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Do Not Call Registry useless against moneylenders

April 7, 2014, 7:59 pm
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Four months ago in December, I registered my phone number in the Do Not Call (DNC) Registry in the naïve hope that I won't get any more spam on my phone.

For a while after the registry came into effect on 2 January, it seemed to work.

No more cold calls or SMSes from property agents and eczema cure salesmen.

Then last Thursday, I received this spam SMS (below).



I decided to make a complaint and found this webpage at www.pdpc.gov.sg.

PDPC stands for Personal Data Protection Commission, the Government body running the DNC registry. Welcome back to Abbreviation Hell.

The page title is "Lodge a Complaint of a Do Not Call Registry Offence".

The first suggestion is:
If you suspect that an organisation has breached the Do Not Call (DNC) provisions, you may wish to directly contact the organisation sending you the telemarketing message and request that they stop doing so.
This is like the dumbest thing I've ever read. The last thing I want when I get spammed is to have any contact with the spammer.

The next suggestion is:
You may also wish to lodge a complaint with the Personal Data Protection Commission (PDPC). The following checklist is to assist you in assessing whether to make a complaint.

All I wanted was an e-mail address to send my complaint. I didn't expect homework. It's quite a long checklist to go through:

Did the sender of the telemarketing call, text message or fax breach the DNC Registry provisions?

1. Was the telemarketing fax, text message or call sent to you within the first 60 days of adding your Singapore telephone number to the DNC Registry?

2. Have you previously given clear consent to the organisation to send you telemarketing calls, text messages or faxes, and that consent has not been withdrawn?

3. Is the message or call excluded from the scope of the DNC Registry provisions? For example, it would be excluded if it was sent by a public agency under, or to promote a programme carried out by that public agency which is not for a commercial purpose or solely to conduct market research or survey or for offering you an employment opportunity.

4. Is the call, text message or fax for Business-to-Business telemarketing? For example, is the telemarketer trying to sell corporate insurance to your company?

You may wish to consider filing a complaint if you have answered “no” to all of the above. If you received a text message or fax, then please also consider the following additional questions:

1. Do you have an ongoing relationship with the organisation sending the text message or fax?

  • Yes (Please proceed to question 2 below)
  • No (You may wish to lodge a complaint)

2. Is the purpose of the fax or text message related to the subject of the ongoing relationship?

  • Yes (Please proceed to question 3 below)
  • No (You may wish to lodge a complaint)

3. Have you withdrawn your consent, opted out more than 30 days ago through an opt out notice, or indicated to the sender that you do not consent for the sender to send you marketing text or fax messages?

  • Yes (You may wish to lodge a complaint)
  • No (You may wish to contact the organisation to inform them that you withdraw your consent, opt out, or inform the sender that you do not consent for the sender to send you marketing text or fax messages)

I just skipped to the part with the heading: How to Lodge a Complaint of a DNC Registry Offence. That was more helpful.
Under the Moneylenders Act, licensed moneylenders are not allowed to advertise their moneylending services via SMS or voice calls. Therefore, any SMSes or calls soliciting for loans are either sent by a licensed moneylender in contravention of advertising restrictions, or by an unlicensed moneylender.

You are advised to report such moneylending SMS (with a screen capture of the SMS you received) or call through:

(a) the Police Hotline at 1800-255-0000;
(b) the National Crime Prevention Council's 'X Ah Long' Hotline at 1800-924-5664 (1800-X-AH-LONG);
(c) the Crimestopper Portal; or
(d) the Insolvency and Public Trustee's Office at ipto_enquiry@ipto.gov.sg
It was as if they knew the spam I wanted to complain about would be from a moneylender.

So I sent the screen cap of the SMS to ipto_enquiry@ipto.gov.sg, hoping for the best but expecting nothing.

So I was surprised to recieve this e-mail (below) from IPTO yesterday.



So they're basically passing the buck to the police.

From DNC to PDPC to IPTO to UMSF - have I welcomed you back to Abbreviation Hell yet? Or AH!

The upshot is that the DNC Registry is pretty useless against moneylender spam. You have to make a police report.

The irony is that I actually like Spam the meat. I'm so sad I lost my Spam T-shirt.

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'Cringeworthy' videos, Stomp petition & the emperor's new logo

April 12, 2014, 8:06 pm
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This may be hard to believe, but I actually put some thought into writing this column.

First, I have to figure out what to write about.

In the past week, a few topics caught my eye.



There were the promotional videos by the Singapore Tourism Board and SingTel, both of which have been ridiculed as “cringeworthy” on social media.



This topic is what I call a “low-hanging fruit”.

It's an easy target. You can get some laughs just by describing the videos.

Readers are ready to laugh along with you laughing at the videos because everyone is already laughing at them.

But I’m reluctant to jump on the bandwagon and join the pile-on by adding my voice to the disapproving chorus.

