Just yesterday at my JC clique outing, we were talking about one of us who have been attached for 6 plus years. We were all quite envious of his “luck” or ability to find a soul mate. In the middle of the conversation, we suddenly went on to talk about how young couples must register a flat 3 years in advance before getting married, because that is how long a HDB flat takes to build. So we think that if he wants to get married at 26 (I don’t know when he wants to), it means he need to register now at 23. For the rest of us singles, we have to wait till 35 before we can buy a Singapore HDB flat. The reality can be really vicious when you’re a single.
Fortunately, if anyone is itching to have his or her own house, there’s still the resale market. You won’t get the HDB subsidy, but at least there’s a chance to buy your own house if you’re rich enough. However, finding a house isn’t an easy feat. Where should anyone start from? Once again, technology comes to save the day in the form of an all in one portal to buy real estate in Singapore. ST701 deals with a variety of stuff, and one of them is property in Singapore.
When you have so many listings in the newspapers, you have to go through them one by one and circle those property that you are interested in, just like how the dramas portray the jobless, by circling the relevant job advertisements. But in this technological age, it makes no sense to do such manual work when we can save time by streamlining it down to things we want. You want houses at Boon Lay? Why look at Pasir Ris? You want Condominiums? Why look at HDB flats? Sort your data effortlessly with ST701. They even allow you to sort it by a price range and a space range (in sq ft), number of bed rooms, and whether it is for rent.
But what I really like is that they also feature articles on the property market. There is also the property price trend graphs for those who are visual people. There are actually many different things you can do on the website, and I think it is important to go through some material there so that we are all aware and will be less ignorant about real estate matters. Only then we can choose a good deal for ourselves.
I have finally watched the award winning movie, Slumdog millionaire yesterday night. To be frank, I do not see all the hype surrounding it. In the middle of the movie, I grew slightly bored, but it is still mildly interesting enough to continue, and hence I did manage to finish the whole movie in one sitting. One scene was super disgusting, that being the young boy jumping into the shit pool so he could get out and get the signature of his idol.
But I guess there are two important scenes that resonate with me in the show. The first scene is where I suppose is something like racial riots, except it’s more to do with religion, since I heard the word Muslims inside, and Slumdog millionaire is an Indian movie. In that scene, the two young boys watched in horror their mother getting killed right before their eyes. They saw the destruction of property and life. And this is really happening in all parts of the world. People don’t coexist peacefully with each other.
The second scene is when the elder brother was being a real bastard. He took out his revolver, pointed at his younger brother, simply because he wanted to have sex with the younger brother’s crush. His younger brother had to go away to avoid getting killed. I feel that such things are the most hated things that can happen in one’s lives, simply because you feel powerless to defend the things or people you care about. To not be able to stand up against bullies who don’t follow the path of righteousness is a very sad feeling. One that you can feel immense hatred against the perpetrators.
Which is why I smiled when my friend shared a link on facebook. It also resonates with me. Although it is the army’s commercial, I find that the meaning is appropriate. Even if you do not like conscription in Singapore, you have to agree with the meaning of the commercial. “What you can’t defend, you don’t own.” Which is why we should do our best not to get bullied. Which is why I feel we shouldn’t give anyone a chance to think that we can be bullied.
I’ll end with the YouTube of the commercial. Do just take some time to watch and see if you can feel the message as I do.
From January 15 – April 15 2009, buy any book from www.mspress.sg and stand a chance to win 3 Xbox 360 and 15 Microsoft Office 2007 Standard Edition worth S$600 each!
