Passengers pushing the MRT emergency button

Posted on April 20, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Explain when train’s emergency button can be used’, 18 April 2013 and ‘Emergency button not for those caught between train doors?’, 19 April 2013,  ST Forum

(Terence Teoh Pin Quan): ON TUESDAY night, I was taking the south-bound MRT train towards Ang Mo Kio. At Yio Chu Kang station, a woman asked for help in a desperate tone, then pressed the emergency button on the train. I realised that an elderly man had his arm caught between the train doors. The doors did not re-open after the usual few seconds, and his arm was stuck for about a minute.

When the doors did open, the old man entered the train and was unharmed. However, an SMRT staff member came and demanded to know who had pressed the button.

When the woman owned up, he asked in frustration: “Why you press the button?” Later, when the train stopped at Ang Mo Kio station, the woman was detained and further questioned. Thankfully, another man stood up for her. When is the right time to press the emergency button? If someone gets caught between the train doors, are we supposed to wait until the train starts moving before we press the button?

Perhaps SMRT can clarify the protocol for using the emergency button.

(Lydia Fung): …I was caught between the train doors on the Circle Line last year. A woman inside the train tried to pull me in. I asked her to press the emergency button, but she said the button was not for this purpose, and that there was a hefty fine for indiscriminately pressing it.

I lodged a complaint after I got off the train at Paya Lebar station, but was told that the train was fully automated with no driver, and that there were cameras to alert staff to emergencies. I received a call from SMRT a week later, telling me the same thing. I asked that the public be educated on the usage of the emergency button, but nothing has been done.

The advice given in the SMRT Rider Guide website is that you may push the button (or technically the ECB, Emergency Communication Button) if you get caught between doors while ON the train, and assures us that the train would not move when doors are not fully closed. In the first case, the elderly man appears to be outside the train when his arm got clamped. Judging by the seniority of the victim and the probability of him having a heart condition, pushing the panic button seems to be the instinctive thing to do.  Strangely enough, in 1991, a passenger was lauded as ‘quick-thinking’ for pressing the ECB when a woman’s HANDBAG got caught between doors (MRT slams on handbag, 23 Dec 1991, ST). It appears that there are times when an inanimate object deserves more attention than a living person’s limb.

Sometimes, it’s actually better to alert the staff through the ECB than try to be a hero yourself. Last year, an elderly woman who got clamped got a ‘large piece of skin RIPPED OFF’ when commuters struggled to free her. In 1988, the button was expected to bring the train to a stop for children who failed to board the train after their parents.  One complained about a rude SMRT officer for not understanding the gravity of having left a 6-year old behind on the platform. It was an ‘emergency’ because a helpless child without a parent could have been ‘SCARED TO DEATH’. (See below for SMRT’s U-turn on ‘lost child’ policy) Most emergency hotlines are deliberately vague on examples of situations that warrant activation, because anyone can argue that something needs urgent attention as long as it happens to them.  I, for one, would sooner die of embarrassment if I were caught spreadeagled and squashed in the groin by the jaws of death before anyone would come to my rescue.

SMRT has also used button-pushing to explain ‘longer travelling times’ in a series of tweets in 2012.  A spokesperson also suggested that the button may be activated solely by people LEANING on it. With the crowds these days and the impending free ride morning rush, I’m hardly surprised. To some freeloaders, NOT getting to the gantry by 7.45 am to earn your free ride is a serious emergency indeed. But aside from people suddenly collapsing and carriages catching fire, you MAY push the button under certain special circumstances without a SMRT warden scuttling over demanding “WHY YOU PRESS BUTTON?!’ with a wagging white-gloved finger.

- When a glass panel breaks

- This excruciating scenario:

Apparently not urgent enough to let go of your Old Chang Kee

- When there’s FIGHTING over people flouting No Eating on Train laws. (However, in a 2009 poll, 52% of commuters voted NO to pushing the button when there appears to be an ASSAULT, especially if it’s gang related, not so much because of the fear of being fined $5000, but of becoming the next target in a gang raid).

- When someone looks like a terrorist about to bomb the train. In the same poll above, 51% would report a ‘suspicious character on board’. I highly doubt it though. I see suspicious characters all the time; they carry dangerous construction tools, smell bad, speak in coded language and nobody ever whispers into the ECB that there is a terrorist insurgence on board.

- When the train breaks down and you need to ‘talk to the train officer’. Unfortunately some commuters take train delays as reason enough to push the button and demand to know what’s going on, inadvertently worsening delays. A $5000 fine is well deserved for such counterproductive kancheong-ness. If Sticker Lady Samantha Lo had targetted ECB buttons instead of traffic lights, she could have saved us all a hell lot of time.

Don’t press until shiok, can

- When your lost child is trapped on the train. In 2012, Senior Manager Bernadette Low responded to a parent whose kid ran into a train without her by THANKING a female passenger for pushing the ECB so that the two can be reunited. Try explaining that to your boss if you’re late for a very important meeting. I think such parents need to pay a nominal ‘Lost and Found’ fee at least if it affects hundreds of passengers. Especially if it costs them a free ride.

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Filed under: 1980s, 1990s, 2013, MRT, Violence | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

Kallang literally means ‘colder’ in Chinese

Posted on December 7, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Keep it in English or all four languages’, 7 Dec 2012, ST Forum, and ‘Chinese tourists need Mandarin station names’, 3 Dec 2012, Voices, Today.

(Kimberly Lim): I BECAME aware of the Mandarin in-train MRT service announcements on Monday. I have reservations against this for two reasons. First, it gives the impression that Mandarin takes precedent over the other official languages.

Second, the translation appears to have been a hasty job. For example, “Kallang” is translated literally to mean “colder”. Translating the name to one that sounds similar to a station’s English name would make it easier for commuters to identify the stations, but it would risk ridicule among Mandarin-speaking foreigners.

SMRT should make such announcements in English only or use all four official languages.

(Elaine Luo): …Recently, two Chinese tourists asked me for directions to “Duo mei ge” station, referring to Dhoby Ghaut MRT station. When I said that they must take a train to City Hall MRT station and transfer to the North-South line, they gave me a blank look.