One option is to provide a contrarian view as I did when I defended last year’s similarly much mocked National Day Parade theme song, which I genuinely liked.



Unfortunately, I can’t say I genuinely like the two videos and I don’t want to be contrarian just for the sake of being contrarian.

That would be disingenuous.

And as you know, the one thing I always strive for in this column as well as in life in general is to be ingenuous. (I think that’s a word.)

Besides, Neil Humphreys is already writing about it in his column, so screw it.

Another hot topic last week was the petition to close down Stomp.com.sg, owned by Singapore Press Holdings (SPH).

But I can’t comment on this because I work for The New Paper, which is also owned by SPH, and so there’s a clear conflict of interest.

If I write anything nice about the petition, I would be biting the hand that feeds.

If I write anything bad about the petition, I would appear to be trying not to leave teeth marks on the hand that feeds.

So it’s lose-lose.



If I no longer work for SPH, then I could comment ingenuously on the topic, like former SPH journalist Bertha Henson did on her blog. She seems to disagree with the petition that Stomp should be shut down but accede that something has to change.

She wrote:
“Any media must move with the times, the demands of its ever-changing audience and in the case of Singapore and its media duopoly, show how responsible online journalism should be conducted.

“Stomp should take a step back and re-consider its content if it wants to continue to stomp ahead.”
I appreciate that she disclosed she was “party to the setting up of Stomp all those years ago” and provided some insight on the intent behind the site’s creation.

And as far as I can tell, the intent was not to turn whether you give up your MRT seat to someone who may need it more into a blood sport.

But like I said, the topic of the Stomp petition is a no-go for me.



How about a “safer” controversy like the new National Gallery Singapore logo?

It’s basically just two rectangles side by side, one shorter and wider than the other.

It has been criticised as bland and lazy. I call it “the emperor’s new logo”.

But again, this is a low-hanging fruit.

Even Mr Brown has made fun of the logo and once Mr Brown gets into the act, you’re just following the tide.



How about a contrarian view? I could defend the logo like I defended the NDP song.

But even that has been done.

On Wednesday, My Paper, another SPH publication, ran an article praising the logo.



The article was contributed by Mr Daniel Yun, who used to be my boss at MediaCorp and is best known as the man who produced Liang Po Po The Movie.

He left MediaCorp in 2009 and recently started an acting school called Act Academy.

Mr Yun explained in the article that the two rectangles in the National Gallery Singapore logo represent the two iconic buildings, City Hall and the former Supreme Court, which house the gallery.



Ohhhhhhhhhhhh, now I get it.

He continued:
“Some said: ‘You pay millions for such a logo? My child can do it.’ Ironically, it will take maturity to see the beauty in simplicity.

“I am not saying I have good taste. Or that I know better. But I love this logo. Purely for its simplicity.”
But what wasn’t disclosed in the article is that Mr Yun has a twin brother, Mr Woon Tai Ho, who happens to be the director of media and marketing at National Gallery Singapore.

Cough (conflict of interest).

Hey, I’ve just figured out what to write about for next week’s column.

Interested in learning Korean?

There is a private school in Jurong East called Hanok Korean Class which is Singapore’s highest rated Korean language school with certified instructors.

So what if it happens to be run by my sister?

- Published in The New Paper, 13 April 2014
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Selfies not narcissistic enough for Baey Yam Keng, so...

April 14, 2014, 4:38 am
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What do you do when you're accused of narcissism because of your fondness for selfies?

You take it to next level!

You post Instagrams of not just yourself, but also of people who look like you.

And this is exactly what my man-crush Baey Yam Keng is doing.

It started last Friday when he posted this Instagram with the comment: "Someone sent me a photo of 'me'. Can you tell which is the real me?"



It escalated the next day with the birth of a new hashtag: "More people sending me photos of #BYKlookalikes. Any more to contribute? I guess each of us can look like someone else from certain angles."



"More #BYKlookalikes contributions" were posted today.



Not wanting to be left out, of course I have to attempt my own #BYKlookalikes photo.



Fail. I think I got the whiskers right, but that's about it.

At least Mr Baey "liked" it on Instagram.



EARLIER: Me, my selfie & I – Baey Yam Keng is not a sissy


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Say three Hail Hydras & call me in the morning

April 15, 2014, 10:03 pm
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Occupational hazard: I got a weird letter today

April 17, 2014, 2:41 am
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I came to work today and found this on my desk.



It's a letter and it says:

SM ONG
You wrote about my movie Ah Boy to Frogman now I want to tell you and your diver friend about the story of the C.B. Bear Pls call my number (65) 6509 8056.

It's unsigned with no return address.

It's obviously regarding my March 30 New Paper column about Jack Neo's upcoming movie Ah Boys To Frogmen, but I honestly don't know what to make of the letter.

Is it a threat? A prank? And what is "the C.B. Bear"?



