Friday 12 December 2014

Monday 8 December 2014

Finnish cultural imperialism pt V

I seem to have made a lasting impression on the people of Singapore. They have apparently now named one of the condos after my nationality! (Even if I failed miserably on my epic quest to teach the Singaporeans to stick to either left or right side of the pedestrian paths -- now they just cannot seem to decide which side of the road to walk).

Picture taken and shared with kind permission from either mr. Laurel or Hardy of the 9minnon blog fame.

Friday 5 December 2014

Final Relocation Summary (part 3 of 3) - What I wont miss

Now that I am firmly back in the place the Sun doesn't shine into -- ie. Finland, it is time to look back one more time. This entry would be the final in the summary series and potentially the very last topic into this blog. It has been one wonderful ride -- not only the excursion itself, but also this reflection bit through the blogging exercise. Check out also the first and the second entry to this series.

What I wont miss

  • Some particularly blur (*) Singaporeans in various service professions. "Can not, lah!" Especially the lady "helping" residents in the management office of our Condominium. Good riddance! (See also this long winding article describing various forms of Singaporean retardation)
  • Getting stuck somewhere because no taxis are available. Why on earth would they change shifts at 5 PM on Friday afternoon?! Also many taxis stop driving when it rains because drivers are worried about ending in an accident and being responsible to cover the expenses. Thus when the demand is the highest, the supply is the lowest
  • Being separated from my dog
  • Obnoxious amounts of bureaucracy and seemingly inherent inability to think outside the process even when it makes perfect sense (need to add that the process typically works if you just bite the bullet and go by the norm)
  • Occasionally the feeling of being suffocated by the crowds of people
  • I will get so crucified over this and I will regret ever uttering the words, but sometimes it can get just a little bit too hot. I received no condolences when making the mistake and saying so in a chat discussion with a friend from Germany.
  • Hordes of animals attacking any little food crumbs left on the table. Within few hours any bread or fruit left on the kitchen counter starts attracting at least ants. Before long also house geckos.
  • Just before I left Singapore it turned out that there was a nest of snakes sharing the condominium yard with me. One had apparently slithered its way into our very doorsteps as well. Apparently not the most venomous type but nevertheless very aggressive.
  • Occasional haze coming from Sumatra when they are burning rain forests. I don't think I could survive living in Beijing if that's what they have to go through every day.
  • This was the day haze started to creep on us back in June 2013.
    Houses both sides on Marine Parade Road got lost in the mist.
  • Being stingy when it comes to providing paper tissues in restaurants. Some of the spicy food still makes my nose run and there is never enough (if any at all) tissues available at many eateries.
  • Freezing myself to death when going to movies and forgetting my winter gear. One weird experience was to go see a movie in an exclusive cinema which provided blankets to tuck into.
  • Having to cope with measly 42 inch tv and mediocre soundbar for sounds. Feels good to be once again listening to music from my substantial speaker setup and watching movies on 106" projection screen.


*) blur = It is most commonly used by Singaporeans as an adjective to describe people who never seem to know what’s going on! An example would be the question: “Eh, why are you so blur?”
1 Ignorant, stupid, slow to catch on.  2 Confused, muddle-headed.
Source: Singlish Dictionary

Thursday 20 November 2014

Kung Pao Liquorice and Coffee, please

I ventured to have a lunch in a local Chinese restaurant called Guangzhou Garden to keep the reverse home sickness at bay. Pretty authentic tasting dishes I would say, but I just gotta love the way the two food cultures integrate so seamlessly.

First of all there is a salad table (raastepöytä), which you would not expect to find in Asia. Not that I am complaining. I was actually often missing fresh side salads with the never ending supply of oil soaked noodles.

Secondly they naturally offered bread with the dishes. And not just any bread but proper crispbread (näkkileipä). Chinese restaurants in Singapore do obviously have pao on their menu, but that's not really the same thing as bread being an integral part of every single meal in Finland (and in all Nordic countries alike). By the way I could have added Liu Sha Bao to my list of things that I miss. As well as having a pao with Chilli crab.

Thirdly they offered coffee and candy as a desert. Serving coffee in Finland is just given, but once again coffee was not accompanied with just any candy but salty liquorice, which is a very Finnish concept and somewhat of an acquired taste. I am not much of a candyman myself, but I do remember enjoying lätkäliiga when I was a kid. (By the way, I just witnessed a massive injustice where lätkäliiga does not have its own Wikipedia entry! I trust that some proper candy aficionado attends to this immediately and makes the world a little bit of a better place).

Tuesday 18 November 2014

Final relocation summary (Part 2 of 3) - What I will miss


This is the penultimate (one of the fancy new words I learned while working all the time in English) entry in this concluding series. Previously I listed things things that I achieved or ended up with after 24 months in Singapore.This time I will cover items...

