Free food

I always love this time of the year when you can have a buffet meal for FREE at Chinatown! For starters, dig in to some prawn crackers with flavoured peanuts and pumpkin seeds; for mains, you can have Taiwan mochi in more than 30 flavours with seaweed and Japanese mushroom as side dishes. For dessert, why not try some cold refreshing Taiwan fruit jelly and flush down with a hot cup of coffee. For after-dinner show, you can watch DVDs of Chinese New Year songs. Who says Singapore is an expensive city? Burp!

Five reasons why Lunar New Year is better than Xmas:

Five reasons why Lunar New Year is better than Xmas:
1. You receive only one type of present from everyone- $$$, and with it, you can buy your own present, instead of the crappy stuffs you received over Xmas.

2. You can save $$$ and recycle your unwanted chocolates received over Xmas to treat your guests. If you have none left, feel free to tabao some from the places you visited and offer at your house.

3. Twelve days of Christmas celebration is long, but Spring Festival lasts 15 days- 3 more days to feast and gamble.

4. "Merry Christmas" and "Peace on Earth" are no match for more practical and auspicious greetings of Prosperity and Good health.

5. Only those homes visited by God of Fortune at the beginning of the year will have enough $$$ for good ol Santa to work his magic in December. Where you think Santa's budget comes from?

Chinese Zodiac

 It would be interesting to see how the design committee tackle the poultry animals in the Chinese Zodiac like Goat, Rooster and Pig. Perhaps they can draw their inspiration from tasty lamb stew, juicy chicken chop and mouth-watering bak kwa and rope in partners like Makansutra or Lim Chee Guan. It will be a big hit for food-loving Singaporeans!

 photo from The New Paper 9 Jan

Movie download

Crowd of 100 refused to leave Rex Cinema after movie premiere was cancelled

It is reported that the cinema "could not download the film in time". While I'm sure it is all legal, with rampant piracy in the region, the cinema might have better luck searching bit torrent sites where different formats can be found: FLV, AVI, MOV, MP4, MKV, even in 720p or 1080p no less.

24 MRT stations to pilot free Wi-Fi service

Shouldn't all good transport systems strive to ferry passengers from Point A to B in the shortest time possible and not introduce features that will create more congestion? Will I see armies of retirees with their tablets invading the platforms and streaming their K-Dramas, adding noise pollution to the mix?

TODAYonline news story 

大吉大利

Those sick of the usual Chinese cheesy new year songs can listen to my favourite Korean babes Girls' Generation wishing all "吉 吉 吉 吉 baby baby" in both Korean and Japanese!


 

 

New Year resolutions

If you have already failed to keep your new year resolutions, just treat it as a warm-up since you actually meant to start after Lunar New Year. And if that doesn't take off, just consider it a test run since deep down you really want to sync with the start of April financial year as part of your collective KPI. Creative resolving is fun!

Do-Not-Call Registry

Similar to the country's new Do-Not-Call Registry, there should be a Do-Not-Post Registry for Facebook to stop parents from posting embarrassing naked baby photos of their adult children, and colleagues from posting unflattering shots of yourself from that wild company D&D.

My wishes for 2014

My wishes for 2013: bigger stamps for my eyes to only look at people's strengths and not their flaws, Hobbit's strong feet to withstand office landmines, and The Rock' broad shoulders for friends to cry on.

Out Of office

Tis the time of the year when you send an email, you will receive an out-of-office auto reply 9 out of 10 times, with the last recipient forgetting to turn on the feature. So it begs the question why we even bother working this week.