mrbrown.com

Audio: Minister Midas and the Say No to Singlish hotline

Minister Midas Jin Jue Lui weighs in on the Singlish debate.

Anchor link: https://anchor.fm/w/a10d8e

the mrbrown show: Kim Huat Learns About Littering

Kim Huat gets learns a lesson about littering from his niece.

YoutTube link: https://youtu.be/cUP24PoIv1w

No news like tree news

Two tree branches fall down and never hit anyone and never hit anything also can be news.

New rules for cyclists and PMD users

Caption: The Author at OCBC Cycle in 2015.

The LTA has released their Rules and Code of Conduct for cyclists and users of electric bicycles and Personal Mobility Devices (PMD). I thought all in all, this was a fairly reasonable approach. You can see the document here. Based on the Recommendation Paper by the Active Mobility Advisory Panel.

In summary:
Bicycles: footpaths, cycling paths and roads can.
Electric Bicycles: footpaths cannot, cycling paths and roads can.
PMDs like e-scooters: footpaths and cycling paths can, roads cannot.

Footpath speeds are limited to 15km/h and cycling path speeds are limited to 25km/h.

I am glad they took electric bicycles off the footpaths. Also good, more stringent specs for what constitutes an electric bicycle (must be pedal-assist only, less than 20kg, max 250W electric motor, below 25km/h, must comply with European Standard, EN15194). This removes the electric motorbikes from the equation.

Also interesting are the allowed specs for e-scooters: Below 20kg, below 70cm in width and no faster than 25km/h. This kills off the huge e-scooters that can go at silly speeds like Inokims and Zoom Airs. They have a non-exhaustive list of the non-approved scooters here.

Two abreast cycling is now allowed on roads with at least two lanes in the same direction, except roads with bus lanes during bus lane hours.

Lights are now required for front and back, and switched on during darkness (it used to be just reflectors needed only). This applies to bicycles, e-bikes and PMDs. I support this wholeheartedly.

All this talk about cycling is making me reminisce about cycling in Portland last year in September. I miss Portland. And cycling in Amsterdam and Denmark too.

This was Portland in September 2015:

This was in Copenhagen in May 2015:

Kim Huat Live: The English Dictionary

Kim Huat on Facebook Live: News of the Day, 17 May 2016. Kim Huat discusses the new entries into the Oxford English Dictionary.

YouTube link: https://youtu.be/QY08VtzNIOI

Our little island city state

"Papa, where we live now, is it city or countryside?" the kids asked me yesterday.

I replied, "Singapore is a city state, kids. We have no countryside or suburbia. And even if we do, it will eventually become city too. We only have Urban, Almost Urban, and Punggol.

Actually, on hindsight, we do have a countryside. But you only get to enjoy it for 3 months when you serve NS.

(No, that's not were we live, we were just visiting friends. But Photos By Me.)

Going brown

This is true. But once you go brown, you never go back.

Thou Shalt Teach Thy Kids To Be Mobile Phone Bill-savvy

The kids’ mobile bills went slightly over free limit this month. I launched into a lecture on the Unholy Trinity of Mobile Phone Fees that telcos love to charge you for, when you overuse any one of them: Voice, SMS and Data.

These are things they don’t teach in school.

You don’t learn this until you pay for the mobile bill yourself and get bill shock either because you have been making calls from the mobile phone even though you have a perfectly fine landline at home. Or streaming video or music on the road. Or engaging in a massive SMS chat. Or downloading stupid videos on Whatsapp, or worse, sending them to friends.

For example, the kids get 150 free minutes a month, incoming. I asked them to calculate how many minutes they would use a month if they used their mobile phones 10 minutes a day for 30 days.

“300 minutes,” they replied.

“That’s 150 minutes over the free calls you get a month, right?” I said.

The 13-year-old and the 11-year-old looked a bit shocked.

“See? It adds up. Five minutes here, five minutes there, and soon, you will be paying for some telco CEO’s sports car,” I told them.

“Repeat after me, I will use the home landline when I am at home, and not call from my mobile phone.”

The kids repeated after me, “I will use the home landline when I am at home, and not call from my mobile phone.”

“And what do you do if your friend keeps on talking even though you say you’ve got to go?” I declared.

“Hang up on them, Papa.”

“Correct. Because as long as your friend keeps blabbering on over the mobile phone, who pays?”

“We do,” the kids replied.

“Indeed. You will pay. And you will pay dearly, Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock,” I said.

I sent them out to the world with this mission: “Your goal is to ensure I don’t see anything other than $0.00 in the Usage Charges column of my phone bill.”

Teach them early. Teach them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess inside.

And how much moolah they will have to cough up the next time they overshoot the limits.

P.S. Tell the telco to cancel the bloody voice mail service. Every missed call that ends up there is a chargeable call. Who uses Voice Mail these days lah.


This article originally appeared on my Medium blog.

Audio: Minister Midas on the Bukit Batok By-Election

Minister Midas Jin Jue Lui addresses the nation after the Bukit Batok By-Election.

Anchor link: https://anchor.fm/w/a06840

Not a political post

If Murali wins, I am leaving the country.
If Chee wins, I am leaving the country.
This is not a political post.
I just want to travel.

May the Labour be with You

Son: "Why can't we go out today?"

Me: "You have to revise for exams."

Son: "Then what's the use of Labour Day?"

Me: "Work. Because that's what Labour means."