Elective mastectomy

Years and years ago, I went to SGH to visit a dear friend who was going through tough times in her professional and personal life.

I wondered why she had to add one more burden to her already much burdened life.

She had an elective double-mastectomy. Her surgeon was the famous plastic surgeon Dr Martin Huang who was still in public service at that time — which underlines just how long ago it was.

I didn’t and still don’t know why my friend opted for that operation. She didn’t have any illness — immediate or potential — that I was aware of that made the drastic step mandatory.

My friend is still hale and hearty today, although being accident prone she’s had a broken elbow and ankle in the intervening years.

Hearing and reading the much repeated news of Angelina Jolie’s elective double mastectomy today brought back that episode that had sunk into the back roads of my mind!

In the past, women cut off their long hair when they wanted to move on in life. In the present, many still do opt for this.

But maybe radical surgery could become the new normal for a small minority?

 

 

 

Reality blind

There’s no such thing as race blindness

There’s no such thing as wealth blindness

There’s no such thing as hierarchy blindness

There’s no such thing as benefit blindness

There’s no such thing as status blindness

There’s no such thing as gender blindness

There’s no such thing as age blindness

There’s no such thing as qualification blindness

Anyone who claims otherwise

Suffers from a terrible impediment!

R-e-a-l-I-t-y b-l-I-n-d-n-e-s-s

Khaw Boon Wan doesn’t geddit!

The media says that Mr Khaw Boon Wan told a Our Singapore Conversation group that there is “something wrong somewhere” with the Executive Condominium (EC) scheme and the scheme cannot carry on in its current form.

Here is the link to the Straits Times version of this confession and the brick bats thrown at him for his belated Eureka moment!

I could have told him so — and did — in January when I wrote a post extensively on the G’s Medusa-like HDB policies. Here is the link and the screen shot.

not just EC policy, Mr Khaw

I believe the most important and urgent U-turn is for G to stop continuing to promise all future Singaporeans a HDB home. The first, second and 3rd generations of Singaporeans born and bred have already had their first and in some cases second and third — and for all we know even fourth!! — bites.

Let fourth and future generations either inherit, rent or work and save up to buy from the market, whether HDB resale or private.

Otherwise G may be doing to future generations what Singapore used to laugh at — the welfare state of our ex-colonial masters which ultimately took the Great out of Britain!

We — at least I — don’t want the PAP’s 80% public housing policy to be the Archilles heel that takes the zing out of Singapore

The dress that took me places…

dress that went places

.. and took me along with it…

I bought this dress out of sheer desperation because I was invited to a glitzy event on Apr 5 that demanded evening dress, as no less than the Acting Minister of Manpower Tan Chuan-Jin would be Guest of Honour, plus a myriad talking heads that are fixtures in the media.

And I suspect, i might be sitting close to the main table, which turned out to be accurate — I was on the next table to GOH’s enlarged table. But then so were a couple of other tables, given the huge circumference of the GOH table.

Okay, what I bought isn’t strictly evening wear, in the sense that it isn’t black, floor length or gltizy. But hey, it’s a major concession for someone who mostly wears denim skirts, jackets, jeans or dresses, the operative adjective being denim.

So I bought the dress — mainly because of what the dress code demanded but also because believe it or not, I had functions on the two days following it, a rarity, as I’m no social butterfly .

So I bought the dress, as I could get the max bang out of the money spent, as i intended to – and did — wear the same dress to all three functions, because I was confident that none of the others going to the three functions would be “overlapping” guests.

I was right!

There was no buzz the first night, as there were many speeches, many strangers sitting with strangers and too many VVIP spotting for anyone, and I mean anyone, to pay attention to what I was wearing.. I could have ignored the dress code, something that I noticed quite a few in the 50+ tables gathering did..

It was different on the 2nd nite – Apr 6 — at old class mate HPC ’s 70th birthday bash at Penang Place in Biopolis –  hosted by her myriad god-children. The party was so big that many PP regulars were driven to dine outside the restaurant!

Everyone thought me a bit formal– from the word go. NS who came to pick me up. Ditto LPC. And so on.

