3 May 2011 – Hookah/Shisha

After visiting Arab St yesterday, the hookah is something that has attracted the attention and always wanted to know more, perhaps due to childhood memories of Alice in Wonderland 🙂 Depending on locality, hookahs or shishas may be referred to by many name but is a waterpipe with a single or multi-stemmed (often glass-based) instrument for smoking in which the smoke is cooled by water.

Have never smoked and have no intentions to try but some of the hookahs have such beautiful glass base and one cannot help but admire them.

Shisha smokers in Baghdad Street. Some cafes in the Kampong Glam area have been flouting regulations that state that only 20 per cent of an establishment’s total outdoor refreshment area can be used for patrons smoking cigarettes or shisha. — ST Photo

Shisha smoking has become a hazy issue for visitors to the Kampong Glam area, some of whom have reported that shisha cafes are openly flouting the rules…

a 15- to 90-minute session using this waterpipe can deliver more than 20 cigarettes’ worth of nicotine, the Health Promotions Board has warned…

http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_660888.html

Got up at 0400hrs to send Lori off on a cab to the airport today. Was hoping to get a few hours of zzz before the 0800hrs dentist appointment. No such luck as the mind was over tired and over active with overwhelming info on the elections and the candidates. Too many choices and not satisfactory info…

Decided to have a few hours of rest before heading to the local library to catch up the missing links during my absence. But only got into a total state of TMI/too much info. Conclusions again and again are that there are no clean or noble politics or politicians. The intentions are usually good in the beginning but somehow get caught in their own webs sooner or later! Gone are the days where we were convinced that we could change the world by burning the mid-night lamp with the idealist ideas and discussions 🙁

Really tired with empty promises and cheap talks. Show me one person (besides the saints or martyr who have died) without ulterior motives and that person will get my vote. What is this that SIN Ministers get paid with figures that are so monstrously out of proportion, even when compared to the whole world; the reason is so that they will not be bribed into corruption!! Helloooo is this political semantics or did something get lost in translation or hallucinations after the shisha???

The blog was and never will be focused on politics, but sometimes even 2cents worth of honesty is better than hypocrisy!

So many roads. So many detours. So many choices. So many mistakes –
Sarah Jessica Parker

2 May 2011 – What Comes Around Goes Around…

US forces kill Osama bin Laden in Pakistan – Al-Qaeda founder and leader Osama bin Laden is killed by US ground forces in Pakistan, President Barack Obama says… http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/

Imagine the kind of repercussions from the Arab world after yesterday’s news about Gadhafi’s son killed and today news of Osama bin Laden who orchestrated the 9/11 attack ten years ago??? This morning, we were walking around Arab St completely ignorant of the news! There will be consequences 🙁

Today is Lori’s last day before heading back to the USA. Safe journeys to her for tomorrow. Did a tour on Arab St, Bugis/Intercontinental Hotel, Orchard Rd/Orchard Central and Parkview Sq. This is the first time pix are taken of Parkview Sq, an office building situated along N Bridge Rd. One of the more expensive office buildings here, houses the embassies of Austria, Mongolia and the United Arab Emirates and was built at a cost of S$87mil!

The open plaza is reminiscent of Piazza San Marco in Venice with sculptures and famous statues surrounding the open plaza.

Specially designed in the classic Art Deco style, following NYC’s Chanin Building/1929 with a lobby also designed mainly in the Art Deco style. The bar in the lobby has a unique 3-storey high wine chiller!

History fades into fable; fact becomes clouded with doubt and controversy; the inscription moulders from the tablet; the statue falls from the pedestal. Columns, arches, pyramids, what are they but heaps of sand; and their epitaphs, but characters written in the dust – Washington Irving

1 May 2011 – Labour Day…

Benghazi, Libya (CNN) – Artillery units loyal to Libyan strongman Moammar Gadhafi pounded rebel positions in Benghazi and Misrata on Sunday after his government announced that one of his sons and three grandchildren had died in a NATO airstrike... and your guess with the consequences, not good 🙁
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/africa/05/01/libya.war/index.html?hpt=T1

With the SIN General Elections due on 7 May, campaigns & rallies have been taking front page and headlines in the news here. Being neither politically nor religiously inclined but it is time to watch http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17qhGIwyGj0 as objectively as possible and there are some valid points made. Can thus understand why people are reacting the way they are.

Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely – Lord Acton

Will not be fair to make comments as am away from SIN much of the time and unable to experience fully what it is like living here with the political parties or their candidates. Amazing that there are 7 political parties on this tiny red dot! The parties in alphabetical order:

National Solidarity Party

People’s Action Party

Reform Party

Singapore Democratic Alliance

Singapore Democratic Party

Singapore People’s Party

Workers Party

May special dates

1 May – Happy May Day
5 May – Happy Cinco De Mayo
6 May – Happy Bdays WONG Wai Kit & Jan SOSA
10 May – Happy Bday Andrew LAM
13 May – Happy Bday Susannah LAM
17 May – Happy Bday LAM Poh Chee, hurra for 17 mai & Happy Vesak Day
18 May – Happy Bday Helen VICKERY-YEO
23 May – Happy Bday Yasmine AMEEN
27 May – Happy Bdays LAM Sui Chang & Karen LIM
28 May – Happy Bday Vanessa LAM
30 May – Happy Bday Hans Kristian HUSTAD

Grant me the courage to change what can be changed,
The serenity to accept what cannot be changed,
The wisdom to know the difference – Reinhold Niebuhr