Mid Autumn Celebration in Singapore

I went to the Chinese Garden Mid Autumn Festival decoration event last Sunday (26th Sept). It was the last day of the event. It has been opened to public for visit since two weeks ago and there was a fire work event on the 15th in the eighth month of lunar calendar (22nd Sept).

Main Entrace

The Mid Autumn Festival atmosphere was much reduced on that day. The weather was hot (reached there around 5pm). Not many people walking around. I think mainly are foreigners like me. I heard about this event from a leaflet sent to my door step. With this leaflet I can exchange for a free lantern, and by the entrace you can get a token for free moon cake.

The garden is not very big. Not much decoration, may be have been taken down. I heard from my local friends, the Mid Autumn Lantern Festival is a yearly event in Chinese Garden, in 2008, the theme is Hello Kitty. In my opinion, this year the event is too near to the Singapore F1 race, thus, not many advertisement and emphasis on it. Below are some photos taken:





Pagoda

Chinese Zodiac Garden

Lake

Children Play Area

Exit to Chinese Garden MRT Station

I didn't stay until dark to see the light deco, it simply too hot...

There is a Japanese Garden adjacent to it, I shall visit it next time...I went back after bought a drink from a vending machine for SGD1.70...expesive...(Note: there is a drink seller just before MRT station, selling drinks at SGD1.00...)

BTW, saw someone playing cards under bamboo tree's shade...hahaha....

Initial Preparation to Work in Singapore 3 --- Travelling Over and Local Transport

Next, plan your Travelling:
It is always cheaper to book your return ticket from Singapore to Malaysia in Ringgit Malaysia. If possible, plan and book it together with your Malaysia to Singapore ticket. We should try to travel a few day earlier to Singapore and if possible even travel one months earlier to have a look around and make sure the accommodation that we found is suitable as described in the web site or photos.

Lastly, plan your Local Transport Route:
The rented place should not be too far from our working place. Without our own car, travelling early morning to work via public transport might be a nightmare. We need to wake up early and rush with the huge number of people (You shall know what I meant, ). We can buy a Street Directory and Bus Travelling Guide (only SGD2.50) as I did or just login to their web site for direction. Prepare few alternative route, especially for bus because it may be too full to get in. It is best to stay near by a SMRT station (expensive rental) or within walking distance (I am talking about walking distance of 15 to 20 minutes).

Hope these help! 

Initial Preparation to Work in Singapore 2 --- Monthly Expenses

Secondly, prepare our budget for monthly Expenses:
This is very subjective and it is depending of individual living life style and purchasing power. Nevertheless, here are some estimated budget breakdown on a monthly basis:
1. Accommodation = SGD600
2. Food = SGD500
3. Local Transport = SGD80
4. Travelling = SGD160 (once per month two ways, back to home town by flight)
5. Handphone = SGD30
6. Entertainment and Shopping = SGD300 (subjective)

As initial, the amount of SGD that we need to bring over (before our first pay cheque) shall be around 2.5 months rental, our daily expenses for a month (as listed above), SGD500 (or SGD1,000) for minimum deposit of opening account (for our salary and waives SGD2 for falling below minimum deposit). If we plan to travel back on the first month, try to book our return ticket together with our initial travelling from Malaysia. The first month expenses may total up to SGD2,110 (minus off the Entertainment and Shopping for first month as well as the Travelling back to home town). It is not a small amount, almost RM5,000 as our initial cost...

Hope these help! 

Initial Preparation to Work in Singapore 1 --- Accomodation

After getting our job offer in Singapore and accepted it. We need to make some preparation ourselves to work in this new environment. If we are going to the new frontier alone without any relative originated from Singapore, some help from our friends are crucial. For our friend that already built a career in Singapore since day one, it is a supprise to hear from us (may be the first time after graduation). We not normally meet them and they are seldom joining any gathering activities due to work commitment and far from KL.

Firsti of all, we must settle our Accomodations:
HDB is everywhere, prime city area and new developed areas should cost around SGD450-600 per room (with or without utilities). In Singapore it is different from Malaysia, we may staying with the house owner, thus, our rental normally covered all the utilities, i.e. electricity, water, gas (for light cooking) and sometimes Internet. We should try to get a fully furnished house to reduce our trouble of getting our own bed, table and cupboard (unless we are a Johorian). Besides, ask for a house that has other electrical appliances, i.e. TV, refrigerator, washing machine, iron, etc. These are the basic needs of living. Try to get as much as possible from the fixed amount of rental that we are going to pay, since it is more than RM1,000 per month.