What I will miss

  • Fresh juice as promised (I did invest in a cool machine called a slow juicer so I can take some of that juicy goodness with me.)
  • Never ending warmth. Eating outside while wearing shorts and flop flops year round. In Finland that is limited to odd number of days around July and August and that's pretty much it.
  • True metropolitan city to live in (The concrete jungle of Central Business District blows me away every time I am taking a taxi through the downtown)
  • Short distances to everywhere with no real traffic jams to speak of. Inexpensive taxis and well oiled public transportation could be added to this category.
  • Excellent food starting from the succulent shrimps and extending to things like soup filled xiao long baos.
  • Possibility to dip into the pool at any time of the day or year. (Now I will start hitting myself on why didn't I make it into a habit to do it everyday while I still could)
  • Gym & tennis facilities in our back yard (see the above comment about the usage of pool). Also cost of having private coaches for both activities was temptingly low.
  • Possibility to hop on a plane and get anywhere in South-East Asia in matter of few hours for typically a nominal price. If I feel like learning to surf I can do a quick weekend getaway to Bali or perhaps I would fancy outdoor rock climbing over Andaman sea in Krabi. There are 4 low cost airlines operating from Singapore so any of these quick trips do not even cost anything.
  • Having a full time helper around. Now getting back used to walking up early just to fix  breakfast for the kids, getting them dressed (and re-dressed to survive the arctic weather), washing their teeth and taking them to school and walking the dog feels like a true chore on top of a normal work day...
  • Effectively the full list of achievements could be also translated into what-will-I-miss statements. For example for the first time in my career in my current company I had a fixed desk and fixed set of colleagues, which was truly nice after having been the very definition of a mobile worker for 10+ years. 
 Once again there must be tons of other things to be missing, but these came to my head first.

The final installment in the series will deal with things that I do NOT miss.

Friday 31 October 2014

Ship ahoy!

Through the turbulent oceans and horrible sea monsters my earthly belonings have just landed into the port of Helsinki. 1 full month ahead of the original pessimistic schedule. I finally get to sleep in my own bed next week! \o/


Wednesday 22 October 2014

Final relocation summary (part 1 of 3) - List of accomplishments

This is the first of the 3 part blog series listing final summary of the 2 year excursion. First entry lists all the new skills and achievements I ended up with. The second installment into the series discusses about things that I am missing from Singapore. Final topic (potentially the very last entry into this blog altogether (snif)) will be about things that I do NOT miss.  

Achievements / trophies / outcomes 

  • 3 ice cream bar mayorships and level 5 mall rat badge in Foursquare (I had to list the most cherished achievement first. I'll have serious trouble making sure I stay on the top in the upcoming months/years -- Actually I think I can. Foursquare did totally stupid update into their previously cool app and removed this gamification aspect completely.)
  • Plenty of gained experiences from living and working abroad. Working in a massive conglomerate, working abroad was not so big of a shock. The corporate culture actually runs much deeper than working differences of various nationalities. Having worked in a truly global role with worldwide visibility makes it so much harder to get used to regional level business after this. 
  • A great group of colleagues to have worked with. A few new true friends in addition. 
  • Further improved English skills (I remember in the beginning it was half scary to find myself thinking in English during weekend).
  • Enough vitamin D to survive couple of dark Finnish winters.
  • New color into the map of visited countries: Philippines, Australia, Cambodia, Indonesia (and Ireland). Also number of revisits to countries I had been to before, but more stamps into the passport: Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and US. Number of the countries visited as of today: 45.
  • Some money left over from very friendly taxation percentage
Also gained new ability to stick to shadows to avoid
scorching sun. In the picture there is still the best place available
to wait for the pedestrian light to change.
This skill will surely come in demand in Finland!
  • Two amazing kids who have had their first true dip into global world and understanding how very similar yet fascinatingly different we all are over the various country borders. Both of them speak fluent English and some Mandarin to top that off. Both of them have learned to swim there as well.
  • 80 odd blog posts documenting the course of past 2 years for 3000+ page views globally.
  • 100+ kilometers of running away from Zombie hordes in this cool augmented reality app. For the record though: I never acclimatized properly to be comfortably running outside during day time. 
  • Successfully completing one of the sixweeks.com projects (200 situps done, 20 pullups &  100 push-ups still to come!) 
  • 2 playlists of commuting music. One list for each year.
  • Full set of furniture which unfortunately ended up being needed after the home coming. My earthly goods are floating somewhere in the Suez channel at the time of writing this.  
  •  
  • Learned little bit more than just basics of tennis. I can occasionally hit one mean forehand. 
  • Mastered the skill of chitchatting about weather when the only real change is whether it is very hot or really hot (once again I remember that in the beginning the very first weather related discussion made no sense whatsoever to me). 
  • 926 PowerPoint files and 745 Excel files on my laptop hard disk drive. Honestly (perhaps unfortunately) majority of these are created by me! All these files got deleted during standard disk wipe on my last day at the office. Perhaps I need to clarify that I practice pretty nihilistic version control system, which leaves a wake of copies of the same file.