The "I LOVE YOU" stamp on the envelope just confuses me even more.

It's postmarked April 10, so the letter took a week to reach me.

I asked a colleague who knows Jack Neo personally if there's any chance the letter could be from him. She scoffed and said either I see Jack "no up or too up" to think that he would bother to respond to my column.

So does anybody want to be a hero and call the number? I know I don't. I give you permission to pretend to be me. Let me know what happens.



And why add (65) to the phone number? If you're writing to someone in Singapore, isn't that kind of redundant?

Actually, why even use snail mail and pay for an "I LOVE YOU" stamp? There's this invention called the Internet...

People are strange.

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Reviving #BYKlookalikes (or my man-crush on Baey Yam Keng takes an obsessive turn)

April 19, 2014, 7:06 pm
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To recap, two Fridays ago, Member of Parliament for Tampines GRC and my man-crush Baey Yam Keng Instagrammed a photo of himself next to a photo of someone who looks like him with the comment: “Someone sent me a photo of ‘me’. Can you tell which is the real me?”



The next day, he posted a collage of more doppelgangers and introduced a new hashtag: “More people sending me photos of #BYKlookalikes. Any more to contribute? I guess each of us can look like someone else from certain angles.”

Another collage of #BYKlookalikes was posted on Monday and then... it stopped.

No more #BYKlookalikes on Instagram.

I was disappointed. Who doesn’t want to see more guys resembling the person I once nominated as the Sexiest Man Alive?

But what also irked me was that a couple of the supposed lookalikes didn’t look like Mr Baey at all.



Heck, even I look more like the former managing director of Hill+Knowlton Strategies. I credit my facial hair.

That gave me an idea.

To keep the hashtag alive, I tried to recreate photos of Mr Baey but with me in my room instead and then share them on Instagram with the hashtag #BYKlookalikes.

Here are the results:











- Published in The New Paper, 20 April 2014
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Alien protesting against foreigners on Orchard Road

April 21, 2014, 2:50 am
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Meet the other S M Ong

April 21, 2014, 11:05 pm
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So I was googling myself again last night and found another S M Ong.



He is apparently a financial planner and a web designer, a rather unexpected combo.

How to tell the difference between him and me? I would never use the non-word "irregardless". I also believe he is based in Malaysia near KL.

I have previously found other S M Ongs in Singapore: a property agent...




...and a plumbing company.



Baey Yam Keng gets lookalikes. I get name-alikes.

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This photo of Vivian Balakrishnan is a meme waiting to happen

April 23, 2014, 2:15 am
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20th anniversary of my 8 Days magazine interview

April 24, 2014, 11:23 pm
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In early 1994, I was a movie reviewer on a Channel 5 variety show called Live On 5 hosted by a newcomer named Gurmit Singh.

As "Smong", I achieved enough notoriety in a few short months to be featured in the 23-30 April 1994 issue of 8 Days magazine with Chew Chor Meng on the cover.





I'm listed on the Contents page under People as "the man everybody loves to hate" (page 20) with a picture of me appropriately sneering at the camera.



Yes, very different hair then.

On page 20, I was described thus:
He's the Abominable Showman - that surly movie critic, courtesy of Live On 5, whom everybody loves to hate.



("Shower without soap"? Isn't that called rinsing?)

I wasn't very happy with the way I was presented. I disliked the picture and several things the article said I said I didn't say at all. But I guess no harm done. I just learnt never to trust journalists again. Ha!

I agreed to the interview to help promote the show, but ironically, the week the article came out was the first week I stopped appearing on Live On 5, although I still worked behind the scenes as the show's research writer until June.

I wonder whatever happened to that Gurmit Singh fellow.



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Why does it seem Aware is treating NSmen like the enemy?

April 26, 2014, 6:00 pm
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Something must be wrong with me. I feel a little ill.

It’s Aware’s fault.

Yes, the Association of Women for Action and Research is at it again.

Last week, Minister for Defence Ng Eng Hen said that the Government is coming up with a set of “meaningful” benefits to recognise the efforts of NSmen “by giving them a greater stake in Singapore, whether it’s housing, health or education”.



In response to this news, Aware posted on its Facebook page:
“Every person deserves access to housing, education and healthcare, because these are basic requirements for human sustenance and social participation.

“Aware disagrees strongly with any link between support for fundamental needs and an individual’s status as an NSman, especially when the military may not be suitable for many people, regardless of their gender.

“Aware has long maintained that military service should not be held up as the single gold standard of citizen belonging – an approach which this proposal threatens to intensify, creating different tiers of people with different social entitlements and worth.”
Almost right away, Aware kena tekan online like a sotong recruit on Tekong.

Aware seems to be saying that “access” to basic needs are given only to NSmen when that’s clearly not the case. I shall resist any puns about Aware being unaware.

