4/02/2012
April 1 price hike in electricity
SP Services has increased electricity tariff by 4.3% to a new high of 28.78 cents per kWh. It is all due to higher fuel and gas prices. Can’t be helped.
Chan Chun Sing’s Lanfang Republic
‘Was it because over time, they have degenerated into different groups fighting only for their own interests?
Was it because the society was broken when those who have and those who can, did not take care enough for those who have-nots or cannot.
Was it that the leaders and the people did not share the same values any more? Maybe it was all these and more.’
This is a paragraph taken from Chan Chun Sing’s famous speech to PAP’s stalwarts before the last GE. He was telling the story of the Lanfang Republic in 18 century West Kalimantan and questioned why a flourishing little state failed to exist beyond a 100 years. And he threw up the few questions as the probable cause of the demise of Lanfang.
He was relating to the Lanfang state that shared many similarities with our little island and how this island state could avoid the pitfalls of Lanfang. Would this island state still be around in 100 years? Or is it facing the same set of problems, self interest, inter group fighting, disconnect between the rich and poor, and leaders not sharing the same values as the people?
Our income gap is the widest in the world, and infighting is starting to show. Not sure about self interest. The disconnect and different values are glaring. The people are to survive on peanuts while leaders find it tough to live on $50k pm income. And praising the people’s ability to buy a 2 rm flat with $1000 pm income only highlighted the disparity and divide. The people and the leaders are having different dreams.
What I can say is don’t worry. We are different, or at least we are very different in that we have the best talents to rule the country. And we are depending on the number One superpower to be our guardian angel instead of a declining power. And no other power is more powerful than our guardian angel. We are safe. The people with $1k income and 2 rm flats are equally happy with the quality living. The leaders may be a bit unhappy with $50k income but bearable. We will survive pass 100 years.
We also have the advantage of more foreign talents to take over the country from the lesser talented locals. The island will exist forever. Wan sui, wan sui, wan wan sui.
Was it because the society was broken when those who have and those who can, did not take care enough for those who have-nots or cannot.
Was it that the leaders and the people did not share the same values any more? Maybe it was all these and more.’
This is a paragraph taken from Chan Chun Sing’s famous speech to PAP’s stalwarts before the last GE. He was telling the story of the Lanfang Republic in 18 century West Kalimantan and questioned why a flourishing little state failed to exist beyond a 100 years. And he threw up the few questions as the probable cause of the demise of Lanfang.
He was relating to the Lanfang state that shared many similarities with our little island and how this island state could avoid the pitfalls of Lanfang. Would this island state still be around in 100 years? Or is it facing the same set of problems, self interest, inter group fighting, disconnect between the rich and poor, and leaders not sharing the same values as the people?
Our income gap is the widest in the world, and infighting is starting to show. Not sure about self interest. The disconnect and different values are glaring. The people are to survive on peanuts while leaders find it tough to live on $50k pm income. And praising the people’s ability to buy a 2 rm flat with $1000 pm income only highlighted the disparity and divide. The people and the leaders are having different dreams.
What I can say is don’t worry. We are different, or at least we are very different in that we have the best talents to rule the country. And we are depending on the number One superpower to be our guardian angel instead of a declining power. And no other power is more powerful than our guardian angel. We are safe. The people with $1k income and 2 rm flats are equally happy with the quality living. The leaders may be a bit unhappy with $50k income but bearable. We will survive pass 100 years.
We also have the advantage of more foreign talents to take over the country from the lesser talented locals. The island will exist forever. Wan sui, wan sui, wan wan sui.
4/01/2012
Not seeing the woods but crying over the trees
Cherian George continues with the episode of smelly bodies and Shimun Lai in the ST today. He also recalled the unfortunate UOB dinner and dance incident when a little mimicry with no bad intention or could be seen as flattery was accused of racism. And the cry for the lynching of Shimun Lai has still not subsided while the real issue that led to the outburst was brushed aside completely.
Cherian George also acknowledges the issue of bad body odour in Indians though it is not the case. Everyone, I say everyone, smells if not wash properly. This has nothing to do with race though some are prone to smell differently depending on their diet and the environment, and of course social habits and standard of personal hygiene.
