By: Warren Carter

22 Oct 2007

For years I told my friends I would be moving to Southeast Asia after I retired. My plan was to move to the Philippine since I could live there and not have to worry about working due to my retirement check and the exchange rate being so good. Just enjoy life and relax, well that was the plan at least.

I can to Singapore the first time in 1978 and then again in 1992 and back again in 1997 when I started to come here a lot starting in 1999 since I was working close to the country. Now coming to Singapore as a visitor is a lot different then living here because you see things in a different light as a visitor plus you are really clueless to how Singapore works.

When you come to Singapore you see everyone driving fairly new cars, from time to time you will see something like an old Volkswagen or some other classic but not too often. Everyone is dressed nicely and you don’t see people living on the street. But there is much more that goes unseen to visitor.

Shopping:

Orchard Road, the money street: This is where you find all the big shops, or the tourist trap street as I call it, while you can find deals on the street you have to know where to go to get them. The Great Singapore Sale which is held each year is a good time to find deal on items you may have been looking at all year so if you are visiting Singapore during the time the sale is going on you have the chance to save a few bucks on your purchase.

Another good place to get deals is during the IT and Computer Fairs that have been held in Suntec Convention Center. These are held over 4 days and really pack in the people so plan on taking your time and dealing with a large crowd. To get the best deals you need to go on the last day in the afternoon when the stalls start to close. The reason is because the venders want to sell every thing off so they don’t have to pack it up. The prices will start drop slowly at first then as the closing time get closer the prices start to down faster. So if you find something you want but have limiter cash you will need to stay on the area of the stall to see what the current going price is for the item you want. Best to have cash in hand when talking to the vender so you can make a deal on there on the spot. If you have to head out to a ATM when you return it may be gone and for less then you had be told before.

Malls, malls and more malls: This place is one big mall and shopping center. In all parts of the country you can find malls and not small malls either. Some malls like IMM specialize in renovations shops or Simm Limm and Funun which deal in all of your computers need. In the housing area you have your shopping centers where really good deals can be found on just about everything you could want. The food courts are great places to have outstanding food and really cheap prices and many of the locals eat in these shops daily since is it cheaper to eat there then to cook at home. You can eat there or get it as a take away which save you time on doing dishes and cleaning up. You can order food from Chile Crab to fried rice to western food can be found in the food courts so no matter who you are or what you like your local food court will have something for you. Even in the Airport there is a food court but many don’t know of it and spend lots more on the food inside then going to the food court which is very close by. This is one way how the locals save money.

Saving for the future:

If you live in Singapore you need to save money. While the place looks like everyone make tones of cash, well they don’t when compared to my home in the states or even some other countries in the area. With the live style being so high it comes at a cost and many can’t afford it. Wages in Singapore are still low when you think about the qualifications of the workers and their skill level. There are some that do make good wags let’s say in the 4000 to 5000 range but the average is only in the 2000 to 2500 range and that doesn’t go to far when you have a flat to pay for, school cost for the kids, food, utilities and other necessities in day to day life.

Housing:

Housing is made available from the government so everyone has the chance to own their own place, well at least for 99 years that is, the Housing Development Board (HDB) controls the blocks that people live in. When you apply for your flat you have to meet certain requirements like in each block only some many Chinese, Malay, Indian and Others can live, if the block you want to live is full of your race you have to pick another place to live. If the HDB wants to upgrade your block by lets say with another room, they will ask all the tenets if that want the upgrade or not. If everyone says yes then we works begins after every one has paid their share of the cost for the upgrade. If the government decides that your block is going away, well that is that, they will let you move into a new block in the area or some other area if you want with in reason and equal price range. You may receive some cash but nothing like what you would have gotten if you sold you place on your own. If you are single you have to be above the age of 35 to get a 3 room flat on your own otherwise you have to have someone (wife, husband or family member) sign with you to qualify. The good part id that you can your (Central Provisional Fund) CPF money to help pay for the flat so bank loans are not always needed. I was really surprised how easy it was to get a flat here compared to the states. Now on the down side after you get your new HDB flat you need to do work on the inside to get it so you can live in it. When I got my place all I got was the wall – unpainted, kitchen – with tile walls, bathrooms – tile walls, sink and toilet and that was it. We need to have the concert floor leveled, kitchen cabinets build, shower heads installed, lights installed, piping installed for water hot and cold. Closet build for bedroom, shower stalls build and installed. So this cost was 17,000 extra plus furniture. So here is were the saving comes in or goes. When you get your flat you don’t get a parking stall unless you pay for it. You would think if you pay 220,000 for a place you would at least get 1 parking spot, but nope you’re SOL (Shit out of luck) in this area.

