EMS Delivery to Singapore

I've had many articles and parcels delivered from myself to myself in Singapore, and Everytime I tried to deliver fast, it ended up as a waste of time and money.

EMS Delivery to Singapore
A waste of time and money

I've shipped many things before, old clothes, sample products, goods. And when time is of the essence, I tried using the post office. In the past, I have used EMS postage several times, and it never turned out to be "on-time".

In terms of EMS post, the cost is almost as much as DHL, FEDEX and UPS, however, as I can usually find the post office, I have tried using the EMS shipping for my urgent deliveries.

I've shipped samples and goods, and everytime I do it through EMS, I get delays at Singapore customs, and of course, taxed.

When I ship samples using regular airmail, I do not get taxed.

Next, EMS seemed to like to deliver at 6pm or later. I don't understand why, as that is usually my dinner time or I'm not home yet. In Singapore, they do not drop off your package at your nearest post office. Instead, they return it to Singapore Post HQ, unlike regular airmail. Getting them to deliver again will take 2 days.

Recently, I have sandals straps delivered over to Singapore by EMS. They arrived on 14 July, 2010 at 6pm. I was not home and was not aware that they arrived, and delivery was attempted. The straps were in a very small package and I assumed it would be in my letter box.

However, when I checked with the post office again, they informed me that EMS from Singapore Post do not drop items in letter box and do not leave articles at the nearest post office. I did not have any slips to claim my article as I did not receive any.

I used the tracking number and managed to get the straps redelivered ... in 2 days.

Way to go EMS.

So if you have any urgent delivery, DO NOT USE EMS if you are shipping it to Singapore. Use the big names freight forwarders. If you can wait a little, use the Air Mail.

Why pay extra, and have a lot more hassle?

-- Robin Low

Night Festival 2010 Review (Singapore)

The Night Festival 2010 held in Singapore on the 16th and 17th of July is going on right now, and there seemed to be a series of interesting events happening.

Venue: National Museum of Singapore



Paraboles 2.0 is a very interesting show with 6 giant satellite dishes right in front of the National Museum. The sounds and experience is pretty surreal and interesting.



There are many other interesting Exhibits at the National Museum of Singapore and the guided audio tour on the second floor is definite worth the wait.




Venue: Singapore Art Museum
(Floribots)



At the Singapore Art Museum, there are many interesting displays. Many interactive art which even children could participate, and some adult themed entertainment.

The Abusement Park



Singapore Art Museum is turned into an underground dungeon where instruments of pain become a form of entertainment. Along with music and dance, it is rather interesting, but very popular!

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More information on the Night Festival 2010 Event Can be found here.

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My thoughts.

I've attended many night arts festival in Montreal, France and London, and I felt that this one in Singapore is particularly weak, not only for the choice of displays, the whole organization seemed a little poor. There seem to be a main draw to the Singapore Museum, where the crowds gather, and queues are very long.

I expected some street performances, or even street magic shows within SMU, but alas, since Singapore is such a "restricted" country, I guess there was not enough time to get the necessary permits for ad hoc performances to happen when you walk from one venue to another.

I have asked the shops/Food and Beverage locations about the Night Festival 2010 a week ago, and no one knew much about it. On the actual day, I'm sure ALL the Restaurants and bars would close early, and there is not much other support other than a restaurant/bar that is located at the National Museum. (The bar does sell beer) Many locations close around midnight or 11pm except the bars.

The whole experience seemed to be not very inclusive. There are lots of loud music, and performance targeted at teens, however, there are not much "street stores" selling beverages other than beer. Is everyone expected to drink?

With the road closures, and lots of people who are directing traffic, there seemed to be very little extra lighting. Much of Campus Green is very dark, and navigation is hard. The lack of signs is also troubling.

Lack of Public Transportation Support. The Bras Basah Station is right there, and since the festival is happening till 2am, it would be nice for trains to run till 3am perhaps. Even at 15 minutes a train, I would still think that the people attending the Night Festival could get home easier. There are not really any form of public transportation after midnight (Other than the overpriced Taxi)

Basically, I think many of the other Night Festivals end REALLY REALLY late, and for Singapore, 7pm - 2am feels a little short, as I do not have much time to see anything else after visiting National Museum and watching Paraboles. Thought it is a 2 day event, I felt that the museums should be opened till 7am, where people can have more time to enjoy the performances, and later visit the museums at their own leisure through the night!

