From ‘ Illegal ads a sticking point for HDB residents’, 12 May 2013, article by Lim Yan Yang and Lim Yi Han, Sunday Times

Now that Singapore’s “Sticker Lady” has been sentenced in court for mischief, some Housing Board residents are wondering if they will see the end of a sticky problem they have been living with for years. They say locksmiths, real estate agents and providers of all sorts of services paste small advertisements and labels all over the place, and seem to get away with it.

Tampines resident Francis Cheng contacted The Sunday Times and said he has put up with ads and calling cards that have been stuck to his meter box, doorbell, gate and on the railings along the common corridor. “It’s a nuisance. I peel it off and a few days later they paste it back,” said the 40-year-old business manager. Competing businessmen sometimes leave layers of overlapping stickers that are just unsightly, he added.

…The police website refers the public with such “non-police matters” to relevant agencies such as town councils and the LTA….Technically, the law has penalties for unauthorised advertisements, under the Vandalism Act and the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act.

But lawyers said the courts are unlikely to act against businesses that do not adhere to the rules unless home owners pursue the matters themselves by lodging a magistrate’s complaint. “Some might argue that it’s a slippery slope: if you don’t arrest them, they will paste more stickers,” said criminal lawyer Amolat Singh. “But the courts operate under the de minimis principle, which means the law does not concern itself with trivialities.”

He said the law must strike a balance between the fact that advertisements promote a commercial service – unlike in the Sticker Lady case – and that most people do not view them as mischief or vandalism.

Most of the locksmiths, plumbers and air-conditioning repairmen The Sunday Times called declined to talk about their ads but one argued that his sticker has helped many people. The 40-year-old locksmith, who declined to be named, said: “Those who complain are those who haven’t had their door spoilt or forgotten their keys.”

Your grandfather meter box is it

I have to admit I once benefited from a vandal’s calling card stuck on a letter box. My door was jammed and I had no one to call. It was, for my intents and purposes, an emergency and I remain grateful enough to close one eye to rival locksmiths tearing each others’ stickers or sticking their ads on top of each other outside my house as long as it’s not on my gate. Property flyers on the other hand, are a downright nuisance, the only consolation being sometimes they come with eye candy amidst the eyesore, on which I’d waste a couple of seconds of my life ogling before tossing it away for recycling.

Need a house NOW

So we have one group of people running foul of Vandalism laws, another being annoying Litterbugs, with neither getting arrested for their deeds, while a graffiti artist with better aesthetic taste when it comes to stickers gets charged for mischief and has to serve 240 hours of community service. If Samantha Lo had inserted an additional line in her Press Until Shiok stickers advertising swimming lessons and a fake number, maybe the law would consider her actions ‘trivial’ as well.

I can’t say, however, that MOST people don’t mind such rampant defacement. Maybe some folks like myself do benefit from sticky ads, whether it’s breaking into their own house urgently or selling their homes at cushy prices. But I’m certain there are many who find it more disruptive and polluting than Sam Lo’s street work, so I question the lawyer’s assumption unless he had run a nationwide survey to ask Singaporeans what they think of sticker ads. There’s also a suggestion of exemption from penalty if your sticker is about a ‘commercial service’ rather than ‘art’. Which means there’s a chance you may be an illegal landlord, uncertified driving instructor or maybe even a prostitute sticking ads willy-nilly and not get caught. What if you’re spreading the gospel through stickers, like what happened in 1977 with a ‘I found it’ campaign? (‘It’ meaning ‘a life in Jesus Christ’). Would the authorities have hauled in a church leader for ‘mischief’ or use some fancy legal Latin term to convince us that he did no wrong?

It also begs the question of what exactly the law considers a ‘triviality’ which it doesn’t concern itself with. One man’s triviality is another’s outrage. If Sticker Lady had simply pasted ONE offending sticker in town, maybe less than 2 cm in radius, would it be ‘trivial’ enough to adhere to the ‘de minimis’ principle? One HDB owner’s complaint may be trivial, but if EVERY level on EVERY block of HDB flats reports a case of sticker vandalism, surely it becomes a PROBLEM, one that I forsee our authorities and courts will no doubt be STUCK on.

From ‘Matilda Portico? HDB gets into the name game’, 19 May 2013, article by Daryl Chin, Sunday Times

A portico is a columned walkway that originated in ancient Greece. Nautilus is a shellfish and the name of Captain Nemo’s submarine in the Jules Verne classic 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. What about ancilla? It does not exist even in the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, but is said to have a Latin origin and apparently means girl servant, or sea snails.

…Among the latest Build-To-Order (BTO) projects announced in March this year was one in Punggol called Matilda Portico. Compassvale Ancilla in Sengkang Central and the Nautilus in Punggol are the other names the HDB has come up with in recent years. Others include Waterway Sunbeam, Punggol Spectra, The Periwinkle, Edgedale Green and The Coris.

These tongue-twisters may be a bane to non-English-speaking elderly folk and taxi drivers, but the HDB says it is all part of a long- term branding policy, which it hopes creates a special identity and builds a sense of community among residents. “The objective was to create local identities that residents can relate to and foster neighbourliness,” said a spokesman for HDB.

…The HDB said its guiding principles for names include the location of the estate, special design features and any interesting historical or cultural link. As much as possible, HDB would also choose names that are distinct from nearby developments to avoid confusion.

…The HDB even has a theme going for studio apartment projects, which are meant to provide seniors with affordable housing. All have the word “golden” in the first part of their names to indicate graceful ageing. The second part can come from local plants or spices, like Golden Saffron in Woodlands.

*Video stills from Stomp/Wah Banana.

HDB has been ripping off condo concepts for BTO branding for years, and since most words containing ‘water’ in them have already been taken, why not a name that sounds like a high-end Italian bakery? Matilda Portico is supposedly inspired by the nearby Matilda House, an abandoned and the only bungalow left standing in Punggol which as of 2012 has been converted to a clubhouse for a condo that calls itself A TREASURE TROVE . Imagine asking a taxi uncle to take you to ‘A Treasure Trove’. He’d probably ask you if you have a wooden leg and a parrot on your shoulder.

And what an ‘interesting historical link’ this Matilda House is, especially if you’re the superstitious sort. ‘Matilda’ was the mother of an Irish businessman named Alexander Cashin, who built the house in her honour in 1902. Alexander’s father, Joseph, was a 19th century expat who made his fortune out of OPIUM farms. Also known as Istana Menanti (The Waiting Palace), rumour has it that it’s HAUNTED and that several construction workers were killed mysteriously while trying to demolish it. In fact, so renown is its spookiness that it is one of the stopovers of the Singapore Spooky Tour organised by the Asia Paranormal Investigators, advertised as the ‘most haunted home in the city’. With the recent makeover, the only thing scary about Matilda today are the prices of the condos and ‘atas’ BTO flats surrounding it. With a name like Portico, I’d expect the facade of a Roman bathhouse at the very least.

Punggol Amityville.

‘Ancilla’, on the other hand, has as much cultural or historical relevance as naming another BTO after a fabled submarine. A quick Google tells us that it indeed refers to a genus of sea snails, while in Latin it also means maid, or girl-slave. I don’t know about the natural history of sea snails in Punggol or whether they have been eaten to extinction thanks to Pungool Seafood, but maids we have aplenty. If you Google IMAGE ‘Ancilla’, however, you don’t see gastropods or slaves, but THIS:

Ancilla, Playboy model

Goodness, HDB has unwittingly named one of its projects after a nude model. Let’s hope it turns out to be as sexy as it sounds. But remember, residents of Ancilla, it’s not pronounced AHN-SEE-LA, but AHN-KEE-LA (though both will confuse taxi drivers nonetheless). I bet some smart-alecks will attempt to say it like AHN-CHI-LA, as in CHINCHILLA. Those in the medical field will make nerdy jokes about how close it sounds to ‘axilla’, or ARMPIT. Meanwhile I would suggest HDB consult a marine biologist before giving BTOs such fishy names.

So it’s not just old people or taxi uncles who get confused about BTO and condo names, it’s the people who LIVE in these buildings themselves. Even deceptively simple words can have different interpretations, like Fernvale LEA: (LEE or LE-A). Don’t even get me started on D’Nest. You have BTO names which are a mouthful like WATERWAY SUNBEAM (not to be confused with Waterway Sundew),  or named after one of the 7 sins (Keat Hong Pride), a Wonder Woman accessory (Corporation Tiara), or a Superman accessory (Compassvale Cape). Not to mention frustrating clones like Tampines GreenTerrace, GreenForest and Greenleaf. All without the spacing in between. Like, you know, atreasuretrove. Kids, don’t try this in school.

