Most of the readers who responded wear prescription spectacles. A surprising number (well, at least to me) use progressives which hitherto I had thought of as the preserve of oldies like me.
Seriously, almost all who wear spectacles on a regular basis have them fitted with with progressive lenses - and wear them for longer periods after becoming accustomed to them. One respondent finds that progressives and she do not get along at all, while another is till groping around.
Consequently I am using my progressives more often in order to try and get used to them. But once I sit down at my laptop or pick up a book or magazine to read, I slip on my reading spectacles as they are still much more comfortable for reading and for computer work.
Over the weekend I asked an optician what choices there were in the way of progressive lenses. Like Rip Van Winkle I discovered a whole new world out there - maybe because I have depended solely on my optometrist to recommended the type of lenses and options and have not asked what else exists out there.
Well, folks, there is a wide choice of manufacturers of progressive lenses, covering a range of price points.
Today I visited my optometrist and asked him to name some top brands of progressive lenses.
He mentioned Essilor (French) and Carl Zeiss (German). As it happens so did the optician I met over the weekend. So it seems like these two brands are 'top of mind' - at least for these two.
Chatting a little more, I asked my optometrist about Asian manufacturers and he said that the Japanese make excellent lenses for reading. Progressives require distance focus and intermediate focus and also (for my want of better words) putting the whole thing together in each lens. Thus he believes Essilor and Zeiss have the edge.
Until now I have never asked about the lenses he's checked me out for, prescribed and fitted for me.
But he's Mr Meticulous and takes time and trouble to measure and fit the spectacles, so I trust his judgement completely.
And in many cases he edges and fits the lenses himself because he is not happy with the precision of the work done by some of the labs.
The dummy that I am, it's taken me these twenty-something years to understand why the pairs of spectacles I had made at a highly recommended optometrist's in Hong Kong were not as good as they should have been! I finally found that out when I had my eyes examined and those spectacles checked.
So, despite the technology, modern equipment and specialised training variances can happen when the prescription is sent to the labs and the lenses are fitted there. Especially when the optician or optometrist is tolerant of variances from specifications.
Anyway, since then I have come back to Singapore for my spectacles.
In case anyone is interested, my optometrist has recommended Essilor's latest Varilux PHYSIO for my next pair of progressives. And says he is happy to answer any questions!
MOMMIES' PETS
I avoided the bulkhead row in 'Cattle Class' on my way back to Singapore (usually populated by bassinets). Little did I know that a few mothers with young children had also made the same choice. So the other adults and I had to bear with one particular boy's screaming until he finally fell asleep. Nope, not crying, yes, screaming.
When I had reached my level of tolerance, I asked his mother whether she could make some effort to calm him down.
Her response was that he had been diagnosed with a condition that prevented him from expressing himself in speech and so his only outlet was in sounds and by crying in exasperation.
By this time the woman behind them was ready to take a hatchet to the family!
The mother of the screamer had two children and two maids with her and sounded like an educated Singaporean (no Singlish). Why she did not have the commonsense to give her son something to pacify him for the flight, I don't understand. A hefty slug of Gripe Water or part of an Ativan (maybe even warm milk) might have done the trick.
But then in today's world, well, ever since Dr Spock came and went, the rod is spared and the child spoiled rotten. The little darlings can do as they please and get what they want, no effort or expense spared.
That's fine by me as long as they do not impinge on my right to enjoy a quiet journey.
And the trouble is that these 'brats in the upbringing' also play up in restaurants, clubs and shops.
Sometimes I feel we should have under fives' sound-proof rooms in all public places and any child under the age of five can be seen BUT NOT HEARD! So stow them away in those sound-proof rooms and let them exercise their lungs to their hearts' content while the adults can enjoy each others' company.
I might even go so far as to fit the sound-proof rooms with dispensers for tranquiliser water that they can suck from tubes!
DISPENSABLE ?
There have not been any reported recent accidents involving foreign workers in the backs of pick-ups and trucks.
But every time I am out and about I shudder when I see workers sitting, virtually unprotected, in the load bed of the open vehicles.
Sure thing, they have side railings that confirm to Singapore's standards. Some vehicles even have canopies overhead to add to the illusory safety.
But if any of the vehicles were to be involved in any accident, you can bet your bottom dollar that these same workers will be flung out (they are not strapped in) or crushed (the railings and supports for canopies are puny).
Perhaps they would not have the luxury of such fine transportation in their homes countries, but they did not come here to die on our roads.
Also road conditions (sometimes narrow, often unpaved or potholed and shared with an assortment of other motorised vehicles, bicycles, carts, people, animals) with in their home countries would be a natural speed barrier to vehicles. Here, they are on good Singapore roads and expressways, driven around by a co-worker enabled by a driving licence originally issued in a foreign country.
And you and I know that the standards for issuing driving licences in some Asian countries may not be as strict as ours.
This is one aspect of life in Singapore that I find appalling; our treatment of people, especially the lower-paid foreign workers.
I wonder what is stopping us from providing safer transportation for workers (and for that matter schoolchildren who take school buses to and from school)?
We are in most part an egalitarian society, but the fact of life is that even in an egalitarian society some are more equal than others. Which leads to the other part to our social equation: meritocracy.
Meritocracy is described as: a system in which the talented are chosen and moved ahead on the basis of their achievement. Or, leadership selected on the basis of intellectual criteria.
I am absolutely in favour of meritocracy - especially when one is adjudged to be of merit!
Jokes aside, what is wrong with us when members of the meritocracy forget their origins? Or is it that they cannot distance themselves enough from their past - except when on the stump for votes?
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