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I'm reminded not to fall under the two extremes.

A good lesson for me indeed.


Yours truly!

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• The oxygen produced through photosynthesis would appear as bubbles in the water.
• These bubbles would then float up through the funnel and test tube.
• The bubbles would break at the water surface to release the oxygen, thereby displacing the water in the test tube (that's why the water level in the test tube should DECREASE) and causing the gas column in the test tube to INCREASE in length.

Hope there are no more doubts henceforth.

For an animated version of the experiment, click on the following link:

http://www.cellplc.com/class8-10/biology.swf

Yours truly!

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Boring place you might say, but I left the garden feeling more uplifted.

The first mobile living thing which greeted me was this dog of mix breed ('chihuahua + ???). You wouldn't have thought that this sweet and lively thing was abandoned by her former owners and residing at SPCA. She's now a happy dog in a warm-hearted caucasian family. For all you animal lovers out there who intend to 'buy' a pet, please go adopt one instead. There are plenty at SPCA and they're waiting for a responsible owner to care for them.

Shortly after I let this dog down, a huge and handsome Golden Retriever was at my feet, trying to be friendly with this little one. No barks. Just happy wagging of tails and exchange of friendly kisses ;) Lovely sight.

My pic with the big dog was too dark so I'm not posting it.

Couple of minutes later, I was greeted by a white furry ball of energy. This maltese was wearing nice comfy walking shoes, mind you. By the time I noticed her pretty shoes, she had walked away. No pics for you!

Near a pond were two pink dragonflies playing around. This beautiful one stopped for a rest and my phone was only mere 5 cm above it. Snapped, and here you see it. How often do you see a pink dragonfly?
I saw a matching blue one at the lake after that but it's too camera shy. Missed it!

After dragonflies came dragon fruits. The fruit is forming...now we're just waiting for the petals on its flowers to wilt. Remember to learn the process ah! Don't say I didn't remind you.

This big grasshopper looks rather matching on the heliconia flower it's resting on. But if it hops at me, I'll scream my lungs off...

Terrapins basking in the sun on a lazy afternoon.
No stress... no fear of skin cancer also haha

These swans and ducks were feasting on my bread treats. Scrumptious...





Remember aerial roots? They're roots which grow downwards from the stem to the ground, capable of asorbing water directly from the air. And when they finally reach the ground, they serve as firm additional support for the plant.

I saw an interesting tree after that - the monkey pot tree. Its fruit is truly amazing. It looks like a pot! There were many pots hung high up there. I couldn't take a photo because they looked too small on camera.
These pot-like fruits have lids! One of the lids fell from the tree. I wanted to bring it back to class but it had some ants crawling on it. Before I could take a pic, it started to pour. I had to run...

Yours truly!

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I am not a member of this society.

Yours truly!

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Pingpingpingpingping

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Hell Has No Fury but A Woman's Scorn...I Married my motherin-law too...

"I did not know that when I married my wife, I would also be getting a second ‘wife’, my mother-in-law, too."

I may sound like a joke, but the reality is no joke. This sad tale is the true story of one man’s plight at the hands of a scheming mother-daughter team that cause him half a decade of hardship.

As we know, the Women’s Charter has often been criticized for being biased against men, and over the years many people have written in to newspapers and other media to express their dissatisfaction. At the moment, Parliament is once again reviewing the charter to try to make it fairer towards men, while still protecting the rights of women.

This is the story of a man who has suffered much due to the "protection" afforded by the Women’s Charter, and how he overcame many seemingly insurmountable obstacles on the way. While this is a true story, the names and some of the crucial identifying details have been changed, so as to protect those involved, especially the children. Our intention is to enlighten and inform, and not to humiliate anyone.

***

Adrian Lim and Ivy Chien decided to get married after only three months together, registering their marriage in July 2000. They had been introduced by a marriage agency in December 1999.

At first, all was well. He thought that this gentle piano teacher would make a good wife and doted on her. She liked to go to expensive concerts, and he would pay for the good seats.

But the troubles started after their customary wedding ceremony (which was conducted at a swanky Orchard Road Hotel at her insistence) in January 2001, when they moved into their flat in the northern part of Singapore. Ivy and her mother, Madam Tan, started showing their true colours. Mdm Tan ordered Adrian to buy a queen-size bed, saying that her daughter was very small built, and would be pushed off a smaller bed during ***!

