The Ws and the Ts

If you replace the "W" in What, When and 

Where with a "T", you would have answered the questions

This key

This keyboard key has been hiding personal feeling 

since the invention of the internet

Short Joke 8 - Losing

I should lose weight. 

But I hate losing. 

Short Jokes 7 - Singing

[Singapore Jokes]

I love it that how music can take you to another place.

For example, Sun Ho is singing in this church, so now I am going to another church.

Short Jokes 6 - Crying baby

WIFE: (hands husband crying baby): Will you please help me change him?

HUSBAND: Ok! (drives to hospital)

HUSBAND: (at hospital): Hi my baby is crying. Can I get a new one?

Short Jokes 5 - Disaster

Q: Where are women and children evacuated first during a disaster?

A: Because men just want a little peace before they die.

Short Joke 4 - Job offers

Job offers these days are like:

"We need a virgin which 2 years experience in sex"

Short Joke 3 - When LKY was your age...

[Singapore Jokes]

Dad: When Lee Kuan Yew was your age, he studied hard at night using just a candlelight and without the distraction of all of modern day technology.

Son: When Lee Kuan Yew was your age, he was the Prime Minister.

Short Joke 2 - Everything

Ever since my girlfriend got pregnant, everything in my life has changed.

My phone number, my address, my name....
Everything

Short Joke 1 - Chicken

There was this foreign guy who want to get a chicken but didn't know how to say "chicken" in English.

So he grabbed an egg and went up to the staff and said: "Where mother?"

Young Singaporean still want to own cars

Read:

https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/young-singaporeans-still-want-own-160000929.html

The article talk about 1) poor public transport reputation, 2) comfort of not using a car 3) financial "im-savviability"


Efficiency is probably the basic need of transportation. People thinking (especially going to work in the morning) are that "I dont care what I am in as long as it get me to work on time" mentality. MRT, Bus, Car, bicycle - anything that can get me to work on time, secondary-ly anything that can delay me from leaving the house (yet get me to work on time), anything that reduce my time travelling is a good, preferred mode of transport.

The train conceptually is a good concept for the above points, especially for those living far from their work place. Get on the train and it usually takes you to your destination in 30 to 45 mins. Your journey is limited to this timing only if you are living one of the train stations and your work place is also at another train station (that is to say almost zero travelling time from station to workplace).

Unfortunately, most people live 1-3km away from the nearest train station and hence they have the following choices to get to the train station before the 30 to 45 mins ride.

• Take a bus from their house to the train station (most common)
• Taxi / Uber / Grab to the train station (most comfortable)
• Walk to the train station (if not too far)
• (Electronic) cycle / scooter / hoverboard / skateboard to the train station (getting increasing common) 
• Drive to the train station (probably most costly if parking cost is included)
• Get a family member or friend to drop you at the train station  

The first choice of taking a bus is most common because of its relatively low, almost zero cost. However, you run a risk of waiting longer (compared to the other options) especially when the buses are not on schedule or when the buses are too crowded and you are not able to board the bus. The same waiting time applies to the taxis when you try to flag one along the road.

The last 4 options eliminates the waiting time and is something that i want to talk about more in details, linking us back to the article of why young Singaporean still want to own cars.

First, walking.  Well, if you don't mind a bit of exercise, dont mind sweating, don't mind using some energy early in the morning and your house is not too far from the train station, it is good choice for you. However, most of us are wearing our formal attires (shirts, pants, skirts, blouse) and its probably not a good idea to get any of these attire wet first thing in the morning before we start work. A car will be good, even if I were to drive it and park at the mrt station)

Really? If you have a car, will you just drive to the MRT station and squeeze in the train to work? What about the distance from the station to the office? Will you want to get yourself wet from sweat at the time you step into office? So...(its obvious which you will choose)

I know at this point, some may argue about the cost of driving (petrol, erp, parking) on top of cost of owning the car. This is especially so when the you work right in town and start work at the end of the peak hour (9am). Peak hour slow traffic, ERP at the highest rates...not to mention the sky high parking charges you pay per day or per month.

Of course, if money is not an issue to you, the only thing that you need to endure is the peak hour slow moving traffic. In fact, you would suddenly wish that ERP charges are higher than the already high charge so that people will avoid the ERP gantry and hence not be driving beside you.  To these people whose money is 'unlimited', life is always great in Singapore. Tell you what, you should get a chauffeur to drive your Rolls Royce and eliminates the stress of driving too.

For the average man on the street, its moving back to re-exploring the choices.