-- Robin Low

Shokudo (Singapore) Revisited

My friend Harean is in town and I went to Shokudo again.

I decided that this was a good place to meet, and try them out again.

Shokudo Japanese Food Bazaar @ Raffles City
Raffles City Shopping Center
252 North Bridge Road, #B1-44E
Singapore 179103
Tel: +65 6837 3793

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For those that do not know what Shokudo is, Shokudo is a Japanese Marché. Within Shokudo, there are many little stores selling different Japanese food, from ramen, hotpot, Tonkatsu, Teppanyaki, Japanese Pizza, Japanese burgers, Omelette rice, sushi, Japanese deserts.

I would say that the concept is interesting, and it is worth checking out for one, and if you interested in getting a little bit of each type of Japanese food, this is the place for you.

From my few past experiences, I felt that the food was ok, and rather expensive. Nothing much has changed, however, I realized one big difference which I thought, made me spent a lot more than before -- The reduction of MAINLAND CHINESE STAFF.

On a few past occasions, I had really really poor service. The staff could not understand English, they were very argumentative, and most of all, serving up errors all the time. I was overcharged several times, and once undercharged, but today, thought the staff did nothing exceptional, the reduce in the number of staff that I could not understand actually made the experience slightly better, and I ordered more food.

I would say I personally ate more than S$40 worth of food, and though it was pretty ok in quality, I still feel it was expensive, and not really value for money. But for all the Japanese things you want to eat under one roof, this is the place to go.

Overall, I felt that it was self service, and the ambiance of the place is very conducive to meet friends and have a good time. The food was a little expensive, and pretty much you do not encounter the staff until the exit where you pay, and I did feel that the counter staff, chatting amongst themselves, and then walking away without any explanation was pretty rude.

Then I was charged one extra item which I ordered 1 and paid for 2, but I realized this after signing, and the queue of people wanting to pay was simply too long for me to really want to spend time and hold up the line to argue about $7.50.

Overall:
Value for money: 5/10
Food quality: 7.5/10
Variety of food: 8/10 (Japanese food)
Quality of staff: 4/10 (an improvement from previous times)


-- Robin Low

HTC Smart Review

Recently I got my hands on a brand new HTC Smart phone, and here is the review.

HTC Smart comes in a very small box. Great form factor.

The way the phone is packed seemed pretty efficient, you get the battery (in the phone) a charger, headphone and data transfer cable, and some instruction manuals.

This way of packing saves space!! You need to remove the plastic, and the battery can be used!

After inserting in the SIM card, here is the review!

The phone powers on, and the intro screen seemed pretty simple. The phone looks very basic and neat.

The back of the phone shows a neat 3.15MP Camera and flashlight...

The following are the specifications of the phone:

GENERAL	2G Network	GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900
	3G Network	HSDPA 2100

SIZE	Dimensions	104 x 55 x 12.8 mm
	Weight	108 g

DISPLAY	Type	TFT resistive touchscreen, 256K colors
	Size	240 x 320 pixels, 2.8 inches
		- Sense UI

SOUND	Alert types	Vibration, MP3, WAV ringtones
	Speakerphone	Yes
		- 3.5 mm audio jack

MEMORY	Phonebook	1000 entries, Photocall
	Call records	Yes
	Internal	256 MB RAM, 256 MB ROM
	Card slot	microSD, up to 16GB, buy memory

DATA	GPRS	Class 10 (4+1/3+2 slots), 32 - 48 kbps
	EDGE	Class 10, 236.8 kbps
	3G	HSDPA, 3.6 Mbps
	WLAN	No
	Bluetooth	Yes v2.0 with A2DP
	Infrared port	No
	USB	Yes, miniUSB v2.0

CAMERA	Primary	3.15 MP, 2048x1536 pixels, LED flash
	Video	Yes
	Secondary	No

FEATURES	OS	Brew Mobile
	CPU	300 MHz processor
	Messaging	SMS(threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Email, IM
	Browser	HTML
	Radio	Stereo FM radio with RDS
	Games	Yes
	Colors	Black
	GPS	No
	Java	Yes, MIDP 2.1
		- MP3/eAAC+/WAV/WMA9 player - MP4/H.263/H.264/WMV9 player - Organizer - T9

BATTERY		Standard battery, Li-Ion 1100 mAh
	Stand-by	Up to 450 h (2G) / Up to 600 h (3G)
	Talk time	Up to 7 h 30 min (2G) / Up to 6 h 10 min (3G)

Here are a few points to note:

1) This phone runs on Brew MP (A Qualcomm OS)
2) It comes in 3 colors
3) This phone is cheap, even without a contract
4) On Brew MP, apps are hard to find and install.
5) The micro-SD slot is pretty nice to have, and allows songs, movies and photos to be stored easily.

