Han Fook Kwang tantalising tales of dark secrets

Last Saturday Han Fook Kwang wrote a story of a small town called Omelas and the dark secret in the basement. A poor child was locked in there, living in abject misery. Everyone in the town knew of this shameful secret. Some pretended that it was not there, some could not live with the ugly truth and left town. No one in the town of Omelas talked about the dark secret in the basement, but everyone was talking about it without saying anything. The dark secret was no secret. It was common knowledge. Who was there to tell?

Han Fook Kwang made it more direct by talking about Singapore and its dark secrets in the basement. He told, all three of them, but nothing nearer the truth. He said so much, in a whole article but said nothing. This is nothing different from the Gang of Four saga in China when the comrades would shout ‘Gang of Four’ but showed a high 5, all 5 fingers wide open.

Perhaps this is the closest that the dark secrets in the basement could be told. Perhaps this is a good way of acknowledging that there are dark secrets in the basement, better than denying their existence. Perhaps when asked, all the wise ones, rich ones, successful ones, and the losers, would say yes, yes, there is no dark secrets in our basement, but keep shaking their heads from left to right.

Singaporeans are so intelligent, from the top to the bottom, to skirt around the secrets in the basement and live life as normal as they could, and live life to the fullest or to the darnest, without spilling the beans. Some left and become quitters to be replaced by new quitters that would eventually come to know of the dark secrets, but be very Singaporeans, knowing and not knowing. Bipolar is a good sickness to have, just like dementia, and not knowing or talking about the dark secrets is a blessing and a formula for success and living well.

I too did not know that there are dark secrets until this story of Omelas. Is Omelas supposed to be a code for something that we are supposed to know? Does it stand for One Man, One Mentor, or Old Man’s everlasting something, something, something? Or should it be written backwards like Salemo? Can anyone break the code or write another book about The Omelas or Salemo Code?