Cars:

I don’t have a car here in Singapore and good thing too. I guess the thinking is if you can afford a car you can afford all the cost that go with it. There is no free parking in the county unless you park illegally which you can see people every where all the time. If caught you can get a ticket and get your wheel clamed which will cost you 50 bucks to get removed. They don’t tow cars here like in the states but if they did the government would make a killing in cash until the drives started parking like they should which I guess would be about a year times. To drive in the town are there is an ERP charge to enter this can go from .50 cent to 2 or 3 bucks at each toll point. Again if you want to drive have lots of cash. If you go to Malaysia you can not come in to the country with a full tank of gas, I am not sure what amount you can have but I know they want to buy your petrol in Singapore.

The reason for the newer cars is that you can only keep your car for 10 years, then you have to get ride of it, sell if off for scrape or what every they do with them when that day comes. Many of the care get shipped to other counties in the area and are resold since they are still in really good shape still. If you wan to keep you car it will cost you about the same price and when you got it new so what is the point to keep it?

Drivers:

 Drivers here are very rude and think they are the shit. I have had them honk at me as I am crossing the street with the green walk man light because I was talking to long for them, who do these people think they are as they sit there in the comfort of their cars as I walk in the hot sun or rain? So when this happens I slow down just for them. They give the person walking no leeway at all and it is if we are in their way as they rush off.

Laws:

While the laws are like those in other countries I find many have a blind eye turned to them. While people may think the law is silly or a waste of time is not really the point. So this confusing some people that may be new to Singapore. So lets start with the easy one first, illegal DVD/VCD’s – you can go to many shopping centers and find shops selling software openly in shops like it is no one business, and some of these shops last for up to a year or more. In your industrial area the person will walk from shop to shop selling they DVD’s both new releases and porno which is forbidden in the country alone. So why are these places allowed to remain open or activities allowed for so long? No one cares enough to stop it from the bottom to the top.

Parking issues – the drivers break the law and say fuck it if they get a ticket. I saw one guy years ago in Holland Village getting a ticket for parking, he ran out of the restaurant and tried to talk to the police office who stood there for about 10 minutes waiting for the driver to return before he stared to write the ticket. When the driver found he could not get out of the ticket he just walked away. What the fuck? He didn’t even move the care and the police man didn’t make him move it either so what does that tell you? If that drive had know that his car could be towed and he would have to pay for towing, impound charge and the ticket he would have moved it then.

When a drunk driver and can hit a person and kill them and leave the scene and not get charge for murder something is wrong with the system for sure. (This happen around May 2007) The person was a girl from China and was hit on Outram Road by where she was working at a KTV.

Which bring up another point? All these KTV have these Chinese girls working in them, do these girls have work permits? I don’t think so but could be wrong too so I’ll have to check this out and see. But seeing how they come and go so often I kind of dough it.

Local workers; work until you die in Singapore! This is a phase I have heard from all races in Singapore about working here. The money they make while working is often not enough to maintain a good life style unless they continue to work as long as they can, again this is due to the low wages paid and raises not keeping pace with the yearly increase of items like utilities, food, transportation and other needed items. In the news papers you can read about the gap between the rich and poor in Singapore and how it is getting wider each year. But when you live in a country where strikes will get you landed in jail you dare not do it or even think about it. So no choice all you can do is keep going on and keep your mouth shut or hope to find a better job some where else.