I did not know at the time how to translate “City Hall” into Mandarin. Granted, they could have used the brochures and asked for directions using the station numbers instead, but they were tourists trying to navigate their way around a new place. They probably thought that Chinese-Singaporeans would be able to assist them with the translation. However, we in Singapore are so accustomed to using English that many of us do not see the need to know the station names in another language.

I believe that most Indonesian tourists here, even if they have difficulty understanding English, are probably better able to read and pronounce the station names, as Bahasa and English use the same alphabet. This is not the case for the Chinese language. English and Mandarin words are dissimilar and translating the words may be more of a necessity.

Chinese station names have been confusing and tickling Chinese-speaking Singaporeans for years, although they were intended to aid the elderly according to a recent SMRT explanation. Commuters in the past have complained that the translations never made sense, whether it’s Somerset’s ‘Rope Beauty Stuffing’, Buona Vista’s meaningless and hyper-syllabic phonetic translation, or the confusion between Woodlands and Woodleigh. But even without additional languages, the selection of English names alone can be bewildering to many.

Take Farrer Road and Farrer Park. I was once asked by a stranger if the Circle Line went to Farrer Road, and had to double-check because at the back of my mind I knew there was a Farrer PARK served by NEL. So even if I had bothered to memorise every station name in Chinese, chances are I could have still sent a tourist on a wild goose chase. Imagine if I had to recall what Farrer Park was in Chinese, differentiate it from the other Farrer station, before giving the right answer. If a Chinese tourist asked me if I knew how to get to ‘Hai Jun Bu’ (Admiralty), I’d give a blank stare too, and wonder what someone from China would want with our Navy headquarters.

Thank God I’d only need to describe the Circle Line as ‘Orange Line’, rather than ‘Yuan Quan (圆圈) Line’ (some would argue it’s not even in a loop). Then again, even SMRT can mess up the colour coding sometimes. First conceived in the eighties, colour coding was meant for the ‘less-educated’. Today, if SMRT went ahead to approve the use of all 4 official languages, they may apply to EVERYONE. Also, you’d have people complaining about announcements being too noisy, or zealous Good Samaritans accusing SMRT of not doing enough for the deaf, blind, colour-blind, dyslexics or people inflicted with a neurological disease where they can only read words backwards and not forwards.

It took SMRT more than 20 years to decide on Mandarin station announcements. In 1985, the MRT Corporation was blasted by the public for using only English station signs. Four years later, there were calls to include Mandarin announcements to ‘familiarise commuters with station names in Mandarin’, as well as cater to China and Taiwan tourists. 20 years would have been more than enough time to figure out if Mandarin announcements were really necessary, whether the elderly prefer to say ‘Buona Vista’ instead of the mouthful ‘Bo Na Wei Si Da’. And yet, critics today continue to hound SMRT despite them responding to customer feedback from the eighties, some arguing that it’s unfair to single out Chinese among the other languages, others ranting about the pandering to PRCs, or those suddenly realising that some of the Chinese translations are nonsensical when they have been there all along.

Sure you can’t please everyone, but at least attempt to convince us that spending money on voiceovers actually  makes a difference rather than tarring the elderly and uneducated with the same brush. Just don’t let this be another excuse for ‘fare adjustments’.  Wait, they have the China worker strikes for that already.

Filed under: 1980s, 2012, Foreign workers, It Should Have Been.., Money, MRT, Names, Noise, PRCs, Public works, Tourists | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

The Case of the open MRT train door

Posted on June 23, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘So, was door of moving train open?’, article by Rachel Chang, 22 June 2012, ST

TRAIN operator SMRT has assured passengers that its trains will not be able to move off if the doors are not properly closed. This is in response to a picture posted online of a train supposedly running with one of its doors open.

‘We wish to reassure commuters that the MRT system is built with many fail-safe features to ensure passenger safety,’ the company said in a statement yesterday. SMRT also said it has looked into the matter and questioned the veracity of the picture.

…It also said that Ms Samantha Francis (content producer of STOMP), 23, who claimed to have taken the picture at Lakeside MRT station on Tuesday night, was not actually at the MRT station that day. This assertion is based on CCTV footage and Ms Francis’ ez-link card details, it added.

In the statement, an SMRT spokesman also said that the railings of the train tracks visible in the picture do not match those at Lakeside MRT.

No Open Door Policy

You know a nation is deprived of worthy news when it is gripped by something like a train door refusing to close, sensationalising it to a ‘mystery’ and ‘web of intrugue’ of detective story proportions. People seem more interested in knowing if (Oops!) SMRT did it again, rather than speculating why rich foreigners are falling more than 50 floors to their grisly deaths off Skypark, Marina Bay Sands. Where were the CCTVs then? Since Stomp’s Samantha has stepped up to defend allegations of duping the nation and no record of her presence was found, it’s either she got the station wrong, or she’s a shape-shifting vampire who can pass through gantries undetected and whose image evades video capture. That at least explains why she works for a soul-sucking website that encourages and rewards the shaming of innocent people in public, even if some ‘content’ turn out to be hoaxes like ‘Woman combs armpit hair on MRT’.

 In all these years in service, SMRT has accepted partial responsibility for crushing people on the tracks, apologised for breakdowns, lapses in security against Swiss graffitti artists, overcrowded trains and platforms , but fully stands by the mechanics of their train doors. Perhaps the fact that they’re are so good at clamping objects like grocery bags adds further support to use ‘fail-safes’ as a valid reason to question Samantha’s snapshot as physically impossible. It’s also the last saving grace for SMRT; they’ve had their share of cable tie, signal and power cable woes, even their escalators occasionally fall apart,  but hey, at least their  DOORS are still fully functional.

