HardwareZone Forums

Anyone here? Scared to fly back or go out learn bad things?

https://www.ettoday.net/news/20200102/1615827.htm
黑鷹直升機墜毀生還名單：

通次室曹進平中將
後次室次長黃佑民中將
作計室參謀周欣頤中校
作計室處長劉孝堂少將
軍聞社新聞官陳映竹
黑鷹直升機墜毀罹難名單：
參謀總長沈一鳴上將
政戰局副局長于親文少將
情次室助次洪鴻鈞少將
正駕駛葉建儀中校
參謀黃聖航少校
副駕駛劉鎮富上尉
總士督長韓正宏士官長
機工長許鴻彬士官長

Am i normal?

More immigrants working in sg,
Means higher GDP
Also means higher GDP per capita (since the working population to non working ratio is higher)
Also means property prices rise

Most importantly also means civil servant and politicians get more bonuses

Good idea right?

Sent from Self-Partnered Partial Hikkiki using GAGT

After moi found out that cleaning is more profitable than IT, moi become cleaner.

but while cleaning, moi also practice on plumbing, cos plumbing is even more profitable!!!

now i learning how to paint. cos tia gong painter earn even more!!!

He joins a lot of RC activities and always like to tell me how good how good the pappies MP is...

Yesterday I saw him moving out a lot of stuff and asked him where is he going
He told me that he is staying with his Mother and renting out his apartment

Lim bei a bit scare and ask him your tenant is it CECA? He said dont worry he already tell his agent not to bring in CECA and view.

I was puzzled and asked him why since he so supportive of PAPPIES CECA?
He said he scare the CECA cook curry and will damage his kitchen and house.

Lim bei smiled and in my heart I scolded him DLLMHGC

Sinkies really have those not in my backyard mentality lol

My friend ask me.. so asking here.

above the age of 35 that has no character problem?

I don't think I have met one before.

Marhisya's IG.

For those who don't have N95, might be wise to stock up now.
Those who still have N95 bought during the haze in 2019. Can use it during CNY.

I am hoping the mystery disease don't spread out of China.
Pray China medical authorities is able to contain it within Wuhan.

Song bo? Knn. Self-entitled bitches dare reject limpei.

Sinkie girls are the horrible. Not chio act chio. PUI!!

taken by me sometimes back.
CECA very kelian

Hi all,

I usually frequent this forum as a lurker, particularly the Money Matters section. But recently Ive been reading a lot in the EDMW section, especially after the Alexandra AMA thread.

A little about myself My parents used to own a cai png store. But I kind of destroyed everything and Ive been reprimanding myself ever since.

Not sure where to begin

When I was still in primary and secondary school, I would sit and study at the coffeeshop as my parents would run their cai png store. My mom, a brilliant cook, does all the cooking; my dad, on the other hand, does the cashiering, and serving to customers. He also does the accounting and all to file the tax returns.

To those who are wondering, cai png stores can be lucrative but it depends on the amount of customers and what they order. The typical 2+1 meals will fetch about $0.30-0.50 or so. Vegetables are usually cheap, but so is their cost so the profits isnt much. However, different vegetables can have different profit margins. Like the cost of procuring sweet potato leaves is cheaper than kangkong. The big profits are on the meats, and, of course, the fishes. Most of the fishes thats served in cai png stores are dory fish. Fishes prices are reasonable, but it is the preparation that takes a lot of time imagine having to debone them, slice them, and cook them. So most of the time my parents will get those deboned fishes from wholesalers. It is a little more expensive but saves a hell lot of time.

One of the reason why fishes are more expensive is because it takes more time to cook them. I mean, just look at chicken. You can just throw a chunk of them in a wok and just stir fry them without worries. But for fish, any rough handling can 'break' them. And you can't just stack fish fillets over another as that would make the top ones uncooked. Compare this to cooking chicken meat where you just stir fry.

Anyway, my family's cai png business was pretty profitable since it is near work and residential areas. Blue-collar workers will usually order 2+1 meal set; white-collar workers would order 3+1 meal set.

The reason why our cai png business was profitable back then is because, as mentioned, my mom is a great cook her food quality is always top notch, tasty, and consistent. Whereas my father is an excellent orator and have brilliant social skills. Introduce a stranger to him and they will be best friends talking endlessly for hours. He is a people person. And because he can talk well, he can persuade customers to take expensive dishes or order more. He is THAT good.