There is also lower end for tighter budget and higher end for luxury and comfort stays. We can still find rooms with price SGD400 per room in remote or old areas. Anyhow, Singapore is not very big, it is still not too bad, just that we need to wake up early to travel to work. If you can afford a luxury place, apartments and condos are the choice to go, SGD800-3,000 per room is the current market price. Normally comes with swimming pool, gym and other facilities.

Below are some useful sites:
FlatsDB.com
Singapore HDB Flat
RoomsDB.net
EasyRoommate
sg-house.com

Hope these help! 

Singapore Bank Application

Before I have started work, we need to open an account for banking in our salary. Most of the local company here is using the service of POSB or DBS bank. They have more than 80 branches around the island. It is like our Maybank or CIMB in Malaysia. It is wise to open one even if your company does not bank in your salary in them, easy to access the ATM for money withdrawal.

One thing I find good in Singapore companred to Malaysia is that they do not charge on interbank fund transfer (Most of the bank in Malaysia charges RM2 per transaction and transfer limit is RM5,000). And the transfer limit is up to SGD20,000, which most of the time shall not reach for normal employee like us. The limit in Malaysia is easily reach and troublesome to split our transfer into several days.

Nonetheless, Singapore's bank always required foreigner (not PR) like us to maintain at least SGD500 in our bank account in order not to be charge SGD2 per month. This shall make us think and survey properly to a suitable bank to put our money and focus on just one or two accounts. One more thing is the savings account normally has very low interest rate, keeping too many account and holding a lot of minimum saving amount is not a good practice in letting your money work hard for you.

Hence, to open a bank account, for Malaysia, remember to bring:
1) Your Malaysian IC and Passport
2) Your Singapore working pass (EP, S-Pass, Q-Pass, etc)
3) SGD500++ for your initial deposit
4) Handphone (for registering to Internet banking)

I have open my first Singapore bank account in POSB as the requirement of my company. But the interest rate really, really too little...You though in Malaysia the interest rate of 2.75% pa for FD (monthly) is very little, wait until I tell you how much is it for POSB bank.....For POSB Passbook saving account is 0.125% pa for the first SGD50,000. And by the way, it is even more less for monthly FD interest rate in Singapore for POSB, 0.1% pa for any amount!!! Can you imagine....I shall find one more bank in Singapore with a better interest rate to keep my saving in months to come (when I have more SGD cash, for minimum deposit)...(@-@)...

SGD

I have openned a bank account in POSB, as my company shall bank in my salary, $$$ to it monthly.

Singapore Credit Card Application

When I started work in Singapore, I began to search for a suitable credit card for myself. I think I shall need one as I am a regular credit card user in Malaysia. At one time, I hold 4 cards and 1 supplementary cards in Malaysia. As I changed my job to Singapore and the implementation of Government Fee of RM50 per card per annum, I canceled all my cards and left with one.

In Singapore, I feel that having at least a credit card, for my daily expenses, Internet shopping and mainly for purchasing air ticket online. This shall allows me to earn points or rebates from my purchase, pay by using my earning currency (without exchange rate) and interest free loan for 21 days with minimum cash in wallet.

I did my research online through the banks' web sites. The first that caught my eye is the Maybank's eCard Platinum.

Maybank's eCard Platinum

1) The main reason is that it has a 5% cash rebate when booking air ticket from Jetstar.
2) There is no service fee, if you charge your card at least once per quarter (easily done by buying air ticket).
3) I already open an account with Maybank Singapore (as in my Singapore Bank Application Post)

I just made one application to this card, since I still new in Singapore, no money to open and maintain too many bank accounts, although in Singapore, there is no Government fee.

Should we take out the job in Singapore?

We change our job for several reasons, it may be for career advancement, it may be for gaining new knowledge and skill, it may be for better organization prospect, it may be for family reason,...etc. Nevertheless, one main reason shall be for more $$...

