tzlee.com/blog

Tag: Renovation

  • Where have the peaceful HDB estates gone?

    I haven’t been blogging for a while, so this really means something I feel strongly about to have me start writing again.

    Wifey was down with high fever over the long Hari Raya/National Day weekend. Her fever persisted for four days. It went as high as 39.5 deg C.

    Earlier this morning her fever was up again at 38.2 deg C even after a half-dosage of Panadol. Fearing it was dengue or some avian-flu thing, we drove to NUH A&E at 4am to have her X-ray and blood tests done.

    As usual it took several hours to have tests done. By the time we returned home it’s already 7am; dengue tested negative, thankfully.

    Wifey took her meds and laid down to rest while I headed downstairs for breakfast.

    Just as I got home from breakfast all ready to do some work, lo and behold, all the pounding from neighbouring renovation works started. Adding on to the pain I still have my stomping neighbour upstairs randomly banging shit around the house at night — especially over this long weekend.

    In short, I have practically no peace at any time of the day. It does not matter if I’m trying to do some work or trying to sleep after taking meds.

    This is not the first time.

    A headache was brewing from all the noise. My skull felt like a cracked egg.

    I even made a recording with my phone. Playing it back appalled me. (Question: How can I share it?)

    Where have the peaceful HDB estates gone? I don’t remember hearing neighbours stomping, renovations for weeks on end, pounding/chopping boards from housewives or noises from bamboo poles hitting against (stupid HDB design) metal railings. These are all noises I hear only after I moved to my new flat.

    I was rarely woken by external noises at my parent’s flat. The loudest thing would be my mum yelling at me to wake up, the kranguni man or the hum from the vacuum cleaner. Occasionally there would be renovation works, but not once every two months!

    Right now I can hear (if you have some faith in a musician’s trained ear) three concurrent pounding/drilling works going on.

    What is wrong with our houses? Why do people have to tear them apart and put them together over and over again. Why are people moving houses again and again? Not tired meh? Not expensive meh?

    With 20 to 30 storey HDBs built in closer and closer proximity to each other I foresee these noise issues to be even worse in newer estates.

    All these made me wonder if I should just suck on it and save up to buy a landed property with my parents or simply leave this country because of the ridiculous property and car prices.

    What good is life with no peace? Can’t work without peace, can’t sleep without peace. Heck, tell me if you can make out with your neighbours drilling. Baby bonus my ass.

    The government needs to recognise that noise pollution is a major issue in densely built up areas. Our kampung era policies don’t work anymore. If they don’t work on doing something about this and leaving it all to “community mediation” we’re going to have neighbours burn each others houses down soon.

  • Curtains Up!

    Curtains and blinds are up! Actually was up about two weeks ago, but I didn’t have time to take photos, edit and upload. I finally found some time to do so. I didn’t take the blinds though, it’s pretty generic roller binds, though they are of much higher quality than Ikeas’. Photos can’t tell the difference in quality – you’ll have to see for yourself.

    The curtains are tailor made by Rosse Curtain and I would like to compliment them for their excellent service. The guy who installed our curtains and blinds was very detailed in his work and did his duty to keep the dust from drilling to a minimum. If you’re looking to get curtains for your new home, I’d highly recommend them.

    Living Room Curtains
    Dining Room Curtains
    Master Bedroom Curtains

    P.S. Choose your fabric wisely. They make a huge difference in price.

  • Three Week Summary

    Renovation has officially completed; we made our final payment last Thursday and the final touches were done yesterday. All the furniture are in as well. Mode Studio didn’t screw up and delivered the remaining furniture as scheduled.

    I pay a lot of attention to detail and there were some minor issues with the renovation (as usual). Carpentry, plumbing and electrical works needed personal supervision but overall we rate our interior designer highly for their design creativity and project management. We are especially pleased with their flooring, painting and solid surface works.

    I’ve been very busy but I will post some photos of the completed work soon.

    Work as usual, hamsters are still alive and kicking. I’m trying to find some time to pick up my R/C hobby again as the sloping season’s back but my time has been all tied up by the house renovation. Cleaning a new house has proved to be quite a chore as the dust settles each day.