There is also the trend of naming studio apartment for seniors with the word ‘Golden’ in them. I’m sure old folks can handle numbers and traditional names like ‘Kim Keat’ and ‘Choa Chu Kang’ easily, but forcing them to say ‘Golden Saffron’, ‘Golden Clover’ or ‘Golden KISMIS‘ is a form of elderly abuse. There’s even a ‘Golden DAISY’ which sounds more like a florist in People’s Park Complex than a home. What if they get lost and need help finding their way home but can’t tell us where they live? What if taxi drivers and paramedics end up at Golden Mile or Golden Village cinema instead? In any case, ‘golden’ is passe. Seniors now belong to the ‘silver’ generation. So how about Silver Crest, Silver Hills, Silvervale or Silver Waves? Wait, scrap the last one, that sounds too much like a tsunami.

From ‘Woodlands to get vertical kampung’, 4 Aug 2013, article by Salma Khalik, Sunday Times

Residents in Woodlands will be the first in Singapore to experience the community feel of an integrated building with public facilities such as housing, health care and hawker centres all under one roof.

Planned, built and run by multiple government agencies – a first – this vertical “urban kampung”, as National Development Minister Khaw Boon Wan calls it, will bring together the young and old to live, eat and play together.

At the bottom of the building will be a massive “town square” or community plaza, and at the top, 100 studio apartments for elderly singles or couples.

In between will be a medical centre with about 35 consultation rooms and options for day surgery, senior activity and childcare facilities, shops and watering holes, as well as roof-top decks that residents can turn into community gardens.

In land scarce Singapore, architects have long dreamed of building the city upwards and this idea of vertical ‘strata zoning’ isn’t new at all. Urban planners have fantasised of residents working and playing within the same ‘self-sufficient’ complex, a soaring monolith that combines community services like schools and medical centres interspersed with commercial zones and open spaces for interaction and line-dancing. Ideally, you wouldn’t need to step out of the building or take public transport at all. The kampung kids of the future may not even know what the ground smells like if this thing takes off.

Proponents of skyline living have christened vertical city models with names such as ‘Babel’ and ‘Arcosanti’. Jakarta may even be ahead of us in terms of embracing the vertical city concept, with their Peruri 88 project, which looks like badly stacked real-life Tetris. In a world where overcrowded megacities are building modern microcosms of themselves, Khaw Boon Wan’s description of future living as ‘vertical kampungs’ is like calling Spotify an ‘online jukebox’. My impression of such a ‘kampung’ is something similar to the Ewok village on the Forest Moon of Endor. How apt that it’s to be located in WOODLANDS, of all places.

Not the artist’s impression

Like the Woodlands project, concentrating the community was the main concept driver behind one ‘progressive’ housing/shopping design in the late 1960’s. This $16 million, 30-storey landmark building was to be the highest in Asia at the time. Even its name embodied the spirit of the design, though today it’s viewed more as an endearing ‘grand dame’ kind of relic known more for its traditional eateries and grimy massage parlours than the archetype of vertical housing. It’s name? People’s Park Complex.

Jump ahead 40 years and we started thinking again of the ‘future of public housing’. Completed in 2009, this award-winning structure has interlinked sky gardens, bridges that allowed residents to ‘sky-walk’ , flexible interiors and remains the tallest public housing project in Singapore at 48 stories high. I’m talking about the iconic Pinnacle@Duxton, of course, basically the yuppie cousin of what Khaw Boon Wan has in mind for Woodlands.

I’m not sure about living in the same complex as a hawker centre or a hospital, where one may be exposed to deep-fry odours one moment and the smell of death the next. Or knowing that it’s not just your karaoke-blaring neighbour from upstairs annoying you but a band performing in one of these ‘watering holes’. I’m already having trouble dealing with void deck weddings and funerals as it is. I don’t want an iMax theatre round the corner shaking my walls before I sleep. I want to have an address that the average taxi driver recognises and I can pronounce, unlike Compassvale Ancilla. I want a HOME, not a 40-storey sardine can, which is likely the case if the designers commissioned for this project honed their skills playing Tiny Tower on their handphones.

Meanwhile, one can only hope that a ‘vertical kampung’ would fetch ‘kampung prices’. At the rate that property prices are climbing, one might as well apply for a space colony on board a mothership than live in someone’s SimTower fantasy come true.

From ‘S’poreans unfazed by Bidadari’s past’, 1 Sept 2013, article by Rachel Tan, Sunday Times

…Once the largest grave site in Singapore, the 18ha Bidadari Cemetery is making way for a new Housing Board town and private estates. However, many young Singaporeans are not aware of its history. From a group of around 20 people in their 20s and 30s that The Sunday Times spoke to, only half knew it was a burial ground.

…Mr Gan Ying Kiat, 30, was looking to move to the Bidadari area with his wife. “I’m not bothered by its cemetery history,” he said. “I’m aware that other housing areas like Bishan were also cemeteries.

…Bidadari – meaning “angel” or “fairy” in Malay – had sections for Muslims, Hindus, Singhalese and Christians but burials ended there in 1972. Towns such as Bishan, Toa Payoh and parts of Bukit Timah were also cemeteries.

…Businesswoman Eunice Tan believes it will take a lot of incentives to entice people to live on a former graveyard. The 60-year-old said: “Frankly, I wouldn’t like to live on such burial grounds unless the prices and amenities are extremely attractive, especially for first-time buyers.”

She even proposed alternative names for the new development – including “Happy Estate” and “Sunshine Estate”.

Ms Sitifazilah Perey had similar sentiments. She wrote on Facebook: “Since there are a significant number of superstitious Singaporeans, it is better to change the name.”

Bishan today is more renown for an elite institution, a congested MRT interchange and an iconic park than a place where dead bodies were left to rot. It’s also known for maisonettes with sky-high prices more terrifying than the ghost stories we used to tell about the last train on the MRT line, or creepy tales about the said prestigious school itself. Not that supernatural urban legends or dug up skeletons will stop people from sending their children to RI, or making Bishan their home (because of wanting to send their children to RI).

Formerly the graveyard known as ‘Pek San Teng’, Bishan was renamed to its Hanyu Pinyin version as part of a $700 million facelift with the original intention of housing ‘LOWER and MIDDLE income groups’. Haunted or not, that didn’t stop ‘superstitious Singaporeans’ from flocking to what was touted as a ‘spanking new’, ‘state of the art HDB‘. Nobody cared if Kampung San Teng used to be a gangster hideout; Bishan was the future then and remains popular now, even if property prices continue to feel like bloody extortion.

Bidadari, a bird naturalist and cyclist haven, looks set to follow in Bishan’s footsteps, yet another relentless drive to turn our hallowed grounds into trendy estates, unabashed urban sacrilege for the sake of progress. History tells us that the government may tweak its name to help people forget about wandering spirits, but one shouldn’t patronise its morbid past by calling it the schmaltzy ‘Sunshine estate’, which sounds more like a retirement hub than an up-and-coming model for sustainable living.

I doubt they would turn a Malay word into Hanyu Pinyin either, because there’s no difference between ‘Bi Da Da Li’ and ‘Bidadari’. My only reservation with the sing-song ‘Bidadari’ is its inconvenient phonetics which encourages tongue-twisters, like ‘Hey Dar, I bid for Bidadari BTO already!’, and that it sounds like a lyric in a 90’s techno song . I have to admit I also typo-ed ‘Bididari’ and ‘Bidadiri’ while writing this post.  Who knows, there may be a competition for such things. How about ‘Vernon’ after the nearby columbarium? ‘Woodley’ as a hybrid of Bartley and Woodleigh (both neighbouring MRT stations)? Or Angelville?

Whatever it’s called, there will be urban legends, legends that our kids will remember more than what Bidadari actually once was.  But it’s not just the ghost of long-haired women in white that we should be worried about, but the ghost of ecological damage coming back to haunt us. Nobody cared about exotic birds or variable squirrels when Bishan was developed, and if voices against environmental holocaust go ignored this time, Bidadari, like Bishan, will within 30 years turn from promising ‘urban oasis’ to a cookie-cutter HDB town with smatterings of sterile, forced greenery where the only link it has with its cemetery past would be how devoid of a soul it is.

