Japan should stop sneering at our world class SMRT

An article in thenewpaper on 20 Nov by a SM Ong took offence at an apology issued by the Japanese MRT for a slight hitch in the departure of its train. SM Ong was incensed, felt insulted because the apology was not because the Japanese MRT had a ponding problem, not because their MRT had regular and frequent breakdown, not because their train had a collision. The apology was because their train departed a mere 20 seconds earlier than it was supposed to. How would 20 seconds affect the lives of the commuters? This is like a case of perfectionist mindset, a privilege only a perfectly efficient system can brag about. But they were not bragging, it is just their culture, something very different from our SMRT culture. Want to blame them for having an efficient culture?
 
By the way, the Japanese apology was reported in the Japanese media for Japanese consumption. How did it appear in our local media? Who did this and what was his agenda? If this is done by the Japanese, then it is right to feel offended for rubbing in on our serious train problems. But if the Japanese did not do it, instead it was done by a Singaporean or new Singaporean, or a local, then it is very unfair to blame the Japanese for it. It is misplaced anger that is typical of daft Singaporeans.
 
I quote SM Ong, ‘So we don’t need you, Japan, to make us feel worse about it. We don’t need your Japanese CEO of your Japanese car company Nissan to say last Friday that he will return part of his salary after an inspection scandal led to a recall of 1.2 million Nissan vehicles…Our transport minister, Mr Khaw, once said: “In Japan, the chairman, the CEO will call a press conference and take a deep bow, and in the good old days, they may even commit hara-kiri.”’
 
Now, aren’t this going too far and being overly sensitive? Actually we have a lot to learn from the Japanese if we adopt a healthy and positive mindset. We should be striving to be like the Japanese in terms of efficiency, be on time, not every day apologizing for delays and breakdowns. We should learn from their culture of accountability, failure to perform, return the salary for not performing, and…ok perhaps committing hara-kiri is demanding too much. Just simply resign may be an honourable thing to do.
 
This is a case of failure to see the real problem, refusing to see the problem and beating the messenger for bringing the bad news. This is our daft culture, a nation heading from first world to third world and behaving like third world people.
 
The decline is evident and very assured. And in the article SM Ong quoted Hsien Loong saying that our SMRT is among the top 4 cities in the world and Japan not even mentioned. Is this the same as bragging that our local universities are ranked among the best in the world while Japan’s are not so highly ranked, so we are better than Japan, our SMRT are better than Japan’s?
 
Oh my God. 无药可救. No medicine can help liao.
If one takes into consideration lightning strike and one SMRT train captain was injured, be mindful, be very mindful that HE is watching and obviously not happy with how things are developing. When the collision hit, I was asking what can be worse. Now lightning struck. What can be worse after this.
 
Someone suggested that commuters should think seriously of getting travel insurance. I hope no clown would jump onto this and suggest making this compulsory and using CPF money.