Alas, we are left with 1 option: E-cycle / scooter / xxx-boards to the station.  Its seems to be a great idea because being electronic, these scooters or bicycles doesn't require must effort to keep it moving and its moves relatively quickly compared to walking. You reach the station in less than half the time compared to if you walk, probably uses much less energy and there is not waiting time involved. The scooters (not the bicycles) can also be taken along with you to continue the journey when you alight from the train. Can see why this is getting increasing popular with the layman.

However, as its is not a car, it is still subjected to the elements of the weather and you could also be stuck behind a slow moving pedestrian trying to occupy the whole pedestrian path. And the e-vehicle are good for the last kilometre (mile) commuting, not the whole journey. And you face the same problems of all other train commuters too. Train breakdown, not able to board the train, squeezing like sardines, just to name a few.

Hence, from the above discussion, the group of people who has the least inconvenience is not someone with an e-scooter, but someone with a car (and chauffeur) and with money not an issue for him / her. It's an aspiration of the best and young people are working towards it.

What happens to your Whatsapp when you put in another sim card (eg. when you are overseas)

I got asked this question many time, so I thought I write a blog to clarify.

What happens to your Whatapps when you put in another sim card temporary when you are overseas.

Firstly, you will need to know that for Whatsapp, it needs 2 things - a Whatsapp account and internet connection.

Let's talk about internet connection first.

We all know that:
WIFI is one of them;
3G/4G cellular data on your phone is another;
and there is tethering (which is basically using other people's data)

Internet connection allows Whatsapp to know when you are online, to receive the text or media you send to your friend and deliver the same. And of course for them to know if you read the message your friend sent and hence display the BT (blue ticks)

So this part is simple. Whatsapp will work when you are connected to internet. No internet (for example when you're in airplane mode, it doesn't work. Simple as that.

Now the account part which is the slightly more complicating.

Everybody has an account with Whatsapp in which they will uniquely identify by your local number. Say your local number is +65 9888 8888, its unique to you because no one in the world will have this number. Call this number from anywhere in the world, your phone will go ringing, but this is not the point. The point is that they can use a set of number and narrow down to 1 person - you!!

Actually this is really what you need to know for whatsapp to work. No confusing at all.

So what's confusing?

You see, many people come asking me, see, my local phone +65 9888 8888 is the number i use to call, text, Whatsapps, etc. When I go overseas, say I travel from Singapore to Australia. Roaming (more specifically data roaming) is very expensive for Singapore SIM so you won't want to explore that option, especially when you are on a budget trip.  So the next best alternative is to buy an Australia SIM card, take out my Singapore SIM and put in the Australia SIM and use it for the duration of my trip.

So when I call back to Singapore, my Aust. number will show. When I text back to Singapore, my Aust. number will show, when I Whatsapp to Singapore...wait a minute....why is it still my Singapore number?

If you haven't done any setting changes in Whatsapp, and when you send a message to your friend, they will not know from Whatsapp that you are in Australia and they will not know that you are using an Australia number know in your phone.

And why is it so?

That's because the only thing your Australia SIM does is to provide **scroll back to the top of this article** an internet connection for Whatsapps to connect itself to its server. Your account remains unchanged if you left the settings untouched. Your Australian SIM doesnt modify your account to have its number on Whatsapp. That will be scary if it happens, isn't it? )

So don't get confused as to what number to use? It's always your local number.

The only time you need to change number on Whatsapp is when you changed your local number (say you switched your service provider) and you wish to use your new number as your permanent number.

Even when you are changing phone and not number, you're merely telling your Whatsapp that this is my new phone, bring all data from my existing account to the new phone. Nothing has changed actually.

X'mas tree before and after you have kids

Early Merry X'mas to all my readers.

Parents with kids should be able to relate to at least one of the trees below not including the one at the top left corner.

Photo credits to its owner

Fitness

What does ISIL stand for?

In light of the terrorist attacks in Paris, there are many reports that the ISIL has claimed responsibility...Wait a minute, thought it was ISIS or Islamic State of Iraq and Syria in full.

How is it that it became ISIL in the recent reports and what does it stand for:

ISIL stands for Islamic state of Iraq and the Levant, where the levant refers to a large region including areas of Turkey, Israel, Cyprus, Jordan, Labanon, Syria and Palestine.

As for why ISIS is changed to ISIL in reports:

Quote

Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” host Chuck Todd followed up Andrea Mitchell hammering President Barack Obama’s attempt to avoid having to follow ISIS into Syria by saying the administration is referring to the terrorist organization as ISIL instead of ISIS because they “don’t want it to stand for Syria.”

Unquote

Source of quote: 
http://www.breitbart.com/video/2014/09/07/chuck-todd-obama-administration-using-isil-instead-of-isis-to-avoid-dealing-with-syria/