Plumping in my House!

Today, I managed to replace the leaking pump in the cistern of my toilet. It was supposed to be quite easy except for the removal of the old pump which was stuck and I did not have the proper tool to unscrew it! In the end, I have to use the destructive method to get the old pump out by cutting and breaking it into pieces. If any of you need plumbing service, you know who to call. :P

Are you scared?

Oh, no! What happened? Do you know? :)

24th April 2007

24th April 2007. That was the day when one of the cars tyres went almost flat! Well, it was punctured by a tiny screw, one hundred times smaller than the tyre itself! I did not realise it at first until I saw the flatten tyre after I picked up my little boy from his playgroup. On realising the situation, I quickly went to the nearby petrol kiosk to pump up the tyre. It could still be pumped up! Luckily, it was in the morning so it was not difficult to look for a tyre shop to repair the punctured tyre. The last time, when I had a flat tyre in the late Saturday afternoon, I had a hard time finding a tyre shop that was still open at that time.

I searched through the Yellow Pages online as I did not have a hard copy on hand. Technology has helped me a lot, especially during such times when you needed some professional help. I managed to find a shop nearby which could do the repair. I called up the shop to make sure the shop was open. Then I rushed down to make the repair before the tyre went totally flat. The repair was pretty fast as it took the repairman or mechanic less than five minutes to jack up the car and remove the tyre. After the tyre was taken out, he rolled the tyre to his work station to remove the screw on it. He took out a thin strip of rubber from his work station, peeled off the backing and poked the rubber in to fill up the hole made by the screw. Then he pumped up the tyre. The next step was to roll the tyre into a big tub of soapy water. Know what is it for? It was to test for any more holes in the tyre.

Everything took me about fifteen minutes and eight dollars. :)

A Quarrel

Last Sunday, I went to this new Giant and Ikea at Tampines. The carpark at Giant was huge and it was free too. I drove into the Giant's carpark as I heard that Ikea charged for parking. I was along a stretch of parking lots waiting for a space when this incident happened...

There were two cars ahead of me in that stretch of small lane. They were already there when I turned into the lane. A while later, a car between them moved out of its lot. The car nearer to me also moved and parked at the empty parking lot. Further away, at the other end of the lane, the other car started to reverse towards my direction and stopped in front of the first car which had already parked into the lot. An unhappy man from the second vehicle, a silver Matrix, got down and started telling off the driver of the first vehicle. I could not make out what he was saying as I was in my car, but from his hand gestures, I guessed he was unhappy that he was robbed of "his" parking lot. After a few minutes of gesturing from both men, the quarrel somehow ended. The second man returned to his vehicle.

While that was happening, I saw a car getting ready to move off, so I drove my car nearer to that car. Then I noticed the man in his silver Matrix reversing his vehicle near to the same parking lot I was waiting for. Suddenly, I got a feeling that he was eyeing on the parking lot I was waiting. True enough, immediately after the car left the parking lot, he quickly drove his car right into the parking lot! I saw his grin on his face and he waved at me as he moved into the parking lot. I was "robbed" of my parking lot!!! I was feeling angry even though the man hand-gestured to me apologetically after he and his family got down from their car. How could he do this to me? This reminded me of one famous saying, "Do unto others what you will want others to do unto you". Likewise, the opposite is also true - "Do not do unto others what you won't want others to do unto you".

In the end, I did not bother to do the same thing he "did unto others". I just drove on further up the lane. Shortly after, I got my parking lot! Ha ha! I guessed there was no need to lose my cool over such small matter. So what is the moral of the story? Anyone? :)

Happy Lunar New Year!

Hi, anyone visited the River Hong Bao at Marina Bay? Near the Esplanade? It will be there until this Sunday as the lunar new year ends. There will be fireworks on Saturday and Sunday, 3rd and 4th of March, at 9pm. You can get a good view from the bridge linking Esplanade and the Merlion. Check out the photographs I took and the twelve zodiac animals. :)

Loyang Tua Pek Kong

On 19th Feburary, I went to this place called Loyang Tua Pek Kong Temple. Guess where is this place? It is in Loyang! Haha! Anyway, I heard this temple would be shifted to another location in Loyang. This place is actually quite hidden within the industrial park. You have to walk about ten to fifteen minutes from the main road.

That was not the first time I had been to Loyang Tua Pek Kong Temple. The first time I went to the temple was when I just started teaching in a school in Hougang (Don't tell you which school). Anyway, on that day or rather in that evening, some time in the year 1999, I took a group of pupils from my former school there to celebrate the lantern festival. You should have guessed that latern festival or mid-autumn festival falls on the fifteenth of the eighth lunar month. I remembered there was a lot of lanterns, moon cakes, games and people.

By the way, I was quite "lucky" when I was at the temple the other day. I was there at about 4.30pm. There was an announcement for the people there to queue up to receive red packets or hong baos from the fortune God. Initially, I did not think of getting into the queue but my wife persuaded me to go. The queue was long but it did not take long before I got my hong bao. The pictures below show the hong bao and the content in it. If you notice, there is a 4-D number on the top left-hand corner on the hong bao. Also, the year on the fifty-cent coin is 1995.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Wishing everyone a happy day everyday, not just on Valentine's Day!

Smile always! :)