Busy Busy Busy

1625 days ago

Yup, have been rather busy these few days. Need to complete all my work before I go for my trip to Hong Kong you see. I need to make sure that...

Yup, have been rather busy these few days. Need to complete all my work before I go for my trip to Hong Kong you see. I need to make sure that everything is properly “passed” down to my co-workers and all instructions properly given to them as well. I must say, a lot of people aren’t pleased that I will be going for a 5 day trip. I guess they think that they should be the ones going, but too bad for them, I beat them to it! And ironically, it’s equally as stressful when you go for a holiday as you try to prevent work from piling up but nobody seems to give a damn. Not even my supervisor who is currently trying to avoid me like plague. What can I say about my great little supervisor?

Anyways, guys, I will not be posting as often for the next week or so. As I said, I will be going for a short trip to Hong Kong for some rest and recover. Come back and when I see the mess they have left me, I will probably collapse on the spot and die. But hey, who cares about it now? I hope to enjoy my trip. See ya guys real soon!

The Cost Of Living In Singapore

1627 days ago

Oh it’s the time of the year where we all sit down and think of what has happened during the past year. I guess it has been okay for me. Sure,...

Oh it’s the time of the year where we all sit down and think of what has happened during the past year. I guess it has been okay for me. Sure, I had to change job because one of my former company’s directors stole a lot of money and fled to China and the company had to shut down. But other than that, it has been no much problems for me.

However, I have one serious complain about the general economic situation in Singapore – the rising cost of living. I don’t mean a little inflation here and there, but massive increases overall. Just look at our bus and train fares, the prices of tickets have increased by around 10-20%. No kidding! How about taking taxis? Yes, the prices for cabs have also increased and is set to be increased yet again. How about food? Well, officially bread prices have increased by 20%. Officially means that the prices are controlled by some baker’s association. I am sure that you will see some bakeries increasing by more than 20%, those greedy bastards. How about food and groceries? Of course the prices for food and groceries have increased. No longer are vegetables considered cheap alternatives, they are now costly! Even made in China products are now very expensive. Expensive in Singapore of course, but not in other countries. How about shop rentals? Yes, that has increased as well, so this result in the same old vicious cycle of price increases. And let’s not forget about the recent GST increase, which was supposed to “help the poor”.

Well, everyone blames someone else for the price increase. Bus companies blame the raising fuel prices. Taxi too. Food prices, they blame the weather. But if you look at Malaysia and our neighbouring countries, you don’t see any price increases there. Weird right? Weather changes is supposed to be global and should affect everyone. And you know what is the weirdest thing, we get our food sources from Malaysia and Indonesia! And the easiest is to blame on the high cost of rental. There is no denying that one, but those rentals are actually controlled and manipulated by the government. I guess when you increase prices is it best not push the blame to someone else, than to admit that you are greedy.

For me, I guess it’s still okay. I don’t mean I earn a lot, just that I am single and without much commitment. However, there are others who are not so lucky. In fact, I believe that a lot of people are affected. Their salaries are already so low, yet everywhere they go, they see price increases. How about those who have a lot of commitments like family, elders and children? Those too are seriously affected by this artifical inflation. Well, that’s life in Singapore, just have to accept it or the alternative is to vote wisely which most Singaporeans cannot do.

I Really Hate Spammers

1628 days ago

Don’t you hate spammers? They never stop and they are getting more and more creative. Just these few months, I have received thousands of emails (from my old email account) from someone...

Don’t you hate spammers? They never stop and they are getting more and more creative. Just these few months, I have received thousands of emails (from my old email account) from someone who has left several millions in a bank in Nigeria and cannot take it out because of war or something, or emails from an idiot’s  brother who died and left millions in another bank, this time the idiot’s brother would like to share those millions with me. For god’s sake, it’s in Nigeria! If they have millions stored inside a bank in Nigeria, then it’s pretty simple to take it out, without any help from me or from anybody else for that matter.

Really, they send me such emails and they expect me to believe them? Seriously, they need to recheck their brains. Who would believe them? Well, apparently, there are people who are that stupid and that greedy in this world. And rightfully, they have been conned of their money. First of all, I have no problem with people who are stupid, but the greedy ones deserve it. Who in their right mind will give you several millions just for a bank account to transfer to? And why is there a need to transfer some money to another bank in the first place?