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In terms of looks, size and feel of the phone, this phone looks pretty good from all angles, has a great form factor, and is relatively light.

The talk time and standby time is descent, and even when I am listening to music (the 3.5mm headphone jack comes in handy) the phone could easily last more than a day.

The phone functions are pretty basic. With 4 buttons below the screen, Call, back, cancel and menu, it is not very hard to use, and yet is enough to perform most tasks. Anyway, its a touch screen, and you use the screen to input other information.

The display is pretty sharp, even in bright daylight, you can view it. The HTC sense, is quite intuitive, however, without multitouch and finger gestures found in iPhone and WM 6.5, this phone functions as just a basic phone with a touch screen with nothing more.

The Smart supports 256MB ROM and 256MB RAM, but there's a microSD card slot for increasing storage space up to a maximum of 32GB. A nice touch is that the card slot is accessible without having to remove the battery.

It takes descent photos, though the camera does seem a little slow on the shutter, and the video mode is pretty bad.

With a dataplan, you can access friend feeds (Facebook and Twitter), Gmail and surf the web, though it is pretty slow. Still, for something basic, its not too bad.

Pros:
Flashlight mode
Good battery life
Cheap for a new handset
Stylish design
Compact form factor

Cons:
No Wi-Fi
No Exchange support
Poor browser
Slow data performance
No GPS or map application
No app store for adding functionality
Terrible shutter lag on camera
Low quality video recording

Basically, this is a low end smart phone. If you are just getting into using a smart phone, this is very much an entry level which can help you get used to the different features, and access some emails, and browsing.

Rating 5/10

-- Robin Low

#TweetMeetSG Review

TweetMeetSG event is for creating awareness for Infocomm Accessibility Centre (IAC) to make IT courses available to people with disabilities to bridge the digital divide and to increase the employment opportunities of people with disabilities.

This is a picnic at SMU Campus Green on 26 June, where everyone, regardless of abilities, will have the unique opportunity to interact with each other.

There are goodie bags, music, a tent and lots of equipment. Pretty standard stuff you will expect in an event.

Location:

SMU Campus Green
(located between School of Information Systems and Li Ka Shing Library)

+ The location is very centralized and easy to get to.

- Picnic area is on a muddy patch, not really suitable to sit on.

+ The location has electricity and necessary shelter for equipment.

- The muddy patch has a narrow walkway for handicap access, and it is otherwise inaccessible by wheelchair. (If a wheelchair is on the walkway, another one could not get by.)

Crowd:

A crowd of more than 400 people were expected, but the actual turnout seemed to be around 100 people, way below the expected turn out, though the weather was good.

There was ample supporters and handicapped people there to support the event, however, the participating people were not present. The event does not seemed to be promoted well.

I've asked many people at TweetMeetSG, and about 80% were apparently unaware that this was for a good cause until they arrived, and the #hashtag that was used was not very descriptive on what the purpose this event was for. I believe if the word got our properly, and if there was more time to promote the event, more people would turn up.

However, everything went smoothly, and there were only some minor hickups. In terms of getting the crowds to tweet and tell their friends about it, it was a breeze.

For a good cause, everyone is tweeting!

I would consider the event rather successful in getting corporates to sponsor products, however in terms of getting a crowd, it does some lack marketing and promotion to get to real crowds.

In Singapore, mobilizing crowds to meet for events on Twitter has been successful for smaller events like Twestival, however only the same group of bloggers and markets turn up. For the rest of Singapore, mainstream media still plays a big role.

However, I do believe in terms of word of mouth, this event will probably get descent coverage and people on Twitter would talk about IAC and spread the word of mouth.

I do hope attendees could recommend someone they know who is handicapped to IAC for training, and spread the word!

More information on IAC:

The Infocomm Accessibilty Centre (IAC) is Singapore’s first centre set up to provide training in infocomm technology for people with all disabilities types. It is specially equipped with a wide range of assistive technology devices to cater to the different needs.

