Singapore Expats

Wd40 wrote:

rajagainstthemachine wrote:

Wd40 wrote: Places like Maharaja on Cuppage road, Song of India in Scott road and Go India in Vivocity are expatty restaurants. Like top end. I see less Indians in them and more Ang Mohs. Muthus Curry is one of the Indian restaurant with decent prices and yet frequented by Ang Mohs.

facepalm! we're discussing prices of foods in restaurants not what kind of people frequent them.
who cares if Indians or Ang Mohs go to such places, the prices hurt everybody equally.

You take top end examples of Indian restaurants and then say that food in restaurants is expensive. I say, Indian restaurants which Indians frequent are not as expensive. Simple, no?

Okayyyy... so what you've been trying to say all this while is that Indians do not frequent expensive Indian restaurants hence Indian fine dining in Singapore is cheap! How dense of us!

And of course the fact that myself and the poster above are Indian too doesn't matter as our views are not as representative of the Indian diaspora as are yours. And this is because you're omniscient. You, for example know that "All Indians are show offers" and that "Facebook is a tool used by people to make others jealous". How can anyone argue with someone as enlightened as yourself!

I was talking about majority of Indian FT workers here. Many of them who share a room in an HDB or rent out a room to a stranger and earn like 5k-6k a month. You are Raj and not one of them.

Regarding the facebook comment, I said "Indians are the biggest show offers" I didnt say "All Indians are show offers". Big difference.

Wd40 wrote: You are Raj and not one of them.

So Piscean Girl is a Raj and not an FT ?

Wd40 wrote:I was talking about majority of Indian FT workers here. Many of them who share a room in an HDB or rent out a room to a stranger and earn like 5k-6k a month. You are Raj and not one of them.

Regarding the facebook comment, I said "Indians are the biggest show offers" I didnt say "All Indians are show offers". Big difference.

And the topic was about... hell what does that matter anyway, right?



Yep, BIG difference - bigoted statements both but different.

That was a genuine mistake

Wd40 wrote:Regarding the facebook comment, I said "Indians are the biggest show offers" I didnt say "All Indians are show offers". Big difference.

wd40 you're glutton for punishment re-starting on this

Wd40 wrote:That was a genuine mistake

You need help! No seriously.

I don't earn much in SG ( around about what you've just mentioned ) and I regularly go to maharajah, live by mself and don't sublet my flat to anyone...I'm not a rich guy at all but it doesn't mean I won't go have a nice meal and a drink from time to time.. so please keep the sweeping generalizations aside and lets get on with this main topic of this thread yes?

I presume the sample criteria includes owning a house and car, which will skew the results, and ignores taxation as a variable?

I can't see how living here is deemed more expensive than London and Sydney when you take taxation into consideration.

Maybe I missed something?

It never ceases to amaze me how consumers can pay such inflated prices for food that is inherently cheap. Amazing.

Take Pasta Mania. First (and last) time I went there, it was by invitation of a friend. I'd ordered the turkey pasta, but after it was delivered, I called back the waiter, because the kitchen staff had obviously forgotten to add the turkey.

Incredulously, I had a bit of a poke around the dish with the waiter standing by me, but I could only locate a few slivers, literally, of what the waiter told me was the turkey part of the "turkey" pasta.

The dish was, basically, noodles, a white sauce and a few slivers of turkey! I kid you not.

And for this I paid a stupid amount. Luckily I've forgotten how much.

Anyway, I wrote in to the Straits Times Forum section about this and my article was published. But of course the restaurant never bothered to address my letter.

I'd rather chew glass than eat there again.

BillyB wrote:I presume the sample criteria includes owning a house and car, which will skew the results, and ignores taxation as a variable?

I can't see how living here is deemed more expensive than London and Sydney when you take taxation into consideration.

Maybe I missed something?

these are quotes from that article
"The city's strong currency combined with the high cost of running a car and soaring utility bills contributed to Singapore topping the list.
It is also the most expensive place in the world to buy clothes.

The EIU's Worldwide Cost of Living Survey is a relocation tool that uses New York city as a base. It looks at more than 400 individual prices "

I'm assuming this would be like comparing a person moving from say New York to Singapore vs New York to Sydney
In this example I think one could definitely afford a car after moving to Sydney but might not be able to buy one in Singapore. but at the same time might get cheaper accommodation in Singapore over say Sydney
Of course the study just didn't look at cars/utility bills/housing as the only criteria, it included 397 other parameters that could affected this study in more than one way.
Sydney and Singapore both have near monopolistic media/telecom/Internet providers as well, but taxes in AU are way higher than Singapore..

It would have been more interesting if they gave some examples in that article.

rajagainstthemachine wrote: Of course the study just didn't look at cars/utility bills/housing as the only criteria, it included 397 other parameters that could affected this study in more than one way.

Slightly incorrect.......in that yes, of course utility bills were included hence we know it is the third most expensive place. Car, yeah, we all know about that one but one small complaint about the survey is, yes, it included housing, just not 'public' housing.

HDB prices have escalated as quickly, or more, as private housing through recent years. By ignoring it, it gives news organisations and the government an 'Opt-Out' to say the survey only applies to foreigners regardless of the fact PRs and locals are also lumbered with sky high public accommodation in a worldwide comparison, which this survey is.

Max Headroom wrote:It never ceases to amaze me how consumers can pay such inflated prices for food that is inherently cheap. Amazing.

Take Pasta Mania. First (and last) time I went there, it was by invitation of a friend. I'd ordered the turkey pasta, but after it was delivered, I called back the waiter, because the kitchen staff had obviously forgotten to add the turkey.

Incredulously, I had a bit of a poke around the dish with the waiter standing by me, but I could only locate a few slivers, literally, of what the waiter told me was the turkey part of the "turkey" pasta.

The dish was, basically, noodles, a white sauce and a few slivers of turkey! I kid you not.

And for this I paid a stupid amount. Luckily I've forgotten how much.

Anyway, I wrote in to the Straits Times Forum section about this and my article was published. But of course the restaurant never bothered to address my letter.

I'd rather chew glass than eat there again.

agreed! The food is very soup kitchen standard and the meat is of poor quality almost canned stuff. There used to be one in united square which was close to work, I haven't had food in pastamania in over 4 years now.
I can't remember if they served in melamine ware or not.

+1 for meat to be a problem.

On the other hand, I haven't been to US or UK, so it makes me ignorant about expensiveness of food in Singapore (I prefer not to recall Ukraine) and it saves my nerves.

If not girlfriend that came back recently and us planning marriage, I would've been packing my bags already.

I just cannot wrap my head around Singapore being labelled the most expensive city. Try spending a week in Perth (my home city) and see how far your AUD goes.

I'm trying to avoid the squabbling, but as for Indian restaurants, there are a few very cheap ones (such as Gandhi's), although these seem to be few and far between. Brinda's, the delivery company, is also relatively reasonably-priced. That said, I can't really seem to find any cheap North Indian food.