Today I was listening to my mp3 and an old song was played. Before I say what that song is, let me bring your attention to another song, Love Me, which is one of my favourite songs.

Basically there’s a story for the song. At the start, the singer reads a note his grandma wrote to his grandpa. It spoke of how the grandma’s dad didn’t approve of the grandpa and how they planned to elope. The chorus part is the content of the note and it’s like this:

“If you get there before I do, don’t give up on me. I’ll meet you when my chores are through. I don’t know how long I’ll be. But I’m not gonna let you down. Darling wait and see. Between now and then, till I see you again, I’ll be loving you, love, me.”

Then the story continues on the day of the grandma’s funeral and how the grandpa cried when he knelt at the doorway of the church as they prayed. The ending of the song is the grandpa saying the chorus to the grandma (first is grandma to grandpa, now it’s the other way).

Ok now the JJ Lin song that played is “Hui You Na Me Yi Tian”. In the song, the grandpa leaves for war at the year 1943, World War II. Before grandpa leaves, he sings a song (the chorus) to grandma. It goes like this if I remember correctly:

我要离去。别在哭泣。不要伤心。请你相信我。要等待，我的爱，陪你永不离开。因为会有那么一天，我们牵着手在草原，听，鸟儿歌唱得声音，对我说声，我爱你。

Basically the translation is: I’m going. Don’t cry. Don’t be sad. Belive in me. Please wait for my love which will not leave you forever. Because there’ll be a day where we hold hands in the grass field, listening to the birds sound, and telling me “I love you”.

The song then continues, and the grandma is dying on her death bed, and then she sings the song to grandpa who is still alive, and she sings the chorus.

The two songs are so alike. In terms of the chorus being sung by the male to female and female to male in the songs. As well as the meaning is somewhat similar. And both grandma dies.

Seriously I think the inspiration came from Love Me. I used to like the chinese song a lot, but I thought Love Me was nicer and I still think it’s nicer. I just find it funny how I only noticed it like now. Well nothing wrong with inspiration!

Be amazed with the superior service provided by the staff. Lawry’s signature dish, Roasted Prime Ribs of Beef, is craved and served specially from Lawry’s silver carts. These carts are wheeled to diner’s tables, giving them the opportunity to choose their preferred cuts, from rare to as well done as they’d like. Absolute freedom. Waiters’ uniforms are designed such that diners feel like they are in a ritzy club.

Lawry’s The Prime Rib Singapore Pte Ltd
#02-42/44 Paragon, 290 Orchard Road.
Singapore 238859

http://lawrys.com.sg/

Ads by BLOG2u

Queen Elizabeth, Bill Clinton and Lee Kuan Yew die and go to hell. But the devil has only one phone there. Queen says, I miss my England, can I use your phone and hear how my people are doing down there.

She calls and talks about five minutes. Then she asks: Well devil, how much do I owe you for the call? The devil says: Five million pounds. She writes him a cheque and goes back to her chair .

Clinton wants to make a call too. He says I wanna call the US. He talks about ten minutes, then asks how much do I owe you devil? The devil says Ten million dollars He also writes a cheque and goes back
to his seat.

Lee Kuan Yew is jealous. He says I want to call Singapore . He calls and talks for about an hour to his son Lee Hsien Loong who is busy trying to find Mas Selamat. Then he asks the devil how much do I owe you?

The devil replies: only one dollar. Lee Kuan Yew is shocked and asks ‘why so little?’.

The devil says: if you make a call from one hell to another, IT’S LOCAL CALL.

I need to get this out of my system. I am totally displeased with the way UOB conducted its operations. Recently, they changed all their debit cards and replaced it with a UOB NOW card, which is free only for the first year.

A bit of history. I applied in December 2006. Then, I knew that the points will expire within two years, and I knew I would have spent enough to redeem my points within the two years. Hence I applied for a TX account, which is free totally, and it came with the TX card.

Recently, in about April or May, they sent me a UOB NOW card, meant to replace the TX card. I was happy initially, because my TX card is super chui. The problem is that I have to spend like SGD $2000+ from second year onwards for the fees to be waived. As a student, my purchasing power is not high enough, so how could I accept this?

Hence I went down to UOB at Raffles Place and applied for the Campus Account that comes with the Campus card. What happened is totally unsatisfactory because the front line staff is clueless with the product they are offering. I got my account cancelled, and my Campus Account registered. After consulting with her superior than the staff realized that the Campus Card has ALSO been replaced with the UOB NOW card. I was really pissed off, because I had wasted my time there. But I asked if it would be free since it’s tied to a Campus Account, and she said yes. “Even for the second year onwards?” The reply was yes.

Then more problem came up. She wanted to tie the Campus Account to the NOW card I had initially, but I had not activated my NOW card. Hence she cannot tie the account to the card, and told me she will reapply for me a new NOW card and she cut up my NOW card. Ok fine, that was in May.