Fail-safe but not fruit-safe

Or are they? In 2010, SMRT conceded that the doors CAN OPEN A BIT when on the move, creating a maximum allowable gap of 10cm. Called a ‘push-back’ device, this is useful in a situation where things get trapped, like say the bag of fruits above. Is it then physically possible for a few strong men to overcome the opposing push-pull forces and pry a door open by more than 10cm? Judging by how someone had to break a window during the North-South Line breakdown for air, probably not. But curiously enough, this isn’t the first time that someone has complained of train doors opening in between stations, with SMRT again raising the guardian spectre that is the ‘fail-safe’ mechanism in their statement in 2010:

The train has been withdrawn from service and we are currently performing checks,’ the spokesman said, adding that all LRT trains are equipped with fail-safe features to ensure passenger safety. For example, a system ensures that trains will not be able to move off if the train doors are not properly closed.

Treating a hidden set of levers and pistons as a PR fairy godmother who comes to your rescue aside, what’s important here is nobody fell out of the gaping hole, if it in fact existed. And like their motto of ‘Moving People’ suggests, SMRT should do the same for this matter, do the necessary service checks and everybody just MOVE on already. If there’s anything good coming about this, no matter what the outcome and whether Ms Francis keeps her job, it’s that you’ll think twice before leaning against train doors, and especially think twice before posting anything from Stomp on Facebook.

Postscript: SPH editor in chief Patrick Daniel eventually apologised to SMRT for what turned out to be firstly a photo deliberately taken out of context (it was believed to be taken at a terminal station instead of actually moving) and a brazen attempt by Samantha Francis to con SMRT, resulting in her sacking. But what’s worrying about this case is the source of the photo, which Samantha claims to be taken off Twitter. Let’s hope it remains a microblogging tool rather than a microstomping one.

Filed under: 2000s, 2010, 2012, Bloggers, MRT | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

My grandfather road vandalised

Posted on June 4, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘My grandfather road vandal arrested’, 4 June 2012, article in asiaone.com

Police have arrested a 25-year-old woman who is believed to have vandalised several roads in Singapore. Between May 17 to 21 this year, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) saw that the words “MY GRANDFATHER ROAD” were painted along Robinson Road and Maxwell Road and reported the matter to the Police.

It also reported that circular stickers printed with captions were pasted on a pavement around Lau Pa Sat and on a road traffic sign along Robinson Road. The female suspect was arrested at her residence in the eastern part of Singapore on June 3. The officers also found several paint-stained stencils and several pieces of stickers printed with captions. These items were seized for investigation.

Investigation is ongoing. The police are also working with LTA on earlier reports of round stickers found affixed on other pedestrian crossings at various places.

The case is classified as Vandalism under Section 3 of the Vandalism Act, Chapter 341. A person who is convicted for the offence shall be punished with a fine not exceeding $2,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding to 3 years and shall be liable to caning subjected to the Criminal Procedure Code 2010.

Sins of the Grandfather

Spray painting a road may land you 3 YEARS in jail and a severe beating, but knocking over someone while drunk driving and splattering someone’s BLOOD all over the road gives you a miserable SIX months sentence, or a fine between $1000 and $5000. So, the police have spent the past month tracking down someone placing stickers on pedestrian crossing buttons, while elsewhere cyclists and joggers are being mowed down by maniac drivers.  Instead of monitoring speedsters, they’re keeping their eyes peeled for sticker vandals, who do nothing more than kill pedestrians’ time, not kill THEM unlike some nuisance drivers we know.

The colloquialism ‘My grandfather’s road’ has been used since the eighties, often used to describe motorists taking their own sweet time on the roads, or road-hoggers. In this case, the phrase could also double up as a visual protest against people who think they ‘own the road’ so they could streak about in the early wee hours in their Ferraris. Just a couple of days back, the ST ran a piece on these mystery ‘Press until Shiok’ stickers, that these  antics were ‘to the amusement’ of Singaporeans, with some speculating that it could be a smart ‘guerilla marketing’ campaign. One interviewee remarked that this shows ‘the vibrant culture of Singapore and a let-your-hair-down attitude’. More like ‘let-your-pants-down for a whipping’ attitude. It almost sounded light hearted and did not end in the typically admonishing ‘Anyone with information on the culprit are to report to the police immediately’.  Next thing you know, the one putting a smile on people’s faces with catchy slogans and making Singapore ‘hip’ again is being hauled to court for vandalising public property. Well thanks a lot, Straits Jinx. Don’t ever attempt to act cool again.

The ‘grandfather road’ vandal brings to mind the ‘white elephant’ incident at Buangkok MRT, where cut outs were put up to mock the two-year delay in the opening of Buangkok MRT station. It remains unknown as to who was ultimately responsible for this ‘outdoor protest’, though it was reported that a ‘veteran grassroots leader’ was behind it and his identity remains protected till this day.  The blatant symbolism seemed to prick the conscience of the authorities that they forgot about the elephant displays being vandalism at all. Instead the police had to investigate if there had been any breach of the ‘Public Entertainments and Meetings Act’. Which means if you’re sticking it to the authorities though a piece of art, you’re ‘protesting’ without a permit. If you’re just trying to be funny with some stencils and stickers, you’re a menace to society.

A couple of years back, the Speak Good English campaign embarked on their own spate of state endorsed ‘vandalism’, putting ugly sticky notes on lampposts and hawker centre tables to instruct people on on speaking properly. So if it’s for a ‘good cause’ and you have a permit, marring the urban landscape is OK, but not if you’re a street artist inspired by the ‘functional’ landscape graffiti of Banksy. With an actual sense of humour. You can’t even walk around with a piece of chalk these days without a cop telling you to stay away from roads and buildings, as if you were in possession of a stick of dynamite instead.

Postcript: Fast turning out to be a anti-establishment cult heroine, ‘Sticker Lady’ is actually Samantha Lo, artist and founder of online magazine RCGNTN. Her Pinterest is still available for viewing, where she appears to have a special interest in typography. Also see the rest of her ‘Press’ series (Tumblr disabled), including ‘Anyhow Press Police Catch’, ‘Press for Nirvana’ and ‘Everything Also Press’. OK I made the last one up.

