A stunning photo of the glittering Singapore skyline has outshone thousands of other entries to emerge as the top prize of The Straits Times' Wherever You Are contest.
The panoramic image was captured by engineering manager Mr Tung Hon Keng, 47, who shot the photo from the Pearl Centre carpark.
He recieved $3,000 in cash and a host of other prizes. This includes a pair of return tickets to London, a five-day free hotel stay at the Millennium Gloucester Hotel and an pair of exclusive Chelsea Hospitality ticketsto the Chelsea-Man City match on Oct 27. Mr Tung and his travel partner will also be treated to lunch where they will meet former Chelsea greats.
The contest, which spanned six weeks and ended on Aug 23, is part of ST's thrust to bring news to readers wherever they are and in whatever platform they like.
Some 4,200 readers sent in their photos and videos in six categories. Besides the holiday category, there were the eat, get around, make money, keep fit and having fun cateogories.
Coming in second is Mr Robin Tan's photo of his son and daughter enjoying themselves on a water slide aboard a cruise liner. The 56-year-old technical officer will recieve $2,000 in cash. The second runner-up goes to Ms Selina Wee for a photo of her father reading The Straits Times while having his meal. She recieves $1,000 in cash.
All three were selected from among the six weekly prize winners who also recieved $1,000 cash. Eight lucky draw winners walked away with $500, among which four bagged double the amount for being direct subscribers with The Straits Times.
An additional set of five merit prizes of $300 were also given out to recognise noteworthy entries.
Among them was Mr Sean Ng, 35, who captured a shot of his wife at the Lourve Museum in Paris during their honeymoon trip last December. Said the assistant vice-president of a bank: "I'm surprised I won. I submitted the photo for fun really. But such contests are good, because it made me read the papers and go to [The Straits Times] website more often to check out the photos."
Here is a list of the winners:
Grand prizes
1st Prize - Tung Hon Keng
2nd Prize - Robin Tan
3rd Prize - Selina Wee
Six weekly winners
Tung Hon Keng
Robin Tan
Selina Wee
Ahamad Iskandar Abdullah
Charmaine Tay
Suhaimi Abdullah
Merit winners
Sean Ng
Law Yi Fan
Wong Chek poh
Wong Poh Peng
Joey Ng
Lucky draw winners
Tan Kai Teng Kaye
Boo Lee Eng
Ho Li-Wen Venessa
Michelle Per
Eileen Ng
Chew Keng Han Jeremy
Lau Bee Yong Jocelyn
Uma Rani Sankar