Road works ahead... it does? And other silly signs...

Warning: Bad joke ahead...

Ah Heng is standing below a street sign that says "Simei Street 1".
A man is standing on the other side of the street, peering at the sign (maybe it's a smoggy day).
Ah Heng (thinks the man is staring at him): Oy! Lu Kwa Simei!
[Note: you have to say this in Hokkien.]

Seriously, I just found out a bit more about the "suburb" of Simei, courtesy of the kiddies page of today's Sunday Times:

"The name Simei is Chinese for 'four beauties'. The roads in this eastern part of Singapore were previously named after the four great beauties of Chinese history: Xishi, Wang Zhaojun, Diao Chan and Yang Guifei. However, non-Chinese found it difficult to pronounce these names and the roads were renamed Simei Streets 1 to 6."

Huh? If Simei still means four beauties, where did the other two come from? Ah Meng? (our late beloved orang utan zoo mascot?) And Merlion? (our, er,  "beloved" half-fish, half-lion tourism symbol?). And shouldn't those roads be Liewmei Streets 1 to 6?

Most absurdly, why beauties from Chinese history?? Hello, this is Singapore. No wonder on my trips to America, the conversation still goes like this, "How far is Singapore from your capital city, Beijing?" And this is after I had patiently explained where the Little Red Dot is, sometimes with the help of a map or a back of the envelop drawing!

At least, elsewhere in Singapore, beauty-wise, we have less pretentious street names, like "Chin Swee Road" and "Jalan Kampong Chantek" and "Chantek Flyover" (apologies to whoever was the person honoured vis-a-vis Chin Swee Road, for taking liberties with the name).

Still on signage, these two are common here:

I don't get it! If the road works, why do I have to exercise caution? As for the one below, is it humanly possible to follow the instruction given?

Or this one, also commonly seen:

Why have the doors at all?? And won't I be "disobeying" the top instruction if I follow the lower command to pull on the door handle?

Last item... yet one more common road sign here is "Hump Ahead". Despite this instruction, the birth rate is still falling! I don't have a picture but here's a link to one example, said to be along Club Street...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tby2004/4148409139/in/photostream