From ‘Ageing Singapore to get first retirement village’, 10 Nov 2013, article by Radha Basu, Sunday Times

After more than two decades of debate and deliberation, Singapore’s first retirement living community will finally be built at Jalan Jurong Kechil. Property developer World Class Land (WCL), a subsidiary of jewellery group Aspial Corp, told The Sunday Times last week that it plans to build the facility on a 10,170 sq m plot of land, roughly the size of 11/2 football fields.

…Singapore is among the fastest ageing countries in the world. The number of those aged 65 and above will nearly double over the next few years, from 352,000 in 2011 to 600,000 by 2020.

In July, NMP Lina Chiam suggested building such a village on Pulau Ubin, an idea which was shot down because it seemed like banishing the old to an island, especially one where charging wild boars roam free. Land shortage has also prompted Khaw Boon Wan to infamously propose that we look into casting our elderly away to Batam or JB which may be cheaper than sequestering them in gated communities. The Jurong site looks rosy on paper, like a nursing home with country club facilities, but one that the less well-off senior may be unable to afford. In fact, one of the village supporters cited in the article currently lives in a ‘spacious bungalow in Braddell Heights’ and is looking forward to a cozier apartment with ‘like-minded’ seniors as neighbours. Senior-living consultant Tan Hee Kian says many seniors in the ‘top fifth to 20th percentile of the income scale’ would gladly splurge on an RV (The Jurong project costs an estimated $70-80 million). The word ‘village’ may very well be a misnomer if only old, rich people live in it. It may turn out to be the Nassim Road for Senior Citizens. The only thing ‘village-like’ about the Jurong RV is that it’s inaccessible by train.

In 1985 when the RV was first brought up, it was intended as a ‘nest-egg’ for the AFFLUENT, mainly middle and upper income professionals and businessmen who were in the same ‘income bracket’ and common interests. Today’s model retirement villages also come equipped with golf courses and club houses.  If golf is the seniors’ game, how about converting one of our existing 18 golf courses to a RV instead of using up precious land then? What other benefits worth the price tag would one gain living in a RV compared to an elderly-friendly estate with easy access to medical care, public transport and an NTUC supermarket? With a ballooning greying population, finding elderly companionship in the general community shouldn’t be a problem, if the reason you’re considering the RV lifestyle is because no one shares your passion for gateball or gardening. If I’m a budding artist and need to live in a bohemian neighbourhood to spur my creativity even if I’m entitled to the living space of a closet, you can bet my calls for a Soho-esque ‘Artists’ village’ to be with ‘like-minded’ folk will be slammed for sure, because apparently young struggling artists are not as important as old retirees with actual savings.

Some elders would rather mix with all walks of life than see the same haggardly faces everyday waiting to see who dies first, or hear the same people grumble about politics or brag about whose children are more filial than others.  One can also imagine how every journey down the stairs would take an eternity if the lift breaks down.

No matter how you brand it, an RV is an enclave of people of a certain class and age, which is contrary to our national drive towards ‘inclusivity’ and integration. It’s not as if our current HDB estates suffer from ageist design. I see old people happily sitting at the void deck watching kids tumble down a ‘youth-centric’ playground where I live. There’s a church if you want to send your final prayers, a fitness corner to stave off venous thrombosis and a provision shop with a makeshift ‘kopi corner’ if you need to chat with random strangers. I’m content to grow old and die here as long there’s a patch of grass to feed pigeons, to feel appreciated by the general ‘townsfolk’, to flirt with the kopitiam beer lady and add to the communal diversity rather than be reminded everyday of my own mortality in an artificial environment smack in the middle of nowhere, where eventually if your house catches fire and you’re wheelchair bound, your equally immobile neighbour can only perish along with you rather than do anything useful.

If I really want to ‘get away from it all’, I’d plant my sagging roots away from this country if I could afford it. But of course if these 100 or so ‘villagers’ prefer it the RV way then no one can deny them a space they can call their own. Maybe they could call it ‘Silver Cove’ or something.

Postscript: The project has been quietly rebranded as a retirement ‘RESORT’ instead of a village, officially called the Hillford, with 1 to 2 bedroom units starting from $388,000 (Packed showflat at first retirement resort, article by Jonathan Kwok, 5 Jan 2014, Sunday Times). The bulk of those interested in the purchase, however, weren’t golden oldies, but those in the 40s looking for investment opportunities, just like they would for any spanking new condo. With a full time manager, 24 hour concierge service, the only things missing from the Hillford are spas, hot springs, a sea view and complimentary breakfast. And eventually anyone above 70 and ‘over the hill’ who would rather check into a nursing home nearer to civilisation than live in a 398 sq ft cell that costs nearly as much as a 3-room flat. No wonder it’s called a ‘resort’ then, by living in such ‘Mickey Mouse’ units, you can almost sense a hint of Disneyland right around the corner.

From ‘Roof of HDB block in Toa Payoh vandalised’, 7 May 2014, article in CNA

The roof level of a 22-storey Housing and Development Board block was painted with graffiti containing vulgarities and criticism of a political party in an apparent case of vandalism. Pictures of the graffiti were circulated on social media sites on Wednesday morning.

Police said they received a call at 6.47am requesting for assistance at Blk 85A, Toa Payoh Lorong 4. “Upon police’s arrival, it was established that a case of vandalism had occurred at the said location,” a police spokesman said.

A contractor at the scene told Channel NewsAsia that residents had called the Town Council’s 24-hour hotline to complain about the graffiti. The access hatch to the block’s parapet was locked when the police tried to enter the site on Wednesday morning.

According to a Bishan-Toa Payoh Town Council staff member, who did not want to be named, the water tanks on the roof top had not been tampered with. “I don’t know how they managed to get up here. The police are investigating,” said the staff member.

My grandfather rooftop

Graffiti and PAP go together like waffles and honey. Breaking into a MRT depot to spray-paint a train is nothing compared to this aerial spectacle of a middle finger to the ruling party, provided that the culprits abseiled the block rather than break their way onto the roof. (Incidentally, there’s a rooftop bar at Carlton Hotel called GRAFFITI SKY BAR.)

Those in the street art scene label such vandals ‘extreme taggers’, amateurs who risk life and limb to mark territory. One such tagger died from such a stunt hanging from a rope by the 16th floor of a building in Sacramento. Another in the same city fell to his death while trying to mark a bridge. No vandal here has died while pretending to be Tom Cruise scaling the Burj Khalifa so far, but we may see the first if this high-rise FUCK PAP mural triggers a spate of copycat HDB tagging. The moniker ‘Mike Cool’ sounds like a 80’s rapper, reminding me more of bright baggy pants and inverted caps than a mohawked punk with a taste for anarchy.

Artists have put roofs to more creative use in other cities, drawing entirely opposite reactions from residents, who view urban graffiti like how they view their child’s first scribblings on the wall. One even proposed to his girlfriend using 5 rooftops as his canvas. If you did this in Singapore, you’d be spending your engagement anniversary in jail, lashes on your back still warm to the touch.

In New York, high rise graffiti has assimilated into the urban landscape, and no one questions how the vandals got up there in the first place. Graffiti artists there are the stuff of fable and magic who sprinkle rainbow fairy dust while you sleep and then disappear before you wake. Maybe it’s because they don’t spray-paint FUCK OBAMA in CAPS all over the place.

Only in Singapore does one see this obsessive urge to deface the Government in public using the ‘language’ of graffiti.  Campaign banners in Aljunied GRC, for example, were subject to a blue streak of vandalism in 2011.

PAP, you’ve been Tagged

Then there’s the rampage of digital vandalism that culminated in the hijacking of the Istana website, with the hackers putting up unflattering comments about President Tony Tan. Well that’s one way to get noticed, but a silly risk to take since the Government knows your IP address and all. The tricky part about nabbing rooftop vandals is that the perpetrators are unlikely to be caught in the act by eyewitnesses, and nobody really sneaks up there unless they want to dispose a body in the water tank, have sex, or SUNTAN.  Maybe the litterbug-catching CCTVs would have some leads for the Police.

A minor embarrassment for the PAP really, but they should take comfort in knowing that for every dozen pieces of graffiti cursing the government, there’s always that rare, diehard pro-Government fan who would break the law just to declare his love for it. Like so.

