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Showing posts with label Mood Food Blog Words of Wisdom. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mood Food Blog Words of Wisdom. Show all posts
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Owning a car in Singapore is an expensive affair. So is having a car in Singapore a want or a need? This topic came up one fine evening by the founders under the cool moonlight. A 1.6L sedan in this land-scarce Republic costs around $60,000 and this does not include the road tax, carpark charges, countless ERP gentries, expensive petrol that you have to pay every day, month whilst owning this piece of metal. All these will add up to roughly an additional $500 to your monthly car installment. Not forgetting that your car faces a yearly depreciation of 4 figures or so. If owning a car is such an expensive affair, why are we seeing more and more Singaporeans heading to car showrooms at Leng Kee Rd, Ubi every weekends? Newer models enter the market every month to cater to the ever increasing demand for newer cars in the market. Why is the queue for car orders piling up every week and Singaporeans are willing to take on this extra financial burden? We aim to argue for the latter (of course, that does not mean that its a must for you to get one and have to cut your expenses for other things) We will argue that having a car will improve your quality of life in Singapore.
Car as a Want
A car is a luxury good in Singapore. The PAP government is discouraging car ownership by introducing various forms of costly disincentives such as the COE, Road Tax, Season Parking, ERP. You don't need a car in Singapore and if you do, you have to bear the high cost of ownership and maintenance. Moreover, there is an efficient, world class, public-orientated Public Transport System network connecting you from and to any place in Singapore (or so some higher mortals are claming for the lesser mortals). Nevermind the yearly profit that the bus and train companies are trying to squeeze out from you. Nevermind the fact that you have to wait 7 minutes for a train to arrive only to have to squeeze with the other 4 million Singaporeans shoulder to shoulder. Nevermind the fact that the bus driver does not understand the language you are speaking. Be a good citizen as the government is advocating, use public transport, free up the roads. Be contented. You do not need a car at all. But if that is so, then why are we facing the phenomenon as posited in the introduction?
Car as a Need
Having a car is increasingly becoming a necessity for some / most/ majority/ all Singaporeans who can afford one (here we are not going to discuss about the cost factor). If you want to improve your quality of life, you will need to have a car. If you want to spend some quality time with your family, loved ones, have a trip to the beach on weekends, you need to have a car. Good food are aplenty in Singapore as introduced in the media every now and then, but without a car, its difficult to get to these destinations. Imagine having to take a 80 minutes ride after changing from Bus to MRT to MRT to Bus from one end of the Republic to another just for a $5 chicken rice or ba chor mee. The thought of the journey would most probably kill off any motivation for the trip. There are numerous places in Singapore where the public transport system is not able to bring you to. There are places which are interestingly enough to visit and yet not having a car is preventing you from doing so. Buying a car is like buying yourself a form of great convenience. You are buying yourself time and a new life that is not constrained by the bus/train timing and waiting time for taxis.
Car as a Want
A car is a luxury good in Singapore. The PAP government is discouraging car ownership by introducing various forms of costly disincentives such as the COE, Road Tax, Season Parking, ERP. You don't need a car in Singapore and if you do, you have to bear the high cost of ownership and maintenance. Moreover, there is an efficient, world class, public-orientated Public Transport System network connecting you from and to any place in Singapore (or so some higher mortals are claming for the lesser mortals). Nevermind the yearly profit that the bus and train companies are trying to squeeze out from you. Nevermind the fact that you have to wait 7 minutes for a train to arrive only to have to squeeze with the other 4 million Singaporeans shoulder to shoulder. Nevermind the fact that the bus driver does not understand the language you are speaking. Be a good citizen as the government is advocating, use public transport, free up the roads. Be contented. You do not need a car at all. But if that is so, then why are we facing the phenomenon as posited in the introduction?
Car as a Need
Having a car is increasingly becoming a necessity for some / most/ majority/ all Singaporeans who can afford one (here we are not going to discuss about the cost factor). If you want to improve your quality of life, you will need to have a car. If you want to spend some quality time with your family, loved ones, have a trip to the beach on weekends, you need to have a car. Good food are aplenty in Singapore as introduced in the media every now and then, but without a car, its difficult to get to these destinations. Imagine having to take a 80 minutes ride after changing from Bus to MRT to MRT to Bus from one end of the Republic to another just for a $5 chicken rice or ba chor mee. The thought of the journey would most probably kill off any motivation for the trip. There are numerous places in Singapore where the public transport system is not able to bring you to. There are places which are interestingly enough to visit and yet not having a car is preventing you from doing so. Buying a car is like buying yourself a form of great convenience. You are buying yourself time and a new life that is not constrained by the bus/train timing and waiting time for taxis.
So should you buy a car then? Yes if you are affluent enough to be able to provide a just-as-comfortable-life for yourself and your family. A car will improve a person's quality of life in Singapore.
Monday, June 1, 2009
Food can affect the way you go about daily life. We am not talking about health food here where people would go at length telling you about how much carbohydrate intake you should have or whether this food product contains trans-fat or not. No. We are not interested in the food's health content. We are just interested in how well the food can improve our mood.
Since we are both quite hopeless with numbers, we came up with a more qualitative method of assessing how food affects our mood. The Mood Uplifting Determinant (MUD) ranges from 0 to 10. Description of the determinant as follows:
0 : Just like the humble chap chai peng (mixed vegetable rice) we find everywhere, a food with a MUD score of 0 is good enough to keep you alive but does not make you any happier or any worst off.
1-3: Mai hiam aye sai (okay if you don't mind). Food with a MUD score of 1-3 gets your stomach filled and set you off for the rest of the day.
4-6: Fills your stomach well and at the same time gives you greater satisfaction. The world seems a brighter place when you consum food with a MUD score of 4-6. Gone are the worries of the day and in comes positive thoughts and gives you much to cheer about for the rest of the day.
7-9: Think of this as the food equivalent of an instant performance enhancing drug. Not too long ago when one of the author of this blog was still serving his National Service, his course mate swore that MosBurger milk tea can make him run faster. Doubt it? Here is the evidence: After consuming MosBurger milk tea the day before the Combat Physical Fitness Test (CPFT), his friend passed the test in a record time. Food with a MUD score of 7-9 are like life's steroids, it increases your productivity and efficiency many fold. Definitely a food you have to try to boost your work rate for the day exponentially.
Eating the right food can make or break a person's day.
Picture this scenario: You just had 2 absolutely mind boggling lectures that you understood nothing; went to the department office to collect your term essay and realized that you have gotten a B- despite spending 3 weeks of time, sweat, blood and tears on it. You get home, expected a sumptuous spread to erase memories of a bad day... But alas! On your dinner table, you see plain porridge with salted egg and salted vegetables for dinner because mum did not feel like cooking...
Under such circumstances, I am sure the thought of getting out of your pigeon hole, climbing to the highest level (to ensure there are no screw-ups in the jump) of your humble HDB block to take the plunge would have crossed your mind...
Many long suffering undergrads have found their own ways to deal with bad days. Some choose to party away at clubs like Zouk and Butter Factory, others choose to immerse themselves in games like DOTA and Counterstrike. The more healthy ones or some would argue, the masochistic ones would choose to run 10km or swim 2km to put the happenings of the day behind them.
For me however, I believe in the power of comfort food, food that can make you happy and keep you going when the going gets tough. Feeling down? bring in the Chay Kway Teows with the extra pork lard and cockles together with a good glass of Sugar Cane Juice(SCJ).
There is no problem food cannot solve. Happy eating people!
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