The crux of the matter is that smelling bad is offensive. And in a highly congested city, in the jam packed trains and buses, my god, pray you don’t have to be squeezed in between a couple of smelly bodies. This is no laughing matter. Imagine the smell could hit you 2 metres away and one is less than a face away.
Why is there no follow up as to how to minimise this social problem? Shall the society or the commuters just accept that smelly bodies are one of those things and have to live with them? Graciousness, first world? Can something be done to minimise this unpleasant encounters by commuters?
No one will welcome a smelly person into their midst or into their homes. It is to the disadvantage of those who smell to find themselves being ostracised. There have been many encounters in working environment in Raffles Place and Shenton Way as well and not only in the dirty construction or sewage industries.
My simple suggestion is to educate the affected to wash and clean more often. And washing and taking a bath first thing in the morning is a must and could help quite a lot. It is unfair to blame others for being rude when one walks around carrying and sharing the bad odour and expecting people to live with it. There is no need to spend a lot of money to keep clean and don’t smell. There is no need to pour a bottle of armour or scented water on one’s body. Just keep it wash and clean.
Or shall everyone just shut up and pretend the problem is not there and when one comes along, pinched the nose and give the person a dirty look? The smelly problem is there and is not going away by pretending it is not there. The lynching of Shimun Lai will not solve the problem. It only encourages the smelly to think it is alright to smell wherever they go. Just don’t talk about it.
Anyone thinking of a solution or wanting a solution other than crying father and crying mother?
Cherian George also acknowledges the issue of bad body odour in Indians though it is not the case. Everyone, I say everyone, smells if not wash properly. This has nothing to do with race though some are prone to smell differently depending on their diet and the environment, and of course social habits and standard of personal hygiene.
The crux of the matter is that smelling bad is offensive. And in a highly congested city, in the jam packed trains and buses, my god, pray you don’t have to be squeezed in between a couple of smelly bodies. This is no laughing matter. Imagine the smell could hit you 2 metres away and one is less than a face away.
Why is there no follow up as to how to minimise this social problem? Shall the society or the commuters just accept that smelly bodies are one of those things and have to live with them? Graciousness, first world? Can something be done to minimise this unpleasant encounters by commuters?
No one will welcome a smelly person into their midst or into their homes. It is to the disadvantage of those who smell to find themselves being ostracised. There have been many encounters in working environment in Raffles Place and Shenton Way as well and not only in the dirty construction or sewage industries.
My simple suggestion is to educate the affected to wash and clean more often. And washing and taking a bath first thing in the morning is a must and could help quite a lot. It is unfair to blame others for being rude when one walks around carrying and sharing the bad odour and expecting people to live with it. There is no need to spend a lot of money to keep clean and don’t smell. There is no need to pour a bottle of armour or scented water on one’s body. Just keep it wash and clean.
Or shall everyone just shut up and pretend the problem is not there and when one comes along, pinched the nose and give the person a dirty look? The smelly problem is there and is not going away by pretending it is not there. The lynching of Shimun Lai will not solve the problem. It only encourages the smelly to think it is alright to smell wherever they go. Just don’t talk about it.
Anyone thinking of a solution or wanting a solution other than crying father and crying mother?
3/31/2012
The injustice against our own citizens
There are still some Singaporeans questioning why PRs do not want to become citizens. The underlying assumption is that if PRs want to be citizens, we should quickly embrace them as citizens. This is a dangerous thought.
We do not need more citizens. We only need more heads to contribute to the economy and the CPF, just like we need more babies. PRs can remain as PRs and should remain as PRs. Citizenship must be closely guarded and issue only to deserving ones.
Many PRs chose not to be citizens for obvious reasons. And even having to serve NS is likely to be a waste of time and effort as their hearts are not here. Would they stay and defend this country in a war? The employment pass holders and work permit holders need not bother. There is no reason for them to die for this country.
Our citizenship comes with many privileges and should be as citizens should be treated thus. Citizens must be treated differently from PRs and others, and should not be disadvantaged. The privileges of citizenships are gradually returning to the citizens. A PR that turns citizens will immediately have a windfall. Buying HDB flats means savings of tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars immediately and may profit more if they eventually sell out, and sell out the citizenship. Then there are all the ‘subsidies’ in education and medical benefits, and the national bonuses. To the lesser foreign talents, the reward is very substantial, enough to make them rich should they choose to return to their previous country after a few years.
