach road. In fact he gave me the rating of the chicken rice...BEST in Singapore.

I see 2 thumps up...let's try, I told him.

You know how long since he step inside this place? About more than 10 years ago. We walked up and down, finally Ah Lam managed to recognize the restaurant.


(This restaurant was inside this traditional pre-war shop house)

The inside was obviously old and run down. Tables with marbles on the top and wooden chairs were like antique, back in the 1970s. I have to admit, it's pretty charming blend of century-old touches inside.

Hey, even the folks eating inside were old as well.


Total damage: SGD22.00 (Including pork chop, half chicken)

Chicken rice was fragrant however can't say much about the chicken meat.
It was very dry.

My verdict: Fail...fail...fail.

After dinner our next stop, wash hair.

For the past few months, every week without fail we would have hair-washing experience. This saloon is somewhere at Jalan Besar.

While at the price of SGD15.00, you get hair wash + back massage.


(I have no idea why Ah Lam walk like this)


(We were waiting for our turn)

Question: So why do we come here to wash hair?
Answer: Simply because they really wash your hair.

Here take a look,....


(A picture tell you everything you ever needed to know; why do we come here)

So I asked Ah Lam, how shiok boh?

He said, “ Just look at my happy face”


(I saw a supremely satisfying man staring back at me.)

Duration: 30 min total (worth every penny)

So this is why,...we do the things that we do.

Here I am back at mini flea market along club street waiting for Ah Lam to finish his work.



Remember I wrote about this flea market on 21 November about this peddler selling old picture of somebody and on why would one buy picture of someone he or she don't even know.



I had to check it if anyone buy, to my greatest surprise, the picture was gone. Sold,....at least I think it was.

Well, I had to take back my word. But still, it's beyond me that why anyone would want to buy it.

Now the peddler had another old picture to sell.


(Picture of baby)
Next week I would check it out if anyone would buy it.

I got new finding of useless stuff that I rummaged from the peddlers.
First was this old fan cover which was broken



See the left side of fan cover? It was broken and why anyone want to buy it? I don't quite understand.

And there is this old and rusty keys


Yup...I really can't see any usefulness of it.

You have to look at this....


(Used envelope cover.)

I check inside, there was no letter only. So maybe the cover can be be re-use again?

And finally take a look the picture below.
See old trophy? At the top?
In fact there are two of them.



The only thing I can think of that people will buy is that they can use a paper weight.

Time: 6:55pm
Damage: $20.40 (For 2)
Rating: 2.5/5
Return to eat: Probably no.

Have dinner with Ah Lam at this place located at Beach road. It's bak kut teh but it's Malaysia style,....Klang (Selangor) to be exact.



Singapore bak kut teh is serve with pork rib, watery soup flavored with pepper and garlic.

For those whom are not familiar with the Malaysia style cuisine, Klang style of cooking is made with less garlic and less pepper and with many more herbs and spices. The broth is usually dark and flavorful. The soup is also served with a heaping portion of pork bones, pork belly, mushrooms, bean curd skin, and other treats.

After dinner it time to do our fave past time.

Every week, for the past month we've been doing this.
Every time, we will look for different environment to go.
Every week same result, shiok.


(Ah Lam enjoy himself)

Bath with massaging jets; Jacuzzi.

It gave us the opportunity to relax, reduce stress, relieve aches and pains. Amazed how the water's ability to refresh and rejuvenate us.


(We are in sauna)

While a hot sauna may seem a cruel punishment to unexperienced bathers, it is actually a very pleasant experience. All you need is a towel and at least half an hour of time. Start with a shower, then enter the sauna for a few minutes, listening to your senses. When you've had enough, take a refreshing shower, cool off for awhile.

There steam bath as well. A steam bath opens pores, soothes sore muscles, increases circulation, and provides a generally relaxing and healthy experience.

Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures inside.

Next entry, on why do we often go for washing of hair.