When end of June arrived (two bloody months), I emailed them about my UNI rewards points, and it is only today, two weeks after the email that they bothered to call me up. And now what have I realised?

Firstly, Campus Account or whatever account, you still have to pay the fees from the second year onwards. Thanks UOB, you could have told me that on the start, and I would just have to withdraw my money and move on to another bank.

Secondly, they will not process all reapplications when they have sent the initial one. Thanks UOB, you cut up my card and refused my reapplication! Furthermore, you called me in the mid June and asked me if I got my new card, of which I said no, and you told me you’ll process it. I even went down to UOB again in mid June to check on my status, and it is in process. Now, UOB, you tell me the application is NOT even processed. Thanks UOB, I certainly deserve better.

Lastly, I have insufficient points to redeem anything. Besides, if I want to redeem, I got to get the card because only via the card can I redeem anything. Why can’t you tie the points system to the internet banking facility you twit bank. The problem with you is that I could have had enough points, but I didn’t because I didn’t even have the full two years to spend enough. The problem is that they are going to expire ahead of schedule (not two years) because UOB decided it was smart of them to change it to SMART points. Yeah UOB, thanks huh.

Now I told the guy not to process my application anymore. One of these days I am going to cancel my account with UOB, take the money out, and go to DBS. After all, it makes more sense right? DBS has an NUS debit card that offers me four years of free card services. It allows me to pay for my domain name + stuff at least for the next four years.

Thanks UOB, with all the hoo haa about customer service, I have discovered what a wonderful company you are. Rest assured I would be very apprehensive about where I put my money next time when I graduate. Perhaps when I want to do any investments, UOB will be the last bank of my choice. So there. Thanks UOB for wasting my time since May. Two months plus. Thank you!

I can’t tell you how important it is to write polite emails. Even when you are filling a ‘Contact Us’ form on a website, e-mail etiquette applies because most probably the administrator is going to receive your information in his mailbox.

What constitutes a good email? What is a no go? Let me just briefly talk it through. I just received a rather “rude” email. It wasn’t entire rude, but the tone wasn’t friendly or polite.

In an email or a contact form, you can always start off by “Dear Sir/Mdm” or a simple “Hi!”. To make it less formal sounding, just use a “Hi” and I’m sure you have started off fine. Please do not launch into the objectives straight away, although it won’t be impolite if you omit the “Hi!”.

Next, the body of the text. Think about what you are saying, and put it in a polite tone. When I contact people from forms, I normally try my best to sound as polite as possible. In the email I got, the person questioned my website policy in NextTutor.

Then you all do this for what? Altruism?

Come on, whats the catch.

Seriously, this is in an “accusatory” tone. He or she could have phrased it differently and making me feel pleasant about answering his or her questions. Directly accusing me of being a “hypocrite” is wrong because I am not. I mean, one shouldn’t directly keep thinking that there are catches when somebody offers a service for free. For me, I would write it this way:

Hi,

I read from your website at NextTutor.com that you are offering the service for free. I was just wondering if there are any reasons behind, like I have to pay some money to unlock special features? I am also curious to know the reasons behind your decision to offer the service for free. I’m curious because most other websites will not do all these for free.

Thank you.

Yours,
XXXXXXX

I think this sounds much better. In fact, if I receive such an email, I would be more than happy to tell him or her why. Of course, no matter what I gave him/her a reply that I hope would be satisfactory and as polite as possible, but I’m sure people will understand when you feel a tinge of irritation when you reply to rude emails.

Well, in fact I’m really doing everything for free. One do not need to pay to use the facilities provided by NextTutor. In fact, there are not many services provided, just a simple database + filter capabilities. There is no hidden charge and I only cover my hosting fees and domain name fees through adsense, which till now, has just been enough to cover the fees.

The reason why NextTutor was started was more of an interest in learning PHP. From young I had an interest in websites, and I guess PHP opened a whole new dimension for me because I can create dynamic sites. Using this technology, everyone’s lives would be easier.

In a way, being cynical and using the word altruism makes me feel like some organ donor.

Seriously, which parent or tuition coordinator will pay me money just to put up an assignment? Tuition assignment forums are also free of charge! In fact, I provide the means for people to see your assignment, but I do not help anyone link tutors and students together. Hence, I guess if I asked for payment, my users will be 0. Simple as that. In this information age, why should we pay money for something we provide? Hence, I’m just using ads to cover my fees.

In the future, perhaps I will go into linking students and tutors, and there will be separate fees for that. No matter what, NextTutor’s database will remain free. If I cannot cover my hosting costs one day, I will close NextTutor down, simple as that.

So please people, write polite emails. It make’s everyone’s day better, especially someone who does not profit by providing a service. I’m sure we don’t go around questioning volunteers who are helping with disaster relief?

“Eh you volunteer for f***? Altruism ah? Confirm got catch one..”