Bangkok is one of the most popular holiday destination for a Singaporean. Largely because there is so much to do! There’s cheap food, cheap massage, great sights, reasonable tailoring, diverse range of shopping options, and even an amusement park (which nearly nobody knows about!) I have went to Bangkok once before last year, and the plan for this trip is not to repeat destinations. So the plan this time is Day 1 Chatuchak weekend market Siam Paragon Day 2 Tailor shirts Platinum mall (yes, the only repeat, because it is unavoidable when you go to Bangkok) Chinatown (for seafood) Day 3 Siam Park City (Apparently one of the largest amusement park in South East Asia) Baan Khanitha (Some Thai style fine dining restaurant) Soi Cowboy Day 4 Mall bangkapi Tawanna Square (the supposed substitute for Suan Lum night market after it was closed) Day 5 Baiyoke Sky Hotel (For the Bangkok Sky Restaurant buffet lunch) Quite a different experience from the previous round, since the previous round was more sight seeing of the temples, and all. We ate a lot, we shopped a lot, we spent a lot. As usual, I flown in on Jetstar on the early morning flight. The good thing is that there is now the Suvarnabhumi Airport Rail Link that takes you from the airport to the city in 30 minutes for just 35 baht. Definitely no reason for travellers to take taxis! And this is probably where the BKK train system is more practical than the Singapore’s system. Their MRT and Airport Link system uses a non-card contactless system. That means, you buy a token from the ticketing machine, tap the chip on the entry like how you would in Singapore, and at the exit point, you drop it into the exit gantry. So, you don’t have to take your single trip EZlink card to the ticketing machine to get back your deposit. Which also means, you don’t have to pay for deposit in the first place! Why isn’t...
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I was recently on my way to town on a Saturday afternoon, and I tell you, I was in for a shock! The number of cars along the CTE and within Orchard/City Hall area are crazy! I remember quite some time ago on a Saturday evening, I drove from Newton to Suntec. It was actually quite a short route, just round novena, then the back of KK hospital, past little india, then straight on to suntec. Shouldn’t take too long since the train ride from newton to city hall was just 10 minutes or so. The drive took 45 minutes. And not only that, the searching for a parking lot at suntec took another 20 minutes. Madness. So I was wondering, is there a reason for this? The first thing that came to mind was that I will definitely take public transport the next time I go to town. The second thing that came to mind was Off-Peak Cars. Off-Peak Cars are basically red plate cars that are allowed to drive only between 7pm to 7am on the weekdays and full days on the weekends. In return, they get a form of rebate off the purchase price of the cars. The essence behind this scheme was that they wanted to keep the roads as congestion free as possible during office hours, so that logistics can move fast, couriers can deliver parcels with minimal delays, and people will be able to get to meetings without 1 hour traffic jams like in other regional cities. (Think Kuala Lumpur, Mumbai, Beijing, Jarkarta) In this aspect, the Off-Peak Car scheme has been very very successful! Now, you only get traffic congestions before 9am, and after 6pm! Inconvenience yes, but pragmatic too. The problem is you get a flood of cars on weekends! Every normal plated cars and Off-Peak cars will be flooding the roads, particularly to places with shopping malls. (which in the case of Singapore, tend to be congregated together) While I can’t say it is an...
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There was quite an interesting open letter on Temasek Review that’s written by a Secondary 4 student griping about the Singapore education system. Not to take anything away from her, I will only quote the first 2 paragraphs: I am a Secondary Four student at Nan Chiau High School, and am due to take my O Levels this year. Being shown first-hand what the education system is like, especially from a fairly unflattering point of view, has made me realise much about the education system that I do not like. Of course, I am fully aware that no education system is perfect, yet in the spirit of transformation the PAP has hopefully adopted since the 2011 General Elections, I write this letter to you in the hope that some of these problems with our system will indeed be changed, or if not, at least reviewed. I speak just for myself, and not for all other graduating students in Singapore when I say this, but I do feel strongly about many methods being employed in secondary schools, especially for graduating classes. For one, I have come to realise the serious emphasis the education system has placed on factual memorisation. Perhaps it is just used in my school, or maybe even a method most autonomous or government schools apply, but based on personal observation, I have come to the conclusion that students are often not taught to ask ‘Why?’ More can be seen from her facebook note post. I first read it last night, and by that time, it was already on the web for several days (hurhur, in internet time, several days means the news is outdated!) and thus there were already a big chunk of comments. Personally, she reminds me of Nicole Seah: Angsty, and maybe sidelined by the current system. I commented that, It’s already been said before last time.. In Singapore, students are not taught; they are trained. Trained for performing a certain role/job for the bigger purpose of being a productive worker in Singapore....
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In Singapore most young adults usually think that we have a lousy bargain in terms of the ruling PAP government. But the recent Thailand election has been quite an eye opener for some, though being a typical human, people are usually only concerned with matters affecting them. I found this video, and thought it’s quite an interesting video. Most people always look things from their own point of view. But the things affecting us is affecting the world (Inflation, social unrest, unemployment, asset prices going mad, etc) Take a look at this video from the Malaysian point of view. There are probably a few more worth looking at.. (eg: Greece 40% unemployment for young adults. Spain 20% unemployment, etc) Perhaps we’re all demanding too much for our own...
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In classical economics, price discrimination is when an identical product is sold for different prices to different customer segments. Of course, theoretically this should not happen, but we see it all the time! A Sweet Talk bubble tea sold at a busy MRT station can be $1.80, whereas a location slightly further away from the same MRT station can be sold for $1.50. A dress sold at a pushcart can cost $20, while the exact same dress (since most pushcarts and blogshops tend to get it from the same manufacturer) can be sold for $16 online. Likewise, airlines practice price discrimination in order to maximise their profit. People who are willing to book tickets 9 months in advance can get tickets as low as $1 (not including taxes that is), whereas people booking tickets 3 days before a flight would have to pay a premium. However, there is yet another form of price discrimination that people don’t usually know about. The booking of 2 single trips VS a return trip! Take a look at the fares above. I got the screen shots within 5minutes of each other. At this point of time according to XE, the THB to SGD rate is 0.0403021. So, a return fare is S$246.90, whereas 2 single trips booked is S$114.95 + THB2699.00*0.0403021 (S$108.78)= S$223.73! A savings of S$23.17 with just 5 to 10 minutes of additional effort! Of course, your credit companies might charge you a lousier rate for the exchange, but they would typically not charge more than 1% spread. I use Mustafa Forex as a typical money changer indication, and they are currently quoting 0.040/0.0409. Based on Visa’s rate and a administrative fee rate of 2.5%, I got 0.0416. That means at worst, you would be charged S$112.28 for the BKK to SG single trip. That’s still a saving of S$20 or so. Likewise for another airline, A return fare costs S$222.87, whereas 2 single trips costs S$80 + THB3570 * 0.0403021 (S$143.88) = S$223.88. In this case, there is...
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