The road on the other side

I was having a BBM (Blackberry Messenger) conversation with my cousin Z. It was 6am in Dubai and he is on his way to work. He was chatting with while driving to work and with very brief pauses. I asked him how that is possible and he said, “15 to 20 minutes” at traffic lights. And, I went “OMG”.

I have heard about how bad the traffic in Dubai is, but 15 to 20 minutes at each traffic junction is annoying to even hear about. If I had to go to work each day after such long hours in traffic, I would most probably be grouchy all day at work.I live in a small island where it takes me about 40 minutes to work. I take a bus to train station and then a mass rapid train (MRT) to my work place with a few minutes of wait and few minutes of walk in between. And, this would be the itinerary for most working commuters.

I suppose if you were residing in cities like Dubai, our daily journey to work sounds blissful. But we, Singaporeans have our complaints. Sometimes the train takes six minutes to arrive and we know this because the LCD screen in the stations tells us so. Can you believe that? We are in the train station for six minutes at the train station doing absolutely nothing, but waiting.

When the trains arrive, we have no seats. It is very crowded and it is getting worse now. Many say it is because the population is increasing with the influx of the foreigners. Now, really this is intolerable. We, Singaporeans, do not get seats in the trains because there are too many foreigners coming into the country.

To top it all off, the weather is ridiculously warm. And, the air-conditioners in the bus or train are not sufficient to cool us off.

Well, you can take a car or taxi to work then. Why squeeze your mornings in the public transportation? Oh, but wait there will be ERP (toll) to the city parking in the city area is very expensive. Taxi then? Well I will need to wait for almost 10 to 15 minutes for a taxi; sometimes even more.

My oh my. For all these hassles, maybe I would prefer to switch places with cousin Z who is having a casual chat with me, during the “short” breaks, while driving to work in his car.

*A raised eyebrow if you do not get what I am trying to say*