Genting Trip 2003

2007-02-14 GrievousLeave a comment

The things I can find on my hard disk when I bothered to. Thanks to Picasa2, I have managed to find and index a whole lot of photos that I have forgotten entirely about.

These were taken in April 2003, some time around the SARS period, with an old Samsung 1.3 mega-pixel digital camera. The pictures are not bad actually, as long as you keep them in small 3R prints. Heh.

And talking about that, there’s a write up on CNET about having more mega-pixels on your camera doesn’t mean better pictures. My personal opinion is that anything more than 6 mega-pixels is actually a waste of money and a 10 mega-pixel monster has no visible improvements over a 6 mega-pixel one. And if you are an amateur, a 4 mega-pixel one is good enough!

Of course such an opinion will definitely get a lot of manufacturers very unhappy. But just what can we expect in this one-dimensional capitalist world, where the bottom line is all that matters, and the only way to ensure that would be to drive demand through false needs by means of commercials and hypes.

Genting Trip 2003

* Click on the picture to view the album
And it doesn’t work in Opera so give up…

Tanglin Halt

2007-02-12 GrievousLeave a comment

Went today for a haircut at my favourite barber – Tanglin Halt’s Champion hair-dressing Salon. (My favourite because not many people knows how to handle the ‘wire’ growing out of my head and give me a quality hair cut. May the barber Mr. Wong and his family live long and prosper! God bless his wonderful soul!)

I took these photos with the Nokia 7390 on my way back to the MRT station and I must say I am pleased with the quality of the pictures.

Tanglin Halt ‘Zup Lau’ (10 Storey)

I spent a good 20 overs years of my life here. Walking past here today brought back much memories – the time I spent catching spiders, or ‘long kang fish’ in the drain, the playmates at the playground, and the Chinese chess playing old uncle with an attitude. For as long as I can remember until 1997, I had lived here. Even though I had spent my primary school years in the Outram / Jalan Kukoh area, I spent most of my teenage years in this neighbourhood.

This is the path that I had spent several years walking past almost everyday during my secondary days. But soon there will be nothing left of this place as it has been selected for SERS. Everything will be torn down probably in the next year, just like they did with Outram Park.

Nice little skyscrapers near Commonwealth MRT. The things that will wipe the memories of my childhood off the face of the Earth forever.

When I looked at them, I can’t help but feel a sense of loss. I can’t help but be reminded that I am ageing and my era is slowly passing. I felt very much like something in me had died – just like the passing of Doraemon’s [小叮铛] author, and also the retirement of Old Master Q’s [老夫子] author.

When I was younger, I had once wanted to be immortal and to live forever… I am not so sure of that anymore.

The replacement HDB flats

More Pics from the W550i Phone Camera…

2007-02-11 GrievousLeave a comment

Taken in a cab on a rainy day…

Traffic Crossing @ Bugis

MRT Track after Eunos MRT

Yet more pics near where I worked…

UOB Centre*

Empress Place

Old High Court

* WindowsXP Hang on Startup

Traffic Accident – Upper Serangoon Road

2007-02-8 GrievousLeave a comment

It’s been a while since I last met this old friend of mine and we decided to have dinner somewhere in the North East [Hougang / Sengkang] side. He said there was a coffee shop with good fish head curry and * gasp * coffee. (You don’t find them anymore these days.)

Since my friend’s car has came out from the workshop, he can’t wait to take me for a spin. It was a relaxing drive all the way from the CBD up till Upper Serangoon Road – somewhere before Kovan MRT Station – and then this happened…

One moment we were cruising at 60kph and the next moment I was shouting out a warning to my friend to watch out for this old kook who was filtering out of his lane into ours without signals, and obviously without checking as well. My friend tried to swerve out of the way, but apparently – as can be seen from the pictures above – there wasn’t very much road left for us to do that anyway.

In the immediate aftermath, I was in shock for about a minute or two before I regained my senses to ask my friend to get off the car so that we can speak to the other fellow on how we should settle this problem. And from the photos you can see there’s no way I can open the door on my side, and I had to crawl out from the driver side, right onto the center divider.

My friend tried to take some photos, but obviously they were no good on his phone. I decided to try with the new Nokia 7390 I bought. And personally, I would have hoped I could test the quality of the pictures of the 3 mega-pixel camera on this phone under better circumstances. * sigh *

We end up having dinner at some HDB coffee shop because we have lost the enthusiasm for a good dinner entirely after this event. We really can’t believe it had happened to us when we weren’t even speeding.

The only consolation was that we weren’t injured, and we are all in one piece and still in good health. Thank God for small mercies… like the seat belts, for example, and good friends who would come all the way in the evening to Seng Kang to give us advice and help.

Photos – Battery Road

2007-02-8 GrievousLeave a comment

More photos of places near where I work taken with my Sony Ericsson W550i.

In the vicinity of Battery Road

OCBC Building & UOB Plazas	Standard Chartered & Bank of China	Demolition of Straits Trading Building #1
Old High Court & Raffles City (far)	Bird Sculpture Near UOB Plaza	Demolition of Straits Trading Building #2