Why doesn’t Aware “disagree strongly” with the link between getting the Jubilee Baby Gift and the year a baby is born? What sacrifices have these infants made for the country? They’re not even born yet.



This latest affront to NSmen comes after last year’s Purple Light episode, which also irked a few army guys.

Aware even gloated about it on Facebook:
“Ever wonder if speaking up about sexism really creates change? Here’s one case where it has!

“Earlier (last) year, Aware learned of Purple Light, a marching song sung by many NSmen, which included the lines: ‘Booking out, see my girlfriend, saw her with another man, kill the man, rape my girlfriend with my rifle and my buddy and me.’

“We were troubled that NSmen were bonding over misogynist lyrics about committing sexual violence against women. So we raised our concerns with Mindef and SAF.

“And now we have excellent news: Mindef and SAF have confirmed that they took steps to investigate. They will ‘immediately halt’ the singing of these lyrics, which they describe as ‘contrary to the values of (their) organisation’.

“It’s really encouraging that Mindef and SAF are prepared to listen to feedback, recognise this as an issue and take action on it. Thumbs up!”
So Mindef and SAF gave in to Aware and now Aware is hitting us with this “military service should not be held up as the single gold standard of citizen belonging” thing?

Give ’em an inch...

Can you blame the nation’s defenders for feeling that Aware is treating them like the enemy?

And now someone online just threatened Filipinos that if they celebrate their national day at Orchard Road, “we will take this as an act of war and will defend ourselves with our lives”.



Uh... what do you mean “we”, kemo sabe?

The soldiers are too busy not singing songs with misogynistic lyrics and luxuriating in our single gold standard of citizen belonging.

But you know what really sickens me as a former NSman?

I actually kind of agree with Aware.

The horror. The horror.

I feel like I’m betraying my bros.

But singing about raping anyone in any situation is wrong. (Killing, on the other hand, is okay unless you’re Chris Ho.)

And I get Aware’s point that you shouldn’t be entitled to more stuff just because you’re an NSman. You should get it because you need it more.

For example, let’s say you’re a general with a Richard Mille RM 011 Felipe Massa flyback chronograph watch – or even a fake one. I think you can do without more benefits.



But most of us aren’t generals and we own a G-Shock at best. So if the Government wants to give NSmen a “greater stake”, don’t be a cockblock.

If the Government really wants to show its appreciation for NSman, it should just stop Jack Neo from using NS as fodder for any more movies. Ah Boys To Men, Ah Boys To Frogmen, what’s next? Ah Boys to Storemen?

Never mind giving NSmen more “meaningful” benefits.

Just let uniformed servicemen have a seat in the MRT train without someone taking a picture and sending it to Stomp as if they’re doing something disgraceful.

It’s not like they’re celebrating the Philippine Independence Day at Ngee Ann City.

To quote my man-crush, Member of Parliament for Tampines GRC Baey Yam Keng:
“Let’s be fair. Everyone should give up his seat to someone who needs it more, not just NSmen. Nothing wrong for an NSman to take a seat too.”
Or does Aware want to disagree strongly with that too?

Let me check its Facebook page.

- Published in The New Paper, 27 April 2014
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Is there really a law against defacing PM's poster? No... and yes

April 30, 2014, 11:55 pm
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From Singapore Police Force Facebook page:
Police have contacted Mr Gilbert Goh on 30 April 2014 regarding his online post (19 April 2014) that called on the public to deface and denigrate a poster of the Prime Minister during Goh’s planned demonstration at Hong Lim Park on 1 May 2014.

Mr Goh was advised against carrying out such activities during the demonstration as they may constitute offences under the Penal Code and the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act.

Mr Goh was also advised to remove any online postings that called on participants of his demonstration to conduct activities that might be against the law.

The Speakers’ Corner is a designated outdoor area for Singaporeans to express their views in public.

Mr Goh is free to hold his planned demonstration at the Speakers’ Corner, but it is also his responsibility to ensure that any activities conducted during the demonstration do not contravene the law.

Wait, what?

There's a law against defacing a poster of the PM?

What is this "Penal Code and the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act"? The police seem rather vague about it.

I'm no lawyer. So I just googled it.

There is no law that specifically say you can't deface the PM's poster, but there seems to be a whole bunch of offences listed under the act that could make it illegal.

Intentional harassment, alarm or distress

13A.—(1) Any person who in a public place or in a private place, with intent to cause harassment, alarm or distress to another person —

(a) uses threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour; or

(b) displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting, thereby causing that person or any other person harassment, alarm or distress, shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $5,000.

Also:
Harassment, alarm or distress

13B.—(1) Any person who in a public place or in a private place —

(a) uses threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour; or

(b) displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting, within the hearing or sight of any person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress thereby shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $2,000.

