Elf's Shrine

Sigh.
Today there has been another accident at a worksite.

This time it's a basement cave in at a worksite in Ayer Rajah (Fusionpolis). At last count, 2 were dead. Initially it was reported that 5 guys are missing.

Why so many of this things happening together? I guess the answers won't be forthcoming just yet. The Fusionpolis worksite is the deepest worksite in Singapore. You also start to hear Feng Shui and Gaia Theories from people hypothesizing what the cause may have been. Who knows, it just may be it.

I watched Saturday Night Fever on Tuesday Night (not trying to be funny here).

Hated the sound system. The high frequencies were killing my ears. My ears still feels funny now. It certainly does not help when the high frequencies are aided by loud volume. I wonder who's the sound engineer? Does the performing group bring them or does Esplanade provide them? Same thing happened during Singing in the Rain.

Story wise, I felt it was average. Not much character development. I feel that I am supposed to know who this 'Tony' and I really have no idea who he is except that he likes to go to the Disco and dance. Then again, when I think about it.. every other musical I watched has about the same amount of info provided for their characters. Still I find this one a tad shallow. Oh well, great dancing anyway.

Hmm.. quite a few things have happened since I last updated my Blog.

Most important is the collapse of a part of Nicoll Highway due to construction works along the MRT Circle line. 4 people were missing. Till date they have found 3 bodies, the last guy is unlocatable. The search has been abandoned due to treacherous search conditions. Apparently, this last unfound guy had been helping people to escape from the site, and on his last trip in to rescue more people, he simply failed to surface again.

Last year, it was the RSS Courageous incident where those of us in the Navy lost 4 of our sisters-in-arms. 3 were found and 1 is missing till date. Strange coincidence isn't it? 4 girls and now 4 guys. In both cases 1 person is missing.

I still remember when Chief of Navy came down and gave us a speech on the RSS Courageous incident. It started to drizzle on all of us who were mustered in the parade square. It was as if the heavens felt sad over our loss too. Personally, I don't really care what happens to the OOW and the OJT on Watch. What's happened has past, I just hope the crew has gotten on well in their life after the incident. I recall how afraid I was to find out who the casualties were. Are my friends in the list? Are my friends on that ship? Well, as things turned out, none of my friends were directly involved, though one of my friends had just been posted out of the ship and she was occupying the bed that the girl who is still missing today was in.

Let the past be remembered, the future awaits.

While the government is lamenting on falling Chinese Language standards, it is not hard to see why it is dropping.

Just today, I was on the MRT en route to City Hall MRT. Along the way, there was this child travelling along with his parents. The parents are very engaging to the child though, they spoke to him throughout the trip. They got to a point when they asked him what his name was, and he replied with his Chinese name. They then asked what his english name was and he promptly gave a reply. Smart kid.

However, the father immediately said..."So call you **english name** lah... so much more easier right?? **english name**"

I do not see why the english name is easier. It is also two syllables like the chinese name. If one cannot even remember his own name what can he do?

You might think... do not be so anal retentive about this lah. Go with the times man. However, what I am talking about is, if we teach our children that Chinese language in all it's existence in any way is difficult, how do you expect the child to like it and learn it well in school??

I really do not see the point of doing a show full of dangerous stunts just to raise funds. I don't deny that I enjoy watching stunts, but I fail to see the point of stunts being performed year after year. In fact it has become the prescribed programme for each NKF Charity Show.

Is it that without all these stunts, there will be very little donations? However, we cannot blame them for putting up such shows every year. After all, we have been donating to the show, and like they say "If it ain't broke, don't fix it".

Therefore, the show programmers would carry on doing the show the same way every year. I think that a major change can only be effected should there come a day when people refuse to donate on grounds that the stunts ae too dangerous. However, that will not happen.

Even amidst all the bad press, they have managed to get 6 million dollars in donations during the show.
A bit of background on the recent NKF scandal. NKF (National Kidney Foundation) was revealed to have 189 million dollars in reserves. This amount is sufficient for their fundings for the next 3 years. While I do agree that they should have money in reserves and should attempt to raise more money in case of a rainy day, I also feel that they should be more transparent with their funds. After all, this is money from the public that we are talking about here. I would like to know that the money I have contributed has gone to good use, and not into some fat cat's coffers.

Well, I'll see how they go about clarifying things. Till then, I got some other charity to donate to, and I know for a fact that this charity really really needs donations.

