The Pretending Lion- Of Casinos, Universities, BTN and Medicine-

I recently went on a trip to Singa-Pura, as a promise to my darling little nieces made in January.

I doubt that they remember it but as parenting experts will tell, Never lie to a child or go back on your promise to them, It will have far reaching consequences, and so I kept my end of the bargain.

One thing I found funny was when I approached my friends in Singapore to get a 'visiting ticket', many other non-sporean friends popped up on the facebook post and asked :why do you want to go to Singapore?"

Um, I'm kinda puzzled by this Q and this will be my rejoinder-
Why do I need a reason to go to Singapore?

If anybody is curious, it appears that reasons to go to Singapore fall under the following categories

1- To go the recently opened Casino- Sources say that the Casino has difficuly breaking even due to the high cost of construction. It's estimated that they require a daily patronage of 3500people spending averagely $5000 to cover their initial investment, in the first year

(the cost was $6.59 billion)

the funny thing is that- not only did they not achieve the expected numbers, the universal studios grand opening with lotsa fanfare reached an anti-climax one week into it when the roller coaster ride was honourably X-ed by red and white security tapes. Authorities claimed a technical error needed inspection and tinkering before deemed safe for the public.

To keep These two major setbacks in perspective, whatever number of visitors they maybe boasting, it is important to keep in mind this is prior to the opening of the 2nd casino. hohum... not a very bright outlook, aint it?

2) To buy electronic stuff or to shop down orchard road

3) To study/ or work

4) visiting

Well, I fulfilled numbers 2, and 4 :-)

Met up with Gene in JB where he scooted me oof to his Hostel at the speed of 120km/h (luckily, heavy traffic thwarted his plan to go at 170km/h, his: "usual- everyone in JB use this" speed.
My eyes were tearing at the end of the ride.

while he packed, I got my hands on Starcraft 2! Wooo
apparently somepeople hacked into a demo version and made in widely available for download, albeit without LAN support-

I'm a stickler for copyright, but this time I fault Blizzard for titillating the fans since 2008 with the promise of a :

"summer release", "coming fall 2008", "early 2009", "late 2009" and now its HELLO! we're entering the 2nd quarter of 2010! The fans have been waiting for 12 years GDMT!



I played Protoss, was impressed with the dragoon turned immortal, the warp gets (something like the nidus canal of the Zerg, and of course the arbiter turned Mothership. So far, other than the colossus, there isn't much difference in the units, the zealots got Bruce Lee's Intercepting Fist but having played Dawn of war, their charge is mellow compared to the Kroot's death leap!

And as a disappointment to the many control freaks out there, you no longer have the dark archon, so no more controlling minds for you :-(

Popping down to Singapore, I went over to Orchard road, looking for Ali's electricals in Centrepoint. But, centrepoint has been bought over by another developer who chased all but a few of the original tenants out, and poor Ali was deemed "retired" by the concierge, oh well...

what I'm aiming to buy from Ali, is a spy pen that can record conversations or video, something useful for me to get hard evidence of the hush-hush going on at BTN camps as I will be headed there very very soon.

http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/index.php/malaysia/44775-btn-taught-me-the-chinese-are-the-jews-of-asia
http://www.harakahdaily.net/v2/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=23431:-btn-dipenuhi-propaganda-politik-umno-unsur-perkauman-sempit&catid=1:utama&Itemid=50

I had a taste of it in Year 3, and this time I shall come prepared.


Turns out that my uncle Steven bought a similar pen for $145, which was over my budget. I was pointed in the direction of Sim Lim Square near Bugis, but on the last day I decided to purchase it over here instead due to price and warantee issues

Arrived at my aunts place much later than I intended as I dropped by a Skater's park and tried catching shots of enthusiasts in action. Bought some Marshmellows, A bottle of Coca-cola Zero and a stick of mentos in Cold Storage. What am I planning for my nieces? not hard to guess!

2nd Day, went to NUS to meet up with E-fly, toured the engineering Fac. As these photos show, they have been very prolific with research and have lots of achievements to stand for it. being holed up in HUKM, I do not know whether our own unis are as productive. I was reassured by Kim Hoo that UTM almost went into the Finals of the Fuel-Cell race but was DQ-ed because they were 2 second off the target time. :-(

This is my 2nd time to NUS, my prior visit being 5 years ago when I interviewed for the medical course. Hmmm, that time, I had 2 rounds of interviews with an Essay thrown in with the title- "your view on Aesthetic Medicine. " that was really tough, I think many would have trouble understanding what the question wanted, including me.

Oh well, I was offered Science in the end, which I did not take up. I felt lucky I was not chosen, for UKM gave me ample freedom to pursue my interests in a relaxed, slow-paced manner. It really is a blessing, and I cherish it.

Photos will be included soon,also in the pretending Lion Part 2.