UPDATE: ‘Mike Cool’ and his 4 friends were arrested within days of the incident, similar to the speed at which the Cenotaph vandal was captured. I don’t know what they were doing to the 17 year olds in the police van, because they seemed to be in some kind of pain. One of them was allowed access to a lawyer, but denied a gag order because the law ‘protects victims, not accused persons’. The last time a gag order request was rejected was an appeal made on behalf of a certain Cecilia Sue. Meanwhile, another infamous 17 year old’s identity remains gagged to this day, as more than 30 men and counting, their names splashed all over the news, get charged one by one for having underaged sex with the ‘victim’.

 4 of them (Boaz Koh, Reagan Tan, Chay Nam Shen, Goh Rong Liang) were alleged to have committed criminal trespass, while David Graaskov has been charged of conspiring to commit vandalism, the latter also accused of ‘removing a reflective vest worth $5 from another rooftop in Toa Payoh. (Teens in vandalism case face more charges, 17 May 2014, ST). Boaz was also playing with a fire extinguisher at the Marina Bay Suites, causing $70 worth of damage to property. Why bother with expert witnesses to solve crimes when you have Instagram? (Boaz and Graaskov have since closed their accounts).

Hawt

New age construction worker

From ‘3Gen flats? No thanks, we’d rather live on our own’, 9 June 2014, article by Yeo Same Jo, ST

YOUNG couples taking part in a dialogue on housing were largely against living in new jumbo-sized flats with their parents after marriage, echoing the preliminary results of an online poll that showed most young couples would rather live on their own. Most of the 20 couples taking part in the Ministry of National Development (MND) session were worried about the lack of privacy of such three-generation (3Gen) flats.

“Personally I value freedom and I want my own space,” said chemist Toh Ke Min, 24, who took part in last Saturday’s event, the first of three conversations held to find out how housing policies can help draw families closer.

Her boyfriend, transport operations officer Quah Hai Hui, 26, shared her sentiment. “I’m apprehensive about what my in-laws think about me. Living in the same flat as them might bring some conflict,” he said.

Others said the 3Gen flats, meant to encourage multiple generations to live under one roof, might be difficult to sell in future, as they can be resold only to other multi-generation families.

‘Jumbo’ is not as big as it once was. The 3Gen flats at Saraca Breeze @ Yishun come with 4 bedrooms, 2 of which with attached bathrooms, and has an area of 115 sq m. In 1990, a ‘jumbo’ unit in Woodlands had SEVEN rooms (150 – 165 sq m), created by knocking down the wall between 3 room and 4 room units. It was practically a presidential suite by today’s standards. Today’s 3Gen units are more ‘Grande’ than ‘Jumbo’, really.

With prices starting from $335K, calling these 3Gen flats ‘jumbo’ makes it seem like a steal, when it’s almost the same size as a 5-room flat, which your property agent will try to sell to you, along with your aged parents and kids, as ‘cosy’ despite the superlative tag. In 1986, if you wished to stay close to your old folks but prefer to retain your privacy you could get an extended unit with a ‘granny’ flat attached, a 40 sq m studio apartment with its own toilet and kitchen, the smallest of the range being 133 sq m, still more spacious than the current ‘jumbo’ flat.

It wasn’t long before Singaporeans began exploiting the extra space for other uses, as a ‘workout room’,  study, workshop and a maid’s bedroom among others. By 1992, the ‘granny’ project was faltering and HDB eventually put a stop to it, with some experts explaining that old people preferred to live away from their married children. Today, there is the ‘retirement village’ for those who would rather live alone than play nanny to Junior when Mom and Dad are slogging their asses off at work.

We all appreciate MND’s aims to meet the national objective of happy-family togetherness, but as the survey results show, perhaps there is a limit to how physically tight families should be when it comes to sharing living space. There are squabbles, and then there are, at the other extreme, horrific bloodbaths. Not everyone gets along and sits around being entertained by grandfather’s stories like the folks in Under One Roof, nor is every family as ‘kampung-spirited’ and accommodating as some 4 generation HDB households. In pure economic, White paper terms, squeezing an extended family in a 3G flat makes sense. Until, of course, it is decided it’s better to send the old folks to a nursing home in JB before someone gets killed, that is.

From ‘Stricter Primary 1 priority rules for grassroots workers’, 12 June 2014, article by Pearl Lee, ST

PARENTS who become grassroots volunteers in the hope of getting priority for their children in the Primary 1 registration exercise will have to serve twice as long as before. They will have to do at least two years of grassroots work, not one, to qualify for the benefit. They will also be restricted to schools in the constituency where they live. Up to now, grassroots leaders could get priority for their children in schools near their homes as well as in the constituencies where they volunteered.

…The scheme qualifies active grassroots volunteers for Phase 2B of the Primary 1 registration exercise, which also includes parents who are school volunteers or have church or clan associations. Earlier phases of the registration are for siblings of current pupils or children of past pupils. About 400 children enrol in primary schools under the active community leaders scheme each year, less than 1 per cent of the Primary 1 cohort, according to a parliamentary reply by the Education Ministry last year.

But long-time grassroots leaders say it is not uncommon to see a surge in the number of people who apply to be community leaders a year before their child is due to register for Primary 1. Lawyer Kenneth Au-Yong, a member of the Ulu Pandan citizens’ consultative committee who is in his 50s, said: “When you have a popular school within the constituency, volunteers will come to you. You don’t have to look for them.” The Ulu Pandan division under the Holland-Bukit Timah GRC has four popular primary schools: Henry Park Primary, Nanyang Primary, Methodist Girls’ School and Raffles Girls’ Primary School.

Mr Au-Yong said he has seen parents dropping out of activities and grassroots meetings once their children start school.

“We should not allow the system to be abused like this’.

When grassroots leader and RC chairman Lawrence Chong was caught fighting for free textbooks and shouting at teenage volunteers in 1995 like an Ugly Singaporean, he defended his right to freebies by saying that ‘grassroots leaders should be given priority’ to the books. In an interview, he said that his breed was ‘hard to come by’ and it would be a slight incentive to people willing to step up to do grassroots duty. He eventually resigned under pressure, but probably still lives in a 4 room flat plus private property till this day.

The benefits of RC affiliations extend down to kindergarten registration as well. Already in 1992, you’d stand a higher chance of scoring a place in your neighbourhood PCF if you’re a PAP grassroots leader living in the ward. Housing is another perk of the job. From 1990-1994, a total of 745 grassroots leaders were given priority allocation for HDB flats. And once you’ve earned the flat, you also get free parking between 7 am and 11pm at HDB carparks within your constituency. Not forgetting the occasional National Day Award. You also stand a higher chance of taking a selfie with PM Lee than the man on the street.

The nature of school and housing incentives for grassroots leaders tends to draw gut-level ire from ordinary folk because of the relative scarcity of these ‘privileges’. If grassroots leaders were given tax breaks, NTUC discounts or free daily entry into the Istana, few would complain. It’s the queue-jumping that gets people crying foul. Aren’t these people supposed to have a flaming ‘passion for servant leadership’? ‘Servants’ don’t go around asking for free kopi, or demand to be first in line for preschool registration, do they? Shouldn’t they be painting banners or holding car doors open for MPs or something? If parents quit their jobs to commit to volunteering full-time in schools for priority placing, we call them kiasu. If a grassroots leader does it, we feel cheated and accuse the PA of breeding a class of selfish bourgeois lackeys who’re in it only to get their kids into branded schools.

Most grassroots workers, PAP or otherwise, serve out of pure goodwill and generally like being around neighbours, have a fetish for organising events, or love meeting new people without personal ambitions of getting ahead in life like the typical kiasu Singaporean. They’re usually not PAP ‘runners’, bodyguards or elite cronies throwing their weight around. But extension of grassroots service alone isn’t going to filter out those with ulterior motives. What’s needed is a more robust screening process and a penalty for those seeking to abuse the system for personal gain, like the public shaming of freeloading black sheep like book-grabbing Lawrence Chong. After all, you may get thrown into jail for lying about where you live when applying for priority placing. Putting on an elaborate act for the sake of tangible benefits for a year or two is just prolonged, inconspicuous lying.

Perhaps the grass is greener as a RC volunteer, only because of all the shit that’s fed into it.

From ‘Caught in the act of urinating in Pinnacle@Duxton lift’, 18 June 2014, article by Hoe Pei Shan, ST

The first photo shows the back of a woman in neat attire squatting down in a lift; the second shows the same woman, her hair tied up in a ponytail, in the same spot, but this time with a puddle near her feet in the lift. The photos were featured in posters put up this week by the Tanjong Pagar Town Council in the void deck of Block 1E at Pinnacle@Duxton, following complaints about urine in one of the lifts back in May.