The injustice done to Singaporean citizens is the denial by govt policies to buy a HDB flat, the biggest investment of any individual. Many citizens are deprived of this privilege while new citizens could benefit from it over night. How more silly can it be? This is the thoughtless policy that should be struck out immediately. The true blue citizens are still suffering from such a flawed policy and treated worst than new citizens.
Would the govt think that this is wrong and focus on doing the right thing, and remove this injustice against its very own citizens immediately? Or should the govt continue to do the wrong and claiming that it is right, to do the right thing? Maybe they are so talented that they could not see the wrong in this unjust policy.
We do not need more citizens. We only need more heads to contribute to the economy and the CPF, just like we need more babies. PRs can remain as PRs and should remain as PRs. Citizenship must be closely guarded and issue only to deserving ones.
Many PRs chose not to be citizens for obvious reasons. And even having to serve NS is likely to be a waste of time and effort as their hearts are not here. Would they stay and defend this country in a war? The employment pass holders and work permit holders need not bother. There is no reason for them to die for this country.
Our citizenship comes with many privileges and should be as citizens should be treated thus. Citizens must be treated differently from PRs and others, and should not be disadvantaged. The privileges of citizenships are gradually returning to the citizens. A PR that turns citizens will immediately have a windfall. Buying HDB flats means savings of tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars immediately and may profit more if they eventually sell out, and sell out the citizenship. Then there are all the ‘subsidies’ in education and medical benefits, and the national bonuses. To the lesser foreign talents, the reward is very substantial, enough to make them rich should they choose to return to their previous country after a few years.
The injustice done to Singaporean citizens is the denial by govt policies to buy a HDB flat, the biggest investment of any individual. Many citizens are deprived of this privilege while new citizens could benefit from it over night. How more silly can it be? This is the thoughtless policy that should be struck out immediately. The true blue citizens are still suffering from such a flawed policy and treated worst than new citizens.
Would the govt think that this is wrong and focus on doing the right thing, and remove this injustice against its very own citizens immediately? Or should the govt continue to do the wrong and claiming that it is right, to do the right thing? Maybe they are so talented that they could not see the wrong in this unjust policy.
The history of Malaya and Singapore is full of rubbish interpretation
The latest drama of the Japanese Occupation of Singapore was replayed by a school teacher, Malcolm Tan of Chung Cheng High School. He rushed into the class in full Japanese uniform and samurai sword to a stunned class of secondary 2 students. It was a novel and interesting way of teaching history.
This was followed by a letter in the ST forum by Liew Khai Kuin asking for a more balance understanding of the goodness of the Japanese people. He was looking at the good and kind Japanese fallen victims to an act of God, the tsunami and their own nuclear bomb in the name of nuclear energy. He never suffer under the hands of Japanese beasts.
History must be told fairly, and the goodness and badness of war and the barbaric acts of human beasts must be enacted and not erased from the history books. I am not sure if Malcolm told the story of Japanese soldiers cutting sugar canes at an angle and throwing babies into the air to fall back on the sharp end of the sugar canes, like meat on skewers. The meat was live babies. This was recounted by a Filipino soldier in a documentary on the survivors of the Second World War in the Philippines. And the atrocities on women and children in all the countries the good and kind Japanese committed, gorging out unborn babies, were they fiction or unfit to be told?
And the factual accuracy of the heroism of the war was twisted by every side to glorify their own interests. In 1940s, Malaya and Singapore were not countries but colonies of the British Empire. The people did not even know that these were their countries. Can’t blame them. They were stateless, owned the British Empire. And rightly many go on as normal, nothing to defend. Singapore and Malaya were not their countries.
As for citizenships, the locals probably didn’t know what that word meant. For the Indians and Chinese, the Indians were also subjects of the British Empire, the Chinese were Chinese and their country was China, being invaded by the Japanese. It would be foolish for those without a nationality to be defending what was not theirs. At that point in time, Malaya and Singapore belonged to the British. Anyone thinking of claiming the two pieces of land as their own? If they did, why didn’t they take up arms to defend their countries? The fact was that they were in a state of limbo, stateless. Only the migrant Chinese had a country of their own in China.
