with anna
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A.nna
anna // singaporean. my dream is to some day live in a countryside and have a lot of dogs. reach me on
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Friday, July 10, 2015
Here's to SG50 ♥ 1. Transportation In my most honest statement, I love Singapore's transportation. I've been to larger cities (obviously all are larger than Singapore) but my point is, their transportation are damn bad. For example, London Tube is so small, so cramp and dirty. It's disgustingly dirty because their seats are cushioned. Just ask yourself, how often do you think they've changed those cushions? Also, their train splits. Yes, they f. split. As in you board the train, halfway they announce that the train is about the split - the first half to XXX and second half to YYY. I was a foreigner, maybe that's why I was confused. Also, different destinations' train share the same track. Which means, the train that is arriving at 3pm brings you to one place and the train arriving at 3:15pm brings you to another. HOW CONFUSING IS THAT :/ On top of all that, it is not cheap either. Especially when we are paying them in pounds. I'm sure everyone wants to compare with prosperous cities, let's say Sydney. One thing I love about Sydney's train is that they're double decked. But again, they are trains that are running on tracks on the ground. Our MRT is above land (to save space, stop arguing with me), but that's the only thing I love about their train. The most ridiculous thing about Sydney's public transportation is that, a week's train-only pass is AUD90+. That's how much I spent on a whole month worth of public transportation in Singapore! Beside trains, they have trams. Their trams covers suburbans and into smaller towns, but it's a standard fee. Which means whether you take one stop, or 10 stops, it's AUD7 :( I never felt poorer spending on public transportation ever. Here's a price comparison chart if you wish to compare.. Singapore really has the best transportation I've seen thus far. Clean, prompt and cheap, where to find? Singapore. Who's complaining? Singaporeans.. Zzzzzzz 2. Safety Omg I can go on and on about this. We take it for granted that it should be a given for a place to be safe. Those fellow travellers, I'm sure you're with me on this. Singapore is really very safe. We leave our bags everywhere and anywhere. We do not have to fear pickpockets on the trains, we do not have to fear being rob or kidnapped or being pointed at with a gun. I'm not saying it's that safe that you should attract robbers, but it is a safe place to begin with. I can't emphasize enough. When I visited London, my bag is tightly secured in my arms all the time. They've the highest robbing rate of 7 cases per minute. When I visited Mongolia, I was travelling alone and God I was crying at night because the city looks so dodgy. And they've a lot of cases of kidnapping because it's so close to the Russia border. In Singapore, if you're drunk and wasted at 3am, the police officer will bring you back to the station. In fact, we have one of the lowest crime rate around. (Source: SPF) Try that in China.. You might wake up in a bath tub without your intestines. So can we take a moment and appreciate how safe Singapore is? Why do you think Jet Li & Jackie Chan migrates to Singapore? I'll tell you why, they can't even fight the criminals elsewhere. #thatswhy 3. Income Tax
I still have zero idea why Singaporeans are complaining. We actually have the lowest tax compared to average of Asia, Canada, average of Europe, Korea, U.S, average of OECD, Australia and Finland. I mean sure, you can find 0% tax in Bahamas, but also note that they have an average of USD22,312.08. GDP. So let's compare apple to apple. Norway has around the same GDP at Singapore, but their individual tax goes up to 27% while Singaporean's individual tax is capped at 20% and 22% for those above SGD320. But on average according to our GDP of USD55,000+, it's capped at ONLY 7%. (Source: Nordisk, IRAS)
In summary, why are you complaining again? 4. Education & Opportunities Well, surprise oh surprise. Coming from me, an O level half-graduate, yes we have one of the world leading education which means we have plenty of opportunities. (Source: Straits Times) And the best part is that as long as you are willing to study, your education fees are subsidised. In most countries, only the rich gets to send their kids to school. It's really sad that in most countries, kids are brought into this world for agriculture cause. There's an estimated 215 child laborers around the globe: approximately 114 million (53%) are in Asia and the Pacific; 14 million (7%) live in Latin America; and 65 million (30%) live in sub-Saharan Africa. (Source: Continue To Learn) In Singapore, most kids have an iPad at the age of 3. Seriously.. I played with stone and mud for crying out loud. 5. Clean & Green Not so much of the green, but it's important. Without the greens, it would be so much more humid in Singapore. So thank you Mr. LKY. BUT CLEAN! Yes, we are so clean. You've no idea. In Ulaanbaator, Mongolia, their city is so dirty and polluted, within the first hour after landing, my eyes was swollen. It was smelly and just filthy. And in China, it smelled like pigs almost everywhere. In London, the place is generally okay but the trains and streets smell like puke.. :/ I love Singapore for this. We are the top cleanest country in the whole world after Tokyo. (Source: Huffington Post) 6. Food Paradise
The picture does my point justice. We have so many cultures and types of food available, (I understand food is kind of a individual preference) but every kind of food is widely available. Mexican, Spanish, American, European, Japanese, Korean, whatever style you want it, we got it. Of course, as a typical Singaporean, local food is the best!
7. Clean Water, Clean Food
We are so used to to availability of clean water, we take them for granted. Most countries I've visited, I was told to NOT drink from the tap. I've no problem with that in Singapore. I always drink tap water which people find it ewwww, but your country's tap water is not safe to drink doesn't mean mine is.
Time magazine called Singapore the global paragon of water conservation. Through sheer effort, and more than a little desperation (Singapore imports less than half the population's water from neighboring Malaysia with agreements set to expire in 2011 and 2061), the island turned to desalination technologies to provide for thirsty citizens. The result is NeWater, which is non-potable wastewater filtered into high-purity H2O that can be used for industrial development and even drinking. (Source: CNN)
In summary, I love Singapore.. And those are excluding the fact that we are also a shopping paradise, multicultural country, strict law (we are the law abiding citizens, we are Gerald Butler) and so much more ♥ I genuinely think that Singaporeans should learn how to be grateful for what we have. Most things were not given to us. We were just a little red dot which nobody sees succeeding and leading today. To me, it doesn't matter if our PM Lee is the highest paid. As long as he does he job to keep this a place I want to live in, I'm happy with that. Well, at least our PM is not another Najib Razak who claims he is paid USD100,000 annually but can afford a lavish house and can afford Richard Mille's watch that is reportedly worth £120,500 for himself and RM457,200's watch for his wife! (Source: Malaysia Kini) Not directly saying he is corrupted but you do the math and let's not dig into others' downfall. Labels: ilovesg, love singapore, reasons to love singapore, sg, sg 50, SG50, singapore |
xx
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