Category: Whatever Works

I want what she has

When your husband retires before you, and doesn't want to 'unretire' by Sumiko Tan

There’s a new Sumiko Tan section called Sumiko At 60 which is a new ‘series’ that I just noticed since Lunch with Sumiko ended. Or has lunch with Sumiko finally got its lunch break? Haha.

Mind you, I hadn’t flipped through the Straits Times for a long while until I want to see specifically ‘local’ news, the opinions or forum page that tend to bring rather eye catching at times dumb responses where people duel with each other hoping their replies catch the eye of the editor in charge to just post it.

Anyway, a brief check showed me that this was her third article in that column. And it is amazing.

Who is Sumiko though? In her exact article When your husband retires before you, and doesn’t want to ‘unretire’ she has this one bit that made me gasp.

I started working in The Straits Times on May 15, 1985. I was 21 years and five months old. I’ve been in the same job and in the same organisation since, and the longest breaks I’ve taken from work were three-week vacations.

And yes, she is the Executive Editor at The Straits Times now. If you checked the Singapore archives somewhere (don’t quote me on it), her first few articles were about Singapore, a typical reporter.

In fact, when I was a student and we had to read the newspapers in school for who knows what reason that I can’t remember for, her articles came full page with an original illustration to go with it to supplement it and her byline. No longer just news reporting, she wrote articles of anything and everything.

I might say Sumiko Tan was the blogger before blogging was in. She had the mainstream media printing her afflictions and struggles or non-struggles.

She is the best clickbaity reactionary writer for the press.

It wasn’t factually stupid things like some writers make a mistake of when they give opinions, no. She backed things up with real facts but enough fluff and opinions to make you go “What the heck am I reading?”.

And I want what she has.

While the Sumiko at 60 article states she’s afraid of retirement, and her husband is a teacher who has finally gotten his chance to chill…

She just wrote what most of us nowadays can’t achieve.

A job that sustains you for more than 3 decades, with 3 week vacations available?! AND she gets a more than a half page to write the heck she wants? Assumedly whatever the heck she wants, I don’t know what goes on the minds of the higher ups.

Maybe they go “Ms Sumiko Tan, do your thing, we believe in you to bring up the readership of ST by rage baiting them with your factual yet inconsequential happenings. Omakase, oneigaishimasu!” BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE.

The latest article read in her typical style but with survey facts and a PSA about how the age of retirement will be increased and the reemployment age. Because Hallelujah, she doesn’t have to retire so soon.

It was a heaped with a dash of ‘postponing’ CPF payout “tricks” such as “monthly payouts will increase by up to 7 per cent for each year of deferral” as she was advised by a “Ms Daphne Lye, a financial planning solutions lead at MoneyOwl, a financial advisory firm under Temasek Trust“.

Can you imagine.

Ms Sumiko Tan calling up Ms Daphne Lye and saying “Help, help, my husband is wearing his tatty t-shirts and shorts around the house after he has RETIRED WHILE WATCHING NETFLIX AT 9am. WHAT CAN I DO????”

And Ms Daphne Lye reassuring her that his “approach to retirement could also offer valuable lessons“.

No, no you cannot imagine so.

Which is why I find this article simply amazing since I wonder if it is an advertorial.

Really.

If it was posted anywhere except The Straits Times, it probably would have a “This post is sponsored by” at the end of it.

By now you might be wondering, why do I want what she has? How can I even write articles like these in a the main newspaper and get PAID for it? You can’t even find listings on The Straits Times job openings page for such a trajectory. Everything seems to be social media based videos or nothing to do with the actual papers.

At most even with the google ad monies I get on this blog, I can only afford a pizza after a year or so with the readership. I doubt I can retire on that. So yeah, I want what she has. To get paid to write such things and have the ability to retire with an already retired husband who watches Netlix at 9am??

Anyway, whatever rage bating article she has in the papers, it is somehow a reassuring thing that as the world goes on, and as Straits Times still gets printed, we will always have a Sumiko Tan article.

I hope she will have a new series in 9 years time too, after this Sumiko at 60 series.

I’m very sure it would be nice.

Film development and scanning in Ikebukuro

Yes, you can develop your 35mm film in Ikebukuro in Japan. You can even have it scanned and saved.

