SINGAPORE: She had been told that a group of volunteers would be visiting her ward but to be given a bouquet of flowers was a lovely surprise for Madam Yeo Peck Hoon.

“I haven’t received any flowers for almost 30 years,” said the 86-year-old, who is a patient at the rehabilitative care ward in St Andrew’s Community Hospital.

The small bouquet of red and pink roses brought back memories of her mother.

“My mother used to have pots and pots of flowers at home and I’d water them for her. I take after my mother and when I got married, I planted roses in my garden but that was a long time ago,” said Madam Yeo, while holding the flowers carefully in her hands. “This made my day and I feel so privileged.”

The bouquets – a mixture of roses, hydrangeas, pink astilbes and eustomas – were delivered to the hospital on Monday (Nov 6) and distributed by volunteers from local social enterprise Bloomback.

Earlier in the day, 12 volunteers had spent more than five hours sorting, trimming and rearranging the flowers, which were collected from a wedding dinner the night before.

Costing more than S$10,000, the vibrant and sweet-smelling flowers had made their first appearance as floral centerpieces on some 80 tables in a ballroom at the Shangri-La Hotel.

Not wanting the fresh flowers to be thrown away immediately after the wedding, the couple – Singaporeans Mark Tan and Stephanie Khoo – looked around for a way to give them a new lease of life.

Bloomback, a social enterprise which runs an e-commerce platform helping marginalised women puck up floristry skills, took up the offer.

After trimming the stems and carefully removing all thorns as well as wilted petals, the beautiful wedding blooms were re-purposed into 300 small bouquets and distributed to patients at St Andrew’s Community Hospital, Banyan Home and the Salvation Army.

This is not the first time that Bloomback has done such a project but its co-founder Hazel Kweh told Channel NewsAsia that this is the biggest donation it has received thus far.

While re-using flowers for charity is not entirely new in Singapore, Ms Kweh, who was an insurance agent before becoming her own boss, said she stumbled upon the idea by accident.

“I was at a friend’s wedding when she told me she had ordered too many flowers. She asked me if I wanted to take them back and I thought ‘Why not? Don’t waste them.'”

Ms Kweh persuaded her sister, who was suffering from depression then, to join her in rearranging the flowers. During the process, the sisters decided to give them away to low-income elderly residents at Beach Road.

“I didn’t think much about it then. I just thought it might make someone’s day and when people asked what we were doing, we told them the truth that we had re-purposed them from a wedding. They smiled and accepted them.”

Bloomback has since organised five of such events over the past year and each of them has left heartwarming memories for Ms Kweh and her group of volunteers.

“We met an uncle who lived alone at Beach Road and he told us about how he used to battle with drugs and ended up being abandoned by his family. We ended up crying with him because my brother used to have similar issues so this was something we could relate to,” said Ms Kweh.

For first-time volunteer Noelle Tan, the afternoon at St Andrew’s Community Hospital was unexpectedly emotional.

“The patients I met at the dementia ward reminded me of my grandmother and I had to try very hard to hold back my tears,” said the 41-year-old who volunteers three times a week at the Enabling Village’s Stroke Support Station.

“It’s always difficult facing patients because sometimes they tell you things like how they feel old and useless. Even though you feel sad for them, you have to smile and tell them everything will be alright,” said Ms Tan.

And it’s not just patients who appreciate these initiatives; healthcare workers get a morale boost too.

“Taking care of patients is not easy so when you receive something like this, it helps to lift your spirits and you feel appreciated,” said Ms Zane Chan, head of group corporate communications at the hospital.

“For patients, it means that somebody cares. While most of them do have family members who visit them often, we have one or two who have less visitors so a gesture or a visitation like that helps to keep them positive,” she added.

For Mdm Yeo, the surprise gift made her day.

” I did not expect this,” she said with a smile. “It’ll be good if I can be discharged today. This is so pretty and I want to bring it home.”

SINGAPORE: The Punggol East slip road onto the Tampines Expressway (TPE) towards Hougang was temporarily closed on Monday (Nov 6), after a lorry crashed into a height barrier.

