Saturday, May 30, 2009
Returning from Indonesia
After my recent trip to Indonesia, I am thoroughly impressed with the locals and upon my return back to this miserable and materialistic country have seriously begun to despise Singaporeans more and more. Oh I don't hate this country at all, I thoroughly respect the leaders and the country, it's the local populace that I have a grouse with.Let's start with an experience with the local security guards.
The Indonesians earn pittance compared to the salaries that Singaporeans earn, though their standard of living is lower than Singaporeans, their quality of life is much higher. They are happier and more contented, they take their jobs seriously and have a great sense of responsibility and pride in whatever line of work that they do. A typical security guard earns about 500,000 – 600,000 rupiah per month depending on rank and importance of the facility. That's a mere S$75 - $90 in Singapore!!! In contrast, a security guard here easily earns ten times that amount for a less demanding nature of their work.. Which is to park their lazy ass in a booth and grow fat paying close attention to their nails.
The profession of the security guards over there are held in high regard, and throughout my visit, I have only met with very competent and helpful security guards. They are great! Unlike that fat lazy security guards we have in Singapore only concerned with their coffee breaks, taking great interest in their nails, and only capable of bothering playful harmless children crossing their compounds under their guard, in fact security guards here have a constant black face as if the world owes them a living, they are rude, irritating, incompetent, obnoxious, impatient and downright annoying for perfectly legitimate activities by innocent staff or visitors to a compound.
I seriously doubt a security guard in Singapore is able to withstand a dedicated punch or a physical assault in the event of a real scenario or threat. They are definitely not competent in close-combat nor are they trained in martial arts or unarmed combat techniques.
I doubt they are fully trained to respond to a threat scenario, crowd control, fire or natural disaster situation amongst others. Do you truly think a security guard who spends the whole day sitting in a booth staring at his fingers will be able to respond to a threat when the situation arises accordingly? Hell they'll piss in their pants.
Do you have faith in a Singaporean security guard? Do you feel safer with a Singapore security guard? Are you confident in their competence to guard the facility? The recent article in a local university's Chronicle has highlighted the fact that security guards on the school campus are using their service walkie-talkies to chat with each other, listening to music and sleeping on duty!!! The more competent ones are fat, unfit and have trouble hauling their own weight, lumbering about like oversized balloons.
But over there it's a very respected and dignified job, they are highly trained, fully armed (yes some of the guards there are armed with .38 caliber Smith & Wesson revolvers), they look like fully armed policemen instead of security guards. They are constantly on their feet, ready with a metal detector, or a baton, or a mirror to inspect the underneath of a vehicle, or a signaling light-stick to guide traffic, and ever-ready with a whistle to stop traffic for a tourist to cross the road or to hail a taxi for a tourist.
The guards are no push-overs, not skinny nor scrawny, neither are they fat and obese. In fact they are trained for several months in a security guard academy before becoming fully fledged security guards and I believe they are trained in a variety of skills including close-combat, fire-arms and definitely courtesy and language courses in human communication.
They are burly, physically intimidating (look like bouncers in a club) yet courteous, despite the physical nature of their job, they don't put on a constant frown on their faces, their faces are stern and firm but they are always ready to help it is always done with a smile.
They don't sit on their ass-es in a booth, but are always patrolling the premises and standing on guard at the gates of the compounds that they are protecting. Even though they are serious in their line of work, they don't harass nor irritate passer-bys or tourists, and in fact extend a helping hand very willingly and unconditionally when the request is genuine. They can tell if you are there to make trouble, or genuinely asking for directions or wanting to cross the road.
Such situational awareness and courtesy is non-existent in Singaporean security guards. They assume that everyone is here to make trouble and harass or delay a perfectly legitimate request and giving trouble rather than preventing it. And the guards here have poor communication skills, can hardly speak English or communicate effectively at all.
I guess the Indonesians learnt their lesson after two bomb explosions in Bali perpetrated by terrorists. I am in awe and complete respect of the security forces back there, and utterly disgusted with the quality of the guards back in Singapore.
Posted by MK at 12:36 PM
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
In the pursuit of Zen 2
In the pursuit of personal achievement.
Posted by MK at 2:16 PM
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
In the pursuit of Zen
In the pursuit of Zen
Posted by MK at 11:39 AM
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Kampong Glam
Sometimes in search of my heritage, I find myself in weird places that the locals seldom go to. And in the process discover many lost and forgotten about local wonders.