Then there’s the question of whether My Grandfather Road is considered ‘art’ at all. According to a ST Forum writer and SOTA student Darshini Ramiah (Suspect art has no value, 9 June 2012, ST Forum):

While the works are humorous, parodying Singaporean culture and Singlish, they seem to have no value whatsoever. Furthermore, the removal of the ‘art’ from public property involved spending money, time and effort.

While the suspect’s intentions may have been light-hearted, she appears to have had no consideration for the impact that her work may have caused. Art should serve to enhance and better a community. But the suspect’s work seems to be nothing more than a tongue-in-cheek attempt to garner public attention.

The writer fails to mention what is considered ‘proper’ art and how this makes a community ‘better’, using vague words like ‘value’ and ‘enhance’ without explaining why art MATTERS. Value, like art, is subjective and in order to argue if what Sticker Lady did has any ‘value’ in the very mundane sense of dollars and cents, consider if anyone will purchase any of her sticker creations after her conviction (It would probably sell like Hello Kitty plush toys). In terms of more abstract ‘value’, her ‘tongue-in-cheek’ humour may have made someone’s day, or made people conscious of their furious but useless pedestrian button pressing, i.e altered someone’s behavior, at least temporarily.  In contrast, an almost blank piece of canvas may be clamoured to death as a timeless masterpiece, but if it leaves a viewer nonchalant and deemed as mere wall filler, how does it ‘enhance’ the community, despite being extremely ‘valuable’? Does ‘Brother Cane’ and its pubic hair snipping have any ‘value’? When Josef Ng broke the law (for public indecency) staging the act, like how Samantha Lo committed an offence (defacing public property), does it mean that the original Brother Cane wasn’t art?

Sticker Lady was eventually charged with mischief in late March 2013, in which the maximum penalty is one year’s jail and a fine. It was revealed that one of Lo’s creations was labelled ‘So Kancheong For What’. Though it was placed near a pedestrian crossing, I wonder if she was really referring to the government asking us to have more babies.

Filed under: 1980s, 2000s, 2010, 2012, Art, Environment, Fun and games, Justice system/Lawsuits, Motorists, MRT, Pedestrians, Police officers, Public works, Singlish/Broken english | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | 38 Comments »

Children getting maimed by escalators

Posted on March 31, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ’4-year-old’s hand torn after being pushed down MRT escalator’, 31 March 2012, article in asiaone.com

A four-year-old boy was pushed down the escalator at Ang Mo Kio MRT station, causing his left hand to get caught in the escalator and badly injuring it. The news first broke when Ms Visa Lee, who put up a Facebook post showing a photograph of the boy’s hand torn and bloody, called for help sharing the picture to locate witnesses for the accident.

According to reports, Lucas Xie was with his brother and maid going down the escalator when he was shoved from behind. He lost his footing and landed on his left hand, which subsequently got caught when the steps of the escalator went beneath the floor, The Straits Times reported.

Escalators are public limb-guillotines, things we take so often on a regular basis that we forget what lethal slice-and-dice contraptions these can turn out to be, epitomised by one of the more gruesome deaths from the Final Destination series.

No Crocs were harmed in this movie

A series of toe mutilations occurred in 2006-2008, with people pointing fingers at rubber footwear instead of negligence on the part of the parent or playfulness/carelessness by the child. But feet trappings were already happening before Crocs became popular; In 1985, canvas shoes and shoelaces were gobbled up by escalators, almost dragging their wearers with them. Handrails, designed as a safety feature, have ironically claimed the hands of a few as well, with cleaners getting theirs stuck in the line of duty. Kids have gotten stranded while hanging on handrails on the outer side of up-escalators, or landed themselves in critical condition after monkeying around trying to climb over them. Even holding on to handrails too tightly may get you keeling over if they stop suddenly, as what happened to 4 elderly women in Punggol Plaza last year. Hands and feet aside, you could also get your HEAD stuck between escalator and wall if you’re leaning over the handrails staring at the basement below (Boy’s head stuck between escalator and wall, 19 Aug 1997, ST)

What about DEATH by escalator? In 1993, a housewife died after falling and hitting her head on an escalator in Jurong East MRT while attempting to retrieve something she dropped (MRT station death accident, 13 April 1993). A year later,  an 11 year old boy fell 3 storeys to his death off an escalator (Misadventure ruling on boy who fell off escalator, 17 Sept 1994, ST). Even if you paid extra caution to avoid those deadly gaps and teeth on escalators, there’s a chance you might perish in a freak fire still, as what happened to an escalator in Ang Mo Kio Hub in 2010. An overloaded escalator may also spell your demise, with commuters tumbling like dominoes during rush hour at Boon Lay MRT station. In 2003, 20 people were injured, including a pregnant lady, when the escalator at City Hall MRT suddenly REVERSED (Sprocket to blame, 29 May 2003, Today), an event captured in an unfortunate analogy used by then DPM Lee Hsien Loong to Pre-U students on the topic of education and career.

…We are no longer riding on an escalator, which you step onto by attaining a degree, and after that the only way is up..Once in a while the escalator stops suddenly and MOVES BACKWARDS (Pursue your passions, 4 June 2003, Today)

A similar incident happened at Bugis MRT one year later (Commuters tumble down escalator, 16 Nov 2004, ST). You could even get hurt on horizontal TRAVELLATORS; according to a Today contributor, a young boy was ‘knocked off his feet’ by rushing commuters at Dhoby Ghaut station in 2005.

If not maiming body parts or falling off them, you could also have your modesty outraged on an escalator, with dirty old men sneaking mobile phones on ‘record’ mode beneath women’s skirts. Of course, any pervert getting his kicks filming upskirts on something as dangerous as an escalator is asking for it if caught in the act by a furious victim more than willing to offer the hungry metallic beast an appendage to chomp on.

Filed under: 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010, 2011, 2012, Bloggers, Funerals/Death, Kids, MRT, Public works, Sex, Shopping malls | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Tay Ping Hui’s Free Transport Day is ‘cheapstake’

Posted on January 4, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Tay Ping Hui in online spat with Twitter user’, 4 Jan 2012, article by Leow Si Wan in sg.yahoo News.