And:
Fear or provocation of violence

13C. Any person who in a public place or in a private place —

(a) uses towards another person threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour; or

(b) distributes or displays to another person any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting, with intent to cause that person to believe that immediate unlawful violence will be used against him or another person by any person, or to provoke the immediate use of unlawful violence by that person or another person, or whereby that person is likely to believe that such violence will be used or it is likely that such violence will be provoked shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $2,000.

More specifically regarding the PM and any minister:
Threatening, abusing or insulting public servant

13D. (1) Any person who in a public place or in a private place —

(a) uses any indecent, threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour towards a public servant in the execution of his duty as such public servant; or

(b) distributes or displays to a public servant in the execution of his duty as such public servant any writing, sign or other visible representation which is indecent, threatening, abusive or insulting, shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $5,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding one year.

The trouble is that if using "insulting words or behaviour" towards another person (PM or otherwise) is an offence, then all of us should be arrested under the act.

You don't even have to deface any poster.

And I don't think Hong Lim Park is some magical safe zone where suddenly all laws don't apply.

Happy protesting, guys!

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Star Awards without Ann Kok is like a protest without dog poo

May 3, 2014, 10:25 am
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What a disappointment.

And I’m not just talking about Ann Kok’s no show at last Sunday’s Star Awards show.

Last year, she wore a Herve Leger tube dress worn over a long-sleeved see-through netted top that made her look like “an aspiring porn star”, according to The Straits Times.

This year, I was hoping she would wear something that would make her look like an established porn star.

But it wasn’t to be.

Kok, 41, had left MediaCorp in March and is now promoting her new movie, Filial Party, which opens on Thursday.



And it seems I wasn't the only one disappointed by Kok not being at the Star Awards, judging by these Tweets:
  • “The only person I might remotely be interested in watching isn’t at the awards. #annkok”
  • “No Ann Kok no #ootn see the whole thing boring already sigh.”
  • “Ann Kok and Fiona Xie... The only 4 reasons to watch #StarAwards20 and they didn’t even show up.”
Wait, Ann Kok and Fiona Xie– that’s only two reasons, not four... ohhhhhhh, I get it. The tweet was referring to the busty actresses’... uh... eyes.

But despite Kok’s absence from the award show, she still managed to make headlines last week.

My favourite headline was by Stomp:
Ann Kok thinks this is even better than going to the sperm bank.

That headline alone was almost enough to make up for Kok’s Star Awards no-show.

There must be a rule somewhere that if one has the opportunity to use the words “Ann Kok” and “sperm” in the same sentence, one must take it.

So what is it that Kok thinks is better than going to a sperm bank?

No, not making a withdrawal at the sperm ATM (otherwise also known as just “men”).

It’s freezing her eggs.

Kok, who is single, told The New Paper: “If the technology for egg freezing is advanced and the doctors are confident they can be preserved well, I think it’s a good idea.”

I believe there are already volunteers to help fertilise her eggs.



Besides the Star Awards, another major event last week was the launch of the new McDonald’s Hello Kitty Bubbly World toys.

It was such big news that even the Wall Street Journal ran the story with the headline: “Singapore braces for a Kitty riot at McDonald’s.”

But it wasn’t to be.

There was no riot except possibly online where the McDonald’s website was overwhelmed by orders and the toys quickly sold out.

After all the build-up by the media, the lack of riots in McDonald’s restaurants around Singapore must have been galling to some.

You can almost sense the indignation in headlines like “What Hello Kitty craze? Online sales kill in-store McDonald’s queues” and “How did Singapore dodge a Kitty cat-tastrophe?”



I got my Hello Kitty Bubbly Kerokerokeroppi toy from the McDonald's outlet at IMM on Tuesday with no problem.

And that was the problem.

Without the long queues, getting my Hello Kitty toy from McDonald’s no longer gives me a sense of accomplishment and seems rather – gasp! – pointless.

I just paid $4.95 (not including what I paid for the Extra Value Meal) for a mouthless cat I don’t know what to do with.

But that’s also not the disappointment I was referring to earlier.

No, that would be the Labour Day protest held at Hong Lim Park on Thursday.



Using Facebook, the organiser had called on protesters to “spit, throw eggs, splash dog poo, draw graffiti and kick at the poster of our Prime Minister”.

But it wasn’t to be.

They were “advised” by police not to do so.



I was curious as to how they had planned to “splash” the dog poo.

Would they first collect the dog poo and then take it to Hong Lim Park? Or would they take their dogs to Hong Lim Park so that they could get it fresh?

And the word “splash” suggests that they wanted to use liquid dog poo, which is even grosser than regular dog poo.

And were they planning to “splash” the dog poo on the PM’s poster with their hands? That’s gross to the max.

I think the police might have done the protesters a bigger favour than they realise.

But the lack of animal excrement at the protest wasn’t why I felt let down.