IAC also works with the IT Apprenticeship Programme (ITAP) to further train disabled people for specific jobs so as to get them to be work ready.

For more information, please visit their site.

I wish the IAC success, all the best for your future endeavors!

-- Robin Low

Orchard River in Singapore

After an hour of rain or so, Orchard Road flooded.



This is the review of the flood that is still going on at Orchard Road in Singapore.



There are a lot of construction going on in Singapore, the new downtown line is getting built, and Singapore enjoys covering up the open drains, and even the Singapore river is no longer a river.

But now, we have a new river in Singapore -- Orchard River.

Video of Orchard River

Video of Orchard River 2

Video of Lucky Plaza, not so lucky now..

Singapore wants to be #1 in everything, We may have been #1 once in Port, Airport, Environmental Offender, Human trafficking, Table Tennis, etc.

With the success on Venice with their Gondolas, maybe Singapore may one day emulate it with the help of poor drainage systems and heavy downpours.

Pity that you will get wet if you are trying to enjoy a nice boat ride though, but I guess a slow boat ride down Orchard Road may prove to be a fantastic experience. Great transport experience when it rains, and then some shopping later.

Rating: 8/10

-- Robin Low

《福星到》Happy Go Lucky Movie Review

I was in Malaysia, on a late afternoon with nothing better to do, and I decided to waste a few hours and watch a movie, but since I have seen all the other movies, I watched Happy Go Lucky (2010) with a few friends.

The word waste is an understatement. This is my review.

This is first-time director Harry Yap’s new film, Happy Go Lucky -- How bad can it be?

Fann Wong and Richard Low are veteran Singapore actors, even with their experience in this overused genre of Singapore movie, can they save it?

To cut it short and save you from watching it, here is the story I've endured.

Happy Go Lucky revolves around a hardcore gambler, Hock Lee Poh (Richard Low) who is very superstitious and at the start of the movie, he was gambling during his wife's maternity and Fann Wong was born. With her cries as a baby, he lost a few bets and lost his car, and all his cash.

In a cut scene, a thief steals the god of fortune from the set of "Fu Lu Shou" and runs away.

Then it cuts to Fu Xing (Fann Wong), Hock’s daughter who works in a foot massage parlor. She is very serious about her job. Donna (Patricia Mok) Fu Xing's sister (from another mother) is her opposite, and she is lazy, and not concerned about her job, just partying all night.

Fu Xing was seen as the helpful one, who helps her neighbors collect old junk, and she paid $150 for some "antiques" and kept it for herself when her "friend's" wife is injured. All the other cast does not really appear in the movie again. In the junk, is the god of fortune that was lost.

Fu Xing works hard and and cooks at home, Donna and Hock complains about her cooking and does not eat. Hock seemed to be gambling all the time and whenever he curses in Hokkien, people seemed to relate and enjoy themselves, even when there was not much need to curse.

Hock has 2 gambling buddies who seem to not win much with him together, and they seem to lose a lot throughout the whole movie. Everyone in the movie seemed very superstitious and there are at least 3 scenes of different fortune tellers who came to give advice which did not matter in the movie at all.

Many characters in the movies are introduced, and their actions seemed inconsequential. When Donna met a "China" Gigolo, she became drunk and he took a lot of photos of her when she behaved like a slut, but never used them at all.

When Hock's friends borrowed money from loan shark, and lost in their gambling game, nothing seemed to happen as Hock won 2 million from a ticket Fu Xing bought.

Hock rapidly gambled away his fortune, and since he has always lost gambling for many years, I don't see why he was "sadder" than normal as it seemed that he had the money for such a short period, and he "gave" $400,000 to a prostitute and bought a Mercedes "S" Class.

Then Hock and Donna seemed to have "lost" everything within 3 months and left to gamble more in Cambodia. Their idea of losing everything was still able to bet US$50,000 and owning Rolex watches. They stole the "God of fortune" from Fu Xing, and brought it to Cambodia, and quickly lost it in a bet.

Fu Xing then comes to the rescue, and found her father and sister and returned to the casino to bet. Of course she won.

The story ends with Hock kinda learning his lesson, and no becoming a problem gambler anymore.

There was no plot, everything was expected. The casts besides the main cast do not add to the story, and the only jokes were the swears in Hokkien.

This is Super Weak.

-- Robin Low