My family was well-to-do from the family business that we lived in landed at Tanah Merah area. My father drives a Mercedes and we have a van too to get the groceries. In case if youre wondering, yes, we purchase the groceries by ourselves from Pasir Panjang centre. It is a lot cheaper than having to buy directly from one or few suppliers as theres usually a contract involved. My parents dont like such commitments and would prefer buying directly from Pasir Panjang. My parents would take the van to Pasir Panjang every morning at 7-8AM, then drive directly to the stall to start cooking and operating. Sometimes, for fishes, sometimes at Changi Village (the area before the walking bridge to Changi Beach) where fishermen would sell their catches of the day. We would only go there if we get news that fishermen have a huge yield selling them at good prices.

The stall would be closed on Fridays. Now you may ask, What? Why Friday? Why not Sunday or Monday? Because families would usually eat out on weekends; and on weekdays (Mon-Thurs) business would be normal as there are blue or white collar workers looking to get their lunch, or dinner for families. But on Friday, most people would pig out or eat something heavier like western. It is my parents years of observance to change their operating schedule to this. Most public holidays the store would still be opened (e.g: Hari Raya, Deepavali, Labour Day, and so on). The definite PH that we would be closed is Chinese New Year until the Chinese 8th day, and New Year's eve.

Life was awesome back then. We were well-off. Me, being the only child in the family, would get all the love from my parents. I felt very spoilt. They want the best for me so they let me buy whatever I want, especially since they have a thriving cai png store. When I was in poly, they gave me a debit and credit card to use. So I was spending on branded stuffs and spoiling my JC gf (we met at the library while I was doing research in my laptop there). We have crazy sex too, shes a nymph and with a hot, petite sexy body (I mean, JC girl duh) it was awesome. During her school holidays, I secretly treated her and we both went to France for vacation. Thats how rich my family was then.

By then, I graduated from poly. I was in a dilemma whether to further my studies by getting a degree. I don't feel the need then as I could just learn the ropes of handling the cai png store. I even thought of helping my parents to expand it like a franchise. I got big plans for it. Then again, I was still contemplating on that. But regardless of what option I take there's always NS. So I decide to just serve and FO first.

Fast forward one day, when I was in the army, my officer gave me the bad news My father passed away. I was later told by my mom that my father had a heart-attack when he went to the stall early to do the monthly accounting (tallying the income and expense for the month). He had a heart-attack and no one was around until an owner from another stall came and saw my dad on the floor. He didnt make it I was just 1 month from ORD. I used up my compassionate leave and normal leave until I ORD-ed I was with my mom caring for her. She was so distraught by my fathers death she was bedridden for weeks. I would drive all the way to Pasir Panjang area to buy her favourite food hoping she will at least have a bite. The stall was closed for about 2 months.

And yes, if you ever see a shop close for months then opened again all of a sudden, you know why now. It is likely a family business and something bad happened in the family.

She finally got the strength to open the store again. I would be the one driving the van every morning to get the supplies from Pasir Panjang area and deliver to the store. Many times I would see my mom crying in the store as she is preparing the food. I would hug and console her I really love my mom. Shes a very strong woman. By then, I was so busy helping my mom and all I chose not to further my studies.

We later decided to hire a helper at the store to do the cashiering and serving. Business did dip by about 30% as our family business has lost its left arm my father whose oratory and persuasion skills were the one to lure and get loyal customers to keep coming back.

By then, I have little time for my girlfriend. She was in NUS by then and we met lesser and lesser. She would always complain and say Ive changed and all. But Im just too busy helping my mom and caring for her. By then we had trouble with our helper as we caught him stealing from the cashbox. Sometimes he would serve the customer, collect the money, but put inside his pocket. All these were known after my mom and I noticed a huge drop in our cash flow, and immediately we suspected it is the helper. So we secretly installed a hidden IP cam and caught his act. He confessed and said he had stolen about 20K over the months. He promised to return it and asked if he could take leave for tomorrow so he can have his family from overseas transfer the money back and he would withdraw it from the bank. We agreed because my mom trusted him as hes like a friend. My mom also said she wont file any police report if he returned the money. He agreed. However, he never returned. Police report was filed and we found out that he has fled Singapore the very next day. By then, the IO said they couldn't do much since he has left the country. But if he ever returns (which we doubt) they will apprehend him.

So my mom and I would take turns doing the cashiering. She was very exhausted at every end of the day.

Then one day I received the other horrifying news. My mom passed. Perhaps it was due to all the grief and exhausting work She collapsed in the kitchen. Like my father, it was early morning. This time, however, she was found by the beverage-serving uncle, but her injury was too severe that even the doctors couldn't save her. Autopsy was done and found her brain to have hemorrhage. The morticians report said she has likely slip and fell, knocking the side of her head against the stove. This led to a blood clot, thus, a stroke.

I remember crying from morning to night for a week. Not just because I miss my mom (and dad) but I felt clueless on what to do with my familys cai png store now. Not only do I not have the oratory and social skills like my father, but I dont even know how to cook.

