My Hatch Day!!

Last Friday marks my 29th bday. Gosh! I'm getting old already!! But still... I party and had fun!! Hahaha!!! It's a cartoony theme last Friday at Crewroom. Everyone who was invited to my party had to dress in cartoon tee. If not, punishment will be imposed!! It turned out to be a blessing rather than a punishment. Well, I'm such a nice, sweet, loving lady... haha!! Those who didn't come in cartoon tee will hav to pin my fav hello kitty on them and drink from the personal shot glass a shot of Macallan! They got to keep the shot glass though. So they say dun wear better, still got freebie =.=

I have selected some pics to upload to my blog. If you are interested to view more pics, go to my FB!!

From my precious love :D Isn't it beautiful?

From my darling bro n gf. He's a sweetie la.

From my friends, my colleagues.

From my Ohana Clan. Haha... prezzie specifically stated by ME!

From my Godsister. It was really a surprise!

From Mr Fav & PPU

First bday prezzie, from my si jiu gui fren to me this jiu gui :P

That's my MAN! The sweetest BB on earth :)

My darling bro.

First batch who got forfeited!

Bell n cousin

My Kitty got abused!!

Nicky bro looks like a salesman

The couple who got punished!

Cookie Monster Couple

Super Couple

Fei Lou came to wish me Happy Birthday and rushed off. But he was not spared!

Thanks for supporting my theme, my dear Ohana!

Bb with MY Band of Brothers

Introducing..... My friends, My Colleagues

Bb's Band of Brothers

Of cos not forgetting the short prata meetup with my cuzzies.

Thanks for the bday cake :) And Xiong xiong for the treat!!!

I'm truly a blessed girl... erm lady... Every year my wish is the same. This year is the best wish granted ever!!! I guessed that's why I cried that night on my bday. Until my eyes all swollen.... I sincerely appreciate everyone of you for being in my life and painting my life with all sort of colours! I love you guys and I love my MAN!!!

Fertility Rate

The government introduced measures after measures and pumps in 1.6 billion in hope of pushing up the fertility rate. They are merely targeting the monetary issue of why couples are not having babies. Yes, it is costly to have kids, raising them and giving them the best education. So the government came up with baby bonus, longer maternity leave, etc in hope of tantalising the married couples to make babies. Despite all the effort in promoting and throwing in 0.6% of our GDP, the fertility rate continued to slide downhill.

On the flip side, the prices of housing are soaring up high and the government came up with new policies to pull down the prices. They introduced the Seller's Stamp Duty (SSD) in Aug 2010, which sellers need to pay this SSD if they sell their flats within 3 years. On 14 Jan 2011, they lengthened the period to 4 years and increased the SSD payable. Deter those speculators from locking in short term possession of the flats and selling in short period of time. In hope of releasing more supply of flats into the market for those who are really looking for a house to call their home. They also lowered the Loan-to-Valuation (LTV) from 80% to 70% if one has existing housing loan. Those who wish to upgrade their homes to bigger space are now faced in the situation whereby they need to fork out more cash as they can now loan lesser for their housing or still eligible for the 80% loan if they sell their current housing and buy a new flat. For the latter, there would be a downtime in between whereby the family has no place to stay but to turn to rented flats for temporary shelter. Which means increasing the cost to upgrade their homes and moving twice incurring more cost. What does this imply? Does it release more supply of resale flat into the market for real buyers?

The holding period is now longer before one can sell their flat. Which means that there would be a decreased in supply as the flats are been locked in for sale. The current supply is already insufficient to match the demand, by locking in the supply of flats would only push the prices higher.

Families who wish to upgrade their homes due to bigger family now has to reconsider. The new policy makes it troublesome to move big families and not to mention the cost involved.

So how is this related to the fertility rate mentioned at the beginning. Well, we all know we need to have shelter before we can consider settling down to setup a family. With the decrease in supply of flats from the resale market, those couples whom want to get married and start a family are unable to, even if they want to. Are these couples able to afford the ridiculously high Cash-over-valuation (COV) portion? Ok, maybe young couples are not cash rich to buy resale, so they wait for Build-to-Order (BTOs) from HDB. But, looking at the figures every month on the number of people applying for the BTOs, how many actually got a chance to own a flat? There are people who applied 9-10 times or even 20 times for a BTO flat. But still, they don't get a queue number or their number is 2 times the flats available. The government claimed that priority are given to first timers and those stay near parents, but this was not seen in the real life cases of the applicants.

Consider this scenario, a couple met in University and they decided to work a few years before deciding to settle down. They graduate at 21 & 23 respectively. So work for 4-5 years, they are now 25 & 27. They applied for a BTO flat. Wait for another 4-5 years for the project to complete. they are now 30 & 32. So how many kids the government is expecting the couple to have? This scenario is if they are so lucky to get a flat so soon. Also, if they get hitch at a later age den it's a whole new story.....

So the 2 Fs go hand in hand. You want the young Singaporeans to procreate and start a Family, you provide the chance for them to buy a Flat more easily. Not having to wait for years in order to get one.

I just hope the government can 'marry' the 2 when making policies to boost birth rate and to curb housing issues.

Sticky Chewy Chocolate!

Yes, I admit. I'm needy and wanna stick to my bf ALL the time. Hahaha... I wasn't like this in the past. I used to be independent and wld get sick of it if my bf wanna meet me more than 3 times a week! hahaha. I will cannot stand it and find him irritating. Now I'm the Sticky Chewy Chocolate. Irony. The more you hate/dislike something, the more you would be ended up with it.

The last 2 weekends we juz spent it nuahing at home, play Xbox Kinect n have home cooked food. Love the time spent tgt. But a small, tiny part of me is still having the insecure feeling. I know he loves me more than I love him. I know he wants to stay and will be. BUT I juz feel scared. The more I have grown to love him, the fear gets stronger. I guess is the fear of losing. Cos the more u love someone, the more u dun wanna lose tat someone.

Last Fri, BB went out with his frens after work. I went for my class. I asked if I cld go find him after my class, but the ans wasn't positive. He said he also need time to be out with his frens. I was a little hurt at first. Cos he was out with them on Thu. Den Fri still exclude me again. It's Fri leh. But I still let him go. I know we both need our personally space. So I went to meet my frens. He came to find me after that :)

In a relationship is like tat. Need to give n take. If I insisted that he meet me on Fri den we wld end up with an argument, he not happy, I not happy, his frens oso not happy. Certain things we can compromise and hav a better outcome.