The police said they were alerted to an accident at around 3.50pm, and that no injuries were reported.

Photos posted on social media appeared to show the upturned trailer of the lorry jammed underneath a 2.4m-height restriction barrier.

Facebook user Zulqarnain Zulkifli said he was making his way home from Punggol to Eunos at around 5.10pm when he saw the stuck lorry.

“The exit was blocked, LTA officers were on the scene, try(ing) to remove the stuck load of the lorry,” he told Channel NewsAsia.

He added that motorists had to take an alternative route.

In a tweet at 4.05pm the Land Transport Authority warned of an accident on Punggol East near the Punggol East and TPE junction.

About five minutes later it warned of an accident on Punggol East towards the TPE after Punggol Field Walk, and told motorists to avoid the right lane.

In a later update at around 5.30pm, it added that Punggol East was closed after Punggol Field Walk.

Police investigations are ongoing.

SINGAPORE: Households will have one more year to switch to Digital TV after the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) announced on Monday (Nov 6) that the deadline to pull the plug on analogue TV broadcast has been shifted from end-2017 to Dec 31, 2018. 

In a media release, IMDA said Mediacorp will continue to broadcast in both analogue and digital formats until Dec 31, 2018.

About three in four households currently already receive Digital TV either over the air or through their pay TV subscription, according to IMDA. 

Additionally, the authority said it is studying enhancements to the Digital TV Assistance Scheme (DTVAS), to potentially help more Singaporean households living in Housing and Development Board (HDB) flats with the switchover. IMDA will provide details about the enhancements early next year, it said. 

These announcements were made by Minister for Communications and Information Dr Yaacob Ibrahim in a written parliamentary response issued on Monday.

Since the launch of the DTVAS in September 2014, IMDA has sent out notification letters to more than 139,000 eligible households. As of Oct 17, about 64,000 DTVAS packages have been given out, and many households have not responded to their notification letters, IMDA said.

“The DTVAS provides households with a free digital set-top box, indoor antenna and installation. Households who qualify under the current DTVAS criteria can continue to apply to receive assistance,” IMDA said. 

Residents can pick up a DTVAS application form at their nearest Community Centre/Club, or HDB branch office. They can also access it online. 

ANALOGUE CHANNEL LOGO ON TV SCREENS

From Monday, all analogue TV channels will include an “Analogue” channel logo on the top right of the TV screen, IMDA said. This is to help viewers determine whether they will be affected when the analogue TV broadcast comes to an end.

Households who see this logo will need to switch over to Digital TV to continue watching Mediacorp TV channels from Jan 1, 2019. 

IMDA and Mediacorp have launched a dedicated Digital TV microsite with a guide on how to receive Digital TV signals. Members of the public who require assistance may also call Mediacorp at 6435 6288 for general and technical enquiries.

Singapore’s switch to digital TV involves the adoption of the DVB-T2 (Digital Video Broadcasting – Second Generation Terrestrial) broadcasting standard. This move to the DVB-T2 standard is in line with global trends to improve the TV viewing experience, according to IMDA. 

With Digital TV, viewers with Toggle Red Button-registered HbbTV (hybrid broadcast broadband TV) sets can access Mediacorp TV shows, Toggle original content, as well as Catch-up TV. 

“Singapore’s switch to Digital TV also frees up scarce radio frequency spectrum, which will be used to provide better quality and higher mobile broadband speeds, ultimately improving end-user experience,” IMDA said.

SINGAPORE: There is no evidence of shortcomings or lapses in regulatory oversight by staff in the Transport Ministry or Land Transport Authority (LTA), said Transport Minister Khaw Boon Wan on Monday (Nov 6), following the train disruption caused by a flooding incident.

In a written response to Non-Constituency MP Leon Perera, Mr Khaw said the responsibility for maintaining rail lines, including the flood prevention systems, lies with the operators. He said as the regulator, LTA sets the Operating and Maintenance Performance Standards, and carries out regular audits of the operators’ maintenance regime and on-site inspections to ensure these standards are complied with.

