In my current hostel, Kent Ridge Hall, there is only one laundry room for the whole hostel. It has about 25 washing machines and 10 driers. To enter the room, we have a white magnetic card. I never noticed a funny thing about this card until today.
Today, I was unfortunate enough to use a semi-functioning washing machine. A fully-functioning machine finishes washing in about one hour, so I went to get my laundry one hour after starting to wash it. The machine was still rinsing then. Too lazy to go back to my room on the forth floor, I decided to wait.
While waiting, I was desparately looking for any piece of text to read. I read the Lost and Found List and even the label of the fire-extinguisher. The last resort I had was the white magnetic card I used to enter the room. On one of the sides, a text reads, "Warning! Do not expose this card to any magnetic field."
It is a coincidence that I read "A Brief History of Time" by Stephen Hawking only the day before. The text on the card automatically triggered the fact that the earth itself is one big magnet! How can it be possible for me, or any other human on the earth, to comply the warning? Is it not the same as saying, "Do not use this card on earth?"
Checking my wallet some time later, I found out that neither my cash card, my travel farecard, nor my magnetic student card has that kind of warning.
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Contact me: at comp dot nus dot edu dot sg with dennyisk before the at Last edited: Friday, 11 May 2001 |
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