  • Life long immunity to one specific serotype of dengue fever.


There are most probably several other achievements, which I don't remember right now. Thus perhaps these are the most important ones. (EDIT: OK, just a few more additions to the list)

Friday 10 October 2014

Reverse culture shock

Surreal. That's the feeling when I am once again walking the dog around the same neighbourhood I have been living in since 2001 (with the exception of the Singapore getaway). Everything is pretty much the same with only superficial changes. Same shops, same restaurants, same schools, same kindergartens, same parks. Same cold, wet weather. As if I never left. I was away only for 2 years, but it is pretty amazing this dreamlike quality when  thinking about past 24 months.

Here are some of the quick observations from the first days before I end up not noticing them anymore:

On the very first day I encountered what could probably only be labeled as an old hobo, who seemed to have peed all over himself just a little bit. He was looking for a fight near the subway station. Luckily not with me. This was around 10 o'clock in the morning. Suffice to say you would never ever see a sight like that in Singapore. I wonder if quick corrective caning would decrease (or perhaps only further increase) the aggressive behaviour over here? The hobo was dressed in black. Like practically everybody else. Perhaps few people have dark gray jacket on. Or dark brown if they are very expressive.

My phone (new OnePlus One!) was struggling to hang on to LTE-network, but was dropping to 3G (!) speeds in the suburbs of Töölö, which could still be considered to be part of downtown Helsinki. This feels quite out of place coming from a area with complete countrywide (albeit miniscule country at that) coverage for full LTE speeds. Apparently I was almost the only one enjoying my 3G connection in the bus. I remember wondering few months ago if 80% of my fellow HKIers would be fiddling their phones in public transports by now.


Was it always like this: only old, ugly and dirty cars on streets? Where are the occasional Lambos, Ferraris and Maseratis? Then again I did get my first Tesla sighting in the streets of Helsinki! Of course I could easily get a ride with one of those German made cars for a fee. I was planning to take my kids to nearby National Park of Nuuksio to marvel the Autumn colours, but the trip would have costed me 70 euros -- each way. I guess we can enjoy the absolutely beautiful display of nature in the city parks just as well.

While on the topic of cost of living, I happily renewed my electricity contract for about 200 euros for the whole year. Also 20 euros a month for a mobile phone subscription with limitless calls and txts and 50 gigs of LTE traffic sounds inexpensive to me (as long as LTE works). Finally home broadband for 350 Mbps connection which costs 20 euros a month is truly a bargain anywhere.

Finally, I am afraid Singapore has ruined my taste buds beyond repair. Japanese food tasted bland. Nepalese wasn't really spicy even with warning texts on the menu. Not to mention eating home cooked family dinner. I solved the immediate concern with a bottle of chilli sauce as my hidden weapon. Now I only regret that I didn't purchase that special chilli sauce from Katong Laksa. However, I am compelled to add that I had truly spectacular sautéed wild boar (*) as part of the Autumn game menu in a local restaurant.

Welcome back me!

PS. For all you Finnish speakers out there there was a similar list of findings shared when Shanghai correspondent of the local newspaper returned back home.

(*) Mission accomplished!

Tuesday 30 September 2014

All good things...(reprise)

(meta comment: Blogger ended up eating my original blog entry that I wrote at Changi airport with the very blood of my heart. This text is obviously but a shadow of the sheer brilliance of the original entry. Luckily SwiftKey has saved some full sentences as long as I remember the beginnings.)

My Earthly goods are currently traveling somewhere in middle of the Indian Ocean and I'm sitting one final time at Changi airport terminal 1 waiting for the gate to open for boarding. During the past two weeks of packing, shipping, fixing, cleaning, farewelling and panicky tennis lessons I have kept asking myself the same question over and over again. Why on earth would I of my free will (or anybody else for that matter) want to go back to live in a country which is cold and gloomy 6 months a year? It comes as no surprise to the avid readers of this blog that I have utterly enjoyed living in this little red dot under the equator.

Every time I ponder upon this question I end up concluding two best reasons ever: One reason is 8 years old and the other one is 3 at the moment. I could have easily extended my Singapore adventure, but the family opted going back as per the original 2 year plan. I would never want to miss a single day of the life of my wonderful kids growing up and thus the decision making was painless in the end.

Even though the feeling of letting go weighs so very heavily on my shoulders right now, I was told that it's good to leave when you are still having fun. At least it makes me so much more anxious to be planning for another similar excursion in the future.
Ended up hurting my back pretty bad as I took a little tumble when playing for one more time in the outdoor courts under the sun. Also ended up hitting my own nose with that new Babolat racket sticking from my back bag. So perhaps it is time for me to go back.