There are many BIC cameras in Ikebukuro and after running around to each one there to check their directory, it’s the one called BIC CAMERA Ikebukuro PC Store:

To know which one, it’s the building that looks like a handphone and I had to go to the basement to find the counter.

I shot this at the Ghibli Museum using the Kodak Ektar h35n. If you’re using half frames, it’ll be scanned as full so you’ll have the little division there.

What resolution are they scanning your film? I screenshotted the details of mine. You can see it’s in 2211 x 1535.

What are the prices? This is the link to the BIC camera itself but do note, it might be different at the time you’re visiting and the time of the link’s pricing. It’s close to it from what I remember when I did it.

However, you do need to bring a phone or a laptop that can take a thumbdrive/card reader. There is no cloud transfer or email for the scans.

Make sure your phone has enough space to download all the photos too or it can download easily from a thumbdrive. I helped download my friend’s scanned film since his phone couldn’t easily find the drive.

Their ‘1 hour’ express service depends on that day if there’s a lot of film being developed, so do ask them if it is possible. The staff might not know a lot of English but they can point to the clock for the estimated time you can come back if you want to try express.

All the best! I wanted to develop my film in Japan itself since the newest terminal in Singapore’s airport apparently might have damaged my friend’s film going through the x-ray and I was a bit frightened of that. You can have it go through hand check but I figured, eh let’s just try shoot everything in Japan and develop in Japan.

Ps. In reality why I say check what time your film might be ready is cause on that day, we went in the afternoon after going around to each BIC Camera and looking at it and went “Huuuh” before we finally found one with the film development one in the basement. With friends we said in moderate Japanese “sashin” (camera) development while waving our film canisters and sumimasen-ing and “Eto..” and “Expressu?” they pointed to what time is available and we were ok cause we would still be in Ikebukuro shopping and eating dinner. And ok, we finished dinner but then BIC Camera has also closing times so we pretty much RAN TO THE STORE BEFORE IT CLOSED minutes before, grabbing our film and downloading in a frenzy to my phone and Arigato-ing to the staff cause else we wouldn’t be able to come back to Ikebukuro since the next day we had to go elsewhere and we wouldn’t be able to return to Japan??? LEAVING OUR FILMS BEHIND? NOOO I SAY NOT.

Pps. So yes, it’s better if you want to pick it up the next day next time if you have the time or do it in the morning…

Hololive Events in Singapore 2022/2023

Hololive Meet & Watame Night Fever 2022

It’s fortunate that we had some official Hololive events in Singapore and I managed to attend them!

Anime Festival Asia 2022 in Singapore had a hololive meet and the event was from 25-27 November 2022. There was a special holomeet postcard for Singapore but of course it’s super limited and all the fans got it so I didn’t get one.

I did get to stand next to the standees and take a picture with them!

That and I was there for AFA Night Live! With the hololive Meet concert. Buying a VIP ticket for that was so worth it.

No photos or videos of the actual concert but you can have a picture of Ash the translator/emcee of the evening.

We played games with the HoloID girls like Moona and Anya. It’s really nice to know hololive friends from all around the world especially South East Asia came to Singapore to attend this convention. Everyone was trying to help each other because we wanted to listen to Moona being a tsundere during the batsu.

Then after, Calli and Gura sang some songs. Look, I know this was mostly a Hololive MEET and a Watame Live concert but I didn’t expect they’d go all the way for us. They sang songs in turn. As usual the HoloEN curse happened because of the audio though it’s expected especially if you’re a Deadbeat (like me) and know it is a thing.

With that they also talked with Watame too. We did have a little talk with Watame but basically with Moona, Anya, Calli and Gura they entertained us all in between while Watame was getting ready with the concert (Watame Night Fever).

This is her first live concert out of Japan and wow.

And yes, Watame was there in real life in Singapore. We know from her actual pictures on twitter. But wow, if the technology was like this to bring Watame to a concert in Singapore and that’s impressive, imagine how it would be in Japan when you have an actual set up stage with everything in it.

I will never forget how she sang Blue Clapper and everyone in the audience knew what to do. It was one of the most tiring concerts I’ve ever went to since we all did the light stick movements for so many songs.