Over time; in many of the contracts that workers sign to get the job will state that overtime will not be paid due to the salary they are making, so this means that a working can be made to work much longer hours with out compensation for the hours since it is already included in the basic salary. I worked from 8am to 1am and got nothing for it, not even a “Thank you“! The need to do well for the company is very strong with the workers of Singapore and long hours are an accepted fact of working in the country. Those that can move to other countries and never return, why should they after all? When you get a job out side of Singapore where you are making 3 to 4 times as much what could make you return to work here? Many have left and many more will each year. There are only so many jobs in the high paying position here so if you have the skill/degree you need to move out to use it or settle for a lower paying job, so what is the point?

People upgrade their skills, ‘life long learns” they are called but how much more are they making over the person that is not upgraded, very little.  When I worked as a security office I was making 1,300 a month I attend my 5 day class, got my certificate and made 1,300 a month, that’s right the same amount. So where is my drive to attend more classes and upgrade my self more, non-existence that’s where it is.

People fear the age of 50 here because at that age the companies start to cut workers out of the company. So the stress of that time is heavy on the workers mind. No wonder high blood pressure is found in most workers.

Things here run in a job circle with everything supporting each other. As a trainer I was told I had to attend a day and a half class to be qualified to teach in Singapore, my 2 month school from the states was not good enough. Ok the circle start, by me going to the class it keeps those teaching working. After 2 years everyone had the old class so to keep them working we will change the rules and make these teachers go back to classes since they want to keep working and circle continues. So 2 years later I am told I have to attend another class and this one is 3 weeks long, if I don’t attend the class I can not teach any more. Well I never attended the new class and got out of teaching. My co-worker who did attend the class took a pay cut from 2,000 to 1,800, figure that one out plus he had to sign a 2 year, 12 page contract to stay on with the company after the class, crazy right? In the same company hour hours were 8am to 6pm, 10 hours right? 50 per week so the company got 24 hours overtime each month or 288 hours per year or 6.5 weeks of work for free. So when you get your year end bonus of 1 month don’t get all happy they are just paying you back what they own you in the first place.

Singapore is ranked as the 6^th most stressful place to live in the world. Well go figure with everything that happens, the things are set up and the inability to fully express one self openly. A parent has to work to pay for every thing the family from the schooling of the children to parking, raising transportation and food cost, unpaid overtime and the fear of the future of their job due to age or even cost saving reductions. The need to succeed in ones job to secure a decent future and get that saving build up so they can have a nice place to live and if lucky a car puts added stress on the Singaporean.

Even the children of the country feel the stress from the parents and government to do well in school to secure a good future. You see kids sitting with friends in Mac Donald’s and Burger Kings all the time doing their studying and getting ready for their test to pass their “O” levels after their Secondary 2 schooling or “A” levels (after 2 years of added education) which make a big different when they apply for collages and even jobs.

Singapore is a county of certificates as away of showing your qualifications for job. No certificate no job, so for many of the older workers this requires them to attend classes to retain their jobs. The problem for some is that in the past some went to Malay school or Chinese school where English was not that important unlike in to days Singapore. Many of the older works only have a very basic understanding of English with some not being able to read or write the language, so problems arise when they apply for work or attend a class and are unable to keep up with the course due to language failure. So now the person that has been doing a job for 15 or 20 years has to find other work because they no longer qualify for the job and are forced to work in another line. Many end up and cleaners or in the security industry if they have enough English skills to enter the basic course of course.

End of year pay:

For those that don’t live in Singapore many companies give what is called, “13 month pay”, depending on how well the company did over the year you can get a check for say 1 of your months pay. Some companies give as much as 36 months pay, that’s right 3 years pay, but this is in the finance area, bankers, stock market people and those kind or professionals, 1 to 3 months is about the average over all.