Farewell to Farewells

I truly feel that I have been a valued member of the work community. Today marked the final set of  farewell parties. Thus the total breakdown of various farewell parties is as follows:
  • One more formal farewell event with cake and cards and everything
  • Two after work beer events
  • Two separate dinners arranged by different sets of colleagues
  • Three separate farewell lunches once again with separate colleagues both within and outside my own department
  • Two ad hoc farewell coffee sessions 
  • One farewell ice cream session

Now, if for whatever reason I was not allowed to leave the country tonight at the airport (bear in mind that I had to return my Employment Pass back to Ministry of Manpower earlier today and officially I'm no more a legal alien),  I would not dare to show my face in the office tomorrow. I would probably just hide somewhere, change my instant messenger location to Finland and work from 2 PM to 10 pm just to fool everybody.

UPDATE: I did actually also throw so called house-colding party for few selected colleagues to help me get rid of beer and souvenir vodka, which my company did not agree to ship in a container for some reason.

Thursday 25 September 2014

Ang Mo signing off, soon

Seemingly many Asian cultures have their own special term coined for foreigners often specifically targeting Westerners. Japanese have a racial epithet for outsiders called gaijin while in China it is laowai (or gweilo in Cantonese) whereas in Thailand it is farang. The Singaporean equivalent would be Ang Mo (红毛). While these terms may not have originated from derogatory nature, there is a pretty strong connotation of exclusiveness (ie. us vs. the outsiders) and depending on the context the term can also be used with intentionally offensive undertone.

Ang Mo literally means "red haired" and the etymology can be pretty easily guessed. The first usages of the term date back to 16th and 17th century in the Fujian province in China with Hokkien speakers (which is still the prevalent dialect in Singapore) and it was referring to the Portuguese and Dutch people most probably for apparent reasons.

This particular Ang Mo is about to let go his honorable title very soon. For the past 2 years I have been clearly in minority. According to the most recently published demographics I would belong to the ethnic group called Others, which represent only 3,3 percentage of the total population. For the record, I have not really had any issues whatsoever about belonging to the minority over here. Perhaps I do have a gnawing suspicion that my landlord did squeeze every last penny from the Ang Mo expat when reviewing what fixing needs to be done in the apartment before the hand over. But then again Chinese businessmen tend to have the penny squeezing reputation no matter the customer ethnicity.

Within a week I will be disappearing back into the majority. In the wake of World War II European countries shy away from tracking the ethnicity of their population like they do very transparently in Singapore. However I will be back in the 89,33 percentage of the people who speak Finnish as their mother tongue. The 3 other biggest language groups after Finnish are Swedish, Russian and Estonian (in that order), thus I am probably not far off when estimating that as a Caucasian I belong to the 97% of the population.

After all this time living in Singapore I would still proudly consider myself a proper Ang Mo rather than a true Singaporean. See what I mean by looking at this Wah Banana clip below:

Monday 15 September 2014

Nerd at 25 meters below sea level

Honestly I need to admit being in a bit of a panic mode to try to see every last thing there is to offer in this region. I just returned from a diving trip to Philippines with a group of friends this time investing a proper full week rather than a hasty weekend getaway.

Unfortunately not my picture,
but pretty much the same experience
(free pic from EzineMark.com)
There are absolutely stunning dive sites in the Philippines. I visited two diving locations in the Visayas region (access through Cebu city): Balicasag island off Bohol and four different sites around Apo island. There were heaps of coral, both soft and hard, and bustling marine life in both locations. I saw massive schools of Jack Fish swirling in true National-Geographic-photo manner. I had also the pleasure of spotting my first sea snakes (Banded Sea Snakes are apparently 3 times more poisonous than Cobras), first Scorpion Fish (both leaf and with out leaf varieties), first Mantis Shrimp among number of old acquaintances such as turtles, Parrot Fish, Snappers, Garden Eels, Groupers, Flounders, Nudibranches and so forth. Another scuba related first-time-evers were diving in stronger currents, diving deeper then ever before, diving away from the reefs into the blue to seek out the big schools of big fish and diving with a group of closest friends. Still no sharks though... 

Roof of our little room, which is directly above the dive shop
and literally 3 minutes away from the Chapel reef
Special mention goes out to Apo island, which is somewhat remote destination off the bigger island of Negros. You need to travel with a medium sized catamaran from miniscule Malatapay village to an island with limited electricity (true test on how can nerd survive without wifi!) and pretty basic accommodation options but with truly mindblowing reefs starting just directly off the shore. Absolutely very picturesque location. I felt truly reluctant to ascent from my final dive into the Visayan Sea. I would have wanted to stay underneath in the magical otherworldly depths until I would have been forced to surface. On Apo we were pretty much the only customers on the whole island due to the rainy season, which didn't bother us during our back to back dives at all. We had truly wonderful weather the whole time.