BUT IF IT WAS TIRING FOR US, imagine how it was for Watame because she was singing it all by herself non-stop!! We needed to cheer for her and to support her with our energy too.

If there’s another Hololive Meet/ concert in Singapore, just spring for the VIP tickets really. It’s so good that you get to sit in front and all. Plus we got an autographed poster too.

Hololive x Aniplus Cafe 2023

Next up was the Hololive x Aniplus cafe that I went on 25 Feb 2023.

We had booked our timeslot over their website. When the announcement was out about this collaboration, within a few minutes it was in the hundred plus range of people in the ‘waiting’ room of the booking system.

Anyway this was the menu list which we could order while waiting outside before the previous slot people would leave.

Just slide to the next picture to see the official menu items there. It is what it is.

These were the free items we could get at random when you bought food and drinks from the menu too.

Unfortunately we got some duplicates so we didn’t have the “full set” though we got both placemats!

I had Risu’s Nutty Milk Tea and my friends had Kronii’s Blue Lagoon Ade and Baelz’s Cream Cherry Ade.

My friend had the IRyS potatoes & meatballs. So it was a BaeryS pairing. We got the table with a little maid Hakotaro standee too!

I had Fauna’s pesto pasta. It was a lot… (It could do with a little more salt but I know the standards of Aniplus’ food anyway.)

For dessert, I had Mumei’s Salted Caramel Cake. This was pretty nice.

Basically, if you ever went to an Aniplus collab with anything, just don’t expect super wow food. Their drinks and desserts are good but their mains have always been average. It’s not the most spectacular of mains but it’s not bad either.

Besides food, you could get the collab goods. I just got a keychain and file for myself. With that, I got a free sticker. Those who spent above a certain number got some other special free ticket thing but I don’t know what it looks like since I didn’t buy that much.

Isn’t Kronii just perfect?

And there were standees you could take pictures with at the front of the cafe.

App fatigue

Do you guys get app fatigue?

Recently Kopitiam is stopping their Kopitiam cards and are switching to an app based one. I do go there once in a while but let’s just say I’m not the target audience because I didn’t use their Kopitiam cards to have significant ‘discounts’. But their announcement to switching to an app based one while would be ‘easier’ to download it feels meh to me because that’s just another new app to register to.

Before this, the Passion card’s services for some places like Giant and Guardian changed to Yuu. I don’t know what’s worse. Hearing the song “Nobody like you” by Phua Chu Kang (the character, not even Gurmit himself) on loop as you go to these places to purchase your things or that now you have to install another app (Yuu) for rewards.

I liked the tap tapping for Passion card because it was there, it’s linked to the debit card for mine and I didn’t have to install anything if I wanted to use the points.

Then there’s the SimplyGo Ezlink app that Ezlink is promoting so people can use their wallets more too for more rewards and topping up stuff.

No, I’m tired even if you get a $2 cashback for converting your regular Ezlink card to a SimplyGo one. I’ll top up my ezlink card manually at the train or bus station with the machines there.

But Sarah, it’s just installing an app, easy one!

NO!

Bit by bit, installing more apps, you might think it’s free but at this rate. Guys. At this rate. How much space are these apps going to take? You might think ohh it’s just so small but no, at this rate, how much space is it really going to take up on your phone?

It might be even worse if you keep installing all of these apps and then you realize you run out of space for more apps that you need a smart phone with a bigger space or something.

I’m tired of apps. Can we just get multi usage apps in a digital environment instead of ‘solo’ apps just because management of whatever company says ‘We should have an app’ to track customer spending and rewards etc?

Surely ‘creating an app’ is not one solution to things.

Are you guys tired of this or do you like all these apps nowadays?

It’s raining today and probably tomorrow

It has been such a wet season. It’s raining almost daily ever since my post about going to the Istana during the holidays. It’ll only be sunny for a just a few hours and then back to rainy skies once more.

Having a dryer at home is really useful during this season. In the news it had said we were supposed to have sunny skies by this time in February but I guess, global warming’s affecting it.

Continue reading It’s raining today and probably tomorrow

The secret to losing weight (for me)

Before the Circuit Breaker (7 April 2020 to 1 June 2020) , I had been attempting to lose weight cause of the doctor telling me I need to (tl;dr health reasons duh and I know what they are so you don’t have to be all wew you don’t have to bla bla, no. I actually have to).

