there's something about ..... biometric passport

My old passport expired sometime mid-year and after hearing that Singapore Goverment is implementing a new biometric passport wef from August, I decided to wait for it.

Of course, passport being passport.. does it matter if it's biometric or chemetric or mathemetric?

Of course, Singaporean being Singaporean... even if it's chemetric or mathemetric, we would still wait for it.

And so the day of reckoning arrived just 1 week before my trip.

It was reported in the papers that people had to queue 2 to 4 hours for it. Damn the papers, the article came after I collected my passport, otherwise I would have gone really early to pick it up.

I waited about 2 hours on a Friday lunch break. When I arrived my queue number and the served number is about 200 numbers difference. When I pick up my passport, the queue number and the served number is about 400.

Now.. what is so special about this Biometric passport? And what the hell in Biometric?

This main purposes of Biometric Passport are:

1.) To boost Singapore Pools Income.

All Biometric Passport comes with a BRAND NEW Passport number. It's no longer your NRIC number. And it's so random that we have now 1 more additional number to remember in our life alongside atm numbers, bank account numbers, pin numbers, password, i/c number of all your family members, and now.. new passport numbers.

And following Singapore Culture, I just have to buy 4D on it. I spent $100 on my new passport numbers. Of course, if I had kenna some prizes out of it, I wouldn't have done this posting.

I really don't see why they have to do that. It's biometric. It's not mathemetric. Meaning to say... numbers is not crucial, the face feature is what they wanted. If they have to differentiate Biometric and normal passport.... just add another alphabet in front of your old passport number lor. Like if old passport number is S71234567A. Then the new biometric would be BS71234567A. But BS also stands for Bullsh@#

2.) To show off to 3rd World Airports that they are so backward that should just shut down their airports and become farmers.

I went to Shantou, China. Their airport custom officer has no equipment to scan our BIOMETRIC Passport and we were asked to wait outside their main office while they check with Singapore Government I believe.

If you are someone that gets anxiety attack easily... this would surely trigger it. And the worse thing is you wouldn't know how to tell them that this is the new BIOMETRIC Passport ..... in chinese.

The wait was about 20 mins. Ministry of Manpower also very smart. They already train us to wait 2 to 4 hours for the passport and any other inconvenience in the world will pale in comparison.

You think Singapore Passport very Big Deal hor... everywhere sure can pass easily one hor... scanner cannot scan... means cannot scan... Biometric or not.

On hindsight, I wouldn't have gotten this passport. I would have saved $100 and 20 mins.