It was because that of all the Scorpions songs the protesters could’ve sung that day, why did it have to be Wind Of Change?



I hate that song.

So what if it was the German band’s biggest hit? The whistling is even more annoying than the whistling in Moves Like Jagger and I ain’t just whistlin’ Dixie.

Hello, this is Hong Lim Park, not the Berlin Wall.

If the protesters wanted a Scorpions song about wind, why couldn’t they have picked Rock You Like A Hurricane, only the best Scorpions song ever?!

What a disappointment.

- Published in The New Paper, 4 May 2014



EARLIER:

Celebrating Singapore’s 17-year love affair with Ann Kok’s breasts

How I failed to get the black Hello Kitty

Is there really a law against defacing PM's poster? No... and yes
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What's with Stomp's obsession with the price of nasi padang & other rice dishes?

May 8, 2014, 10:22 pm
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Shitty times: Nasi goreng poisoning, $9.70 nasi padang & dry Rendang Burgers

May 10, 2014, 8:32 pm
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Last week at home, I went to the toilet and read The Straits Times while taking a dump.

After I was done, I joined my teenage daughter at the dining table where she was having her lunch.

Although I had already eaten, I wanted to keep her company since she always complains about having to eat alone.

But instead of appreciating my thoughtfulness, she recoiled in horror as I sat next to her and continued reading the paper.

“What are you doing?” she asked. “I’m eating!”

“I thought you wanted me to sit with you,” I said.

“But you just went to the toilet,” she said.

“So?” I asked. “I washed my hands.”

“Your shit newspaper!”

I was confused at first by what she meant.

I know some people like to call The Straits Times “The Shitty Times”, but I think my daughter meant it more literally. She was not referring to what was in the paper, but what might be on it.

Apparently, just because I took the newspaper into the toilet with me, to her, it was as good as I had wiped my ass with it – which, I should make clear, I didn’t.



I wanted to tell her about the faeces transplants at NUH that I had just read about in the paper, but was afraid it would ruin her appetite even more. Shitty times indeed.

By the way my daughter over-reacted, it was like I committed some sort of heinous food crime by sitting with my toilet-tainted newspaper at the dining table where she was eating the mixed vegetable rice I had bought for her.

You would think that I had tried to poison her with some over-spicy nasi goreng kampung.

Maybe she should go to Johor Baru and make a police report.



Just three months ago, the police chief of Johor assured Singaporeans that we are not specifically targeted by criminals in JB.

He said: “Crimes are committed when an opportunity arises regardless of (a victim’s) race, religion, sex and nationality.”

So what he was saying is that if you get scammed, robbed, kidnapped or murdered in JB, be reassured that it’s not because you’re Singaporean. It’s because you’re there.

The police chief also pointed out that last year, only 397 cases of crime were reported by Singaporeans, compared to 466 in 2012.

I wonder if any of those cases included poisoning by nasi goreng kampung.

This was what happened to a Singaporean in JB a week and a half ago.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to Johor…

On April 30, retiree Lau Thiam Huat paid RM3.50 (S$1.35) for a plate of nasi goreng kampung in a coffee shop at Jalan Bukit Timbalan near City Square shopping centre.

It was not the first time he ate the dish there, but this time, it was different.

“My tongue was burning by the third mouthful,” Mr Lau told The New Paper last week. “It wasn’t the kind of burn you usually get from chilli.”

He stopped eating after that, but still felt the sting on his tongue the next day and decided to make a police report before seeing a doctor.

“I wanted to make sure I could nail them down easily if they really meant to poison me.”

But why would anyone want to poison a 60-year-old Singaporean retiree in JB?

It’s not like he’s King Joffrey at the Purple Wedding. (Uh… belated Game Of Thrones spoiler alert.)

“It’s just my gut feel,” said Mr Lau.

Gut feel? Or just acid indigestion?

The deputy police chief of South Johor Baru confirmed that the police had received the report, but said no action would be taken because there are no relevant laws about this matter.

What kind of cowboy town is this? How can there be no law against poisoning by nasi goreng kampung? That’s anarchy!

And you can spray-paint that on top of a Toa Payoh HDB block.



On second thought, don’t.

Of course, there is no lack of food crime in Singapore as well.

Just last month alone, Stomp.com.sg posted two complaints from people claiming they were overcharged for nasi padang.

One woman paid $7 for rice, fried fish and mussels. Another guy paid $9.70 for rice, chicken, vegetable and stingray.

Mr Lau might have been poisoned by his $1.35 nasi goreng kampung, but at least he wasn’t overcharged for it.



More seriously, it seems that Burger King Singapore has been guilty of skimping on the rendang sauce in its Rendang Burger, which was reintroduced last month.