And I had been trying to do with by ordering those prepackaged meals from specific brands. Mind you, this was cause the area I worked at had such limited food options and they were so carb based. Sometimes I just wanted a nice soup but it isn’t available there.

Anyway, it didn’t exactly work out. I wouldn’t gain but I wouldn’t get a deficit either and sometimes the menu choices are kinda meh too that I wouldn’t finish it all since there might be too much kale.

Then there were the Korean grain-shakes which are delicious and are supposed to be a ‘meal replacement’. That didn’t work out too that it didn’t make me gain and didn’t get me have a deficit but it did taste good so it was still a nice option when there’s still nothing around and that the cost didn’t break the bank.

I’m not going to link you guys the brands since you all need to see what is suited for yourselves anyway and I’m not that sort of influencer.

Alright, so meal plans and meal replacement didn’t work out for me as much as I thought it would be. And you might ask, Sarah did you exercise? Yes, yes I did.

But the thing with both, I just got so meh over the menu after awhile cause it wasn’t what I actually wanted.

Now, you see. This didn’t discourage me cause I was still kind of experimenting. There was a period of time when I had work and I had to run around a lot and I ate kinda… actually it was a sucky menu too because shops closed when I got out of production for the day/night. But woah, it was so effective that I knew that it took that much of exercise of work to do so.

But that was indeed not sustainable.

It was then, that I didn’t do much during Circuit Breaker to go out that I found out the secret.

It was.

Eating the heck I wanted.

I know, what it sounds like. But I don’t want to gorge myself and whatnot. I just want food that I want and apparently on its own, they do not cross that calorie intake and it is so stupiiiid.

All I had to do was not eat what it should be “eaten” but eat what I actually want and that’s it!

And I only knew that during Circuit Breaker cause I had to work from home and I made my menu of food I actually like. Like, miso soup, salmon, salads with nice dressing or chicken and whatnot. And there was no delivery of food back then either because only essential shops were closed.

So I really ate home food and that’s it.

After this so called discovery, I know. It’s kinda duh when you think of it. By the time you read this post, I will do another ‘experiment’.

And that’s eating the heck I want. No deliveries (if I want it, I got to go get it myself). And the intensity of the exercise I did back then but ‘less’ and in a more compact timing form instead of a whole day.

Let’s see if this ‘experiment’ will work. All I got to do is just not forget these rules for me. And we’ll check in back with this in November 2022. Cause that’s when my next checkup will be and I’ll be talking to the doctor to tell her SEE I DID IIIIT.

Hopefully.

Just remind me ok?

The Mid SES life

I don’t know if anyone out of the Singapore context would know what “SES” means. It’s an acronym to describe socio-economic status in one of our textbooks here. The short of it, high SES means you’re rich as heck and low SES means you’re on the lower end of it with little income and such. Since we’re here, I might also let you all know high SES also means being atas which is Malay for “on top”.

But you don’t pronounce it in the Malay way to say it is high SES, you got to say it in a faux-English way where it’s “A-tas” for the extraness of it.

Anyway, as per usual, I was looking at instagram, scrolling through, seeing how some ‘influencers/celebs’ post pictures. That and I got ads before I get to watch a youtube video about how you can make ‘money online’ by going to their special webinars and all that.

For some influencer/celebrities especially actors and actresses, I just wonder. How do you make money? I know some of them are thankfully supported by family, work in some business, be a tutor/lecturer, be a real estate agent and whatnot.

No, those are pretty clear cut.

But there’s some that, it just seems that they do party (of course it’s just pictures, so they won’t post about their struggles) but what do they do to get money to party? What do they work as when they’re not on screen?

Then the money making youtube ads. I don’t believe they get money from whatever they’re doing. I’m just wondering do they get enough by making people ‘buy’ into their webinars and all that to create a sustainable life?

What is their actual struggle to make monies? Cause what they post looks just so dangerous to me in their expensive cars (maybe rented for a shoot?), fancy condos and whatnot.

I don’t want to know how you all ‘made it’. I want to know, is it all sustainable and why the heck are you all still trying to sell these investment courses if it works.

Is it to diversify income or something?

Which brings the point of my mid-SES life.