However when starting our homewards journey on Saturday morning, we were greeted by dark skies, howling winds and heavy rain. The sea next to our hotel was so ruff that there was no way of climbing into any boats from there. We started to wonder whether it is safe to venture out to the sea at all and if we are going to miss our flight back home. We were suggested to hike across the island over two hills to go and ask the boat captain himself on if there is any way off the island. Getting to the other side fully soaked we noticed that the sea was indeed calmer on the east shore due to coverage provided by the island itself. However the captain told us matter-of-factly that there is typhoon Luis ranked at Signal 1 (* running rampart on the island of Negroes and it might continue for several days. To our surprise the captain still continued loading the boat and shoving us one by one into a small paddle boat to get into the same catamaran we crossed the 45 min distance on few days before. The sea was pretty ruff indeed, but not overly scary. The only half scary thing was the captain wearing an old scuba mask and laughing maniacally while driving the group of tourists into the eye of the typhoon and potentially to their wet graves. But instead of a grave, we reached the opposite shore safely. Royally soaked, but safely.

*) Googled Typhoon signaling system afterwards and Signal 1 it is actually the lowest level of warning for tropical storms and typhoons. Sounds scary enough though especially after the sad events in 2013.

Sunday 31 August 2014

The end is nigh

My days are numbered. Twenty three months already done, only one more month to go and then it is all over. I booked one way trip back to Helsinki feeling pretty sad about it. I would have not have minded to continue for another year, which was an option on the table, but my family insisted on following the original plan A. 

October is pretty much the most miserable season to venture back into Finland. It is wet, dark and cold. When the snow comes, typically in December, then at least it is not as dark anymore due to snow reflecting some light. Also when it starts to be seriously cold outside people finally start to dress properly in their winter clothing. Until then folks go freezing in their half warm autumn wear.
I guess I have to shake these feelings away by going to the pool to read my book and recharge some of those vitamin D operated biological batteries while I still can.

Friday 22 August 2014

Nerd at 4k (Extra curriculum activities part II)

This edition of the blog is going to be particularly lengthy description of the mountain hike excursion I concluded last weekend. This blog entry has very little to do with the relocation theme of the blog other than trips like these are perfectly doable on a long weekend when based in Singapore. So brace yourselves. Here comes easily the longest entry in the history of this blog. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Saturday 9 August 2014

Manjulah Singapura

Today marks the 49th birth day of Singapore. Many of the buildings - private and public alike - have been covered with red and white for the past few weeks to celebrate the occasion. Also many cars sport a little Singapore flag on the windows or colored pouches over rear view mirrors. In addition shops are heavily promoting Singapore t-shirts and related paraphernalia at this time. 

I actually find it rather charming this hype about a nation. The pleasant observation is that there is only a positive spin on the national pride from what I'm able to see.  Sadly nationalism has been somewhat smudged and owned by the right wing extremists in Finland and several other European countries. I wouldn't think of wearing a shirt with Finnish flag unless I intentionally wanted to risk being labeled as red neck neo-nazi. 

Big surprise for this year's birthday festivities was that it rained a little during the National Day Parade. From what I have heard they  actually seed the clouds to prevent rain on special days like NDP and formula one race day (!). Probably not something that you would see in Europe...
Finally cannot do much but to have a wry smile when reading the neverending bright eyed touting for the prime minister by the National news paper:

"The crowd's enthusiasm reached an all-time high with the arrival of Mr Lee Kuan Yew, who received the loudest cheers from the audience. He arrived before Prime Minister Lee Hsien Long [current PM's father] . As the former prime minister took his seat, the audience gave him a standing ovation. - See more here"

But then again I have no doubt that that really took place earlier today. Singaporeans seem to be truly happy and proud of their nation and genuinely appreciate the work Lee family has done for this place over the past 49 years.

Wednesday 6 August 2014

What is good "rye-ight" now?

I haven't really missed any food from Finland during all this time. Like I have mentioned before, you can find pretty much everything your heart might desire from the next door grocery store. However, after more than a year in between I just visited Finland briefly (it was actually warmer in Finland than in Singapore, imagine that!). On my way back I noticed that there is a proper grocery store inside Helsinki-Vantaa airport Arrivals hall. It is mostly catering for folks returning home in the evening flights, but realized then and there that it can also provide added value for departing passengers. I ended up buying a loaf of rye bread and some delicious cheese. I can get some Swedish rye bread in the local supermarket, but not the good everyday stuff. Also you can surely find various different cheese, but I am not sure if the Asians really appreciate the smelly goodness. It is a 12 hour direct flight from Helsinki to S'Pore, so any food will stay easily fresh in the cargo hold.

