Out Bar
It may be small when it comes to floor space, but this new gay bar packs a punch with ritzy burlesque-drag performances happening every first Friday of the month. To keep the pre-party spirits up, happy hour starts from 5-9pm daily, with two beers at $14 nett and house red or white wines at $8 nett daily. Each cabaret night has a different theme to keep things fresh (the last shindig was Pink Out, in line with Pink Dot 2013) and you can keep updated of their oh-so-fabulous shows via their Facebook page.

Shanghai Dolly
The modern, chinoserie-chic aesthetic with dark interiors befits this sizable two-story club, which consists of a lobby bar, a restaurant, a cozy piano bar and a 400-capacity theater hall where artists, musicians and dancers from Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and China take to the stage every night. Even if you don’t care for the shows, Shanghai Dolly’s happy hour is one of the best in the area with 50% off glasses, jugs, buckets and shooters from 6 to 10pm daily. Plus, its restaurant Dolly Kitchen serves supper till 4am to fuel you up post-party.

Tawandang Microbrewery
Launched just last year, Tawandang Microbrewery’s theater concept features a variety of Broadway-style shows (Tue-Sun, 7:30pm onwards), ranging from Thai cultural dances and classical ballet to more contemporary acts. Knock back freshly-brewed German beers—lager, weizen and dunkel—while catching up to eight different performances on any given night. And they’re rather entertaining: shows accompanied by props, light and full-on theatrics, played to international Chinese, English and Thai hit songs.

Deezer √√√
What: First started as Blogmusik in 2006, this high-traffic French stalwart boasts over four million premium subscribers worldwide.
Pros: It overshadows Spotify (its strongest competitor) with a bigger music library and makes managing music collections easy by letting you import your own songs—especially good for those who like their tracks all in one place.
Cons: Sound quality and free versions aren’t the best around (though they promise up to 320kb/s when you pay). As a web-based player, its interface—as on the home page, for example—is cluttered with things like recommendations and Facebook activities.
Mobile access: Available as an app on all mobile devices (iOS, Android, Windows 8 and Blackberry).
Price: Free (Discovery), $5.99 (Premium), $9.90 (Premium+).

Grooveshark √√√√
What: The controversial US-based streaming service launched in 2007, runs on user-generated content with over 12 million active users.
Pros: When it comes to convenience and usability, Grooveshark is hard to beat. There’s no registration, no app download required, and you can tune in anywhere on your desktop, and mobile from devices for as long as you like without paying a single cent. Ads aren’t intrusive, either (which makes upgrading rather pointless with its scant benefits).
Cons: Its free-to-upload, user-driven music database may be all-encompassing (an indie music paradise really), but problems are rife: song titles and audio quality are inconsistent, plus there are legal issues that the company grapples with every now and then due to copyright infringement (also why they’re not accepted in the App Store).
Mobile access: Available via mobile web browsers. Android and iOS apps are only available for premium account holders.
Price: Free (ad supported), US$9/month (ad free).

Spotify √√√√
What: The award-winning music service and app is the most successful of its kind, catering to over 24 million active users.
Pros: Unlike some products whose free versions are undesirable or worse, non-existent, Spotify Free’s pretty great. We’d pay for a Spotify Premium account though—it gets your music library on mobile devices and lets you download music you can listen to offline. Also, Spotify’s ecosystem is to-die-for— a host of their self-made apps makes the user interface friendlier and more interesting, plus it’s its own social media platform.
Cons: You can find obscure stuff like Japanese avant-garde electronica on here, but only karaoke versions of ‘90s pop? Weird.
Mobile access: Available as an app on iPhone, iPad, as well as Android mobile and tablet.
Price: Free, $4.99 (unlimited account), $9.99 (premium).

This is My Jam √√
What: Pick a song that’s your current “Jam”—a track you just can’t stop listening to—and post it on a customizable page. Write a couple of words for it—mention fellow Jammers and add hashtags if you wish—plus pick color combinations that convey the song best, and you’re done.
Pros: It doesn’t look like much, but sharing your emotions with what’s probably a very impressionable group of people using just one song is pretty addictive.
Cons: We’re not sure how legal this is—you can put up original songs as your Jams, but you can also paste Vimeo and YouTube links in. Plus, This is My Jam’s still quite underground, so you’re probably going to be following more strangers than friends for now. Get the This is My Jam for Spotify app to extend your reach.
Mobile access: Available via web on desktop and laptop browsers, as well as the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.
Price: Free.

As a kid, I was dreamy, nerdy and spent most of my time with books. I love reading fantasy and sci-fi genres and I’m not ashamed to admit that I still read young adult books, even though I’m possibly 30 for 40 years older than their target audience.

I can talk about Percy Jackson with my 12 year-old nephew and I know Harry Potter backwards to front.

Fashion for me is every day; it shouldn’t be high-end or low-end. It’s a silent expression of your personality, without having to say a single word.

I’m not a devoted slave to any label, I would appreciate a piece or a collection that a designer does at any one time.

When I was a legal journalist, I spent many hours listening to court cases, from molest and divorce cases to trademark issues. Property disputes are the ones that seem to capture the most attention. We’re in a country with a remarkable penchant for figures and it’s fascinating how people can remember to the last dollar what the valuation was.

Ballet is something that I’ve been doing since I was little, but I still have the worst balance in the world and fall during my classes. It’s terrific exercise for anyone interested in fashion, though. It gives you tremendously good posture.

Part of what makes you look fabulous is the way you carry yourself and how you move.

All the spare time I have—even during holidays—is dedicated to dancing. Nowadays it’s lindy hop, which I’ve been occupied with in the past 10 years. I even took part in a dance competition in Korea with a bunch of my friends—all in their ‘30s and ‘40s. We abandoned our kids for weekends on end to rehearse, and came in third.

I have the worst memory in the world, and to be a good dancer you need to remember all that choreography. I think the reason why I love lindy-hop so much is because it’s impromptu.

Singaporeans are a very practical lot. They dress appropriately for the weather, yes, but I can’t say we’re a style capital. There’s a cultural mindset that Singaporeans have in terms of valuing comfort and convenience over style, and we have a higher threshold for dressing more casually. But there’s a greater nod from the younger folk to wear things that are unusual.

The education system here kills your brain by stuffing so much into your head, making you feel like running a frantic race to learn facts. This whole grading system, where you’re rewarded based on how well you do, stops people from taking chances if it isn’t worthwhile. But it should be worthwhile if you’ve tried, or you’ll never know.

People should dare to make mistakes more, and not be afraid to say what they mean even if they’re wrong. It irritates me when they give some kind of a tentative answer, fishing around to see what you’re going to think.  

There was hardly a week that went by, during my time as a journalist, without someone questioning why I gave up being a lawyer and that was how I was introduced by colleagues in the newspaper. It bugged me that people in Singapore care about that, like it made me more respectable and elevated my status.

I’ve always had a soft spot for nerds; they belong to a certain breed. Big Bang Theory guys, baby!