Orchard Road Legends

With the passing of Ng Teng Fong, the rag to riches fairytale of some great legends of Singapore is nearing the end.


In 1958, Tang Choon Keng bought a 14,500-square feet piece of land at the corner of Orchard Road and Scotts Road at a cost of $10,000 which work out to 70 Singapore cents per square foot.





Ng Teng Fong first foray into Orchard Road was to built Far East Shopping Centre in 1974, then made a fortune with Lucky Plaza in 1978 followed by Far East Plaza in 1983.





Khoo Teck Puat with a few partners founded Malayan Banking (Maybank) in Kuala Lumpur. The bank grew rapidly to more than 150 branches within 3 years. In 1968, he bought over the Malayan Banking's Singapore properties including Goodwood Park Hotel for $50 million.

Joy of Parenthood

For men who wake up one fine morning and suddenly feel nausea with or without vomiting, do not make your way to the GP office, just yet.
You are having the morning sickness symptom known as Couvade Syndrome.


It is thought to be a form of a sympathetic pregnancy in which the husband experiences symptoms of pregnancy without actually being pregnant. Yes, dudes, this means that you have many of the "joys" associated with pregnancy.

Dr. Arthur Brennan, Senior Lecturer in Research Methods and Statistics and Psychology at the Faculty of Health and Social Care Sciences, St. George's University said the reasons for the sympathy pregnancy are not known. There have been some complex psychological theories written but current thinking seems to be focussing on changes in hormones.

Giving a Speech ?

Preparing and making a speech can be an unnerving event. Facts need to be assembled and scripted. Capturing the attention of the audience is critical in a successful speech.





In a nutshell, a speech is likened to a stag horn. A point here, a point there, and a lot of bull in between.

CNY Tradition

Chinese New Year is a week away and demand for new banknotes is as usual high. Cities like Singapore Taiwan and Hongkong have the tradition of giving lucky money to the singles in the form of red packets.





In Hongkong 300 to 400 million new and used notes are issued to cater for demand in connection with the Chinese New Year. This translate into 20 containers load.



Polymer banknotes were developed by the Reserve Bank of Australia and first circulated in 1988. Today seven countries, Australia, Bermuda, Brunei, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Romania, and Vietnam are now fully using all plastic notes.

CNY

It is the time to stock up on goodies for the chinese new year and one favourite is the cashew nuts.



Many people are not aware that the shell of the nut contains a toxic, viscous and dark liquid, known as cashew nut shell liquid (CNSL), which is extremely caustic. That's why cashew is the only nut not sold unshelled.

CNSL is an important and versatile industrial raw material. It is used as an ingredient for powder for automotive brake linings and clutch disks.




In South America they threw the nuts away and ate the fruit, the flesh is spongy, fibrous and very juicy. They chew it just for the juice, spitting out the fibrous remains.

Happy New Year

The Paper Chase

Webometrics:

1 University of Tokyo
2 National Taiwan University
3 Kyoto University
4 University of Hong Kong
5 University of Tsukuba
6 National Cheng Kung University
7 Peking University
8 National Sun Yat-Sen University
9 Chinese University of Hong Kong
10 National Chiao Tung University


4icu.org:

1 Peking University
2 Shanghai Jiao Tong University
3 Tsinghua University
4 Fudan University
5 Xi'an Jiaotong University
6 Keio University
7 National University of Singapore
8 Nanjing University
9 Indian Institute of Technology Mumbai
10 Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur


QS.com:

1 University of Hong Kong
2 The Chinese University of Hong Kong
3 University of Tokyo
4 Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
5 Kyoto University
6 Osaka University
7 KAIST - Korea Advanced Institute of Science
8 Seoul National University
9 Tokyo Institute of Technology
10 National University of Singapore


Asiaweek:

1 University of Tokyo
2 Tohoku University
3 Kyoto University
4 University of Hong Kong
5 National University of Singapore
6 Seoul National University
7 National Taiwan University
8 Chinese University of Hong Kong
9 University of Melbourne
10 University of New South Wales

Giant Tools

Countries do one up to better the height of the previous "world tallest" building. Infrastructure facilities are designed larger. Machines builders too are going big with enormous tools.


Kroll of Denmark has the biggest tower crane in the world.



Mammoet of Holland built the biggest crane which need 85 trucks and other heavy trailers to transport the crane nicknamed Momo to a site. Maximum Lifting Capacity: 1600 Tonnes



Manitowoc, USA will construct the 31000 crawler crane which will surpass the Momo to become the largest construction crane on the market, with lifting capacity of 2,300 ton.



Not so long ago a 52 metre concrete pump was considered the longest but Sany, China has come up with a 72 metre version.

Emma Maersk, Denmark. Length 396 metre which is longer than the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise which is 342 metre long.
The vessel can carries 15,200 twenty foot containers.