Now writing this particular blog entry with my mouth full of oh-so-familiar Finnish taste. It is actually pretty surreal feeling.

PS. As always it was a charm to waltz through the Changi airport with my multiple entry Visa permit. Having my fingerprint scanned and welcomed back home took me only few minutes.

PS2. BTW, while in Finland it did feel good to have access to proper toilet paper. Soft yet sturdy. Not the Singaporean fluffy stuff that easily gets all mushy in the wrong places.

Thursday 17 July 2014

Iced Volvo

Could you guess who happens to be the lucky owner of the car in front? And whether that person has a client meeting starting in 30 mins.



No, I don't still miss Finnish winter and the related shoveling. In fact I am off to do some wreck diving off the coast of Bali just now.

For the record, I have since these times invested into a warm parking garage and improved my quality of life immensely. 



Monday 14 July 2014

Fiddler on the MRT

I imagine I am stating the obvious here, but easily 80 % of my fellow commuters (me among them obviously) have their necks tilted while tapping away on their smart(ish) devices. I guess that is now the new norm everywhere, but it did strike my eye when having just relocated over here. Of course you had people fiddling with their equipment in buses and metros in Helsinki, but not even close to this amount of people across all age groups. This might have changed in the past 21+ months though. Remains to be seen.

The constant fiddling is not limited to killing boredom while commuting. I have seen couples spending a romantic evening in a posh restaurant with stunning views from the 70th floor and both of them are deeply buried in their own devices. I took the liberty of noticing with certain sad happiness, that at least one of them was busy bringing more money to the Finnish mobile app phenomenon, Supercell.

While on the topic of commuting: I am not typically fond of allowing my social media existence to be used to promote any commercial products, but this time I need to give praise to Bose QC20 headphones. I just bought a new set over the last weekend to get me prepared for my next upcoming travels. I have grown so dependant on active noise cancellation headphones in planes that I was forced to replace my previous headphones (AKG NC 495) which broke during my business trip to China a month ago. I gave the Bose an acid test of ambient noises of Singapore in the morning and honestly was blown away. This is by far the most effective noise cancellation I have ever heard of. Or not heard of!? I was walking in true bubble of silence getting immersed in Portishead potpourri through Spotify and pretty much hearing nothing else. It was magically surreal to see people, buses, cars, trains, but not hearing anything but Beth Gibbons voice over trip hop beats drilling into my head. I didn't even feel the urge to fiddle my phone to pass the time.

PS. So that marketers don't have a field day on how social media affects buying behaviours, I need to state that the sound quality of these in-ear headphones is not as great as big over the ear model that I used to have. Especially the low bass sound I find is lacking. However it's the noise cancellation that is FTW.

PS2. The selection of Portishead was inspired by the fact that they had just performed live the other day in a Finnish music festival in Ilosaari. Wish I had been there.

PS3. With absolutely no relation to fiddling mobile devices, killing ambient sounds or really anything at all, I need to share the weirdest dream in a while which I just remembered by all of a sudden. My old client had drawn a donkey's head (!) as a failed rating on my exam for religion class (?!). I had refused to answer correctly because of the appallingly denominational way the questions were posed.

Tuesday 8 July 2014

A blast from the past

This day goes down in history. I believe this was the first time ever that I have queued for a cashier and deposited a paper form cheque to my bank account. I am of the generation of people raised in Finland who never had to engage with check books or checking accounts. I had my first debit card when I was 15 and was later using a crude pre-internet bank over 36,6 Kbps modem connection (who remembers the infernal noise?) for all my bill payments and money transfers.

Honestly Singapore is not the worst place in terms of advances in banking. Actually there is a fierce competition between the regional and global banks to demonstrate who are seen as the most innovative and cutting edge with rolling out new services like NFC payments. I can get by using mostly my credit card including for small purchases like taxi trips. But still everyday bill payment through electronic means is not as straightforward and everywhere accepted as I have grown to expect.

Also there is some inherent weirdness and unnecessary level of complexity in the way electronic banking is set up here. I can pay a bill normally (provided that I have added a new payee) or choose to use GIRO, bank transfer, credit card, standing instruction, online cheque (!!! if I had a checking account)  or advance pay. All of these modes of payments are hidden in various parts of the navigational hierarchy of my internet bank UI. In Finland in my bills I have two pieces of information: recipients bank account and typically reference code and after that I set it to run automatically if it is a reoccurring payment. I see all transactions (past and upcoming) in one place. How hard can that be?

Thursday 3 July 2014

All your berries are belong to us

I have a had a massive misconception all throughout my life. Now that I have recently been enlightened by my wife and learned my lesson, please allow me to contribute to the shared body of knowledge in case there are others like me out there.