The fast food chain posted this mea culpa on Facebook on Thursday:

“Yes, BK fans. We hear you. We understand that the Rendang sauce is what makes the Rendang Burger so delicious. So from now on, you’ll get more yummy Rendang sauce in every Rendang Burger…

“Also, we’d like to ask for your help – if you still encounter dry Rendang Burgers, please send us a PM with your contact and date+time+location of your purchase!”

Regular readers of this column may recall that last year, Burger King also brought back the Rendang Burger for a limited time but added mayonnaise which I called “a crime against nature and all taste buds”.

Fortunately, this year, Burger King has ditched the mayo, so I don’t have to make a police report.

I’ll probably buy the Rendang Burger for my daughter for lunch tomorrow to make up for the newspaper incident.

The burger better not be dry.

Unfortunately, the rendang sauce looks a lot like… never mind.

Brings a whole new meaning to faeces transplant.

- Published in The New Paper, 11 May 2014

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Foreign celebrities in Singapore fed strange local food

May 15, 2014, 10:01 pm
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We don't have new NDP song to kick around any more

May 17, 2014, 10:17 pm
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For years, it was there for us to criticise, ridicule and complain about.

For years, we wanted it to stop.

But for years, it persisted.

The criticisms, ridicule and complaints became so frequent and predictable that they became like a tradition.

They became part of our uniquely Singaporean culture.

Like force-feeding foreign celebrities who come to our country - like footballers Rio Ferdinand and Sergio Aguero, movie star Hugh Jackman - strange local food such as fried carrot cake, durian and “Maya butter”.



Since the Instagram shows Jackman at a Ya Kun Kaya Toast outlet, we can assume the Australian actor meant “kaya”, not “Maya”.



But who knows?

Maybe next time Russell Crowe can come to Singapore, have breakfast at Killiney Kopitiam and compliment its Aztec bread spreads.

Anyhoo, where was I?

Oh yah, the criticisms, ridicule and complaints became so frequent and predictable that they became part of our uniquely Singaporean culture.

We took it for granted that the thing we love to criticise, ridicule and complain about would always be there for us to criticise, ridicule and complain about.

Until it suddenly wasn’t there any more.

No, I’m not talking about Hello Kitty queues at McDonald’s.

I’m talking about the annual TV licence fee.

For years, Singaporeans bitched about having to pay the $110 every year, usually as justification for bitching about how local TV programmes suck.

As in “Point Of Entry is so bad it’s funny, like VR Man. Why are we paying $110 every year for this? I demand a refund! The TV licence fee should be abolished.”

Then in 2011, the Government unexpectedly did just that. The 48-year-old TV licence fee was scrapped. No one saw it coming. It was like Christmas in February.

On top of that, the Government also refunded the money that people had paid in advance for that year's licence fee. If you guessed it was an election year, you’re right.

Explaining the move, Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said the fee was irrelevant as TV is no longer considered a luxury and programmes can be watched on the Internet.

The fee was supposedly used to fund public-service content on free-to-air TV channels, but most people just assumed it was to pay for shows like Point Of Entry and VR Man.



But of course, the lack of the TV licence fee hasn’t stopped people from bitching about local TV.

I still can’t believe Channel 5 showed the movie The Gods Must Be Crazy on Good Friday last month.



Aside from the movie being 34 years old, how insensitive MediaCorp had to be to air a movie called The Gods Must Be Crazy on a religious holiday?

You might as well insult a blind woman on radio.

Anyhoo, I think people miss having the TV licence fee to bitch about, even though no one misses paying the $110.

Without the TV licence fee, I sense a void in our culture that can never be filled.



And now another void has opened up.

Last week, it was announced that there will be no new National Day song this year for the first time in 16 years.

Like killing the TV licence fee, the announcement was greeted with cheers.

This year’s NDP creative director, Dick Lee, said: “Why not bring old songs back on a more regular basis?”

Could one of those old songs he was referring to be Home, which happens to be written by someone also named Dick Lee? Coincidence?



Anyhoo, this announcement comes four years after I wrote a column in this newspaper in 2010 called “Why we don’t need new National Day song every year”.

If only they had listened to me back then, the NDP organisers would have been spared the ignominy of the disastrous public reception to last year’s song, One Singapore.



Bitching about the new NDP song had become an annual national ritual, but last year’s backlash was apparently so vicious that the NDP organisers have now raised the white flag, which I hope Vietnamese protesters won’t burn “by mistake”.

I believe that the online abuse inflicted on the song co-written by comedian Selena Tan could be partly responsible for the tougher new anti-cyberbullying laws Parliament passed in March.

But I’m not here to say “I told you so” or take a victory lap because I suspect the reprieve is only temporary.

Unlike the TV licence fee which is probably gone for good, a new NDP song is as inevitable and certain as death and taxes. It’s just a matter of when.

My guess is that they’re saving the new song for next year’s National Day, which seems to be the only one anyone really cares about now since it will be Singapore’s 50th birthday.