Actor Tay Ping Hui is embroiled in a petty online tiff with a Twitter user. On 23 December, the star who is also a young PAP member, posted a tweet on his account, calling for SMRT to implement a “Free Transport Day” to make up for the massive train breakdowns.

A user, who goes by the Twitter username of smrtsg responded to his tweet, with a snide “@taypinghui is a cheapskate”. He also described Tay’s attempt to make his ‘Free Transport Day’ idea viral as “pathetic” and said to the actor, “What we do know is you don’t take the train.”

Tay then replied in a series of harsh-sounding tweets. He questioned “the authenticity” of the the twitter user, and described the user’s “attempt at humour” pathetic.

…He continued with “I should just let you embarrass yourself, but I feel obliged to open your tiny mind. One does not need to be in war to know its atrocities.”

“And since I’m in a giving mood, this is my feedback to you: you need to get a life and stop pretending to be something you are obviously not.”

Tin Ping Hui: Rolling Deep

Labelled a ‘troll’ in other news sites, ‘smrtsg’ proceeded to mock Tay Ping Hui for his rendition of Adele’s ‘Rolling in the Deep’, a painful cover which is a sign that Tay should stick to his day job. Political aspirations aside, the actor’s humourless, retaliative response is pretty much in character with what he portrays on television most of the time. It’s ironic however, that he tells smrtsg to ‘stop pretending to be something you are obviously not’, when ‘pretending’ is very much the actor’s bread and butter. Here’s what the man had to say about the REAL SMRT compensating affected customers on 17 Dec 2011, according to his twitter account.

I propose tt SMRT be made to set a FREE TRAVEL DAY for ALL commuters instead of paying a fine. Lets take this viral. LTA, show us u care.

Obviously this was an attempt to use his popularity to garner some kind of online petition. I’m not sure how well thought out Tay’s plan to grant an island-wide open house was, since one of the possible outcomes of an unpredictable free-for-all is an instant replay of the breakdowns previously, confirming the inadequacy of the system rather than making up for its flaws. A random Twitter search of ‘Free Travel Day MRT’ to see how well this meme has spread since Christmas yielded zero results. And LTA hasn’t ‘shown that they care’. Earlier in the year, a Mediacorp colleague, again through Twitter, almost single-handedly brought down a famous grilled chicken chain with a call to arms against bad service and very expensive hot water.  Maybe the difference lies in the fact that the Nando’s boycotter is Joanne Peh, while this is merely Tay Ping Hui, an actor who’s as accustomed to wolf-whistles as SMRT is to an actual compliment.

Anyway, lacking the response he desired, his call for freebies was rephrased and re-tweeted on 23 Dec 2011.

Committees set up, apologies issued, & investigations launched. Great. Now 4 a Free Transport Day to show SMRT’s sincerity to its customers

It’s hard to tell from this tweet how serious his subsequent appeal was, though the drop in enthusiasm was apparent. That’s when the name-calling began, though one could argue that smrtsg was being satirical in calling Tay a ‘cheapskate’, a jibe which the latter  took a bit too personally instead of playing along, which would have been the smarter way to manage a SMRT imposter. But let’s go back further before determining if smrtsg’s accusation is valid.

In Sep 20, 2011, it was reported that Tay posted the following on Twitter following a Circle Line breakdown.

“Circle Line is down this morning. This time, punishment should be to provide free rides for commuters and not paying a fine to the authorities as usual.”

Which makes Tay some kind of Free Rides champion. Nevermind that he majors in Political Science and Economics, or drives a Mercedes E-coupe rather than taking the train.  Speaking up for the common people is part of the fundamentals of politicking. So technically, if Tay doesn’t need to take the train but is calling for free rides for the supposed benefit of others (even if that benefit is not clear), he’s not ‘cheapstake’ so much as offering a rather ‘simplistic’ payback and getting noticed. But leaving the impression of a smart-aleck, stuck-up , bullying wannabe-politician-activist aside, this is a man who, 10 years ago, actually INTERVIEWED himself in a guest column in Today, where he came across as an actor who doesn’t really care about what people think, his fans included, and  is inspired by the ‘Stanislavski’ method for his work, which probably gives you results as boring as it sounds.

Tay, of course, isn’t the only Twitter user asking for free rides in compensation. He just happened be a celebrity turned rabbit caught in the headlights, since smrtsg calling any ordinary Twitter user a cheapstake wouldn’t have the same impact and snappy boldness as putting a Mediacorp actor in a difficult situation. In fact, a day of free rides was actually given by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, according to a Today letter writer on Dec 30, 2011 (When trains stop, have a backup). But that’s Massachusetts, and Singapore is not a place where you can get away with the ideal compensation without ‘cheapskate’ people falling off overloaded platforms in their haste for a free ride. I  mean, this is a country where people will queue for hours at a closing down book sale when they haven’t flipped a page in their life, not to mention a free trip, even if it’s from Orchard to Somerset. I personally wouldn’t take any offence to being called ‘cheapskate’, a term often used in jest rather than a straight insult. Perhaps what Tay needs is not a mastery of Stanislavski, but something far commonplace and even helpful for his acting: A sense of humour (even though he would like to think one exists).

Filed under: 2000s, 2011, 2012, Bloggers, Local actors, Money, MRT | Tagged: , , , | 3 Comments »

Seng Han Thong’s nightmare before Christmas

Posted on December 25, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘MP Seng not racist, says Shanmugam’, 25 Dec 2011, article by Teo Wan Gek, Sunday Times

…During a Channel NewsAsia programme Blog TV, which aired on Monday, Mr Seng made a comment which some found to be racist. He was asked about the lack of communication with passengers during the evening peak-hour breakdown of MRT trains last Thursday.

In his response, he misquoted an SMRT officer, who had earlier said: ‘Our staff at the stations and in the trains may not be making sufficient announcements and also good enough announcements. And that’s because our staff of different races, it could be Malay, Chinese, or Indians or any other race, they sometimes find it difficult to speak in English.’

But Mr Seng, when rebutting the officer’s comments, mentioned only Malay and Indian train drivers. He later clarified that he misheard the SMRT officer’s remarks, which he had heard over radio while driving.

