Where I Live...

I wouldn't call the neighbourhood I live in as having the best living conditions.

Neither would I call it the slums, as there are still certain things I like about my estate that wouldn't really justify it as a "slum" per se.

Things are really going to change for the year of 2011, and as much as I admit that I am looking forward to it, there will always be a sense of nostalgia that I will think back at. The things I used to do when I was younger, the places I went when I was younger. Even the places I used to go and eat when I was younger. All these will change in time to come.

The past 2 years of embarking into a working life as an adult has been an eye-opener for me, to say the least. I have learnt many things that the previous phase of my life as a schooling teenager was unable to teach me.

While this post may seem awkward and sticks out like a sore thumb compared to the rest of the posts I have here, I must say that many things have changed over the year as time passed by.

We may see the dawn of a new era beginning...

Service with a Smile.

So we was at Swensens Plaza Singapura. Ordered a Pesto Salmon Saute, and it arrived with a strand of hair as the "sides" on the plate.

Manager is summoned, and hair is swiftly pointed out. The manager stares at the hair, and whisks the plate away back to the kitchen.

While waiting for the food again, the manager comes out of the kitchen with a bowl of cream soup. "Here, please have the soup while waiting for the food. I ordered the chef to cook another plate."

W.O.W. OK...

We start to eat the soup, and then the manager comes out of the kitchen again with a second bowl of cream soup. And fries. And two dip sauces for the fries.

"Please have some fries while you wait for the food," says the manger.

I stared at the fries and the second bowl of soup (we usually order only one bowl of soup to share; two is usually too much). Being a skeptic, I wonder if the items were given to us by mistake, or if the manager was giving them as complimentary items as an apology for the hair.

The food comes a few moments later, and the table for 2 is crammed full of plates and bowls.
The meal was finished with two stuffed turkeys wobbling out of the restaurant.

Service with a Smile, indeed.

May I Know... #1

So I went for a run today. On the way back, a middle-aged woman stopped me and asked me:

"Do you know where is Block xx?"

I pointed out where the building was, and turned to walk away.

"Sorry, do you know how to get to Potong Pasir from here? I heard you can walk to xxx and take Bus xxx."

I told her it was too far to walk to take Bus xxx, and directed her to take Bus yyy and transfer to Bus xxx.

And then she left.

Ed: This is not the first time I have been stopped by strangers on the road to ask for directions. The last time I encountered such a situation was just one week ago. And the one before that was like another week ago also. I thought that I should start writing down all these "encounters", and perhaps it would be a good laugh at the end of the day.

In The Land of Freedom

I am trying to make a list of the things I will do if I ever get to go to the United States of America. Here's my list:

1. Buy a box of Twinkies and gorge myself on it.
2. Visit Jamba Juice and purchase a drink from there. [Here's a funny video related to Jamba Juice by the way...]
3. [Still deciding.. to be appended in future]

Ushering in the Year 2010

The year 2009 was a very busy year. So busy that I didn't have time to continue my posts of nitpicks, rants and complaints.

Hopefully, the year 2010 will be much better.

A high-level overview of what will be up for 2010:
- Adidas Sundown Marathon (Half)
- Singapore Standard Chartered Marathon (Full)
- Anything else that may come in my way is tentative and TBD.

ATMs and What-Nots

So I was in a queue to use a cash deposit machine at a bank lobby. There were 2 machines. 1 was spoilt; the other still working. Needless to say, the crowd was lined up behind the working machine. The spoilt machine accepted passbook updates only.

One non-local Indian holding a stash of money in the middle of the queue (in front of me), looks at the spoilt machine and wonders why nobody is using it.

He leaves the queue to try his luck at the unused machine. He realises that the machine is spoilt, and looks around over his shoulder at the queue he had left just a few minutes earlier.

He walks back to the queue, and rejoins the queue at the position where he left.

Two Malay girls behind him confronted him, and tells him to rejoin the queue from the end of the line.

One Philippine woman notices the commotions. She is right in front of the non-local Indian man.

She turns around and chides the two girls, "No, he was queued up right behind me."

The non-local Indian pretends to not understand any word the girls are saying, and keeps quiet. He stays where he is in the queue, helped by the Philippine woman.

The Malay girls refuse to swallow their pride, and leaves the lobby.

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Right in front of the queue, using the machine was an auntie who looked to be in her 40s. She was listening to her personal audio player with a white pair of earphones.

She was trying to deposit cash, but the machines kept rejecting her notes.

So she kept on trying. For a full 5-7 (?) minutes.

The crowd behind her gets frustrated, and people start asking each other what the woman is doing.

One ah-beng dressed in construction worker boots shouts out for the woman to leave. He says, "Eh auntie, go away and use some other machine. Don't keep using this machine... blah blah blah blah..."

Another guy chips in and tells her to stop trying and give up and let other people use the cash deposit machine.

The ah-beng finishes off with, "...if you keep on trying like that, we all gonna sleep here tonight already..."

The woman took her rejected notes, having tried to re-deposit it for the umpteenth time, and stands in a corner, silent against the angry mob that has formed behind her.

I left after making a passbook update at the spoilt machine, before the commotion turned ugly.

Another Workday... #5

Another workday, another weekend. Cometh thou rest, begone is thy youth.

Whence shalt this race slow down or stop, to let me take a breather?

I am entwined and grasped in a vise, falling from the heavens in a downward spiral.

This is a fucking evil vicious cycle.

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I should be happy - I am not.

I should be contented - I am not.

I should be broken - I am not.

I should be grateful - that I am.

I should be mindful - that I am.

I should be thrifty - that I am.

I should be thoughtful - that I try.

I should be loving - that I try.

I should be careful - that Itry.

I should be resting.