6/24/2009
Tan Kah Kee Station
How can we called an MRT station Tan Kah Kee Station? Who is Tan Kah Kee to deserve such an honour? Never heard of him or his contribution. A better name for that station should be Queen Elizabeth Station. This will remind everyone of the royal neighbourhood of Duchesses and Kings and royalties. It will also remind Singaporeans of the great contributions of our colonial rulers. These are the legacies of the neighbourhood according to Leslie Raj.
Actually I don't care a damn about the royalties. To the many ignoramus, the piece of land which Hwa Chong sits was donated by the philantrophist Tan Kah Kee. That piece of land is as large and as far as the eyes can see. For those who only know the value of money, please count how many condominiums can be built on that piece of land, real prime estate.
Tan Kah Kee's contribution was more than that, if one bothers to read the history of Chinese High School and Hwa Chong. Their existence came about by the spirit of the community to break the stranglehood of secondary education for our children when the British govt refused to educate them but only at primary school level to be clerks and office boys. The community stood up, led be Tan Kah Kee, to build the first secondary school for the Chinese community in this island. And Tan Kah Kee donated his treasured piece of land on which the school stood today. That is the legacy of Tan Kah Kee and Hwa Chong. And his contribution is not just in and around Hwa Chong.
Tan Kah Kee is most deserving to be honoured by having the station named after him.
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22 comments:
colonial suckers
Cacultta--> Kolkata
Rangoon--> Yangon
Iran expell British
The Station can be named anything except names of that of the current leaders. Because it will expose the Station to perpetual vandalism. Many Names in the Current Leadership stink and evoke much hatred in many. Hatred so strong that it could last for many generations to come.
Imagine name(s) that could affects the feelings and upset ones' emotional wellbeing.
Be remembered like Tan Kah Kee, most who know his contributions will always honour him with respects and feel for his humanities. He is very revered in Xiamen(China Hokkien Province), especially in Gulangyu Island.
patriot
I really don't give a rat's ass what and who they name the stations after so long as they do not increase the fares of 66 cents off peak senior citizen rate, for me to travel across the island.
What's the fuss? It's only a fucking name. Most (younger) people don't even know who he was — might as well call the station Annabel Chong Station, since one could argue she attended Hwa Chong.
Most people don't know that Tan was a complicated man — he started everything as private enterprise — enormously successful in business, but disappointingly warmed to communism later.
It comes as no surprise that The State often co-opts the achievements of private individuals and twists it to favour the image of the state. The Chinese schools which Tan started — raising money by private means, not by going to the state later became hotbeds of student communist activism.
It seems that the spirit of student activism continues (against yet another govt agency — the LTA) — although I doubt that many of the students at the Bukit Timah schools are communist these days. They are mostly "good Singaporeans" — materialistic and ambitious.
I do however consider the link between Tan Kah Kee and porn-superstar Annabel Chong as an interesting historical quirk. Maybe the LTA could commission for the station, a muriel of our dear Annabel with all her orifices wide open for the enjoyment and spiritual uplift of commuters.
matilah, what nonsense were you uttering? chinese high school was founded by tan kah kee in 1919. communist china was founded in 1949, 40 years later.
this man lived a life very similar to mahatma gandhi. simple and unpretentious. he was lesser known as he was not in politics. he gave his fortune to the education of the young both here and in china. in the early 1900s, they were chinese ciizens, not singaporeans.
just to make sure you know your history, singapore only came to being in 1965. in the 1950s, some of the locals were british subjects. you may want to use 1959 when we became a self governing state as a beginning is ok.
Eh harlow, I know my S'pore history probably better than you do lah.
I'm not going to quibble with the dreck of history. Personally, I think Ghandi was not as "divine" as his legend. He was man who slept with young female children.
i was just tickering you mate.
this simple man was a good man. despite his wealth, he ate like a coolie. he gave away his fortune and died penniless. never heard of him misbehaving.
cheers mate.
Is that a pic of "O"?
I have seen so many of his pics with a "halo" around his head that it is really refreshing to see something that may perhaps reflect an alternative view.
Tan Kah Kee is Hero.
I prefer the MTR in Hong Kong.
So efficient, so fast. The Lines are planned well in advance. North to South, East to West and one running to the HK International airport. Not like ours. Such a small little island and so many lines which are added almost as an afterthought. Pretty soon, we will be spending most of our time underground. And if global warming continues and glaciers melt further the island will become smaller because the tide is higher. Hope the tunnels are all seepage proof. That's why we need sand, sand, sand to reclaim, reclaim, reclaim.
To Wally:
Yes, it is HE, Grand High Poobah of the Planet: Barry Hussein. And he's going to fuck it up like a brother on crack...of course pumping up the jam from the shit started by the 'white boys' — namely Billary and Bush: Buy One Get One Free
I also agree that Hong Kong kicks serious ass. HK and the wonderful people of Hong Kong is light years ahead of Singapore. They work harder and smarter, and they party with incredible energy and verve. The people are more independent — rarely asking for the govt to "help them", instead preferring that the govt stays out of their lives, unless it was a matter of life or death... but even then... They even have the balls to stand up against Beijing, and in no uncertain terms tell the Peoples' Republic to keep their hands off the lives of the people of Hong Kong and their private property.
To Matilah,
Whoever you are, you are one "COOL" guy/gal?
On Hong Kong, my sentiments exactly.
Wally,
Last I checked (about 5 mins ago in the loo) I posses the sex organs of a male humanoid. They are remarkable specimens — in pristine working condition, given their advanced age, and dare I say, experience.
Hehe,
I think we are the same model from the same Terminator factory.
Now, where's that freaky John Connor?
if we cannot honour simple men like tan kah kee and think of honouring fakes who called themselves royalties but contributing nothing, only idiocy to the world, then we are equally fakes.
behind that glory, power and wealth, could be another scum.
Here we go again with the "evil" shit.
When will people realise that there is probably no such thing as "evil", and that "evil" is simply an idea invented by religions to control people by making them feel unnecessarily "guilty"?
Hehe,
Matilah, you're a genius!
I accept the compliment, but please. I'm no "genius". I simply get pissed off at this whole "religious" thing. One thing which really gets me going is how our species (thankfully not everyone) seeks to BRAINWASH children with this religious nonsense.
Scare the kids into believing something terrible is going to happen to them. Make the kids feel "guilty" simply for being alive. Child abuse on a grand scale.
Then these kids grow up and vote, or worse still, end up running the country.
many adults are more delusion in their fantasies of beliefs than children. but you can bet for sure, they sincerely believe in what they believe in. that is how dangerous this world has become.
And how do you think those adults get "deluded"?
They are fed bullshit when they're kids.
The human brain takes 20 years to mature. The first 5 years, the growth and physiological change occurs at a very rapid rate, then slows down.
Look at the timeline of the brain, and you'll notice how much "opportunity" there is for fucking up some poor kid's thinking.
Hey man, I don't know about you — I'll readily admit that I was fed a lot of bunk growing up — from good-hearted adults who meant well, but were themselves products of bad thinking.
my growing up years were not much different from yours. our parent's generation were mostly illiterate and their understanding of life is very elementary. just like the great sages of the old, many were illiterate or half illiterate. and modern man, with tertiary or post grads education still want to believe in their truth.
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