Control:

In one way or another everything goes though the government here, either directly or indirectly. This is where the money is both with the government and the people within it. Many of larger companies in Singapore have major stock holder or are owned by member of the parliament or other officials. Add to that the salaries they government officials make in the country “to keep corruption down” as the country was told for the reason you can see where the pay gap starts to widen.

I read about this shop owner that got busted for selling illegal cigarettes from Malaysia. And the first think I though was “well if this guy was making a better wage he would have to turn to this kind of activities to support his family! So the corruption at the top is taken care of at 3 million plus per year but at the lower end it is settled with a jail term. I am not excusing the shop owner for breaking the law by any means I am just saying if he earned more he would not have to break the law. People do what they need to do to survive.

If you have money come to Singapore if you don’t go some place else to work and live, because out it you will die here. if you have money to invest you are treated like a king and the world is your, you can afford the condo’s that go for up to S$4,000 per square foot off Orchard Road and drive your Porsche  or Ferrari around town in second gear and show off your wealth. Other wise get your MRT card, get in line and try to get a seat like everyone else because that is the 2 extremes here.

Western influence on the Singapore is high, credit cards are making it big here but you have to make at least S$2,500 per month to qualify for one to start with. Along with that is the need to have the best and newest items in your home or flat. In the states we called it ‘keeping up with the Jones’s”, they have it, so we need to have it or something better. This leads to living outside of their means and going into dept very deeply. Having a maid and a car when one is really not needed is another issue. With the cost of cars being so high in Singapore I can see how it would and is impressive when you say you have one. It is a sign of making it to some degree. But are they really needed? In many cases no! When you think abut the total cost for the car payments, parking, petrol and insurance you spend each month that is a lot of taxi rides for when you really do need to use transportation besides the bus or MRT line. I was surprised at the people that had maids. If your job requires you to do some driving then the company should be providing the car and I would think you would be a fool to use your own to do company work in.  Realtors, different job plus they are pretty much working on their own anyway, right?

Maids:

All maids live with they employers, they work long hours for the family, so everything and if lucky get one day off a week. The employer had total control over the maid, setting up all rules for them to follow to the tee.  The maids have very little rights of their own. While the government is working on improving the working conditions for the maids it still falls on the employer to live up to them and enforcement is hard unless the maid files a complaint. Where do the maids come from, India, Indonesia, Philippines for the most part.

People give many reasons why they need a maid like both the parents work so there is no one to take care of the kids or the mother is sick and needed the help. Strange I wonder how my parents did it, oh yeah that’s right I took my self to school and then I cleaned the house before mom and dad come home; I think it was called responsibilities or something like that. But on the other hand I can see the need to since these parents are working until 9 or 10 at night, so ok maybe it is justified to some degree in some cases. But in the long run doesn’t it all boil down to time management and sharing the work load at home? Yeah that means having the children do the house work after school since they only attend classes for half a day anyway, which leads me to the next section.

The kids here, oh my god what is the world coming too! Maybe I am just getting older but most of the kids I see are spoiled little brats with on discipline at all. They are pampered to no end and get just about everything they want. Waited on hand and foot and are not held responsible for anything. Some races here have a better control then others but over all it is in my book pretty sad over all. A large part of the House work is done by parents while the kids watch TV, play on the computer and complain and their internet connection speeds and they talk to their friends on the newest hand phones on the market. No wonder the parents here are only having sex 4 times a month on average, at least with each other that is.

Sex and more sex:

You can have sex all over the island at any time of the day or night, from legal brothers to escorts to health care centers to KTV lounges. Finding a woman to have sex with is not a problem. I will not even get in relationships married people have that lead to affaires.  So one day you go to a KTV lounge and see the business men out having drinks chances are all or most are married and for the money they are dropping and the dressing of the girls you know they are doing then just drinking and singing songs in the room. The high rollers have Chinese girl friends they support on a weekly basic with money and support in the clubs if not even providing them their own apartments to live in. At the health care centers all you need to do is ask for special service, pay the price and you in there. At some pubs you can find girls they will go to a hotel with you for a around S$100 to S$150 after the club closes and in some places sex is sold openly where the girls will walk to you and come right out and say “you take me to hotel?”. Streetwalkers, oh yeah there are here too, mainly in the Geylang area but I Have them on Orchard Road and in the Boat Quay areas too. They have been spotted around the island around some of the major housing area snagging older Chinese men on their way home. Oh yeah one more place, the internet, you can set up appointments to see a girl at a certain time and place. Then you have the cab drivers at night, I have yet to be in a cab after midnight and not have one offer me a girl, from a local Chinese-Singaporean for S$500 to an Indonesian for S$100 and S$200-S$250 to have A Russian girl for a short time fling.

Sex villages spring up from time to time in the areas around the industrials areas so service the TWN. These villages are set up out the jungle with make shift tents where the girls, mostly Thais, have sex with the guys for S$20 to S$30 a shot. 

Now for the ladies that are seeking some fun with the number of night clubs and visitors to Singapore it is easy for them to find someone to have some fun with if they wish too but this applies to women around they world doesn’t it?

In closing:

Singapore to say the least has a lot more to offer them people may think. It is one of the easiest countries to open a business in and rental spaces are very affordable which make it a good location to operate out of if you are in the region. The government is stick on companies when its laws and take action quickly when regulations are violated. With a skilled work force finding talented people to staff your company is not a problem.

We all know that Singapore is one of the safest counties to live in but crime does happen but nothing in numbers like in other countries. Pickpockets, robbery, thief, murders all happen so you still need to take some precautions to protect your self and your family.

The transportation system is the most effective way to get around the country. Being so small every place is with in a 1 hour ride. Buses and trains run time and are plentiful so your wait is not long. Cabs are in the 10,000’s and easy to catch for the most part but sometimes you can have a hard time getting one like on rainy days or during rush hours when many of the cabs may be booked for other passengers. The prices for all transportation means I think are fairly prices and cheap when compared to other counties I have been to.

The night life is something you will enjoy with so many different places to go from your local pubs to your large entertainment areas like St James Power Station to the Clarke Quay area you will surely find something you will really enjoy. In a few years Singapore will have its 2 casino’s to add to the attraction of the country and within 1 year there will be a Formula 1 track that well run throughout the Mariana area section of the country. This will be the only Night Race of the season. The Singapore Flyer is a Ferris Wheel  with a Diameter of the wheel: 150 metres / Height:  165 metres (the height of a 42-storey building)  / Duration of ride:  About 30 minutes /  Capsules: 28 fully air-conditioned and UV protected capsules with capacity for up to 28 people each and are connect on the outside of the wheel.

 If you seek more adventures clubbing you have the 100’s of pubs and KTV’s that have the girls working in them and the legal red light districts to enjoy.

And lastly the weather is great. Being only 1 degree above the equator the temperature between day and night is only 10 degrees being 86° on average in the days and 76° at night. This makes your outings so enjoyable since you can dress very lightly.

I have never had a problem with any person I meet in Singapore and found most very helpful if I needed help on find something or someplace.  While customer service can use some improvement over all it is not that bad and over the past few years I have seen a vast improvement in this area.

Other key points:

• Self imposed censorship by the news papers and magazines
• The government had to do a study to see what would be the affect of bar top dancing before they would allow it in bars
• Dual citizenships is not allowed
• A large number of the security officer in the country come from Malaysia
• The average age of the security officer is 55 to 60
• First country to receive the new A380 Airbus
• You can walk down the street drinking a beer
• Children attend schooling for 10 year
•  All school kids have to wear uniforms
• Age of consent is 16
• Singapore has one of the highest teen abortion rates in the world
• All males Singaporeans have to serve 2 years in the military, police or fire department
• Military contract for enlisted persons is 10 years long
• You can be locked up in jail for 5 year with no charges
• You have freedom of speech but you must submit your speech for approval, if they don’t like what you are going to say it is denied and if you hold it anyway you will be locked up