Yup I should have been in denim

The dress was attention grabbing at the 3rd event for the right reason: JL celebrating the first spring of her first grand-kid at a high tea at Intercontinental at Bugis Junction.

Amidst all the singing and real babas and nyonyas dancing up a colorful storm, I was complimented by hostess JL and others, tho I was no competition at all for the star of the show: Anna Rose, all of 5 months!

Love, baby love!

It wasn’t the last outing for that dress. It got two more outings be4 it was sent into the wash. And if you wear the amount of Clinique’s Get Happy or Estee Lauder’s Beyond Paradise that I do, and go from aircon car to aircon malls and/or restaurants, then clothes can do several rounds be4 needing to meet the washing machine!

I kept the dress for a family lunch on Apr 10. We were going to ION but at the last moment opted for Plaza Singapura because I wanted to redeem the goodies in my Ichiban card!

Again, the law of co-incidences worked its magic for me. As we were finishing, a friend from CPF FBed me to say that Tim Ho Wan @ Plaza Singapura has opened — at last. A colleague had bought her some char siu bun that morning and they were delicious.

Had we gone to ION, I won’t have had the energy to dash over. But since I was in the same building, I decided to go pick up some of the buns while the rest of the family headed for the carpark where I promised to meet them within minutes. I’m the optimistic sort.

So it was with shock and surprise that I discovered the snaking line outside Tim Ho Wan. My heart jumped happily when told the takeaway queue was separate, believing it would be shorter.

I wasn’t wrong. It was shorter but each customer was limited to buying 5 buns! I consoled myself that as I wanted to buy 4 only, so being given 5 was a 25% bonus.

But the queue barely inched for 10 minutes. I soon found out why. An affable hunk with soothing voice and demeanour started explaining to potential customer by customer that all the buns had to be split between dine in and takeaway. Also, each tray that Chef Mak (founder of Tim Ho Wan)  baked contained only 20 buns. Oh yes, the restaurant was quite liberal with early bird takeaways, allowing customers to buy unlimited quantities. Hence the backlog in meeting demand. Hence the ration.

In short, Tim Ho Wan didn’t, couldn’t or won’t anticipate the demand on what was its opening day, a fact i didn’t know till I had joined the queue willy nilly!

The minutes passed; family members called from the carpark to demand what was keeping me…

Said hunk and a colleague decided to close the queue altogether, sending other hopefuls on their way.

A few behind me in the queue quietly melted away, probably because they had to go back to work. I deliberated mentally whether I should give in but the Tim Ho Wan hunk was still nattering on and I was optimistic that if I applied some antique charm on him, he might let me have my order ahead of the others. At minimum he would be moved by pity that this ditzy auntie actually entertained thoughts of charming a hunk?

It was no dice but mayb our “flirtatious” conversation was so asinine that it drove away whomever else were behind me in the line and I found myself the last in the queue with some 10 others ahead of me.

My turn came finally around 2.45pm and it was worth the wait. I decided to try my luck and asked for 10 buns instead of the rationed 5 and was happily surprised when with a nod from the hunk my request was filled.

It was worth the wait and the wrath of family members who didn’t appreciate being left to cool their heels for 45 minutes in and around the carpark while I queued! Although half of the loot I passed over to sister D did mollify her somewhat.

golden buns

still good to last bite after 3 hours!

Did my dress help in some supernatural way to get these golden buns? Or was it something else?

The next appearance of my dress may explain.

After four wearings, the dress was waiting its turn to be washed when I had to rush to the supermarket to pick up some essentials one late Saturday afternoon.

I grabbed it off the hanger, put it on and drove off to Clemeti Mall, thinking that such a big Fairprice Finest shouldn’t be too crowded. I was wrong. It was ren san, ren hai between the racks and at the check out lanes.

I was in a hurry and looking at my amount of purchases — not a lot and nothing wet or highly perishable — decided to die-die try the self-scan and check out lane.

Again, my trepidation was misplaced. A Fairprice sup came to my rescue. Not only that. She even gifted me with a spare “bonus point” voucher discarded by a previous customer and then took me through the paces.