    I have also attempted cooking. BTW, it’s not exactly cheap for two persons to cook at home. Breakfast is easy but I haven’t been very successful with my first dinner dish. However, the wife makes nice Chinese soup dishes!

    It’s just one more month before the year comes to an end. Time to close yet another chapter and kick start 2010. It will be a very exciting new year!

  • House Cleaning, Part Two

    A quick check on the to-do list:

    • Pass ah fen a hamster – done.
    • Grab the side table we ordered from Defu – done.
    • Pay the balance for the sofa and dining table and arrange for them to be delivered next week – half done. More screwups with the delivery.
    • Grab the trolley, TV and sub woofers from parent’s office. I left my new TV there for storage – done.
    • Bak Kut Teh at Jurong East for lunch at 1300 hrs – failed.
    • Clean the living room, and maybe three bedrooms if they get dusty again – done.
    • Figure out where to mount the bathroom accessories, and what else we need to buy – half done. We know what we want to mount, but haven’t figured what we need to buy.
    • Assemble the Ikea lamps – done.
    • Set up the home router. It’s going to a Linux box with Vyatta, then I can establish an IPsec Site-to-site VPN! Whoopee! – Not done!
    • Hopefully a karanguni drops by so I can get rid of the old ceiling fans – didn’t happen.
    Leaving Sakae Sushi at TradeHub.
    Leaving Sakae Sushi at TradeHub.

    When Ferren arrived at Jurong East, she found that the entire hawker center was under renovation, so we ate Sakae instead of Bak Kut Teh.

    Duckie smiling on the way to the new house.
    Duckie smiling on the way to the new house.

    Even Duckie’s excited about the new house.

    Study room cleaned and ready.
    Study room cleaned and ready.

    This is the study room with Ikea chairs and tables, all set up and ready for use.

    Watching TV in the living room after a tiring day.
    Watching TV in the living room after a tiring day.

    We watched G-Force and some crappy YouTube videos in the evening after two days of cleaning.

  • House Cleaning, Part One

    Sincere thanks to Hui Zhen, Ferren, Yan Po, Wen Xi, Chrispin and Sheng Xuan for helping clean the house. Every little bit counts!

    Unfortunately, I left my DSLR in the new house. I will get some photos and post them up tomorrow.

    Meanwhile, here’s what we accomplished today (Saturday).

    • Cleaned up the store room and moved the mess in the kitchen over.
    • Cleaned up all three bedrooms, kitchen, windows and grilles. Thanks ladies! Fantastic job.
    • Built the Ikea furnitures – a study table, two office chairs and a side table with drawers. Some instructions are wrong, especially the cheaper furnitures.
    • Installed the almighty lock that only requires one key for all! Whoopee. How I wish my car key could be used instead.
    • Set up the bed in the master bedroom.
    • Carpenter dropped by to inspect the work done on Friday.

    Here’s the agenda for tomorrow (Sunday).

    • Pass ah fen a hamster. 🙂
    • Grab the side table we ordered from Defu.
    • Pay the balance for the sofa and dining table and arrange for them to be delivered next week.
    • Grab the trolley, TV and sub woofers from parent’s office. I left my new TV there for storage.
    • Bak Kut Teh at Jurong East for lunch at 1300 hrs.
    • Clean the living room, and maybe three bedrooms if they get dusty again.
    • Figure out where to mount the bathroom accessories, and what else we need to buy.
    • Assemble the Ikea lamps.
    • Set up the home router. It’s going to a Linux box with Vyatta, then I can establish an IPsec Site-to-site VPN! Whoopee!
    • Hopefully a karanguni drops by so I can get rid of the old ceiling fans.

    I’m still thinking if I should start moving some old books and computer equipment. Maybe my R/C stuffs can go over too.

    The audio system will go over next week before the weekend, that’s for sure!

    More shopping list for next week.

    • A stool, just to facilitate cleaning some stuff that’s higher than us.
    • A (cheap) bicycle? Just to get to and fro the in-law’s place and Bukit Panjang Plaza.
    • A mini TV console for the master bedroom?
    • Another Ikea side table for the master bedroom?
    • Subscribe to StarHub TV and Internet! (Sorry SingNet, your marketing and helpdesk just fails me.)