The youthful-looking woman, whose face is not seen, was caught in the act by surveillance cameras in the lift at 8.22pm on May 23.

“The Town Council has received feedback regarding the stench of urine in the Fireman Lift in Blk 1E… This has caused much inconvenience to residents,” read the message in the poster. The posters and photos are part of what MP Lily Neo (Tanjong Pagar GRC) describes as the town council’s “very effective” method of addressing such incidents, and have been employed several times at the Pinnacle@Duxton estate as well as elsewhere in the constituency.

…”We would never show people’s faces in the photos used, so only the person committing the act would know it is him or her,” she said. “We’re not trying to shame anybody, we put the posters up only in the affected blocks. Our job is not to make trouble, we just want to stop the urination problem.”

…No one has stepped forward so far regarding the latest incident, and little is known about the woman pictured. “Urination in public places still happens from time to time in different areas around Tanjong Pagar, but thankfully it’s not that prevalent,” said Dr Neo.

This iconic housing project was indeed once the PINNACLE of international design, the first in the world with 2 skybridges linking the 7 blocks, creating what could be the LONGEST continuous skygardens in the world. A winner of the 2010 President’s Design Award, the Pinnacle’s skydecks have been described as ‘social dynamos’ encouraging communal activities, initiating an ‘innovative typology of public communal spaces that are metaphorically reclaimed from the air.’ A bit TOO communal perhaps. This, like how we deal with most social nuisances, calls for a CAMPAIGN, before someone brands the building The ‘Pee-nacle’ (Wait, that has already happened). The mascot could be a singing, dancing giant incontinence pad, one who goes around smothering people before they even unzip their trousers.

Peeing in lifts is a scourge that won’t go away soon, with exploding bladders, loose sphincters, alcohol and lack of public toilets often used as mitigation pleas when culprits do get caught. Most of these, to no one’s surprise, are men. In 1988, the ST ran a survey which revealed that of 112 pissers caught, ONLY ONE was a woman, and they were mostly adults within the age range of 36 to 54. These days, people seem to get away with urinating in lifts without having the media shout their name, age and occupations like they used to. An anonymous offender smearing a public amenity gets away with nothing more than embarrassment, while a blogger who smears the name of someone very illustrious gets hunted down and sued his pants off for defamation. Even getting caught EATING a damn sweet on the train is a worse situation than this.

You must be truly desperate if you’re a woman and need to resort to 1)pulling down/aside your underwear 2) squatting 3) answering the call of nature 4) risk soaking your damn feet while at it. No one seems to ever get remanded in IMH for such behaviour, especially one that has been fetishised by the authorities since Singaporeans began living in HDBs, with some MPs in the 80’s even suggesting a JAIL TERM for offenders. Peeing in a lift is an entirely different breed of public disgrace compared to say dumping litter or throwing cigarette butts out of cars. A grown adult urinating in a closed, moving compartment, especially one in which you have to eventually use yourself, seems to me more of a bizarre psychological disorder rather than a case of uncontrollable nerves, mischief, or even ‘vandalism’. It’s like vomiting on the side of your plate, and then continuing to eat the rest of your food like nothing happened.

The Pinnacle may boast one of the most panoramic, expensive residential skygardens in the world, but all the lifestyle frills and pledges of ‘sustainability’ aside, one thing that the building appears to be sorely lacking is a basic lift URINE DETECTOR, a gadget that stops the lift dead when someone takes a leak on the floor, sounds an alarm, and traps you inside until the cops come and whisk you and your vile bladder to court. A brilliant invention because it forces you to be confined with your own putrid stench for at least a good half an hour, and more importantly, catches you red-handed, with or without CCTV. Have we gone all soft on lift pissers lately? Will the Pinnacle management take more serious measures only when MP Lily Neo steps on a golden puddle during her walkbouts like what happened to former Speaker Tan Soo Khoon in 1991?

Urine detectors can’t do anything to prevent one from DEFECATING in the lift, though. Yes, it happens, I shit you not.

UDDs will give residents a piss of mind

From ‘Why fewer flats seem to be flying the flag for National Day’, 7 Aug 2014, article by Joanne Seow and Yeo Sam Jo, ST

ENTIRE blocks of flats awash in red and white in the run-up to National Day? It is a less common sight these days. More than half of the 15 Members of Parliament and residents The Straits Times spoke to said they have noticed fewer flags on display in recent years. Changes in the work of grassroots groups and public housing designs are two of the reasons for the drop in the number of Singaporeans flying the national flag from their flats, they added.

Some residents’ committees (RCs) now prefer to hold community events instead of going door to door to give out flags. Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC MP Zainal Sapari said some RCs in his GRC have stopped actively decorating housing blocks for National Day since two years ago.

“We feel it would be good if residents do it themselves so that it’s more heartfelt,” he said. He hopes that when residents realise fewer RCs are doing it, they will put the flags out themselves. Tampines GRC MP Baey Yam Keng said a resident told him he did not hang a flag as he did not want to be the odd one out.

New flat design is a factor too, said Tanjong Pagar GRC MP Chia Shi-Lu. He said newer blocks in Queenstown do not have common corridors facing the outside, making it harder to display flags.

Public servant Rachel Lim, 29, said her family stopped putting up the flag when they moved from a road-facing block in Chai Chee to a point block in Sengkang West nine years ago.

“There is no common corridor and the block is inward facing,” she said. “Even if you display the flag, there is no audience.”

‘This is where I won’t be alone…’

Naked flats on National Day isn’t new at all. In 1989, the Kaki Bukit Zone 5 RC were forced to come up with a brilliant solution to spur Singaporeans into flying the flag over their HDB parapets loudly and proudly: LUCKY DRAW AND FREE FOOD. If you bought a flag from your RC, you stood a chance to win a radio, TV or a table fan. You were also invited to a buffet breakfast so that you could ‘mix around’ with fellow flag buyers. No such luck these days. Today it needs to be more ‘heartfelt’ without us wondering if they’ll be serving free N-day roti prata at the void deck so that I’ll be the first in line.

Even if you take the initiative to fly the flag without any form of shameless inducement or pressure from your RC, you may be criticised for not hanging it correctly, letting it flap in an unruly manner in the wind, or even get charged for displaying a faded or stained flag. So if you happen to be the ONLY one on your block showing off your patriotism, you’d better make sure the flag is in pristine condition and salute-worthy condition otherwise you’d put the whole block to shame.

When a block of flats festooned in red and white becomes an annual symbolic staple on the nation’s birthday, it naturally becomes a visual representation of how much love we have for the country, or a scoreboard of how well the PAP is doing. You can imagine the various MPs checking each others’ constituency colours out like students comparing test results. Our MND minister Khaw Boon Wan is particular proud of his Sembawang residents. CHECK THIS SHIT OUT, BITCHES!, this post seems to be saying.

The government is partly to blame for setting the standard in the first place. With RCs doing the dirty work for us all this years, we never learned how to buy a flag or even hang it up ourselves, not to mention coordinate them in a single perfect file down the block. It’s like parents holding a massive birthday bash for their kid with clowns, magicians and firestarters in one year, and then ordering miserable McDelivery at home for the next. This year, nobody even bothered to compose a new birthday song. You’d think your folks love you less as you get older, when the truth is you can’t measure love by how festive every birthday gets. Think of N-Day as Singapore’s Valentine’s Day, and the display of flags as the gesture of giving an obligatory bunch of roses. Not giving one this year doesn’t mean I love her less. Conversely, putting one up for the past few years doesn’t mean I won’t migrate to goddamn Perth the next.

There are all sorts of personal excuses not to do so, of course, namely:

1. Don’t have the time
2. Lazy
3. I don’t want to stand out if I’m the only one
4. My flag is faded
5. Don’t know where to buy the flag
6. I already draped my car’s sideview mirror in flag
7. I was away on vacation
8. I forgot
9. The dog ate my flag

There are also those who try to explain the phenomenon by summoning the tired ‘too many foreigners’ argument, while some of us would only put up flags as a show of defiance on days other than N-day, like a certain ‘Gulam’ who hung a Palestine flag to ‘raise awareness’ about the Gaza situation. Or another Singaporean flying a China flag for some damn reason.

Flags on flats or not, this is still home, truly. Happy National Day, Singapore.

From ‘Dog disturbances, HDB suggests debarking…’, 28 Aug 2014, article in CNA

An animal rights group has voiced “strong objections” to a Housing and Development Board (HDB) suggestion that dog owners who are unable to keep their dogs from barking should consider surgically “debarking” their pets.