Posted by MK at 1:11 AM
Friday, May 22, 2009
Garage sales
I am selling off some old/used stuff that I've not used due to upgrading and are sitting around collecting dust. Most are still in good condition, and I will be describing the listed item description and some noted faults. Note that I will be listing the noted faults to the best of my knowledge.Interested parties are free to post bids and I'll reserve the item for the highest bidder if there are no bids for the listed item after 24hours.
Please be reasonable with the bids too, not $1 for a monitor etc, and I will reserve the right to or not to sell the item to the person.
As these items have been used and are old, I will give a 3-day personal warranty. If I don't hear from the buyer after 3 days, I will take it that the item(s) are working fine and will not entertain refunds. If the buyer notes faults that are unacceptable within 3 days, I will fully refund the item.
Feel free to look through my garage sale forum in the link below.
Garage sales 2009
old/used Original unreal tournament 2004 game with manual and box
8-lamp flower-design ceiling lamp (all working and dismantled).
Old (unopened, new and unused) Sony Ericsson Bluetooth headset
Old/used Samsung SyncMaster 551s CRT monitor
Brand-new LG Ivory DVD-RW Faceplates.
Brand-new high-quality S-video cable.
LITON High-Quality RGB cables
Watercooling T-connectors
I've got 2 new NALGENE quality T-connectors for sale as well, they are clear and about 4mm internal diameter. Never used before, Lab-grade NALGENE quality, fits 3/8" tubing.
1/2" T-connectors for watercooling
I've got a few industrial black 1/2" T-connectors for sale! These connectors were gotten from an overseas hardwareshop specializing in tubing and cheap too! Brand-new.
Going for sale at $4 each. PM if you are interested! I've got 8 pieces for sale. Initially bought them for my w/c rig. But changed tubing, so not using 1/2" anymore. Fits 1/2" tubing very nicely.
Posted by MK at 12:09 PM
Thursday, May 21, 2009
About GPA Homogenization
During exam period, I had lots of idle brain time to think about many issues that have cropped up in my mind. One of the stark issues that I have a grouse with is about something that I term GPA Homogenization. Is GPA homogenization far?What is GPA homogenization? One might ask. Well GPA is a standard grade that is used to gauge the academic performance of all students in tertiary education. It is calculated in a simple manner as such.
Each module the student takes has an academic weightage. In NTU it's called AU or "Academic Units", for example a very taxing subject such as "Organic Chemistry" has a weightage of 4AU, a simpler elective module has a weightage of 3AU or a really simple module like a laboratory session has a mere weightage of 1AU, in contrast, a heavy industrial attachment easily has a weightage of 10AUs or more and a final year project (FYP) has a weightage of 20-30AUs. A general guideline is that the number of AUs a module has is the number of hours a week that the module entails lessons for. E.g 3AU module = 3 hrs per week, it could be 2hrs for lecture and 1hr for tutorials. So if a student has a 23AU semester, he spends no less than 23hrs a week in class based on time-table. This number doesn't include self-study, extra-lessons, reports, project time and etc etc.
The grade the student achieves for the subject has a value to it, for example an "A+" has a value of 5.0 (max), "A's" give 4.5, B's give 3.0-3.5, C's give 2.0-2.5, D's give 1.0-1.5 and a fail gets a 0 grade.
The GPA is calculated by (module AU x module grade) / total modules taken. Let's explore an example, let's say student X takes 4 modules, each with a weightage of 3AUs, so he's total AU taken for that semester is 4x3 = 12AUs. If he get's B's for all the subjects, that's [4 modules x (3AU x 3.0) ]/ 12 (total AUs taken) = 3.0GPA. Which is pretty straightforward so far.
Lets say the same student gets 2 A's and 2 B's, so
{ [2 x (3AU x 4.0) ] + [ 2 x (3AU x 3.0) ] } / 12 = 3.5 GPA.
Now what is GPA homogenization?
Lets take 2 students, one in engineering, taking very heavy academic subjects with over 21AUs per semester, (it can be up to 23-26AUs), with five or more core subjects of 4AU or more in weightage.
And let's take another student in business school, doing a mere 14-18 (16 on average) AU per semester with less weighty subjects of 3AUs each. (an example would be economics as compared to Applied Physics).