I know I’m not doing my most lowest, I know I’m not doing a high-SES life either. I’m just mid-range average. Maybe even slightly on the lower range of average.

If all these ‘high-SES’ people are diversifying in trying to get as much money from as many places as possible.

Then, am I doing enough?

When considering all the work I do, is that still enough? I don’t know what’s the average of enough at this rate. Cause if so called ‘high-SES’ people are doing so much to just get as much income as possible somehow.

Then, am I doing too little?

Of course I ask what other people’s plans are so here. Let me tell you what I do.

I work, get the income there, save bunch of the monies. And then on the See Pee Eff side, I do invest with it.

But besides that, should I be having more jobs or something? Is there something I am missing because all these people keep trying to gain more somehow?

A thousand stars

Alleycats had this song called Seribu Bintang and it’s such an iconic song to me.

This song was released in 1999.

I remember the family car was a Mazda. A boxy looking car. I do like boxy looking cars instead of the ’rounded’ corners that cars of today have.

We drove over the highway at night and this song reminds me of the cool night air. Trips to Malaysia, just to visit the kampung and leave ‘quickly’ to get back home before the jams happened. When passports covers to Malaysia was blue because it was a special Malaysia/Singapore passport. You couldn’t use it for international use but you could for going across the causeway.

When karaoke is back, or it survives somehow. I want to sing this in a karaoke room with friends as I put down my glass of honey lemon and dust my fingers off the complimentary spicy chips to grab the microphone.

Do you have a song that takes you back to a year? Also listening to this song, it’s such a tsundere song that fits with a lot of characters that I like in stories.

Translation of Seribu Bintang (A Thousand Stars)

by Alleycats (Malay lyrics by M Nasir)

I want to leave you
So I can understand why I miss you
I want to dive deep into your soul
So I can understand your love for me

I want to hate you
But there is no hatred within me
No matter what you think
I still love you.

I've been living a miserable life for a long time
I have failed in love
And now you appear with a thousand stars
These stars had been hidden from me
These stars were meaningless

If you are willing to touch my heart
I'm always close to you
But don't you dare
To play with my heart

I've been living a miserable life for a long time
I have failed in love
And now you appear with a thousand stars
These stars had been hidden from me
These stars were meaningless

If you are willing to touch my heart
I'm always close to you
But don't you dare
To play with my heart

Don't play with my heart
Don't play with my heart

Disappointment at workplaces

Is it the norm in your workplace to be disappointed? For example, there are so many articles about uplifting people or being disappointed about not getting a raise or whatnot.

This isn’t about that.

How about the disappointment where you expect the mere competence of a fellow colleague or worker but all you get is just subpar work. And the only way to make sure it is done is that you would have to fix it yourself because clearly they cannot do it even with exact instructions to do.

What do you do with the disappointment?

And those who disappoint people, do they even care that they did so?

Or do you change that sort of disappointment to the feeling of expectation instead. Expect that they would fail so you will not be disappointed and be slightly thrilled that they did not make too huge of a mess?

I will not find answers here, of course.

But is it an average thing to be disappointed by work people or that there are places where people actually excel and do competently at their work? And if so, where are they working at?

What sort of jobs are those?

How much disappointment can you take before you take further steps and what steps are those?

Can I use my posb debit card as an ezlink?

I googled to ask if I could use my posb debit card as an ezlink without topping up because I left my main ezlink card at home.

It didn’t exactly answer me and my card is an older passion card POSB debit card which did have the ezlink icon at the back.

The simple answer is no.

I couldn’t use my card because it didn’t have any “value” loaded in it.

So in an emergency, you had to somehow top it up first if it’s one of the older cards, I think the newer ones can just auto deduct. I didn’t check it but it might be able to, if you do this, comment if it succeeds!

Anyway to top up your ezlink enabled debit card just go to the ATM and click more services when you log in at the machine.

There, click ezlink top up. It will tell you to remove your atm card, put it next to the keypad for the sensor to sense the card which you want to top up.

It’s the same place if you want to top up a regular ezlink card or cashcard too.

Place the card on the censor next to the keypad

Just follow the instructions on screen and your debit card is now ready to be your alternate ezlink.

You don’t even have to install SimplyGo to somehow top it up if you just need it to be used for an emergency and if you don’t have a phone with you.