It is foolish thinking expecting anyone defending British colonies other than the British themselves. But the British scooted, yes scooted, when the Japanese came. And Malaya and Singapore became Japanese territories, conquered land! No owners to defend them. What citizenship? No, Japanese subjects, all the residents became conquered people.
How to write about stories of heroism, nationalism and defending a country when there was no country to talk of and no citizenship or nationalities to be proud of? But historians bungled everything together as if there were an independent state of Malaya and Singapore and nationalities like Malayans and Singaporeans. The state of Malaya only existed in 1957, and Singapore in 1959 as a self ruled state but still under the British rule.
Who was there as citizens of Malaya and Singapore to defend these states? Or why should they be defending the land when they were not even citizens? For the residents of Malaya and Singapore in 1945, what would they be defending, their countries, their nations or the British Empire? The best thing to do is not to defend anything as there was nothing to defend. Many of the locals did that. None of their business. The British got their Empire and colonies to defend but they too chose to scoot. Funny isn’t it?
Today we have a country we called our own. We are Singaporeans and would defend this island as our own. We must not be confused by the fact that there was no country called Singapore and any misgivings about Singaporeans not defending Singapore can only come from a twisted mind. Such distorted perception of history is warped.
This was followed by a letter in the ST forum by Liew Khai Kuin asking for a more balance understanding of the goodness of the Japanese people. He was looking at the good and kind Japanese fallen victims to an act of God, the tsunami and their own nuclear bomb in the name of nuclear energy. He never suffer under the hands of Japanese beasts.
History must be told fairly, and the goodness and badness of war and the barbaric acts of human beasts must be enacted and not erased from the history books. I am not sure if Malcolm told the story of Japanese soldiers cutting sugar canes at an angle and throwing babies into the air to fall back on the sharp end of the sugar canes, like meat on skewers. The meat was live babies. This was recounted by a Filipino soldier in a documentary on the survivors of the Second World War in the Philippines. And the atrocities on women and children in all the countries the good and kind Japanese committed, gorging out unborn babies, were they fiction or unfit to be told?
And the factual accuracy of the heroism of the war was twisted by every side to glorify their own interests. In 1940s, Malaya and Singapore were not countries but colonies of the British Empire. The people did not even know that these were their countries. Can’t blame them. They were stateless, owned the British Empire. And rightly many go on as normal, nothing to defend. Singapore and Malaya were not their countries.
As for citizenships, the locals probably didn’t know what that word meant. For the Indians and Chinese, the Indians were also subjects of the British Empire, the Chinese were Chinese and their country was China, being invaded by the Japanese. It would be foolish for those without a nationality to be defending what was not theirs. At that point in time, Malaya and Singapore belonged to the British. Anyone thinking of claiming the two pieces of land as their own? If they did, why didn’t they take up arms to defend their countries? The fact was that they were in a state of limbo, stateless. Only the migrant Chinese had a country of their own in China.
It is foolish thinking expecting anyone defending British colonies other than the British themselves. But the British scooted, yes scooted, when the Japanese came. And Malaya and Singapore became Japanese territories, conquered land! No owners to defend them. What citizenship? No, Japanese subjects, all the residents became conquered people.
How to write about stories of heroism, nationalism and defending a country when there was no country to talk of and no citizenship or nationalities to be proud of? But historians bungled everything together as if there were an independent state of Malaya and Singapore and nationalities like Malayans and Singaporeans. The state of Malaya only existed in 1957, and Singapore in 1959 as a self ruled state but still under the British rule.
Who was there as citizens of Malaya and Singapore to defend these states? Or why should they be defending the land when they were not even citizens? For the residents of Malaya and Singapore in 1945, what would they be defending, their countries, their nations or the British Empire? The best thing to do is not to defend anything as there was nothing to defend. Many of the locals did that. None of their business. The British got their Empire and colonies to defend but they too chose to scoot. Funny isn’t it?
Today we have a country we called our own. We are Singaporeans and would defend this island as our own. We must not be confused by the fact that there was no country called Singapore and any misgivings about Singaporeans not defending Singapore can only come from a twisted mind. Such distorted perception of history is warped.
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