The student spends much less time studying for less subjects which in turn are less academically demanding and heavy and as a result, able to focus and concentrate on lesser subjects, which translates to a better academic performance per module. So lets say this student gets an A for all the subjects during his/her semester and gets a 4.0GPA.
What about the engineering student who works just as hard, if not harder? Engineering subjects are extremely time-consuming to understand and assignments and tutorials are very mentally taxing. Engineering modules in general require much more time to study and understand in depth as compared to a business module and not to mention the modules have a greater weightage, require more time and are very academically heavy. A student can study all day for his/her 23AUs and still not get A's for the subject due to the bell curve for the entire engineering cohort.
So lets say this engineering student studies 45 hours a week on top of class schedule of 23 hours, and gets B's for all his 5-6 heavy-weighted core subjects (which is actually rather good), he still only scores a 3.0GPA. As compared to a student from business school who say, studies 30 hours a week and scores a 4.0GPA
So the engineering student gets 3.0GPA and the business student gets 4.0GPA. Does this mean that the engineering student is LAZY? Or Stupid? Or Can't-be-bothered? Does that mean the business student is SMART-er? Clever-er? More hardworking?
On paper yes, but if you break down the individual components as I have, you would see that that's not true. The engineering student worked just as hard or harder but did not get the same recognition as the business student and this is the first level of judgment that the outside world has of any graduate.
So the engineering student got a 2nd-class honors and the business student got a 1st class, so that means the business student is smarter or more hardworking right? It might make sense and sound logical, but that would be a very myopic view of the academic system.
I am merely citing an example between an average/general business vs engineering student and not suggesting condescending remarks to either party both ways. If insulting insinuations can be inferred from my text written above, it is not meant to be. This is merely an example of what I term "GPA homogenization" and can be applied to any student from any school anywhere which uses GPA as an academic gauge.
GPA is a convenient way for academic authorities to gauge student performances, but it is NOT a fair way of judgment at all. I am sure for all the brains and PhDs in renown institutions all around the world, there can be a fairer way of academic judgment. But until then, GPA is still used as the academic gauge in institutions all around the world.
But then again, my thoughts could be flawed and myopic in itself if the system has been in place for so long without review or question by higher-authorities, and I am open to suggestions of improvement or critique to supplement my current understanding.
Posted by MK at 2:12 PM
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Transformers thumbdrive
This is uber cool! Sure, you already have piles of flash drives scattered around your apocalyptic nightmare of an apartment,
This is a Transformer-- Ravage, AKA Tripredacus Agent. Ravage has outlived the age of cassette and is onto smaller, better things, and he can store up to 2GB of your most valuable data. He's going to run $42.99 when he's available in September, and can be pre-ordered now.
Posted by MK at 10:46 AM
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
GL SPnight prototype!
This NUEVE V Foc camp is going to be interesting, for SP night we're going to make a large heart-shaped balloon structure and us ACGLs spent the day today working on the prototype, and I must say we're quite pleased with the end result!
ACGLs lead the way!
Posted by MK at 8:43 PM
Monday, May 18, 2009
Chiller reservoir
Today we continued to work on the chiller reservoir. We made very good progress today with his new coolermaster Xeon copper heatsinks and finally decided which container to use as a reservoir. We'll be using my PolyPropylene container since it fits the heatsinks very nicely. The heatsinks look to be of very good quality but the fins are not skived but soldered on. Nevertheless shouldn't affect performance too much.The whole assembly was mocked up and we got to fix on the high-power Minebea fan and look at it in operation. Very good progress today even though nothing was actually fabricated yet.
A single cooling tower with a copper heatsink base and 4-heatpipe HSF assembly.
Reservoir mock-up
Temperature sensor and display
Fitting the cooling towers into the PP reservoir
Testing the Minebea-fan cooling tower assembly.
Posted by MK at 8:03 PM
Friday, May 15, 2009
It's a GL thing!
All the ACGLs (assistant-chief GLs) and GLs of NUEVE V 2009 camp meet up today for a pre-camp cohesion and refresher. A very fruitful day.
GLs leading the way for the freshies of 2009!
Posted by MK at 10:40 AM
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Finished another rig
Finally finished a rig for one of my clients. A medium-low end gaming rig. Did up cable-management and sound-proofing, then overclocked to 3.2ghz quite. Quite happy with the final outcome.
Sound-absorbant padding on the base.
Cable-management to the rear.
Cable management and sleeving can be a real pain.
