Thursday, July 01, 2010

It’s raining

It’s raining cats and dogs outside and I am not in the mood to work. Wonder if it’s going to flood again.


Looking out of the window on a rainy day like this always reminds me of an occasion about 30 years ago when I was working as a young industrial engineer in Philips Singapore. We were attending a course on Work Factor (a form of Predetermined Motion-Time Systems or PMTS). Our trainer was an old man from Australia. Our seminar room was at one of the high floors of the Equatorial Hotel. Remember this hotel? It used to stand at the corner of Stevens and Bukit Timah Road. Our company liked to hold its training programmes there.

Anyway, it was raining heavily and our trainer was staring out of the window during the break. He told us the part of Australia where he came from, it was very rare to see such heavy rain. In fact some places do not see rain for one whole year or more. And so he was ‘soaking in’ the sight.

Enough! … Get back to work.

12 comments:

Brian and Tess said...

Ah that rain! You will recall Chun See that on our visit last year Tess and I saw something of the heavy rain that Spore gets. And I had told her that it rained at most once a week - how 40 plus years of absence can fool the memory!

jacosawilliam said...

It is truly beautiful because I love rainy season and also like to play with rain and also like to get wet in the rain. The pictures you have shared over here are really fabulous.
sticker labeling machine

Victor said...

The heavy rain today did actually cause flash floods in Macpherson and Paya Lebar. So the flash floods are happening more often and definitely not just "once in 50 years" like what some wise minister said.

Zen said...

Singapore is a very small country with very few natural resources. The only thing I can think of is the large deposit of granite lying below the north-western part of the island, but luckily nature is kind to us, giving us prenty rainfall and sunlight (1 degree north of the equator) - if only we can fully exploit them.

yg said...

"the marina barrage is part of a comprehensive flood control scheme to alleviate flooding in the low-lying areas in the city...." what is the meaning of 'alleviate'? is it 'to raise'?

Icemoon said...

Victor, according to the wisest one, it is unrealistic to expect [flash] flood-free Singapore. So let's move on. :P

Anonymous said...

i m happy to share my beautiful article. I love the rainy season very beautiful.i much.its like to be considered in this article.
Cheap Holidays Spain

jean said...

Its nice to be philosophical sometimes LCS!Watching the rain does make us wonder about life sometimes.
Yes I remember Equatorial Hotel.A rather towering hotel that held seminars & even business courses.It had a bus stop right in fron of it.

Tom said...

Talking about the rain,I remember when I in Borneo we had a electrical storm, some were up the Baram river we had set up our base camp and that night I was lying in my hammock and it started to rain very heavy and the lightning lit up the jungle, storm got that bad we where all told to get out into the clearing at the edge of our small base camp soon as we got into the clearing a big ball of lightning came out of the trees I have never ever seen a storm like that again. Looking at the photos of the rain coming down in Singapore it looks very heavy, I loved the rain In Singapore I use to strip of and run about in it when I had a few Tiger beers haha , by the way what is the name of the Plant in the second photo bottom tight?

Lam Chun See said...

Tom. The local folks must think you Brits were all crazy and fond of stripping. First, as Freddy narrated here, they stripped to get themselves barbequed in our hot tropical sun; and now you. If you have been here this week, you will probably have to strip everyday.

As for the plants, they are called Pitcher plants. My son has planted lots of them and I had blogged about them here.

Tom said...

Chun See, I had learnd my lesson about lying Out in the tropical sun. this is true I was on a police boat out on the sea just of Sabah and I was of duty for afew hours, so I went on top deck just with a towel round me , stupid me I layed down on the deck and fell a sleep and when I woke up I just could not move, yes I was Barbequed, all the lad had a good laugh at me I could not sit down for about a week,

jade said...

Floodings in Singapore now seem more frequent and in areas not known to flood before.
An Indonesian 15-yr-old boy just lost his life yesterday because he waded thru' shin-deep water, stepped into an uncovered drain and was swept away by the strong torrents. The poor boy was a visitor and wouldn't have known that he was near the drain. Even Singaporeans will not be familiar with the location of such drains as new construction is always happening here. Hope this reminds everyone that it is very dangerous to wade thru' a flooded area. And I hope more railings and covers can be constructed to prevent such tragic accidents.