Mr Perera had asked if, following the incident, senior staff in the Transport Ministry or LTA tasked with oversight of the MRT operator would be affected in terms of compensation.

The poor state of water pump system at Bishan MRT station had led to flooding along a stretch of the North-South Line tunnel on Oct 7, disrupting train services for 20 hours. Train operator SMRT had revealed last week that the maintenance team in charge of the system had signed off on works that were not done. It had earlier said on Oct 16 that the leader of a team in charge of anti-flooding maintenance was removed, and the bonuses of the team’s members will be affected.

Mr Khaw explained that LTA takes a risk-based approach and prioritises resources in areas which are assessed to be most complex, have the highest risk of failure and which could potentially have the biggest impact on the rail network. “The anti-flooding systems are considered less of a high risk area compared to the other core railway systems as the constructs are relatively simple, easy to maintain and have ample provisions,” he said.

Nonetheless, Mr Khaw said that on Sep 29, LTA had, in accordance with its regulatory role, expressly highlighted to SMRT the importance of regular and diligent maintenance of tunnel pump systems, and to surface a list of pumps requiring replacement to LTA.

“Unfortunately, the remedial actions instructed by LTA were not taken in time,” he said. “The flooding incident occurred before the replacement programme could be completed.” 

SINGAPORE: Shortly after the launch of Apple’s iPhone X in Singapore, OCBC Bank has rolled out banking authentication using the iPhone X’s new feature, Face ID.

The Face ID system uses a mathematical model of users’ faces to allow them to sign on to their phones or pay for goods with a steady glance at their phones.

OCBC OneLook is the first service in Singapore to use the facial recognition technology to enable payments or the viewing of bank account, credit card and investment information, the bank said on Monday (Nov 6). 

“Your face is your new banking password,” it declared in the news release. 

OCBC Bank customers using the iPhone X, running on the iOS11 operating system, can authenticate access to its consumer and business banking apps like OCBC Mobile Banking, OCBC OneWealth and OCBC Business Mobile Banking by looking at their phones, instead of using passwords or fingerprints.

Once logged in, customers can view their account and card balances, as well as their latest transactions, the bank said.

They can use the service to view their investment portfolios on the OCBC OneWealth app or pay friends via QR codes on the OCBC Pay Anyone app, it added. 

OCBC head of e-business Singapore Aditya Gupta said: “There’s a whole generation of customers becoming more comfortable with biometric authentication technology, and we are confident that they will find OCBC OneLook truly impressive and relevant. So, bye-bye fingers, hello faces!”

The bank’s head of cash management in global transaction banking Gregory Trotter added: “We are introducing OCBC OneLook for our app, so that business owners who are early adopters of the iPhone X can continue to use biometric authentication to access banking information quickly, conveniently and securely.”

Addressing queries on possible security concerns using Face ID, Mr Aditya said that when OCBC OneLook is used to view banking information, all account numbers displayed are partially masked, with only the last four digits of the account number revealed, which is the case now when users log in using Apple’s Touch ID fingerprint recognition.

The bank does not store any account numbers, balances or other related information on the phone and two-factor authentication is required should the customer wish to perform banking transactions, he added.

Last month, Apple disputed a report by Bloomberg News that it allowed suppliers to reduce the accuracy of the iPhone X’s facial recognition system to speed up output of the phone.

“The quality and accuracy of Face ID haven’t changed. It continues to be one in a million probability of a random person unlocking your iPhone with Face ID,” the company had said in a statement.

This makes it 20 times more secure than the company’s fingerprint identity sensor, Touch ID, which has an estimated one in 50,000 chance of someone other than the user unlocking an iPhone using it. 

However, Apple has stated in a security guide published this month that the probability of a false match using Face ID is different for twins and siblings that look like the user as well as among children under the age of 13, “because their distinct facial features may not have fully developed”.

For those concerned in such cases, the company recommended using a passcode instead.