…Mr Seng has since apologised for his remarks.

It’s Christmas Day, and instead of government officials sending well wishes or attending to holiday ‘ponding’, they’re spending time on damage control over an MP’s blooper, or Freudian slip, whatever critics want to call it. A driver who’s unable to calm passengers in the midst of an emergency breakdown is a victim of inadequate training, drills and SOPs. As an organisation with a rigid mastery over templates, surely there should be some standard announcements in place to aid anxious train drivers during disruptions.  This is all just one finger-pointing and tactless blame-shifting after another between various MPs, an SMRT vice president named Goh Chee Kong, and train drivers . If this incident and Desmond Choo’s backfired sexist anecdote tells us anything, it’s that politicians need to stop paraphrasing totally, or learn how to use the disclaimer ‘I quote’ or read excerpts out loud from pieces of paper instead.

In Seng’s defence, he seems to suggest that ‘broken English’ is OK when desperate times call for it, which runs counter to the efforts of our Speak Good English campaign, that lapsing into sub-par English is our ‘default’ setting in stressful situations, while putting on Good English politeness for mundane things such as telling someone that you need to ‘excuse yourself’ for the washroom is expected of us.  In fact, broken English/Singlish, by doing away with time-wasting grammatical formalities, would be ideal in a situation where every second counts and sounding professional should be the least of your worries. The problem is speaking English of any sort, whether broken or of the pristine BBC standard, isn’t very useful when one considers elderly passengers who would be more prone to fainting spells or injuries in the event of a disruption, in which you would have to depend on good Samaritans to do the necessary translation, provided of course that the driver is relaying the right instructions, and that passengers are not busy smashing windows for air in panic. You can bet SMRT will not be happily celebrating their annual Xmas dinner, despite earning the title of the year’s biggest turkey. Even if there was some form of celebration, you can bet no one wants to be caught pants down being treated like a pharaoh like CEO Saw Phaik Hwa in a previous DnD. You probably wouldn’t see the Dim Sum Dollies providing the night’s entertainment as well.

Seng Han Thong’s faux pas is mild compared to the remark on Indians by ex-MP and soon to be convict (twice) Choo Wee Khiang, whose atrocious joke on skin colour qualifies as true racism.  But being labelled a racist and trolled online isn’t the worst that this man has suffered. In Jan 2009, MP Seng was literally FLAMED by an assailant whilst attending a community event as Yio Chu Kang GRC MP. He was inflicted with burns on 15% of his body and his attacker was determined to be a 70 year old retired taxi driver who was subsequently admitted to IMH. Even then, not everyone was sympathetic, with some forum users adopting a ‘let this be a lesson to MPs for bullying the elderly‘ tone, adding ‘fuel to the fire’. The MP torcher was even lauded as a ‘courageous hero’ by others.

It appears that MP Seng has a history of drawing the ire of crazy old taxi drivers. Earlier in July 2006, he was punched in the face, again by a 70-plus former cab driver during a Meet the People session. The attacker was reportedly unhappy that his contract was terminated by ComfortDelgro and demanded an answer from his MP. Despite being boxed in the face and suffering the trauma of being burnt alive, this man continues to serve, though he  might be wearing asbestos underwear wherever he goes and have a phobia of blowing birthday candles for the rest of his life.

Merry Christmas everyone.

Filed under: 2000s, 2011, Corporations, Customer service, MRT, Politicians, Public holidays, Racism, Singlish/Broken english, Taxi drivers, Violence | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

One man’s breakdown is another’s income opportunity

Posted on December 16, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘SMRT says sorry for its message to cabbies’, 16 Dec 2011, article by Daryl Chin, ST

SMRT has apologised for a message it broadcast to its fleet of taxis yesterday amid the chaos on the subway system. The message, which flashed on its drivers’ screens at about 8pm, read: ‘Income opportunity. Dear partners, there is a breakdown in our MRT train services from Bishan MRT to Marina Bay MRT stretch of stations.’

A photo of the screen – presumably taken by a passenger – soon appeared on social networking site Twitter and spread online, drawing sharp criticism.

‘Bad enough they are raising taxi fares, now they want to cash in on an event that is their fault to begin with,’ said sales assistant Candice Tan, 24, one of the many who tweeted about it.

Attempts to contact the photographer were unsuccessful. The message, presumably sent by SMRT call centrestaff, would have reached all 3,100 taxis in its fleet. An SMRT spokesman said last night: ‘We are sorry for the oversight. Our staff were using a template message, and we have since corrected it.’

Some More Revenue, Taxis!

The second breakdown in a week came after a Circle Line delay the day before. News of the trauma of passengers stuck in tunnels went live before SMRT could even recover from the backlash of its ‘official statement’ fiasco yesterday. Train windows were smashed out of desperation, passengers plunged into darkness and sent on a pitch-black tunnel march between City Hall and Dhoby Ghaut, images which anyone who’s seen the 90′s Sylvester Stallone disaster movie Daylight would find hauntingly familiar. I exaggerated in a previous post that SMRT was keeping silent because of zombie carnage in the train and on platforms, and looking at the state of chaos and the contorted faces of victims in agony, it appears that I wasn’t too far off the mark.

SMRT: Tunnel vision

Seems like SMRT is running out of ‘I’m sorry’ templates too. Here it’s ‘We are sorry for the oversight‘, last night it was:

We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused…Preliminary investigation shows that around 40m of the power rail had been damaged between the City Hall and Dhoby Ghaut stations.

Inconvenience, of course, is a gross understatement, especially if you have passengers gasping for air, resorting to sacrificing fire extinguishers to smash windows to stay alive. One can only guess at the kind of mixed feelings that cabbies would have capitalising on stranded, desperate commuters only too eager to head home after a hard day’s work, although the cruel coincidence of the two incendiary events (MRT breakdown, taxi fare hike) reeks of a backdoor cost-recovery conspiracy on the part of SMRT, which not only has to deal with ticket refunds and whatever damages sustained because of angry, oxygen-deprived mobs, but foreigners sueing them for negligence after having their legs pulverised by trains. Or perhaps so much attention was given to ‘security breaches’ that there were simply not enough people to inspect cables every once in a while. Give me a graffitti-strewn train that gets me to work and home on the dot rather than a squeaky clean one that disgorges passengers into tunnels smack  in the middle of nowhere.