Worst of all? My girlfriend broke up with me. She claims that I neglected her, but somehow I suspect she broke up with me because I told her my familys business is in trouble. I realize shes just a gold-digger. Whats more crazy is she later got a new boyfriend barely 2 months later. Some NUS classmate of hers whos buff, good-looking and rich. I don't even want to know if I was wearing 'green hat' then because before we broke up there were a lot of photos of them together.

I fell into depression and the store was closed for 3 months. It was so bad that my uncle (fathers brother) had to step in to settle some of the paperwork for me. Like telling the landlord the tenant of the stall will be under my name; my parents assets, and such. And yes, that also means I was still paying the stores rental for that 4 months (3 months + that 1 month my moms unfortunate event happened).

When I felt better I decide to try whatever I can to salvage my familys cai png store. I hired a Malaysian chef. You can hire a Chinese National chef at a cheaper rate but I dont want to take the risk as I was looking for a GOOD chef. In fact, if you see most cai png and zi ca stores, the chefs are usually Malaysian. So I was willing to pay about 25% more for a Malaysian chef. Then a rather chio Malaysian helper too who is bilingual English and Chinese to do the serving and cashiering. All this in the hopes of reviving the business. I was still pretty depress so there wasnt much of my presence nor contribution physically.

Unfortunately, from that 4 months of inactivity, many loyal customers are gone. Probably because they assumed the cai png store has closed down. Or maybe because the food standard isnt as great as it was before. Its so bad that all the food that was cooked would still have 80% remaining at the end of the day. As I didnt want to waste food I instructed the workers to give out to people for free at the final hour before closing everyday. And guess what? Singapore kiasu-ness kicked-in Many people would NOT order from my store until near the final hour to collect free food. Ironically, thats when our shop have the most customers.

To counter this, I simply asked the chef to cook lesser portions and also, we ceased giving out free food.

I then came up with a new idea to salvage my business: any 3 ingredients + rice at a fixed price of $2.50. The main intention was to draw more new customers to patronize our store.

And, sigh, guess what again? Singapore kiasu-ness and stinginess retuned. Customers would queue up and pick all the expensive ingredients like fish, and meat. In the end, all the vegetables were untaken. This is mainly my fault for not foreseeing this.

So I changed my strategy again. Any meal set (2+1 or 3+1 or 4+1) will be entitled to a free drink at the drinks stall. At the end of every week, I would reimburse the drink stalls for the amount of drinks redeemed.

And, yeap, as you expect it, I got outsmarted again. This time customers would only get the 2+1 meal set. I was making a loss for every 2+1 meal set. Because every 2+1s profit is about $0.30-$0.50. Now imagine a cup of kopi or can drink back then about $0.80.

Thats not the worst part To be entitled for the drink, the customer have to simply show the receipt to the drinks stall to redeem their drink. Some people would show the receipt, then pass the receipt to their family member or friends to go redeem too. So at the end of the week when I was tallying the amount of drinks redeemed and the customers who purchased our food It would be a 2-fold difference. For example, 100 customers, but 200 redemption. It is nuts.

Remember the durian charity incident? Yeap, reading that news reminded me of the above. Pure recollection.

The whole situation was so bad that my stall was making a loss of 20K every month. And the losses are increasing every month. Gradual increments but enough to make me lose sleep.

I decided to close the stall down. I practically killed my parents business and I still regret it until today.

Later, over the years, I had several other business ventures and investments. But they all failed. This resulted me to sell my parents landed and all. And that was my biggest mistake because I have problems getting a home after that. I was only 25 then and I cant even get a HDB as Im not 35, nor married. So I have to live in a rented room (not house, ROOM) for $800 a month.

I hated myself. I felt like a real char siew. All the decades of my parents hardwork were destroyed by me.

Im now 27 with barely 100K in my bank now. And that is why I am always in the Money Matters section reading financial tips and advice.

I cant find a job since my business ventures failed.

No one wants to hire a 27 year old with ZERO work experience. The only option? Be a grab driver. But I can't fathom the thought of it... Having to pay a room rental, then car rental and all.

The unfortunate story of a son of cai png store owners. The downfall of well-to-do individuals are more unfortunate than you think. I cant imagine how much more dire it is for once rich individuals having to declare bankruptcy. And being the only child is worst as I have no one to turn to in such dire circumstances.

:o

Bonus photo

https://www.kfc.com.sg/whats-new/nyonya-chicken

moi ish going to jiak the nyonya cheekon for moi supper rai riao tonight. :o

Since you already reached there, might as well eat there, wipe your mouth and leave.

Some people eat halfway, then pay extra to dabao... not very bo hua meh?

Latest Images