It went far beyond choosing the marital bed, for this meddling mother-in-law would control their entire *** life: determining when and HOW they were to have ***. This made Adrian so frustrated, he once said to her, "Do you want to join in on the fun?"

And if that wasn’t enough, even though it was a relatively new resale flat, Mdm Tan insisted that he replace the toilet bowl, which was in excellent condition, because of "germs."

Yes indeed, they were very superstitious. This was clearly seen as Ivy first moved in, when she deliberately stepped on his shoes to have mastery over her husband. And master him she did.

He became her slave, doing all the housework and obeying of her every whim. She said it was the Hainanese custom for husbands to take care of the wife. He would buy her breakfast every morning, and in return, all he got in return was accusations from his mother-in-law that he was ill-treating her daughter, feeding her two-dollar breakfasts like roti prata when she deserved eight-dollar meals: Adrian could not imagine what kind of breakfast would be so ridiculously expensive.

Within three months, Ivy started treating the flat like a hotel. She would leave the house at 10am and not come back until late at night. Adrian eventually discovered that she would go over to her mother’s condominium and spent all day there, virtually living there.

Worse, she would lock the master bedroom and not allow him in when she was gone, saying he might bring other women home and have *** with them. In fact, she would not even allow him to speak to his female collegues or even sales assistants in shops they patronized! Throughout the day, all he had was the change of clothes that she would throw on the floor outside the bedroom door, to last him until she came back.

Eventually, Ivy became pregnant, which only served to worsen the situation, rather than improve it.

When she was admitted to the hospital maternity ward, Ivy checked herself out of the C-class ward and into an A1-class ward, insisting that her husband pay for it. At that time, her husband, who is self-employed, was in great financial difficult and could only scrape enough money to afford a B-class ward at best, and that is after calling his sister and parents to loan money.

As a result, Ivy and Mdm Tan alienated the father of the newborn girl. They prevented him from holding or even seeing his daughter after she was born, calling him a cheapskate for not paying for the A-class ward.

Eventually, Adrian had enough of this treatment, and filed for divorce in 2002. But far from alleviating the situation, it only made it worse. This led to a few years of long drawn out battles, and at least fifteen court appearances. Adrian had no idea what he got himself into that day he decided to marry the Chien family!

THE CHIEN FAMILY ALBUM

Adrian Lim was not the first victim of Mdm Tan. In fact, her husband was also victimized.

Adrian had been told that he had abandoned their family and run off with another woman to Hainan. But the truth was that he was still in Singapore

She demanded all the same things that her daughter was now expecting, a life of luxury and a husband at her beck and call. He eventually died in a nursing home for the mentally unstable, having been driven made by his wife.

But all is not lost, for not all her children were corrupted. During the course of the divorce, no family members supported Ivy and Mdm Tan. In contrast, Adrian’s family rallied around him, attending court hearings to support him. Mdm Tan even had to force another daughter to attend court. Even then, she did not sit inside the courtroom, but waited outside, not wanted to hear all the nonsense her family was spouting in front of the judge. She is probably the only one in the family living a stable life in a happily married family, mostly because she had cut ties with her mother.

Mdm Tan was a Chinese teacher, and later head of department, in a neighborhood secondary school, and drove her colleagues and principal crazy.

Similarly, Ivy could not hold down a job. She has worked at the Yamaha, Kawai and Cristifori music schools, but always left after bad behaviour angered her boss. For example, she would take extra long lunch breaks, and cancel class at last minute with no explanation. In return, she would complain that the principal of the school would always assign her first-timers, who were harder to teach. Whether or not that was deliberate on the part of the principal, to get back at her, we do not know.

This atrocious behaviour was by no means unique, as throughout the course of the legal proceedings, his wife went through five lawyers, as they all progressively quit on her because of her abusive behaviour.

HOME SWEET HOME

Adrian regrets ever being bonded by this money-grubbing pair. He had seen the signs early. He remembers that when they first moved into the HDB flat, his mother-in-law rubbed her palms and had a look of glee in her eyes. She was probably already imagining getting her hands on the $360,000 flat.