SMRT isn’t the only body exploiting the misfortune of others. Just after the Japanese tsunami in March this year, Mediacorp sent out an email soliciting for advertisers who might be interested in ‘breaking news’ coverage, each 30-second commercial costing $5000. Edwin Koh, Senior Vice President, stepped up to ‘apologise unreservedly if we had been seen to be insensitive to the gravity of the situation’. Note that it could have been either Mediacorp or SMRT who wanted to hush up DJ Hossan Leong for tweeting about the Circle Line fault yesterday as well. But it’s only the amoral nature of business after all, and corporations like these two have been ‘cashing’ in way before the advent of social media, whether we like it or not. Pharmaceutical giants ‘cash in’ whenever there’s an outbreak of disease, weapon manufacturers in the event of war, and likewise a swarm of passengers with nowhere to go is prime catch for cabbies.  Whether you call it ‘good business’ or ‘income opportunity’, the fact of the matter, as it is everywhere else, is that there is always a market for misfortune. It’s just unfortunate that an ‘oversight’ exposed the unfeeling machine that SMRT really was all along. So much for ‘MOVING people, ENHANCING lives’ as its motto boasts, when it has done the exact opposite these past few days.

Tsunami=Income opportunity

Let’s not forget another player in the grand scheme of things; ComfortDelgro for raising fees in the first place, after which we’ve seen wave after wave of sociopathic behavior occurring, from old men vandalising taxis, to graffitti on taxi panels about how we’re like ‘donkeys’ and always ‘Pay and Pay’, and the most ‘Grand Theft Auto’ of them all, a Trans cab taxi going on a hit-and-run rampage across town. Police blamed it on DRUGS, naturally. Maybe it’s the same drug that the SMRT spokespeople have been taking these couple of days, one that depletes every ounce of empathy in your body. Then again, according to writer/film-maker/lawyer Joel Bakan, corporations  are inherently self-interested psychopaths, with one of the traits being a ‘callous unconcern for the feelings of others’. A big, fat ‘Check’.

Nobody died during the shutdown last night (though it was reported that one fainted), but if there’s anybody that should be ‘apologising unreservedly’ it should be an actual PERSON, not the epitome of insincerity  in the form of the collective ‘WE’, crafting a response with the cut-and-paste dexterity as one garbles swill from random leftovers for pigs. The only trait that separates a chief mafioso from a company head in the context of exploiting tragedies for personal profit is that the gangster never needs to apologise.  This is how conspiracy theorists would view this situation: If you’re stuck with a cure (fare hikes to alleviate cabbies’ miserable takings) which nobody wants to take, then you have to create the disease (train failures). The truth is ‘shit happens’, but adding to the stink with a ‘template oversight’ is just ‘full of it’.

We want to see a sorry face, not a sorry excuse for an answer.

Postscript: And here’s SMRT CEO Saw Phaik Hwa’s ‘very, very sorry face’ during a press conference later in the day. Isabella Loh must be thanking the heavens she never got into a seat as hot as this.

CEOs can resign, it is whether they choose to

Filed under: Bureaucrats, Corporations, MRT, Public works, Taxi drivers, Violence | Tagged: , , , , , , , | 7 Comments »

Hossan Leong in trouble for tweeting Circle Line downtime

Posted on December 14, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Radio DJ in trouble for reporting on Circle Line breakdown’, 14 Dec 2011, article in Asiaone.com

Local radio personality Hossan Leong was reportedly censured for announcing the disruption to the Circle Line train services this morning.  The deejay was allegedly rapped because his announcement came before an official statement was released by SMRT.

He had reported on the delays based on tweets that he received. In another tweet at about 9am this morning, Hossan commented that he was now “getting into trouble” for reporting the incident on-air. Hossan revealed that he could only “talk about it if (an) official SMRT statement is given”.

It is not clear whether the warning came from MediaCorp or SMRT.

Mediacorp’s Trafficwatch hotline plays a similar role to Twitter except that listeners call in to report on road congestion or accidents rather than MRT delays.  How is information dialed in from a random listener at the wheel  more reliable, or ‘official’, than a commuter tweeting a train breakdown? Hossan wasn’t tweeting about a terrorist hijack, or people jumping in front of trains or anything that could cause unnecessary alarm, yet the way a simple well-meaning alert was handled here comes across as a clumsy, conspiratorial , cahoots-y cover-up by both Mediacorp and SMRT as if it wasn’t a signalling roblem that stalled the trains, but a rampant zombie infestation instead. Perhaps they needed time to double-confirm?

The official word from Channel News Asia was ‘communication network problem’. A few months earlier in September it was ‘leaks and a damaged cable’. The responsible authorities seem preoccupied with figuring out WHY the train was stalled rather than giving passengers an early heads-up. Whether it was an explosion, a derailing or someone jumping on the tracks, people still need to get to work. Announce, divert, THEN deliver your official statement.  It’s like the police/military refraining from telling people to stay at home and lock their doors if a dark menacing cloud with crackling green lightning suddenly occupied half the sky, waiting for the meterologists to give an official diagnosis, by which time our streets would have been already littered with crisp, smoldering human remains. Some of us suffer a worse fate if we’re ever late for meetings. A hundred heads may roll out of a single delay but the one head that matters somehow remains in place.

I experienced first-hand the morning delay myself at Marymount station, where the staff were all at sea trying to placate a frustrated crowd demanding speedy answers. A bewildered auntie exclaimed ‘Train SPOILT ah’, Cisco auxillary police officers had to take up temporary SMRT staff roles to guide passengers, and not a single soul thought of setting up a signboard to tell us what’s happening. I would be surprised if the control station was even equipped with a permanent marker. Hossan was spot on, the train was ‘down’, even if the term SMRT would prefer to use is ‘delay’, but Marymount was in chaos as early as 8 am and services resumed only 3 hours later. This was no delay; it was a breakdown, a stupefying system failure that befits the name of a network  and its authority that persist in running RINGS around commuters with one useless apology after another.