The HDB notice, issued by its Ang Mo Kio Branch on Aug 22, referred to a “dog barking nuisance in the middle of the night at Blk 601, Ang Mo Kio Ave 5″. It called upon dog owners to consider one of three options: Obedience training sessions; training collars to control and modify the behavior of their pets; or debarking the dog through surgery.

There are two ways to debark a dog in the vet’s surgery. One, yank its mouth open, pull its tongue forward, grab the vocal cords with forceps and cut them off. Two, make an incision over its voice box, remove voice box and tendons. The dog may continue to bark though effectively muted, but may display ‘neurotic behaviour’. Animal lovers have been long aware of the consequences of debarking, that it would turn the dog into a dangerous ‘monster’ who bites postmen’s crotches willy-nilly without warning. Well so would you if someone de-tongued you. Or if you were forced to do it yourself with a pair of sewing scissors like that finale scene in Oldboy.

Well that’s one way to take a vow of silence

Amazingly, this barbaric practice isn’t banned anywhere in the world. It’s a subtler version of the ancient torture gadget called the ‘choke pear‘, a device which is shoved into a liar’s orifice and unscrewed open slowly leading to severe internal mutilation. If a human being can’t seem to keep it down whatever the situation, to suggest making a few snips around the voicebox would be considered cruel even under general anaesthetic. We all know a few karaoke singers around the block who desperately need to be de-‘sung’, but HDB wouldn’t dare suggest that we send these chronic screechers for ‘voice recalibration’. It would be psychological torture, because God gave us voices to sing and recite poetry under the moonlight so we can score mates and reproduce.

There are less invasive ways to make any yapping dog shut the hell up without taking the ‘dog-ness’ out of him. Give him something to chomp and latch on. Like the groin of some HDB officer on his dog-silencing prowls for example. Or pay hundreds of dollars to get on stage live with Cesar Milan when he comes to town, whose dog sorcerer magic can turn your boisterous, extrovert dog into a hushed, plaintive squeaker which just a single, penetrating stare. If dogshit became a rampant problem, we have it in our human ingenuity to surgically remodel a dog’s anus, creating an artificial defecatory delay so that we can catch its poo in time and avoid the nasty business of picking the yucky thing up from the ground.

HDB comes across in their notice as treating a dog’s voicebox as a switch to turn on and off, like an annoying leaky tap that a plumber can fix. In 1985, they even considered a blanket ban of dogs in general from homes because of complaints by residents. But it’s not always the Board endorsing the torture of innocent creatures. Some owners resort to turning their Wolverine cats into Hello Kittys by ‘declawing’, which involves some form of amputation of the feline’s digits so that their human babies don’t get disfigured by moody cats. All you World War POWs got off easy by just having your fingernails yanked out one by one. In agriculture, calves are dehorned by a searing hot iron so that they won’t gore farmers or other animals. Or remind people too much of Satan.

Let’s hope our MND Minister and well known Buddhist animal lover Khaw Boon Wan puts his money where his bark is and stop this debarking nonsense once and for all. As for those who complained about the dog nuisance, maybe this clip will change your mind about dog barks.

From ‘Some see red over colourful facade for Bishan’, 17 Sept 2014, article by Melody Zaccheus, ST

A FRESH coat of paint usually brings cheer, but a splash of colour on Bishan’s beloved red-brick flats has upset some people instead. Some terracotta housing blocks, like those in Bishan Streets 22 and 24, will be doused in a medley of colours, with combinations such as grey, silver and golden yellow, as part of ongoing repairs by the area’s town council.

But the mishmash of colours has upset some residents, architects and heritage experts. Architectural and urban historian Lai Chee Kien said the paint job will change the feature of an estate known for its red-brick facade. “Red-brick panels and bands were probably chosen by the estate’s original architects to present a common, unifying aesthetic identity. Today’s town councils must look at this from a larger scale and keep the entire town in mind when making these changes,” he added.

…At Blocks 201 to 219 in Street 23, residents were presented earlier this year with three colour palettes starkly different from the original. They included a pink and purple combination.

Resident Charlene Koh, 27, a designer, was upset. “The rows of red-brick blocks evoke a sense of warmth… They are iconic and distinct. I don’t want to look out my window and see a horrible colour on the next block.”

HDB’s palette used to be restricted to neutral tones of grey, white or brown, but in the eighties some designers decided to boldly go where no bureaucrat has gone before, add a PRIMARY colour to the mix. Red, however, was considered too ‘loud’, and you don’t want a colour that’s universally associated with rage splashed all over your flat. Nor do you want to drop random stripey rainbow colours and end up looking like a rastacap, or some kid’s toy xylophone.

I personally don’t really care what colour scheme my block has unless it’s a genuine eyesore, like yellow polka dots. Some stark combinations like Rochor’s foursome of bright red, blue, yellow and green have become recognisable icons (though rated as one of the ‘worst buildings in Singapore’ by CNN), while others betray a dismal lack of imagination, or if they have no idea what colour to douse your house in, they add an orchid mural, or a giant Cupid. Overdo the cuteness and you’ll have people mistaking your block for a multi-storey kindergarten, especially if it has rainbows splashed all over it.

There’s even an FAQ on the Bishan Town Council page to address ‘awful colours’. The response is typical.

What ‘experts’, exactly HDB? Are they the brains behind the Teletubbies? Maybe they’re psychologists who specialise in colour-mood matching who’ve done extensive research to determine what are the best colour combinations to lull HDB dwellers into a state of passive obedience. Granted, you can’t get two people to agree on a preferred colour scheme, might as well choose a combination scientifically proven to stop people from leaping to their deaths.

Here’s a quick list of things that HDB’s ugly colour combinations have been compared to:

1) Chocolate cake (brown brick with shades of darker yellow, Jurong, 1985)

2) Old people’s phlegm (green/yellow, unknown, 2008)

3) Menstrual/hospital sanitary pads (pink, green, unknown, 2014)

4) Pigeon coop, Lego, Tupperware

5) Puke

6. Disneyland (suggested pink, purple, blue palette for Tiong Bahru, 2008)

From ‘Hand wringing over neighbour from hell’, 24 Nov 2014, article by Joyce Lim, ST

From ‘Rat infestation near Bukit Batok MRT’, 17 Dec 2014, article in CNA

A rat infestation has been spotted in the vicinity of Bukit Batok MRT station. Simulation system operator Ryan Keith, 33, is a longtime Bukit Batok resident, and recorded a video of the rat infestation on Tuesday evening (Dec 16), at the hill just beside the train station.

“I was there for about 10 minutes and I think I saw more than 50 rats,” he told Channel NewsAsia. “This spot is near to many eateries, and rats can breed very quickly and bite through wires, so I am quite concerned.”

He said he has approached the National Environment Agency (NEA) about the problem, and they told him that “they will look into it“.

Channel NewsAsia understands that this is a plot of state land under the management of the Housing and Development Board (HDB), as an agent of the Singapore Land Authority. Channel NewsAsia has approached the HDB for comment.

It does not bode well when an agency says they will ‘look into it’, when they really should be saying ‘we’ll send someone down before someone gets bloody typhus’. At press time, both agencies are waiting for the other to issue ‘statements’, by which time another litter of rat babies would have already been born feeding off scraps from a discarded, oily Old Chang Kee plastic bag. Opposition parties contesting in the ward should be taking notes, because this is the best evidence available if you ever decide to call Bukit Batok constituency a shameful ‘slum’.

In this case, it appears that the buck is being passed to HDB who owns the vermin-infested land. When dead rats were found floating near the Merlion in 1972, the Ministry of Environment directed a complainant to the PWD (Public Works Department) and then the Health Ministry, before redirecting him back to the original contact. Well if only we had grass-cutting coordinator MSO to sort things out back then!

In our reputedly ‘spick and span’ Garden City, you still find these resilient little bastard critters invading shopping malls, fast food joints, hawker centres, HDB drains, or on the MRT. Even the food we eat is not spared. You could find pieces of rat in even roti prata with mutton curry.  In the fifties, people bought hunting cats to take matters into their own hands during a rat epidemic. Today you find rats as large as cats themselves, and the reason why cats are not doing their job is because they’re being over-fed, mutilated by humans, or being rounded up to become cuddle accessories in some cat cafe, where they spend their confined days staring out of the window depressed, fantasising about all the big fat rats they could maim and eat instead of entertaining shitty humans over tea and biscuits.