True enough, after his wife moved back to the mother’s condo, the flat became a major battleground for them. Even though Adrian was the sole contributor towards the buying of the flat, she still demanded her share after having only lived there for less than three months.

Once, when he was not in, she came with a lorry to cart away movable items from the flat, even the washing machine. And what she could not move she sabotaged, like taking the heads of the kitchen stoves. She was even so petty as to take all the bed linens in the house, even the ones that were currently on the bed!

She later tried to force him to sell the flat at a loss so that they could split the price. She did this by claiming that since they were no longer married, it was illegal for him to own and occupy the flat. She was not only trying to rob him, but throw him out on the street as well.

Fortunately, Adrian had a few legitimate tricks up his sleeve. He appealed to then-Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong about his situation. He knew Mr Lee was very concerned over the lives of his citizens and takes all appeals seriously. As a result, upon his appointment as Prime Minister, Mr Lee announced that HDB flats could now be owned by single adults aged 35 and above. Adrian was pleased, as he could now legally keep his flat, which he paid for with his own hard earned money.

But the battle raged on both inside and outside the courtroom.

In fact, Ivy even figured out a way to use the law against him. She made anonymous calls to the Ministry of Environment alleging that he was breeding mosquitoes. They sent investigators down to his flat, and found the claims to be untrue. She also reported him to the Housing Development Board for operating an illegal tuition agency in his flat and making a nuisance. The HDB interviewed the neighbours, who all denied that Adrian was noisy and creating a disturbance. They also found that Adrian’s tutoring was small-scale and did not constitute a business.

She then lodged several police reports against him, as a result the police would raid the flat. And each time, she would only take something small like a pack of batteries.

In fact, she had planned this long before things turned sour. Soon after they were married, she had suggested that they purchase some "blue films" (pornographic shows) to watch together. Adrian knew it was illegal and did not want to, but she bought them anyway. So part of the point of the raids was in the hope of the police catching him with the illegal VCDs. But he had disposed of them by then.

It seemed like that system was against him. With each raid, she would go to a different Neighborhood Police Post or Centre (in different police Land Divisions), even ones outside the neighbourhood, to make a report, as the police would soon get wise to her tricks.

In frustration, Adrian appealed to the DPM and Home Affairs Minister Mr Wong Kan Seng, which successfully put a stop to that nonsense. Yet, all they were able to do to his wife was issue her stern warnings against filing false police reports.

But she was not done manipulating the system yet.

THE LOVE OF A FATHER

Throughout most of the process, Adrian was denied the right to see his own daughter. In fact, Ivy and Mdm Tan had gone so far as to take out a Personal Protection Order against him, under false charges, in order to prevent him from seeing his daughter.

He was disgusted by her behaviour. It did not show love towards the father or to the child. On the one hand, when she was 7-months pregnant Adrian had to dissuade her from aborting her baby because of her personal discomfort. On the other, she was using his child against him, as leverage to get him to pay for her 50-day stay in an A1-class ward for her delivery. And even after the child was born, she did not have any regard for the child at all, not even looking at her.

And to top it off, he finally found out why his wife was spending all her time at her mother’s condo: she has thalassemia major, a life-threatening disease, which required daily blood pumping. The pump was probably located at her mother’s place. But this was also a disease that she had a responsibility to declare for the sake of the child, and she never told him throughout their marriage; they had claimed that the surgical scars on her body was from liposuction. It is amazing that she survived this long, as most thalassemia major sufferers do not live past the age of 30. (They were married when she was 32, and he was 38.)

Ivy went to great lengths to prevent Adrian from seeing his daughter. She would repeatedly miss the visitation sessions, and give all sorts of excuses, including frivolous medical certificates saying that the child could not play with water (as if a family service centre has a pool). The issuing doctor was unaware that she was using the MCs to miss the court appointed meetings, and only found out later.

Even when she did show up, she created problems. She would arrive late and use abusive language against him. She even tried to claim in court that the taxi ride from Yishun to Sergangoon, where the centre was, took $24 and over an hour. But the judge was not fooled.

She even claimed that he hit her at the family service centre, but the staff there did not witness anything of the sort. She also claimed that while still in the hospital after the delivery, Adrian had hit her with the hospital phone. However, Adrian denied this, saying that if he had, she could have reported it to the nurses and doctors immediately, and he would have been arrested on the spot.