Finally, the long awaited, or should I say long dreaded OHSAS/ISO audit is finally over. Pheww!! All of us have been so worried over it these recent days. I got to say that the most stressed person has got to be my Nursing Officer! She is the OHSAS Management Representative, so she has to settle everything to do with OHSAS at the Formation level as well, not just at department level. She had to come up with all the new procedures... right from scratch!!

I really admire her, I simply cannot fathom how someone can achieve that! It is definitely a lot of hard work, but to be able to create procedures is a tough job by my thinking. It is sad that she will be leaving us soon.... but I sincerely feel that it is better for her to go where her skills and experience can be put to practical use. She is doing mostly adminstrative work here. Quite a waste.

Got to enjoy the last 2 months of her leadership. Hope the next person will be just as nice and capable as she is. I hope to be able to perform to even 10% of her capability... THAT's how good she is!

Ok, my fermentation complain mode has struck again.
I was at Sony Square yesterday (030404) to ask the staff there if they could give me any advice on a problem that I have been having with my Sony NR70V.

I have been unable to hotsync it recently. I keep getting an error message that says:
"HotSync operation started 02/26/04 17:15:32
HotSync Error:
An application failed to respond to a
HotSync notification. Please check the Palm Desktop for details. (8009)
HotSync operation complete 02/26/04 17:15:32"

So I happily thought that I could go to Sony Square and ask for advice. BIG mistake. I approached this guy who was quite free and posed my question to him. First thing he said when I took out my PDA was "Wah!! So big ah!!"

Hey, I don't think he was supposed to say that. He's selling Sony stuff for goodness sake. Next he said that he could try to check out the problem for me and asked if I brought the Hotsync cable. When I said that I did not, he gave one kind of look (baka!!) and said he could try. Then, he proceeded to ask me what OS my PDA used. I told him it was the older version and he promptly told me that he could not help me.

He then proceeded to tell me that there are many newer models of PDA now (As if I didn't know that! What are you getting at, buster??) and my friend then started to get pissed with his attitude and asked him if there was any place where help may be provided. He went to get the contact of Sony Service centre and went on about how I ought to have a fat wallet when I go there because:"What sells at $1 outside will be sold at $10 there"

Unbelievable!! I know that it will not be cheap to buy things at Sony service center but I never expected him to make such comments! Then he went on again about how there are newer models available.. blah blah blah. I told him to forget it and walked off.

Hey, even if you are trying to earn commision on sales.... this IS NOT the way to do it. Do I look like I will buy anything from you if you piss me off? Not to mention that you insulted my choice of product right at the beginning, which belongs to Sony anyway!!! I probably might not have started to be pissed had my friend not been there... but he was just bad!

Sigh, my longest post yet has to be a complain.

Saturday. It's over. Soon Sunday will be over all too soon and it'll be Monday again. I guess this is what defines Monday blues. Just thinking about it makes one upset. Why does the weekend have to end so fast?

The good thing is that next weekend will be a very long one. I am planning to get off on Thursday so I will be off from Thursday untill the following Monday!! Hurrah! I hope this goess according to plan.

Sometimes don't you just wonder what's the point of life? We work, we spend, we attempt to earn enough to provide for a comfortable retirement. In that attempt, we work so much that we neglect other things like actually living our life as it goes by. In a blink of an eye, you're too old to do many of the things that you always wanted to do.

I am not a hardworking person. That I admit and declare upfront. I believe in working to live, not living to work. There are people around who believe that if you are not spending every waking hour working, you must be lazy. I think they must be crazy. I want to enjoy my life. Live life.

Hmm. Just found out that there may be fare increases for public transport in Singapore. Again. This time the justification is increased security measures on public transport in view of the Madrid bomb blast. Heck. Everytime something happens, they'll do a review (that's good) implement some new measures (maybe not that good) and come up with some cost increasing policy (DEFINITELY not good).

Where increased security measures are for the interest of the commuter, does it not also benefit the transport provider in preventing loss of assets which will lead to loss of revenue? I have to take transport everyday, so there is no way I can avoid this increase in expenditure. At this time when salaries are not increasing as they used to, we are experiencing one of the worst periods in history with regards to all manner or fare and fee increase.

AH. My very own Blog on the net.
Ain't this the most popular little thing on the net these days? Sometimes I wonder why anyone would like to share their life on the net with people that they do not know, but I guess it's fun! :)
I would like to use this opportunity to practise my writing skills. They have simply gone down the drain since I left secondary school all those years ago!
Ciao for now. Hope I remember to come back and update this regularly.