It was easy peasy and I was so pleased with her thoughtful help that I grabbed a shot of her, to post on FB, Twitter and now in my blog. Good service should be acknowledged and publicised while the converse should at least be dissed thru word-of-mouth

3S = Sunita Service with a Smile

 

So did this experience have anything to my much worn dress? Did it give out the sort of aura that made people want to help or be friendly to me? Was it the pastel shades or the soft draping material that softened my personality like a magic cloak?

I won’t know till I next wear it. But it will take me to more places for sure and give me more wear to make it worth the $59.90 I had paid for it

Singapore service sucks and…

… here are some tasting portions.

• In the post immediately be4 this, I wrote about going to this noodle and congee place at ION. While I didn’t mind the waiting (too much) or the perfunctory order taking, what took the cake was how they handled an incident that occurred while our food was being served.

One wait person knocked over my cup of Chinese tea. There was a lot of apology and wait staff were all a fluster. With different ones coming up to provide paper napkins and wet “ones”.

Yet no one noticed that my pair of jeans was wet on one leg from mid-thigh to knee and there was a small puddle at my feet — this despite my standing up and asking for tissue paper to help dry my pants and feet.

I accept the restaurant is probably not well prepared for such incidents — for example why no decent towels available instead of bits of paper to mop up what was a fair amount of spill?

What I expected, like a dessert or discount on the bill by way of genuine make up for what was an appalling service lapse that was entirely the restaurant’s fault ie the wait person knocked over the tea, not me or any one at my table.

Alas, the bill came in full. There was no complimentary dessert. I should have known better. This is Singapore. I had set my expectations too high

• Then there was the Unity store at Raffles City I went into the other day. On my way to an appointment. I went in to quickly check out items on offer. In particular QV cream and wash.

To my delight, I found QV wash on offer: 2 bottles of 500mg each for about $44 together, a saving of almost $10! Made a mental note to return after appointment to pick up, especially as i was impressed by their staff’s polite greeting of “May I help you?” left, right and centre.

I was in for a huge disappointment. Everything regressed to the Singapore service norm on my return.

While I was again greeted by “May I help you?”, that was as far as service went. I discovered to my disappointment that there just one bottle of QV body wash available and was refused the discount.

“You must buy two,” one of the sales associates told me assertively, “to qualify for the discount.”

“How come you are left with one when your offer is based on two per sale?” I asked.

“Because someone came in and wanted only one,” was the terse reply.

“OK, give me the other one?”

“There would be no discount.”

“Why?”

“Because you must buy two to get a discount.”

“But you only got one..”

“That’s why there’s no discount.”

As if what happened was my doing…

She added like something of a concession: “Come back tomorrow. We may have some more.”

As if I would make a special trip to Raffles City just on the off-chance of buying QV cheap!

What got me riled was the lack of empowerment. Sales person claimed to have sold the last but one bottle at full price. Couldn’t Unity have given her the power to sell the last bottle at the discount price, seeing that when taken together the takings for the pharmacy chain would be more by selling the last two bottles (one with discount; one without) than selling one without discount and not selling the last bottle at all!

• But then again why should I be riled or even surprised by this service or lack of it at a lowly retail outlet to a casual customer-to-be when a well-known medical chain I go to annually for health screening showed complete lack of bedside manners that’s tantamount to no service.

This year, I received a call from the clinic to go back to the doctor for a review –just two days after my tests were done, when the norm in the past had been almost a week be4 getting that call.

Naturally I was surprised and anxious — thinking the early call meant something was amiss. I dashed down to the clinic just be4 noon on a Monday, thinking by then, the sniffles and cughs would have been done with.

I was wrong. The clinic was stubbornly packed although in reality there were about six patients ahead of me and with two doctors in attendance, I thought I shouldn’t have to wait too long.

Again, I was wrong. I was seen just be4 1pm. And no, it wasn’t a bad medical report. Just the same-old. Why was there need of a review? Why bring me all the way down? I seethed within but managed only to say: “It took me almost an hour to see you.”

To which the doctor replied nonchalantly: “Sorry. You shouldn’t have come on a Monday. We are always crowded.”