Well, if even stray cats and dogs are terrified of this marauding menace, there’s only one option left to resolve this issue. Release the PYTHON!!

Update: The NEA, AVA, Jurong Town Council and HDB issued a joint statement the following day blaming the rat infestation on people feeding stray dogs, while a pest control team was deployed to wage war on the rat army, an operation with the cheesy sounding name of ‘Rat Attack’ that drew excited crowds as if they were witnessing a SWAT team in a terrorist hostage situation. Kudos to the Star Pest Control team for braving the rain to subdue the pestilence. These guys have their own Facebook page, which features grisly photos of massive insect nests if you’re into that kind of thing. Their logo, strangely enough, includes a rat with a Elvis hairdo. Still, glad to know someone out there gives a rat’s ass about public health.

From ‘Upset over columbarium plans, Fernvale Lea’s future residents want a refund from HDB’, 4 Jan 2015, article by Samantha Boh, ST

Upset about an upcoming columbarium close to their future flats, some would-be residents of Fernvale Lea have asked the Housing Board for a refund. Their request came even after Dr Lam Pin Min, MP for Sengkang West, held a dialogue with residents on Sunday and said that there would not be a crematorium or funeral parlour services at the Chinese temple where the columbarium would be housed.

Some residents stood in line to leave their contact details with the HDB after a three-hour dialogue with Dr Lam and representatives from Life Corp, the company developing the temple. Residents at the dialogue said the HDB should have been more upfront about the Chinese temple housing a columbarium.

News of the columbarium, which is expected to be completed by 2016, had surprised many residents when it was reported last week. An online petition started on Tuesday to stop the development of the columbarium had garnered more than 800 signatures.

Speaking on the sidelines of the dialogue, Dr Lam said the authorities had been upfront, noting that it was indicated in the Fernvale Lea brochure for the new flats that the temple may include a columbarium allowed under the guidelines of the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA). “There is really nothing to hide,” he added.

Some residents had also asked why the Chinese temple is being developed by a private company. Dr Lam said URA guidelines did not restrict the type of company that can develop a religious institution and he understood from the URA that it has been done before.

Sin Ming residents can relate. When a funeral parlour was proposed to be built in the vicinity of a school, one resident complained that the estate would be henceforth known as the ‘Avenue of the Dead’. But it’s not just spaces for the deceased that get people upset, but also void deck elder-care facilities and sometimes even community HOSPITALS, where residents may get traumatised by the ‘smell of medicine’ in addition to the threat of impending doom.

Fernvale Lea’s selling point, according to its online brochure, is that residents get to live amid ‘lush greenery’, which also happens to be the kind of environment you want to ‘rest in peace’ within. It does mention the future placement of a Chinese temple, but leaves the interested buyer to interpret the disclaimers at his own risk, namely the statement that ‘the proposed facilities, their locations and surrounding land-use….are indicative only and subject to change or review. These facilities may include other ancillary uses allowed under URA’s prevailing Development Control guidelines.’ Which basically means HDB can do whatever the hell they want years after you’ve settled down in your new home, whether it’s building a private-owned ‘dragon and phoenix’ temple, a foreign workers’ dormitory, or a cut-and-paste shopping mall which turns out to be an foreign worker enclave. Heck, they could run a new highway or MRT line right next to your house and you can’t do anything about it.

In 1984, applicants of Clementi flats slammed the agency for keeping dead silent about plans to build a funeral parlour near the estate. It appears that HDB should know exactly the sort of reaction from people whenever you surround them with facilities reminding them of their mortality, but till this day continues to refrain from telling buyers straight in the face, like a property agent omitting the tiny detail of your flat being previously owned by someone who committed suicide in the living room. In any case, people are still going to hold void deck funerals right under your block anyway, columbarium or no columbarium.

If you’re diligent enough, you’d actually go the extra mile and read about URA’s ‘Development Control’. And by extra mile I mean sending an email to URA because I have no idea where these guidelines are from the website. Or, if you’re desperate for a house even if it means living next to a cemetery or a string of noisy pub/bars, you could look past the hazards of living near a storage for urns and maybe consider that you have quite a few decent schools nearby (e.g Nan Chiau), which may allay any fears of poor resale prices, since some parents would camp above a mortuary just to live 2 minutes’ walk away from a top school. You could also interview Yishun Ring Road residents if they had witnessed any creepy happenings living near a heartland columbarium, a mere 10 min walk away from the MRT station.

Ironically the developer of the ‘80% temple, 20% dead people’s ashes’ is called ‘Life Corp’. And for anyone who has gripes about religious institutions run like corporations, look no further than City Harvest. People will continue dying in our ageing society and unless we move beyond the traditional way of remembering the deceased through tablets and urns, or loosen up on our superstitions, both the living as well as the dead will be fighting for space in this already very crowded city. Hopefully when it’s time for my demise, all I’d need to do is download my memories digitally into a thumb drive or upload my electronic ghost on a password-protected family cloud somewhere without having to hide in some basement of a posh temple designed to look like a shopping mall and scaring the shit out of the living around me.

From ‘Void deck railings to stop ball games’, 25 Feb 2016, article in ST

A set of barriers that caused confusion among residents of a Queenstown Housing Board block when they were installed at its void deck were set up to stop football being played, Tanjong Pagar Town Council clarified yesterday.

Three railings, each around 3.5m long, were erected across the void deck at Block 143 Mei Ling Street last Saturday, leaving residents scratching their heads and wondering what they had been put there for.

One Facebook user posted a photograph of them and wrote: “(This) space, originally filled with so much potential for use and creativity, is now effectively transformed into a dead space.”

The miscreants were told to stop playing football, as it was not allowed in the area, but to no avail. “Upon discussion with (MP for Tanjong Pagar GRC Chia Shi-Lu) and the Residents’ Committee (RC), we installed the barricades… to discourage football activities.

It’s a dark day for humanity when kids playing soccer in a void deck are called MISCREANTS by journos. The guy on the train playing his handphone game at full blast is a miscreant. The couple having a sex tryst in the stairwell are miscreants.  Amos Yee is miscreant extraordinaire. A town council that wastes our money building obstacles to stop fun things from happening, hence destroying a child’s dream of becoming the next Fandi Ahmad, is the worst offender of them all.

Void decks have been romanticised as ‘community spaces’ and people have won photography contests capturing them in all their concrete, uniquely Singaporean glory. These places are where foreign workers eat and sleep, Chinese traditionally mourn and weep, Malays rejoice in matrimony, Indians sell sundries, a home next to home resonant with chapteh memories, the rustle of old hanging magazines at the mama shop, the echoes of neighbours’ greetings, the squawky horns of the karang guni man and, soon to be a thing of the past, the thuds of balls bouncing off the walls. Void decks were designed to break down the walls between us, but now we’re building them up again.

An entry for the Singapore Stories exhibition, by Alphonsus Chern, 2012

Sometimes barriers do more harm than good. We all know of glass doors in shopping malls that shatter over little children. When the LTA built an anti-bicycle deterrent on overhead bridges to persuade cyclists to get off their bikes, somebody crashed into it and became paralysed. Other bicycle barriers built along void decks proved to be an obstacle not just to errant cyclists, but the disabled as well. If you’re wheelchair bound the only railings you want to see are those you can hang on to for dear life, not those placed in a manner that makes traversing a void deck as painful as solving a booby-trapped labyrinth designed by an evil dungeon master who just wants to fuck with your mind.

If your rose garden is invaded by a family of gophers, grow them on a minefield. This is what erecting barricades in a void deck says to you when you’re home after a hard day’s work. You’re not welcome. Keep out. We already deal with metaphoric cages and choke-chains on a daily basis, and now we’re punished with physical, spiritually toxic ones right below our homes. That’s right, with these new fittings the void deck underneath your flat now looks EXACTLY like a GE polling station save for the yellow lines that you’re not supposed to cross. 24/7. Whatever your opinion of void deck football, about how flying balls tend to hit pregnant women smack in the bellies or how the miscreants of the night keep you awake, you have to admit that this idea is balls-out bonkers.

There is already a dismal lack of play spaces to kick a ball around these days, what with people complaining that grass patches are becoming bald because of the sport. Unlike those up there who only know how to build fences when they can’t figure out how to shepherd a flock, kids these days have more creative ways of wriggling their way around the iron clasps of authority, at risk of putting themselves in even greater danger. Put up a fence and I will climb it. Build a wall and I will tag it with graffiti. Obviously the town council hasn’t heard of parkour, or  groin-crushing skateboarding tricks. Worse, they may give up football altogether and turn your void deck into a flying kendama death trap.