Ivy and Mdm Tan even made false reports alleging that Adrian violated the PPO against them. Mdm Tan testified in court that Adrian had repeatedly beat and pinched her within five minutes, with the bruises to show for it. However, the judge threw out the testimony for inconsistencies, and concluded that the injuries were self-inflicted. Mdm Tan was made to apologize publicly in court, however, by then Adrian had already spent 6-hours in lock-up.

Ivy even made a police report that Adrian had drugged her with a sweet and induced her into ***. Adrian could now even sue her in civil suit for the perjury but hesistated to do so in view of his young daughter though he did not get a chance to see her anymore.On another occasion, she claimed that he hired a bomoh to curse her.

In the end, as the divorce was settled, Adrian was resigned that he would never see his daughter, who is now seven years old, for a long time. He just hopes that when she grows up, and is old enough to understand what was happening, that maybe he could reestablish a relationship with her.

MONEY MATTERS

Ultimately, Adrian realized that all they were about was money. Not that he even had much in the first place. Although he did accumulate some wealth in his younger years, by the time he got married, he was in a financial crisis and only making a meagre income running his own business. In fact, when they were married, Ivy was making $3300, more than double his income, and she still made him pay for all the household expenses and give her an allowance!

During the divorce proceedings, she even told IRAS that he had a lot of hidden wealth that was undeclared, which of course was proven false.

She had asked for 70% of the value of the flat that she stayed in for only 2 months, as well as 70% of his CPF, which was largely accumulated before marriage. She even requested for $3700 in alimony! She made claims about her lack of income, which if it were true would be her own doing, and Adrian countered with a testimony of the father of two of her students who confirmed that not only did she work as a music teacher, she was not a very good one. The judge finally awarded her $50.

AFTERMATH

Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, yet Adrian himself no longer has ill feelings against her, and wishes only to highlight this for society, and especially other men, to be aware of the problem.

"Although I have forgiven her, as I have accepted Christ as my Saviour… I feel it is not right [that] she and even her mother (i.e. my ex-mother-in-law) had even used the same strategy [against my now deceased father-in-law]…" Adrian told us via email.

He really feels that he has been victimized by abusive women, and also a society that protects women at the expense of men. He believes that they behaved this way they knew that as women they would not be serverely punished with jail time. That is why he is grateful that the Women’s Charter is being reviewed. In fact, in a letter published in the forum page of one of our local newspapers, he advocated instead that a Family Charter be set up, to protect families as a whole, rather than just one gender against another.

In the past, he has shared his views with Mr Chan Choo San, at the time Minister of State for Law, that it was unfair that all the judges hearing cases in Family Court related to husband-and-wife disputes were women, and would invariable find in favour of the wife. Since then, male judges have been introduced to Family Court, and Adrian is happy that he could play an instrumental role in protecting the rights of fathers and husbands against their abusive wives.

"When I went to court on the first day," Adrian told us, "I thought I was sure to lose. The Women’s Charter is a very powerful law. But instead, the judge saw right through them [Ivy and Mdm Tan] and ruled in my favour. I was overjoyed. It was on that day that I turned my life over to God and became a Christian, as I knew He was responsible for achieving this miracle.

"In fact, it started earlier that morning. It was raining heavily, and I was trying to get a taxi. I was supposed to appear in court at 10am, and it was already 9:15. I was desperate and called out to God. The amazing thing is that the moment I finished my prayer, a cab stopped right in front of me to discharge a passenger. I managed to get to court on time."

Since early this year, Adrian is happily remarried to a lady whom he met at church. He lives with her in the same flat with his elderly parents. He continues to run his business and is now financially stable again.

Adrian has survived a terrible ordeal, and he hopes that other men do not have to suffer his fate.In fact his father-in-law had passed away in 2005 in a mental nursing home after his wife( ie Adrian's ex mother-in-law ) used almost similar techniques to torment his husband and had passed her 'teachings' to her daughter.To avoid history from repeating ,Adrian has decided to reveal his true life story and to advise all those who intend to get married to be wary of abusive wives and troublesome mothers-in-law.

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