While I really, really enjoy the regional cuisine in SE Asia, I have been vocally of the opinion that there are few food items that indeed are objectively better in Finland (perhaps also in Sweden and other neighboring countries) than anywhere else in the world. I am obviously talking about berries here. Strawberries are much sweeter and tastier in Finland compared to their sometimes bigger and even visually more appealing foreign siblings. The same thing applies to blueberries. I just can't seem to find as good blueberries as the ones which I can pick up readily from practically any forest in Finland as per quite extensive freedom to roam.
You know nothing, koo mikko! 

The thing is that I have been comparing apples and oranges -- or more precisely comparing bland blueberries to real tasty bilberries. I have been unjustly dissing that other blue colored berry to its Nordic relative. It's actually pretty easy to make the distinction now that I know what to look for.

Thus for the record, let me apologize globally to all the berries I may have offended over time. I regret my actions deeply.


Tuesday 24 June 2014

AC acclimatization

I have made an observation that the fancier a venue (be it a hotel, shopping mall or taxi) the colder they have set their air conditioning. I have to wonder if that is some kind of intentional demonstration of level of luxury. I am writing this blog entry from a conference venue in a hotel on Orchard road and my fingertips are turning white because it is horribly cold inside.

People with glasses have to deal with the situation here where glasses get foggy when going from indoors to outdoors. This is exactly the other way around back in Finland during winter. In Finland it can be always warm and cozy inside the buildings throughout the year. It is actually pretty strange how some of the coldest conditions I have ever had to survive have been indoors in countries like Singapore, Japan and Italy.

One would imagine that as a Finn I would have centuries of adapting to cold weather built into my very DNA. That may be the case, but Finns have also centuries of practical experience on building efficient central heating systems and proper insulation for their homes, offices and venues. Every winter there will be cold weather hitting Tokyo and cool air creeping through their paper thin (sometimes literally) doors and windows. Then again Singaporeans just want to create the winter conditions on their own.

Tuesday 17 June 2014

Art of Queuing

Long time no post. I guess that's the novelty value wearing off and complacency settling in. I am glad I did capture the early findings in the beginning as it starts to be harder and harder to spot any interesting peculiarities. However, this topic I just need to cover. 

Local newspaper ran an article mentioning that one of the most popular tourist attractions in Korea is opening up a venue in Singapore. I had actually heard about the Trick Eye Museum already before and I was thoroughly interested. I remember being blown away by an exhibition portraying paintings by Escher and playing other tricks on audience's perception. Ever since I have wanted to experience more of similar kind of art.

I expected that perhaps a few more might have seen the same story on the paper, but if we were to venture forth early enough on Saturday morning we should be OK, right? While it is still something very new, I expected the hordes would not have found the place yet.

So there I was with my 2 kids standing on a not too long of a queue to the ticket counter. I was wondering why there was two queues, but I decided obviously to choose the shorter one. Once it was my turn to purchase the tickets, the chap at the ticket counter told me matter-of-factly that the waiting time today is 5 to 6 hours. Please proceed to the end of the other queue. Which was outside. With a measly fan moving the hot and humid air around the queue.

I had to make sure I had heard properly. "Yes, 5 to 6 hours today. You may want to try some other day. It might be only 2 hours then". I stared at the guy in disbelief. Then I stared at my 3 year old who was already pretty anxious about the 20 minute wait so far and the heat. Without much hesitation I made a graceful exit from the queue number 1, bought my kids a soda and went back to the taxi stand we just had came from.

Queuing truly seems to be a national past time in Singapore (along with eating, talking about food and spending time in the malls). If there are two similar stalls in a hawker center, the localites seemingly tend to patronize the one with longer queues. I assume the queuers expect they are serving better food since so many other people are already patiently waiting. Something that I still have hard time grasping are the queues of adults waiting for some little cheap plastic toys as part of the kids meal in some fast food chains ("This week only, you can have a purple Hello Kitty which has a tiara! Yay"). It is a common sight that the restaurants list outside which toys are already gone and what can be still purchased. Back in the 5 to 6 hour queue in front of the Museum there were number of families with little ones in prams probably there to get some good exposure and training in proper queuing behaviour.


PS. Finland's about to enter official Summer season and pretty much a period of closure of the full nation for the next ~2 months starting from Mid-Summer festivities this weekend. I just got pinged that it's right now snowing (!) at least in Central Finland. As you can expect, not too many queues in Finland. At least outside. Except always when waiting for a taxi after one of the pre-Christmas parties in the middle of coldest Winter.

Saturday 19 April 2014

One among many

I raised an observation regarding the lack of people on the streets when I visited US briefly last year. That really would not be the case in the most densely populated country in the world. Here you are never alone.

Take a look at a short video clip I put together from various places like Clarke Quay, Vivo City and Expo MRT station:

The music on the video is by Amerigo Gazaway and his excellent Otis Redding flavoured remix of Big Boi's Shutterbug (aptly titled for a purpose of amateur video clips). Song is available from bandcamp.