The funniest thing is that they have started being creative and that includes sob stories, some of which sounds very ridicuous to me. One email told me about how his brother cheated him of his inheritance (in Nigeria) and left him (and his sisters/mother) penniless (boohoo!) and now with his brother dead, he wants to reclaim it with my help. AS IF!

And they somehow write it in such a way (using just text without any URLs or links) that spam filters fail to detect them as spam. All they need you to do is to reply to them. The emails looks like normal emails, and I guess it is going to be different to detect them properly. DOn’t you wish it was like before where spam emails usually come with HTML and tons of links and images which can be easily detected by our spam filters? Not anymore.

Singaporean Youth And Their English

1629 days ago

You guys know that I have nothing against the youth of Singapore, right? I was once young myself, so I know that it is tough being young, especially here in Singapore...

You guys know that I have nothing against the youth of Singapore, right? I was once young myself, so I know that it is tough being young, especially here in Singapore where the parents are problematic and just plain lazy and stupid. And just imagine the amount of stress they have to face everyday in order to get good grades and stuff. However, the thing about Singaporean youth is that they cannot write proper English. Well, I will give you an example – I wrote an email asking a food catering company to send me some information regarding a Christmas Buffet we were planning to organize and since we have Muslim staff in the company, I also asked whether their food is Halal certified. And this is the reply I got:

Cute right? I have removed the name of the authour and the company to avoid embarrassing the company. Well, yes, this is a business email enquiry and this is the reply I got! Wuhahahaha, nowadays Singaporean youth must think that what they write through SMS on the mobile to their friends is exactly what they should write in an email to their customers! That’s not a good impression to their customers. My English isn’t that good, but this kind of English is just bad and unprofessional. Well, at least I understand what they are saying. I wonder if someone who is not a Singaporean or has not been in Singapore for long, would they understand all the short forms and the “wan”s? Na, those are Singaporean slang, I really doubt those who are not born in Singapore will understand.

Anyway, I think companies and businesses should also be responsible for what their staff write in their emails. It reflects on their business badly if their staff don’t write (or speak) proper English. Sure, most of their customers are Singaporeans but seriously, would you worry if someone replied to your business enquiries this way?

Just Reformatted My HDD

1631 days ago

I finally had enough of my slow and sluggish PC, I reformatted it. And now, it is running smooth. I am happy. Looks like I have tons of crap in my...

I finally had enough of my slow and sluggish PC, I reformatted it. And now, it is running smooth. I am happy. Looks like I have tons of crap in my PC, usually old programs and leftovers from my installations. Well, getting rid of these useless programs and files really do help speed things up. In my opinion, everyone should reformat their PC and reinstall Windows (if they are using Windows) once every six months just to ensure that your PC is running in it’s tip-top condition. Or you could just install a clean Windows and then ghost (or clone) the HDD. That’s what I always do in my office. This way, whenever your PC starts to feel sluggish, you can clone it back to it’s “clean” state. Of course, you have to backup all your data first since the cloning process will revert back to the original condition, ie the state which you have initially installed your Windows.

Man, if only my games and programs can run in Linux, I would thrown away all my Windows installation discs. No, I am not saying that Windows is a terrible Operating System, it’s a suitable system for regular users like you and me. But the problem is that it gets sluggish and even problematic after a time of usage. Old files, redundant files and so on are left behind by Windows. These contribute to the slowness of your PC. Plus, spyware, viruses and all sort of nasties tend to be attracted by the Windows Operating System. My office servers are powered by Linux, and they are really solid piece of software. One of my file servers have been running on Linux for 4 over years and it is still running problem free. That’s what a Operating System should be – stable. Most of us don’t have the patience to install and reinstall our Operating System every 6 months.

Anyways, are any of you guys using Windows Vista? I find that this Operating System is one of the worst Microsoft have come up with. It’s slow, it’s buggy and it can really annoy the hell out of me, an IT administrator. Installation stuff is a pain in the neck and getting work done on a Vista system (with a middle spec PC) is a test in patience as well. But it is definitely more stable than Windows XP. At least, there is something working for it.

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