Asia On The Edge pics2

Beatrice Chia is in green and Tan Kheng Hua in red.

Asia On The Edge Show pics1

This is a performance produced by Goh Boon Teck for The Arts House. The 30 min show is free and will be on from Thur to Sunday 27 Sep 09 at 7.30pm outside the old Parliament House . Any of you recognise Mark Richmond? The girl is one of the top local model, I think. Can't remember her name.

More than we can chew

Ngiam Tong Dow said that we may become strangers in our home. Don't worry, we are already strangers in some part of the island. Walking through Chinatown or Geylang makes me feel that I am no longer in Singapore. No need to mention Little India. We are becoming a minority in some parts of our homeland. I forgot to mention The Sail and many high end residential estates and Orchard Road. And we are hearing calls on how to integrate the foreigners into our society. Maybe a more practical way is to integrate ourselves into the ways of the foreigners. The docile, nondescript, voiceless and faceless Singaporeans are as good as non existing other than be a digit in the big number games. The newcomers are the ones doing the talking and telling us what we should do to be like them or else.... And according to a 19 year resident PR, Atul Temurnikar, '...failure to integrate newcomers can post political problems, the way it has done in some European countries.' It is an early warning. Europe is big. Each of the European state is much bigger than we are, in physical territory and population, and the problems they are facing with their migrants are mounting. Could we tackle these same problems when our time comes? Maybe we can if we grind the numbers in our calculators. It is all a number game and with money, nothing is impossible. I enjoy the way the $10m integration fund and campaign is being turned into a joke. Maybe it really is.

A shitty article written by a lump of shit

Thursday, September 24, 2009 Singapore hopes for an end to its shame They must be spitting razors in Singapore’s corridors of power as I write this. ...... Imagine then the outrage, the fury, the sheer indignation felt in the island city-state at the certainty that their country will now forever more be associated with easily the most blatant example of crookedness in motor racing and one of the worst ever in the history of sport itself. The 2008 Singaporean Grand Prix could hardly have been more execrable. Nelson Piquet Jr. was ordered to crash his car by his bosses at Renault in order to force a safety car episode at a time which so suited his team-mate Fernando Alonso that he went on to win the race. Formula One is now thought about as a mafia-controlled, vile sport where anything – even people’s lives – is expendable. Because of the skulduggery of Flavio Briatore and his loyal lieutenant, Pat Symonds, the first ever night-time Grand Prix – an event which was supposed to showcase the best of Formula One’s glamour and pizzazz - is now linked with the ludicrous new word “Crashgate”. Oh dear. It does not take too much imagination to see that some hapless government official or minister from the appropriate government department was probably summoned to the office of Mr Lee Kuan Yew – who, although well into his eighties, now sits in the Singapore cabinet of his son, the Prime Minister, as Minister Mentor – and had heavy objects hurled at his head. The above is an extract of an article by a joker by the name of Gitau Githinji posting in his blog in UK. And he called himself a writer. I can't imagine that the fraudulent crash by the Renault Team is now a Singapore problem and Singapore should be ashamed of it. What kind of shit did he store in between his ears? His full article is at http://gitaugrandprix.blogspot.com/2009/09/singapore-hopes-for-end-to-its-shame.html

Myth 211 - Public housing cheaper than private properties

Most Singaporeans believe, superficially, that public housing are cheaper than private properties. Is this true? In truth, public housing is expensive like hell. Let me use some simple statistics and formula to prove this. Just like there are many formulas and creative ways of computing affordability of public housing, let me prove that public housing is really expensive relative to privately developed housing. A 5rm HDB flat at $500k for 99 years will cost $5000 a year to the owner to live in the property. A private condo of a similar size at $1.5m for 999 years or freehold, will cost the owner $1500 a year. Can this be true? Of course it is true. A 3000 sq ft landed property could be had for $2.5m or $2500 a year. And this is double the size of a 5 rm flat. The govt and the banks should review their housing and loan policies. I would suggest that the govt build public housing for foreigners and repackage private housing with 999 yrs or freehold lease for Singaporeans. And the banks should allow Singaporeans to repay the loans in 3 or 5 generations or more. A 100 yr or 500 yr loan and the borrower needs only to service the interest computed annually at a special rate like the HDB's. With the 999 yr or freehold property as collateral, and appreciating in prices, the borrower can choose to liquidate when the price doubles or triples, or continue to let the descendants to service the loan repayments. The bank has no fear with an appreciating asset in the bank vault. Such an approach will see Singaporeans owning 999yr/freehold properties while foreigners live in 99 yr public housing. Of course the quality of public housing can be upgraded and the price be according to market pricing. Think about it.