In most of our thoughts, a Malaysian working in Singapore shall earn a lot more, because of the stronger SGD compared to RM. By getting SGD1,000 is equivalent to getting RM2,300. For fresh grad engineer in Malaysia with 1st class honours, we are getting around RM2,800. It is the same for Singapore, fresh grad engineer is getting SGD2,800 to SGD3,000.

I have read an article on comparing your purchase power using Big Mac Index. It is comparing the value of the money that you earn by comparing the price of a Big Mac in the country that you are working at. Why Big Mac? Because it is sell in over 120 nations world wide and it is the most easy accessible item in a country. It is a good representation of the "real" value of the currency in your monthly income.

For example: If you are earning RM3,000 in Malaysia and you have been offered a job in Singapore at SGD3,000. It seems like you have got a good deal, with a currency conversion of RM2.30/SGD, it resulted in a pay raise of RM3,900 or 130%. But actually by comparing using the Big Mac Index, it shall shows something much less...

From the above, Malaysian's Big Mac Index is 2.08 and Singapore's Big Mac Index is 3.19 as compared to USD. So the Purchase Power Parity (PPP) ratio is 0.6520. Where your actual value of SGD3,000 new salary has only a value of RM4,601. Big Mac Index shows that RM is actually undervalued. Thus, your actual income raise is actually only 53% instead of earlier 130%. It is still not a bad deal though...

[Note: There are other factor to be considered as well when make this comparison, namely some factors between two countries are inflation rate, value-added tax (GST), personal tax, supply and demand of Big Max etc. We are comparing just on one consumer product, i.e. Big Mac, for the value of our salary, it may not be too representative. Nevertheless, it is a good base guide...don't rush to make decision when job hop to other country]

Buying a Laptop

It is important to stay online and keep yourself updated these days, for email, MSN, Skype, social networking, reading news, youtube, etc. Thus, buying a laptop to bring over Singapore is the first priority. (Normally, as an engineer in Malaysia, our laptop is loaned from company for us to work at home...)

Why buying in Malaysia instead of Singapore? Doesn't it cheaper in Sg with GST (Good and Service Tax) rebate? And with more advance design and features in Sg?

The price is not necessary cheaper...in My actually there is similar priced laptop. The only cheaper is due to the Sg's GST rebate (7%). But as we are working there, we cannot claim any rebate, (we are earning money from Sg and not as tourist) hence, this has wiped off the discount. In term of latest design and features, I would said in reality there is "slightly" more advance in Sg. Unless you are looking for a very high end laptop for your own work or gaming, we normally do not need the latest design, and it is normally more expensive.

For me, at that moment, I am looking for a laptop that are ok in performance in term of speed, ram, storage, outlook, etc. But the most important criteria for me is the weight. I plan to travel often back to Malaysia. We do not want to carry such a big laptop around. You may thinking that slightly more heavier laptop is not a problem. Please remember that we are just starting to work in Sg, we normally travel via public transport, no more car to carry the laptop for us. Trust me it is very important. Changi Air Port is located at one end of the country, no matter where you work, normally you need to travel quite a bit.

I have shortlisted two laptops of choice:
a) Dell Inspiron
b) HP Pavilion dm3



HP Pavilion dm3

 I bought a HP Pavilion dm3, with Intel Core 2 SP9300 2.26GHz, 500GB Storage, 4GB RAM, 4USB ports, 1.91kg for RM4,379.00. I extended the warranty to 3 years, and it comes with a bag and external DVD R/W drive. It was last year December (2009).

Actually Dell is my first choice but there is no chance for the online purchase to meet the delivery before New Year. So I bought the HP off the shelf from a local computer shop in One U.

Dell Inspiron 13R

Now, I think Dell Inspiron 13R with a similar features is cost only about RM3,091.00. It is a good buy. Even then, when I comparing price Dell's Inspiron is less than RM4k. Just that I cannot wait...(><)

The main reason was because the My's income tax relief when purchasing laptop or computer...in other words I am getting a discount of about 20% if I purchase before 1st Jan 2010. It was just the timing. For people who are working in My, hardly we thinking of getting the tax relief by buying laptop (as mentioned earlier our PC mainly by company). Only when I was about to leave the country, then I think of it...Luckyly still managed to purchase in time and get the tax relief this April. (^^)v