Magna Carta: Tears of BLood

Replaying one of my old PS2 games. Still the same opinion. Storyline is good, but it's a game where guys have boobs and girls have bigger and drooping boobs ie character design is lousy. Well, at least the game designers did not forget there is such a thing as gravity.

o.O

Food Culture

Haha... If my mom knows I'm still blogging instead of getting my sorry arse out of the house to shop, she'll probably nag at me. I need a pair of jeans.

There was an interesting article on food in my bro's copy of Time magazine so I thought I'd just laze my afternoon away reading that. What really caught me was the article on the many different flavours Maggi actually produces for different countries. By different flavours, I meant a singular product with subtle differences in tastes, intended for sale in different countries.

Of course, I have suspected the food industry of so-called "localising" their products. It was evident when I went Japan. Pocky sticks there are delicious; the biscuits are lighter and crunchier compared to the Thai import we get from NTUC. Qoo is less sweet in Japan (more suited to my taste) than the Singapore version (no longer available in the S'pore market). And if you go to Candy Empire at Vivo City, the KitKat's from Australia, better tasting than the Thai import you get from NTUC. Even Milo from Nestle Australia tastes different from, again, the Thai import.

Sure you have to pay a higher price for the Australian or Japanese variants, but it's value for money if you can afford to pay for it. Anyway, it's sad we do not have the Singapore variant for many of the products. Guess it's just not economical to localise anything for a small country. After all, we are slowly acclimatising to the Thai taste so why bother...

Some Updates

Have not been blogging regularly, so here's some updates on what is going and had gone on recently...

I passed my pharmacy competency test. Yah, and as Tytianne and Yun put it, I am certified competent for another year.

Drank chilled sake with Yun and Tytianne. It was not much but I still end up turning red. Then again, I have an impaired acetaldehyde dehydrogenase system, so no matter what I do I'll still end up being a tomato...

Managed to help my dad paint the house for 4 consecutive Sundays. It was tiring trying to paint textured walls. My house walls, including the ceiling, all have the orange peel/ splatter texture. It is more difficult to get an even coat of paint, and the higher surface area meant we had to use more paint. Really not a joke when you have to do a double coating.

I finally received the pay the hospital owed me. Felt a little rich for the time being, but seeing the Great Singapore Sale is on, think I'll be made poorer. Think I'll stockpile on my toiletries while the GSS is here.

If You Have...

包包脸, then you've got to use 包 - Essence. Man, can't they at least get somebody who can pronounce properly to do the ad...

Yeah!!

We've finally finished painting the house... well, not the whole house. There's still the balcony, but that's just a small area and wouldn't take more than 2 hours to finish. :D

It was tiring, but it was fun too.

Misconception

If you have read the Straits Times yesterday, you will know news about our healthcare system appeared on the front page yet again. It was talking about how people with means to stay in B2 class and above are choosing to stay in C class wards thus increasing the financial burden on the restructured hospitals.

Somebody, can't remember who, commented that people are choosing to stay in C class wards because people progressively realised healthcare cost in Singapore is "expensive". This is just plain b***s***. What Singaporeans do not realise is our healthcare cost is actually very affordable for the majority sans those who fall into the lower income bracket, and those whose conditions require the use of expensive medicine/ treatment. Comparing with other countries such as US and those in Europe, our healthcare cost is a laughing matter.

A course of amoxycillin 500mg 3 times a day for 5 days cost about $1.50 in restructured hospitals and polyclinics. In US, it will cost about US$10-15. Ignoring the fact that USD is bigger in value than S$, just comparing the numerical value it is already about 6-10 times more expensive just to get a course of antibiotics in US than in Singapore.

Of course, not all medicine are that cheap. I work in pharmacy, I know better. However, just how many percent of Singaporeans actually had no choice but requires the use of expensive medicines that can amount to a few hundred dollars per month? Just look around you. How many people do you know have chronic/ end stage renal failure requiring erythropoeitin injections to boost their red blood cells production? How many do you know (besides Andrea de Cruz) have undergone organ transplant requiring expensive immunosuppressants to prevent organ rejection?

The majority of us Singaporeans really have no grounds to complain about the cost.