But maybe it’s not just kids who will make the most out of these ugly obstacles. We may lose our football, but we may yet become a nation of champion hurdlers, steeple chasers or calisthenic spider-warriors if those barriers could be put to actual use. Alternatively, if you’re not the active type, you could lean around it fantasising about waiting for the bus, while the foreign worker grumbles next to you about having one more damn thing to wipe down.

From ‘Poster banning chess did not reflect intentions: Marine Parade Town Council’, 14 March 16, article by Loh Chuan Junn, CNA

The poster put up by Marine Parade Town Council (MPTC) banning chess games at common areas did not reflect the intentions of the Town Council, MPTC said on Monday (March 14).

The clarification came after a picture of a poster stating “No Playing of Chess at Common Areas” caused a stir online when it was first posted on social media on Sunday (Mar 13), with some people questioning how “rowdy” a game of chess could be to have caused the ban.

…Responding to Channel NewsAsia’s queries, a spokesperson from the Town Council admitted that the content of the poster was not clear, and that there was no ban on playing the game.

“We acknowledge our oversight for the content of the poster which does not reflect our intention well,” said MPTC. “As such, we would like to apologise for the wrong context of our poster.”

I wonder how much time and effort was spent making the chess poster, when in fact the game that’s causing all the fuss is actually draughts/checkers, or colloquially known as ‘dum’, a word that describes perfectly the thought process that goes into the creation of such a notice. Firstly, they got the game wrong. Nobody plays classic Western-style chess in public anymore and aristocrats don’t live in HDB flats. Second, by specifying chess you set yourself up for cheeky retorts like: ‘So does that mean poker or mahjong is OK?’. What about having a Magic cards gathering, or ping bloody pong? No chess? No problem. Unleash the Go! set.

The real problem, though, is not so much the noise, but when a dum gathering turns into a makeshift gambling den. One player reportedly lost $30,000 over a week. Still, if you’re a die-hard gambler, what better way to get your fix through a battle of wits instead of praying to the gods for lucky numbers. I would rather experience the clatter and commotion of a dum match than the annoying squeals of a casual handphone game, or the pontianak mating calls that pass off as karaoke singing. Board games like dum are also an entertainment source for sore-loser drama. We all know of that one petty friend who flips the board over whenever he loses a match, ruining the party for everyone. You can’t vent your frustrations on your precious phone.

Like void deck football, the image of uncles crowding around a grandmaster duel looks set to be a thing of the past. A couple of generations down the road and the concept of a game that requires you to move physical tokens, instead of swiping pixels on a screen, would be, tragically, an unfamiliar one. Gone too would be the ‘terrazzo tables‘, an icon of the senior citizen’s corner where Chinese chess enthusiasts gather, and in its place metal barriers and naggy posters telling you to shelf your activities and just stay at home while dementia gradually kills you. If all else fails, there’s always Fish Hunter at the arcade. Yes, you’ll spend the rest of your dying days gawking at digital fish instead of engaging whatever’s left of your brain.

Not all hope is lost though. If you can’t kick a ball around or have a dum tournament in your own void deck, I’m sure town councils would be perfectly happy turning the space down there into a library outpost, but they probably have to ban reading newspapers because of the noise generated from all the page flipping.

From HDB letter to resident circulating online, 8 Jan 2017

All felines are banned from HDB flats but not various pedigrees of cat-sized toy dogs. HDB’s rationale for the ban has been the same for the last 4 DECADES. In 1978, HDB issued a statement ‘categorically’ banning cats from flats because they tend to stray ‘by nature’ and cause a nuisance to residents. Cat experts would subsequently protest that most cats are perfectly fine being confined within 4 walls and the ‘pussy gone wild’ excuse is a gross misconception. In that letter, roaming cats were also blamed for inciting fear in certain people and can ‘damage public property’ with their CLAWS. Yes, provided people hang their curtains OUTSIDE their flats.

Dogs, on the other hand, whilst enjoying this privilege, do not have the tendency of invading homes or leaving pawprints on your car, though occasionally, unlike the most ferocious of kitties, may BITE A CHUNK OFF YOUR FACE. 

Of course it doesn’t take just a cat to ‘disturb good neighbourliness’ by shitting indiscriminately, shedding fur or cauterwauling in the middle of the night. By the same token, not only should we ban shedding, barking dogs (though HDB has a solution of ‘debarking‘ noisy ones), but we should evict humans who smoke and burn incense in corridors, blast music in the wee hours of the morning, or take a piss in the lift. 

Surely HDB should be aware of the Love Cats pilot project in Chong Pang, a program endorsed by our cat-loving Law Minister himself, and let everyone know if the results have altered their perception of cats in any way. Even if they’re still pussyfooting around the regulations, it’s hardly useful to demand that an owner ‘remove’ the cat without offering any humane suggestions, considering that stray cats have been victims of horrific barbarism of late. Is HDB going to knock of the doors of every ‘old cat lady’ there is and round up all their cats? Wouldn’t the ban encourage more people to feed strays indiscriminately? Are the cat abusers out there rubbing their hands in masturbatory glee?

The approach to household pet management should be consistent across the board, whether it’s a dog, cat, goldfish or chinchilla: Enforcing responsible ownership. A blanket ban on cats based on their ‘nature’ has no scientific basis and reeks of an innate bias from watching too many campy spy movies with cat-stroking megavillians.

Perhaps our Law Minister or other ‘angels in power‘ can do something about this.

From ‘Town council says student’s effort to cover HDB staircase in gold foil ‘not permissible’, 7 March 2017, article by Wong Pei Ting, Today

The Jalan Besar Town Council is reaching out to an arts student who covered the 20th floor staircase of a Jalan Rajah flat with gold foil to explore future collaboration, although it made clear what she did was “unauthorised” and “not permissible”.

 …Ms Priyageetha Dia, who is studying fine arts at Lasalle College of the Arts, had earlier identified herself on Facebook as the person behind the “golden staircase” at Block 103 Jalan Rajah. “We appreciate Ms Priyageetha Dia’s desire to enhance her surrounding space,” said the spokesman. “Under the Town Council’s (Common Property and Open Spaces) By-laws, however, this constitutes an unauthorised act and is thus not permissible.”

Set in the public area near her unit, Ms Dia said the artwork exists to question “what constitutes public and private spaces” and if it is “possible to draw a line between art and vandalism”. …Aware that she was treading a thin line between art and vandalism, Ms Dia asserted that she “did not deface anything”.

“What I did was to enhance the space and my surroundings,” said Ms Dia, who lives on the 20th floor. “This work provokes. Provokes in all sense (as) we are used to living the standard way of life, and all of a sudden something as glaring as gold negotiates the space. My work does not seek to obliterate a public space; vandalism in all sense has no respect for another individual.”

…Members of the Jalan Besar Town Council were also present on Tuesday to ascertain if the gold foil made the stairs slippery.

…Ms Akiko Ler, 43, felt that such an act, if done on the artist’s own accord without seeking counsel from the town council, is considered vandalism. “Residents here pay fees to keep the public space clean, so it’s only fair that it’s kept like how it was meant to be,” said the housewife from Japan.

‘Enhancement’ is subjective. When ‘Sticker Girl‘ spray-painted My Grandfather Road, she was promptly arrested for public defacement. Pave a road with gold like it were the Yellow Brick Road of Oz and you’re likely to suffer the same fate. If an allocated section of HDB void deck is splashed with colour, it’s called a ‘mural’, but when it’s ‘unauthorised’ and presented on some random wall or tunnel outside, it’s called ‘street art’. On an MRT train, or on a HDB rooftop that says ‘Fuck the PAP’, it becomes ‘vandalism’.

Covering a staircase with gold foil to add an illusory aura of royalty to HDB peasantry is not the only decorative activity going on in HDB flats. Potted plants, for example, are breeding grounds for dengue and if lined up on parapets becomes potential killer litter, yet you hardly hear of town council officials going around cracking down on fauna enthusiasts trying to ‘enhance’ living space with their own little Edens.

The artist should count herself fortunate that the authorities are waving an olive branch of ‘future collaboration’ instead of taking her to court. Others with the same intent outside of HDB blocks were not so lucky. What I’m curious about, though, is how much money the artist spent and if it were actual gold, why hasn’t anyone tried scrapping it off for keeps already?