Cleanliness in Singapore

Now don't ask me whats there to write about it, everyone knows that Singapore is one of the cleanest cities in the world.The more eye popping topic would have been dirtiest places in Singapore. Well I will get to that topic also someday.

After coming here I realized how clean this place actually looks.It looks like a city created using building blocks game. 80 % of population here lives in HDB and almost every other apartment here looks the same.

Some random pic


Singapore dint get the title of cleanest city overnight. We can see how much effort the government is investing in maintaining the cleanliness over here. With so many people from different cultures under one roof it becomes difficult to maintain the city given that not everyone has a habit of keeping their surroundings clean.That's when the rules come into picture.

There are plenty of rules to be followed here and there is a heavy fine if these rules are broken. There are no littering boards on street,no eating or drinking boards in stations and buses, wherever you go in Singapore you will find dust bins, even the lifts are not spared . You just have to take two steps to find the nearest dust bin.

But these are just regular rules which I think every country has in place. The more amusing ones are the images shown below

They clean the apartment corridor every now and then


Chinese burn papers which look like currency so that it is sent to their ancestors in heaven .Hence the below notice.
And look at the window cleaning instructions. this is something unusual.people have to be reminded to clean their windows ?????

This is where the papers need to be burnt rather than open spaces


In the first month of my stay here two people had come to our place to inspect if there are any mosquitos.They told us to keep things dry and not to clog water anywhere.It was part of some anti-malaria campaign.

Then there are things being done for the beautification of the city.The whole buildings are renovated and demolished whenever necessary. Ours got renovated recently.It looks brand new now. When my husband had told that you wont find any dust in Singapore I refused to believe him.Now I see why he said so ???

There are hardly any open dusty grounds here.I mean there are huge grounds but they are covered in green grasses and these grasses are ploughed evenly every 15 days I guess.There might be some industrial places which might be dusty but rest everywhere its either roads ,pavements or huge green spaces.

The best part is roads, wide smooth roads ,if it rains there are no craters or it doesn't get dirty. We can walk freely in rain without getting scared of being splashed by dirty water from a moving car.

My office building being cleaned


I sometime wonder why the government of India cannot do all these. Sure we do have money but the corruption is too much.The roads in India are built just for a season. Its high time we as Indians pick up all these positive things that other countries has to offer .

Funny lift sighting in Singapore

Although this is a long weekend ( Monday is a holiday here ) it is turning out to be a tiring one . This whole week we have been busy house hunting and look at the coincidence I actually wrote an article on how to find a house in Singapore but had not posted it .

Now I will post it after we find a house and ofcourse the article needs to be re written with some of the not so good experience we are having .

Anyway today we saw around three house and I better not tell how they are . Coming back to the title some of the old apartments will not have lifts to all the floor . I dint see one personally until today . In the pictures there are only 1 ,5 and 9 floor button.



Ha... Ha.... This is the first time I am seeing it and why will anyone even dare to do it ??????? I cannot answer this one .



Another sign in the lift

Looks can be deceptive !!

One of the favorite pastime of Singaporeans is complaining !!!
These are not my words but those of Singaporeans themselves as shown by a ad promo given below for a quiz show based in Singapore.



Singaporeans complain for not having enough seats in MRT , for increasing property prices(well this one we all do) ,for increasing number of foreign influx,for waiting too long for buses(too long means 10 min , don't compare with Indian standards) ....the list is endless.

As they say when in Rome do as Romans do ,so I decided to complain.We ordered bruschetta with mushrooms in Pizza Hut and look at what we got ....



Frankly speaking I should have complained to the manager but we were too tired that day so I decided to blog it instead .

My dental nightmare

It started one month before when I went to doctor to get my cavity filled . I estimated that it would cost me 50 dollars and one hour to get everything fixed. I was in for a rude shock !!!!

The doctor told me that the tooth is cracked and the only way to save it would be to get root canal done . Well I am not new to this procedure .I have got it done in India for one of my other stupid tooth . Anyway back there it cost me about 4000 rs including the crown that they place on the tooth . It was way back then but still I assume the price now would be not more than 10,000 rs even with a best doctor at your service So I was taken aback when I was told the price here . If you have seriously fallen sick here than you should worry more about your hospital bills , that will prevent you from falling sick next time . Ok that was a bad joke !! .

But on a serious note medical cost is very high in Singapore . Even for a common cold you will end up paying $50 .Most doctors here won't just give prescription , they will give you required medicines too ,hence the increased charge .

Anyway coming back to my dental charges I was told it will cost 800 dollars for treatment and 600 dollars for crown. That's 1400 dollars inturn 50,000 Indian rupees. This was good enough reason for us to hunt around Singapore and even neighboring Malaysia for best price .

The prices throughout Singapore are more or less same . As far as Malaysia is concerned it would take us around two hour to reach the neighboring town of johar baru . The total rates there was around 900 dollars in a good clinic. So we could have saved around 500 dollars but the weekly trip to that place would be too taxing so finally after a month of pondering and delaying ( I was scarred to get the treatment started ) we decided to have my treatment done here in Singapore .

Had my first sitting last week just can't wait to get over this painful torture .