Post New Year

Post Chinese New Year, feels much like the impending sense of doom felt after X'mas, or the ominous feeling of apocalypse one gets from realizing that life will go back to the way it used to be. I'm starting to just get a taste of all that.

Oh cock! some might exclaim. yes while the boys get a 'welcome to the jungle' surprise when they head to their field camps and the girls go back to their 9-5 white-collar desk jobs, i once again find myself irreversibly stuck at home, as if waiting for some form of miracle to occur miraculously, albeit sounding ironically paradoxical.

The highlight of the New Year shall i say, is the absolutely horrendous experience while being jammed into a train carriage like a can of sardines at peak hour. i had absolutely no intentions of traveling during peak hours during CNY, however some strange tradition has dictated that we should all gather for a meal some time around the evening, shall we say six-ish to seven-ish. that does not leave much of a window for one to procure a form of transit from the place of his residence to the place of the congregation, where the ingestion of food in the company of several dozen other people usually takes place - be it someone's lovely home or a distant, un-homely, rented venue.

One might think arriving in style in a chauffeured vehicle (a.k.a a cab) might be the way to go, if one finds that he's too young to be at the helm of a road legal vehicle, or simply can't be bothered to commandeer a vehicle. however that is not the case as i have unfortunately discovered - it turned out to be quite a pricey affair considering the amount of surcharges available during peak hours and festive seasons for one to fancy.

By now you might be thinking of a more affordable form of mass transport - the inaptly named MRT which stands for Mass Rapid Transit. Now there are several flaws i am obliged to point out at this point about the coining of the name MRT.

Number one: the M in MRT is absolutely rubbish. in every country i have been to, no matter what it is called, the train carriages never seem to have enough space nor seats for anybody. the company responsible has to understand that the population demographics does not stay stagnant over time. therefore it only makes sense to keep expanding the number of carriages on each train to accommodate for a growing population, and not have someone's sweaty or smelly armpits shoved in your face every time the train lurches forward or stops abruptly.

Number two: the R in MRT seems to be a gross understatement. when there are ten million people squeezed into the carriage, the thing inevitably slows down to the speed of a snail. not to mention the train seem to intentionally go slower on rainy days. is it just me or do people actually think that pedestrians are actually gonna suddenly start climbing all the way onto the track just to catch the driver off guard on a rainy day trying to drive a little bit faster. or it's not like if the train slowed down a bit on a rainy day we'd all be overjoyed in the cabin thinking we are in safe hands because if something happens we're gonna be able to brake in time to stop. the fact is, it's a train. trains don't stop for obstacles, they usually run them over before they realized there was an obstacle.

And what's with the renaming to SMRT? does it make them sound SM(A)RT-er? i don't think so. the only word i can think of that jusifies the S in front of MRT is "Shit-fuck". but then again, you cannot shit and fuck at the same time.

and there u have it, some fond memories of chinese new year



cheers!