Thursday 27 March 2014

Never grow up

Greetings from Krabi, Thailand this time around. The beauty of being positioned in Singapore is to have the possibility to make a quick decision to go rock climbing on signature rock formations overlooking Andaman sea. Door-to-door time from a resort near Ao Nang beach to office was 3,5 hours this morning.
I trust I will never be too adult not to get amused by this type of stuff.

Sunday 9 March 2014

In your face, Tokyo

Singapore has done it again. Yet another top of the world position. Not only does the tiny nation have the largest ferris wheel, aquarium and indoor stadium in the world. Also it is already old news that there are most millionaires per capita living in the city of Singapore. A report released this week rated Singapore as the most expensive city to live in. Replacing Tokyo from previous number one position and beating (?) Paris, Oslo, Zurich and Sydney.

One thing that easily helps Singapore in this competition is the concept for Certificate of Entitlement. A special permission must be bought for 10 years at the time to own a private car. Not only are the cars ridiculously expensive to start with, but the new car owner needs to cough 70+ k SGD just for the entitlement to own a car. Personally this doesn't really concern me as it also translates into a metropolitan of 5 million people with no apparent traffic jams to speak about. Seriously now, there is heavier main road congestion in metropolitan Helsinki with measly 1 million people and greatly larger land area. Worth noting also is that the squeaky clean public transportation runs like a charm.

Having just missed my train in Paya Lebar station. But no worries. The next train will arrive in 2 minutes time.


Also the study mentions soaring utility bills as benefactor for the high rating. This is something I can relate to. The utilities (particularly electricity) is relatively expensive. My monthly utility bill varies from 100 SGD to 450 SGD correlating clearly with the amount of air con usage. If memory serves me correctly while in Helsinki, living in a same size apartment I would not expect to pay more than 250 € (~450SGD) a year for the electricity bill!

Finally apartment rental rates are just otherworldly in this most densely populated country in the world (yet another top position by the way). I am paying 3 times more rent that I was paying in the city of Helsinki. Obviously back in Finland I didn't have a vacation resort like yard with no less than 4 separate swimming pools, but still a considerable addition to living expenses.

To be fair, there are plenty of things which are less expensive here than in Finland such as eating in hawker centers, riding taxis, costs of various professional services (haircut at my local low-end barbershop costs 2 SGD a visit). You can see further details in this cost of living comparison web site.

Thursday 27 February 2014

Quick Zhi Ya during lunch break

Over the past 1,5 weeks I have been even more tied with my laptop than normally and finally my lower back started to protest. Today I decided to pick up a quick lunch from the global fast food chain (I had McSpicy because non spicy stuff starts to taste bland) and then head out for 30 minute back massage next to the office. The traditional Chinese massage feels actually often more painful than good while receiving the treatment, however right after the session I could really feel the blood circulation running again. And thus feeling great I returned to my nerdy kingdom and resumed slouching over my laptop.

Sunday 23 February 2014

Effective guards

Is it just me or is this warning sign a bit too definitive. Typically you would expect to see trespassers detained rather than shot at sight.


Sunday 2 February 2014

Galloping into the future

"Meaning of year of the Horse...

The new Moon on January 30 at 11:20 pm PST (but listed as January 31 in many calendars) begins the year of the Wood Horse. Chinese New Year is a spring festival that begins on the second new Moon after Winter Solstice, with the Sun and Moon in Aquarius. This new Moon also starts the month of the Fire Tiger making energy very strong and lively as Horse year begins, a clear departure from the slower energy of the previous Water Snake year 2013.

The Wood Horse year is a time of fast victories, unexpected adventure, and surprising romance. It is an excellent year for travel, and the more far away and off the beaten path the better. Energy is high and production is rewarded. Decisive action, not procrastination, brings victory. But you have to act fast in a Horse year. If you are not 100% secure about a decision, then don’t do it. Events move so quickly in a Horse year that you don’t want to gallop off in the wrong direction."

(source unknown as I received this from a colleague)


Monday 27 January 2014

Autumn is coming?


Unrelated PS. Greetings from Cambodia where I went for a quick weekend trip.  

Friday 17 January 2014

Happy piercings

Yesterday and today mark the celebration of Thaipusam festival especially for the Tamil community in this particular corner of the world. How this celebration shows itself to us outsiders is by parades where the devotees perform a dance as a ceremonial worship of Murugan, the Tamil God of War (I thought it was Kratos). Spectacular part of this festival for the participants is to carry a physical burden or kavadi. Typically this burden is either in a form of carrying a pot of milk or going through pretty gruesome piercing of one's skin with sharp skewers. I'd choose the option with milk any day.

See some examples of kavadi bearers from Kuala Lumpur.