There were retorts aplenty in my mouth, such as “Why didn’t your clinic staff tell me this when they called? But I swallowed all protest and gave a weak smile.

I could write a whole series about the indifferent to downright bad service I’ve encountered in Singapore but decided that, the other common factor besides service is me. It could be I attract bad service like light attracts fireflies?

Otrherwise how could our Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Tharman Shamugaratnam say at a service excellence presentation tonight – with straight face in the Singapore context — that reducing reliance on manpower does not mean that service standards need to be compromised.

Mr Tharman said: “The traditional concept of good service in the Asian context, is one that emphasises personal attention. Many of our service businesses have hence relied on more manpower to provide better service because service involves personal attention and if we want to provide more personal attention and more frequently, it often means more manpower.”

Alas, even a full complement of manpower hadn’t translated into good service for me. I shudder to think what might happen when Singapore will have to rely on less people power and rely more on brain power to deliver the service. Or perhaps service can’t get worse than it already is

 

Many chance encounters: random or SG small?

Is Singapore really that small? After all, aren’t we already 5.3 million, pushing 6.9 million?

But I could swear that based on personal experience, recent and in the past, I might as well live in a small kampung, the way I keep running into people I know or people who know someone in my extended family or in my small circle of friends.

The latest random meet up happened only on Monday morning when I went to hand over a small unit I own to new tenants whom I don’t know from a bar of soap since they came via property agents.

Yet, one of my sisters in law who came along to give me moral support discovered that the male half of the two tenants is actually a long-time business associate of her late father and her brother! (They used to supply cooking gas but have switched to rice cookers for hawkers and restaurants!)

OK lah, this may not seem such a co-incidence given that SG is quite small. But note this. This SIL wasn’t supposed to be my moral support. My sister was — till I discovered in the middle of my nephew’s ordination on Saturday to be a minister of the BP Church that she had another appointment.

So I turned to one of my many SILs — who happened to be sitting next to me in the pew — and asked: “Can come with me instead?”

At first she demurred but I kind of pulled rank and she agreed.

Thus there were two chances she won’t have met up with her family’s old business associate: If my sister had been available or if she had ignored my rank “pulling”.

I can’t also dismiss this latest “encounter” as just one of those co-incidences when three other random meet ups similarly occured over the past 10 days.

One morning I was on my way to Ikea to buy curtains when i noticed some flyers in my car from Spotlight. After glancing thru them, I decided to head there instead, as it being in Plaza Singapura meant I could also check out if Hongkong’s famous dim sum shop Tim Ho Wan had opened yet!

After I picked up the curtains needed at Spotlight and was about to leave, a woman passing called my name!

She’s only an acquaintance but she’s a close friend of one of my best friends. And we ended up with her keeping me company over lunch and dessert — she had intended to see a film at PS but found what she wanted to see was showing at a cinema somewhere else. Was at a loose end and so obviously was glad to join me to “kill time”.

Now if I had gone to Ikea as planned, I won’t have run into her — tho who knows I might have had an even more meaningful encounter? Or perhaps none?

A couple of mornings later, I headed for the Long House in Upper Thomson Road, something I haven’t done for years, after we moved away from that district.

It was on a whim after reading a mouth-watering review of the popiah, rojak and otak sold there in an old copy of the Sunday Times.

Frankly, the popiah and rojak were nothing exceptional and the otak which i had intended to take home wasn’t available.

What was available was the sudden appearance of another old acquaintance who lived behind Thomson Plaza and whose driveway I used on and off when TP’s carpark is full.

I ended up chatting to her and her husband while they ate their lunch. And believe it or not, I spied out of the corner of my eye an old colleague who was with a female companion also ambered into the Long House to eat!

Perrhaps that’s not too surprising — after all, my acquaintance does live in the neighbourhood. Also, I read the following day in the newspapers about the reopening of OCBC’s premier banking outlet right next to Long House. My ex-colleague was probably there for the event!

Still, what followed a couple of days later made me more certain that I seem to have entered a chance encounter groove .