As easy as it is to blame the transport authorities for not meeting even the most basic requirements of public commute, this mini-crisis also brought out both the best and worst in Singaporeans. I saw ordinary individuals  taking leadership to keep everyone’s heads together, strangers diverting others away from the station and towards the right shuttle buses in the absence of any signs. I witnessed people who otherwise wouldn’t even look at each other engaging fervently in complaints, bonding through anger and disappointment in an organisation  they are beginning to lose faith in, topics ranging from regretting their voting choice in the past elections to the recent taxi fare hikes. You’re more likely to talk to a fellow Singaporean stranger when something goes horribly wrong than if he were just next to you at the National Day Parade.

I was late, but thankful that I wasn’t trampled in a riot, because Singaporeans as a pragmatic lot would rather work towards a contingency plan than harp on something that can’t be resolved with complaints alone. Most commuters at Marymount took the incident lightly, queuing up patiently outside the bus bridging services despite being late for work, messaging their bosses to explain, friends to complain, or sending tweets to radio personalities like Hossan Leong hoping they could put the SMRT whack-jobs to shame. If anything, SMRT should be grateful that we are a cooperative lot, though that is often mistaken for ‘powerless’. Transport Minister Lui, Where the Tuck are Yew?

Filed under: 2011, Bureaucrats, Local radio DJs, MRT | Tagged: , , | 6 Comments »

Big strollers blocking MRT entrances

Posted on October 9, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Monster wheels’, 9 Oct 2011, article by Jane Ng, Lifestyle Sunday Times

Supersized strollers are getting on the nerves of commuters and shoppers. Fed-up folk have to dodge bulky baby buggies rolled out by pushy parents who at times behave like they and their little princes and princesses own the road.

These are not the slim-built push prams you see at the neighbourhood centre, but are rugged three or four-wheelers which can scale rough terrain with ease, if need be. But they seem to be the rage among modern mothers, never mind that their prices can go to more than $2,000 for a Stokke, a lifestyle stroller by a Norwegian company.

One commuter tired of push coming to shove is Ms Helen Lim, 63, a headhunter who takes the MRT to work every day. She sometimes finds her way blocked by big strollers at the entrance of a carriage. Ms Lim politely asks the parent to move the stroller aside, or shoos other passengers away from the carriage area designated for wheelchairs, so the pram can move there.

Although she takes the initiative to solve the problem, she is losing patience, and feels the situation is worsening. Speaking to LifeStyle, Ms Lim, who is not married, said she is ‘annoyed’, both at pram users and inconsiderate commuters.

‘Strollers are a hindrance when you don’t fold them up. They take up standing room and block entrances. Then there are passengers who are inconsiderate and don’t take the initiative to move in, so it makes the situation worse,’ she said.

Strollers or Stompers?

The futuristic Stokke pram looks like an all-terrain military-grade armed mobile unit that could transform into a battle exoskeleton out of Avatar, while the Bugaboo Bee stroller (see below) is a space-age utility vehicle that should have been featured in a Transformers movie. Both state-of-the-art baby accessories make parents heaving their kids around in a sling or backpack look Neanderthal in comparison. Ironically, prams models are given twee names like the Bugaboo ‘donkey’, ‘cameleon’,  ‘bee’ when in reality, ‘Goliath’ or ‘Devastator’ would be more fitting, judging by the number of toes being crushed by these marauding, mechanical beasts.

Bugaboo Autobot

Strollers are no longer ‘baby carriages’ like what they used to be in the past, now  sleek, portable cribs equipped with sexy, NASA-endorsed features that could also describe the specifications of a luxury sedan. I’ve no problem with parents  bringing infants around in these little makeshift trailer homes, but what’s really annoying is if they transport kids old enough to walk about on their own, more so if they are playing with Daddy’s iPhone in the comfort of the pram instead of sleeping. Prams are also formidable obstacles if they hoard aisles at a restaurant or food court, not just because they make  it completely inaccessible for you to get a table, but trying to move it would provoke an  angry, overprotective parent into calling the police on you for infant assault. You also don’t want some creepy design out of a horror movie like Rosemary’s Baby.

Evil burps

Even in the late forties, baby carriages were a relative luxury, with pram-beds available from $50. For the ‘Loveliest baby in the world’, you could get a Marmet folding pram for a bargain of $179 in the early sixties, though design-wise it looked rather similar to a wheelchair (see below). In the late eighties you could get a ‘Geometric Convertible Stroller Bed’ for $239.95 at Toys R Us.

Hospital grade

Today, for a cool $2k you can get a Stokke pram/stroller which not only fulfills the basic function of baby ambulation, but also aids the ‘healthy development of bones, joints and muscles’. It comes with a ‘cocoon visor’ too. So, it’s not just any ordinary stroller/pram, it’s an ergonomic growth-accelerator and incubator that looks like a cyber-nanny as well. Being accused of helming Mad Max- style battering rams by irate commuters is a hefty price to pay when you’re a busy parent and bulldozing your way through the crowd is the only way to get things done. If the government won’t do anything about overcrowding or baby-friendly spaces we only have technology to look to if there’s any hope of miniaturisation, or at least putting our kids on robotic walkers with intuitive (and safe!) parent-obeying AI. Unfortunately, when it comes to baby comfort and safety, bigger does seem to be ‘better’, to kiasu parents at least. Or you could blame Battleship Potemkin, a 1925 classic which features a scene of a renegade baby carriage tumbling down the stairs, scaring parents the world over into buying more expensive, and presumably safer, prams. Also, nobody wants to be seen with the pram equivalent of a newspaper pick-up van next to a monster truck.

Baby makes Contact

Filed under: 1940s, 1960s, 1980s, 2011, Babies, Kids, MRT, Parenting, Strollers/Prams | Tagged: , , , , , | 1 Comment »

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