I’m surprised we’re not skipping this year’s National Day celebration altogether.

So while the tradition of bitching about the new NDP song will likely return in 2015, I will certainly feel the emptiness this year.

Perhaps Young PAP can upload another in-house video on YouTube.



Maybe some time closer to August.

- Published in The New Paper, 18 May 2014



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Why it's a bad idea to do chin-ups at the monkey bars (video)

May 21, 2014, 11:44 pm
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I did something stupid the other day.



My head still kinda hurts a bit. I'm a little worried I might have suffered brain damage.




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How I met your moth

May 24, 2014, 10:41 pm
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I live on the third storey of a 16-storey HDB block.

To warm up before my regular jog, I usually climb the stairs to the top of the block and then take the lift down.

On Tuesday evening, the lift door opened and I was startled by a large moth flying around inside. How did it get in there?

I was paralysed for a second.

What should I do?

Should I take the lift with the flailing moth? What if it careened into my face? In my eyes? Or worse, my mouth?

The last thing I want is a moth in my mouth in the month of May. What would my mother say?

Maybe I should let the lift go and take the stairs down instead. Since this is 2014, I decided to take a selfie with the moth first.

But I wasn’t quick enough. By the time I got my iPhone camera ready, the moth had fluttered out of the lift and into the night. I was disappointed with my slow reaction.



My wife had told me a few days earlier that she and our daughter had also encountered a moth in the lift. I wondered if it was the same one. A photo would have confirmed its identity.

Now I would never know.

So I went for my jog with a heaviness in my heart. About an hour later, I returned home to a sight more chilling than a letter of demand from the prime minister’s lawyer.

Outside my flat, a large moth was perched above my front door.



Could it be the same moth?

How did it find out where I live?

Could it be the same creature that harassed my wife and daughter a few days earlier?

Oh my god, my family was being stalked by a psycho-moth!

This time, I did take a picture of the moth with my iPhone but was so rattled, I forgot to make it a selfie.

Careful not to let the insect follow me, I calmly went inside my flat and told my wife about our winged stalker and showed her the picture.

She didn’t freak out like I thought she would. I was a little frustrated that she didn’t seem to be taking the threat of the psycho-moth very seriously.

Before I went to sleep that night, I double-checked that all the doors and windows were tightly shut.

In case the psycho-moth had figured how to turn door knobs (and managed to get a duplicate of my house key), the front door was also latched from the inside.

That night, I slept dreaming I was an obese Godzilla battling two giant moth-like monsters.

No, wait, that was just a movie I saw the previous week. That guy who plays Bryan Cranston’s adult son is a terrible actor.



After surviving the night, I woke up the next morning to check my Facebook page and discovered that other people had also encountered the moth in other parts of Singapore.

Oh. So it wasn’t just me.

There were many moths. There was no single psycho-moth stalking my family.

That was a relief.

The species is known as lyssa zampa or the tropical swallowtail moth. I also read that it has a lifespan of only two weeks and that made me feel kind of sad.

How to reach the CPF minimum sum like that?

It made me wonder what I would do with my life if I had only two weeks to live.

I’d probably take even more selfies.

If I die in two weeks, I wouldn’t live to see a nationalised public transport system or the release of iPhone 6.

I wouldn’t get to watch the new Transformers movie with my daughter.

But at least in two weeks, I’d be able to complete my McDonald’s Hello Kitty Bubbly World collection.



I thought about death.

That’s right. I’m going there.

A campaign was launched earlier this month to encourage Singaporeans to talk about the usually taboo subject of kicking the bucket. The campaign is not-so-subtly called “Die Die Must Say”.



The trouble is that the entire campaign seems to consist of a way-too-perky music video of the Die Die Must Say theme song featuring a Hokkien rap, and a series of Chinese getai shows, which targets only the audience of such shows.

What about those who don’t watch getai shows? Or understand Hokkien rap?

Like me.

And the moths.

Why are we being left out of this deathly campaign?

Could it be mere coincidence that the campaign coincides with the sightings of the moths, which some consider a symbol of death?

On Friday, I climbed the stairs again and on the 16th storey, I saw another moth.

I don’t know if it was my “psycho-moth”, but instead of flying around, it was lying motionless on the floor in front of the lift.

I wasn't sure if it was dead, but I decided to take a chance.

I lay on the floor next to it and finally got my moth selfie.



Life is short. Yolo!

- Published in The New Paper, 25 May 2014

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Rosalyn Lee is so totes into using the word 'totes'

May 30, 2014, 7:36 pm
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I started following radio DJ Rosalyn Lee on Facebook last June when she dissed SAF for not training because of the haze.

I noticed in her last few posts that she seems to be rather fond of the word "totes" - and not in reference to the bag.

"Totes" is the new shorthand for "totally".









I get it that you want to show off a trendy new angmoh slang you just learnt, but this is just cray-cray.





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