Last Wednesday, I had intended to go with mum, my sister D and mum’s maid Picky Siti to eat at Itacho at ION, one of my fav good value Japanese eateries.

As usual, wheel chair-bound mum, D n Picky were dropped off to head for the eating venue while I wen to park the car.

On the way to rejoin them, i ran into an ex-colleague whom I haven’t seen for more than a decade, similarly with a woman companion who may or may not be his wife — like the other ex-colleague at the Long House. (Where I used to work didn’t have a reputation for being the Peyton Place of SG for nothing )

We exchanged pleasantries as people who are out-of-sight out-of-mind are won’t to do. We each declared the other to look soooooooo well

When I got to Itacho, it was again a long queue which is par for the course. We went down to B3 to check out the eateries there and would have settled for Bali Thai if not for the fact we had eaten at its outlet at West Mall only a few days earlier.

Then I saw Imperial Treasure Noodle and Congee House on the other side of the atrium and rushed over while the rest of my family entourage took their time.

Too bad, at least 3 others were in front of me and, taking a queue number, I resigned ourselves to another late lunch.

The restaurant seemed to have more tables for those who came in pairs rather than in bigger groups.

It was then that I was joined by a pair of acquaintances — they are bosomy with the other acquaintance whom I encountered in Plaza Singapura and like her, I’ve not seen them for a couple of years at least!

Small chat; their upcoming holiday and mutual friends. Then they were given a table while we continued to wait.

The door girl, taking pity on us, whispered that a big group was leaving but because one of them needed a wheel chair, she thought mum and us should wait outisde till she cleared the narrow space between tables be4 sitting mum who was also in a wheel chair.

We were cheered by the news but I was even more cheered –and surprised – to see that the other lady needing a wheel chair was none other than NH, a good and long time friend of mine. Her “big” party comprised her helper and a number of her cell group members, all of whom I know very well too and haven’t met since last X’mas!

As a result we had loud and rather over-long exchanges and introductions much to the chagrin of other customers further down the queue. Probably that of the restaurant too, as we blocked their titchy entrance and to their business, time and turnover is money!

After the last of that day’s chance meetings, I continue to muse: what if we had continued to queue at Itacho? I would have missed running into those friends and acquaintances for sure, but who knows whom else I might or might not have seen or met?

It’s like the road not taken or crossed; turning right instead of turning left; leaving 5 minutes earlier instead of later. And vice versa!

Reminds me of a Chinese saying which went something like that: if fated to meet, will meet even if a 1,000 li separate us; if not fated, would miss each other even if seated face-to face!

Use lucky draw as magic wand to clear trays

This thought came to me as I ate a hurried lunch today at West Mall’s Koufu Food Court be4 rushing back to the other flat where mum’s Picky was doing me a favour and giving it a lick and a spit be4 new tenants who replace Bernard move in on Monday.

The food court was packed and no one but no one cleared their tray when they were done

Some time ago, I took a pix of a notice pasted on the table of a cafe or food court I was eating at and thought “fat hope” in relation to the message addressed to all and sundry.

Dream on?

Since the clear your tray campaign started in earnest late last year, G-owned food centres have been going full tilt, even with oil company Exxon Mobil chipping in $2 per tray returned to go to a fund for low income families, capped at $5,000 which amounts to 2,500 trays returned.

New tray drop off points have been created hither and thither and all sorts of suggestions have surfaced in on and offline media, including refundable deposits for trays — v much like the supermarket trolley — to ensure their return.

I predict with confidence that the campaign will be a major fail using moral suasion or do-good methodology.

Instead, I propose a complete no-brainer. Reward each tray returned with a lucky draw ticket; two if turned with at least two used utensils and other dispoables like tissue papers, drink cans.

If the prize is suitably attractive — a national quarterly draw with say $20,000 going to the winning ticket — we should see a new eagerness to clear not only one’s tray but possibly even that of one’s neighbours.

And a certain coterie who measure out their lives by hanging around food courts and hawker centres could with the lucky draw be incentivised to do unpaid voluntary work and clear up any trays that have not already been dealt with.

So come on National Environment Agency! Get the ball rolling and get some real and lasting compliance with your clear your tray campaign