Khaw Boon Wan – We support strong family ties

‘Strong families make strong communities and a strong nation. This is why we don’t just build flats; we also help families live closer together.

There are many benefits for such an arrangement. Grandparents can help look after grandchildren, and children can support their parents and grandparents.’

The Chinese text used a combination of two characters to define a nation, ‘guo jia’ 国家. The two characters are country and family. The family is the basic building block of a nation. Without the families, a country would just be a piece of empty land. It is the people and families that turned it into a nation. And Boon Wan must have reflected on this concept when he was doing his meditation, and he is now enlightened. He understands the importance of families and family ties. And he explained that HDB policies are crafted with the building of strong family ties in mind.

Unfortunately many netizens did not see his viewpoints and lambasted him and his policies that they said were bad for families. They quoted things like small micky mouse flats, over priced HDB flats, including his idea of sending old folks to JB nursing homes. They were furious about some of the things Boon Wan suggested that meant well. They see the Medishield Life as a transfer of govt liabilities to the children, to make them bear the cost of providing medical insurance for their parents.

They even called Boon Wan a hypocrite. Now that is a bit too much, to call a good buddhist a hypocrite. Look at the calmness in his face, non violent, always smiling, every angle you look, he is like the laughing Buddha. How can he be a hypocrite? And they even blamed him for young couples turning to their parents to foot the down payment for cheap and affordable HDB flats. How can like that?

Let me attempt, with my not super talent ability, to explain away the wrong perceptions the netizens had of Boon Wan. Yes with good communications, everything can be explained away. I hope my explanation is good enough and not half past six.

Let’ take the first issue of micky mouse flats. I think the original objective by HDB was to make the flats cheaperer and more affordable. Now people complained too small and cannot keep three generations under one roof. Ok, that was a lack of foresight. But they might look at small flats different. You see, being small, everyone will be closer to each other, at least physically, cosy and warm. 

Anyway Boon Wan is correcting that judgemental error and is building 3 generation flats. Swee boh? You people complained and he heard and responding to your feedback and trying to make it better. And he also got give good grants to help the families live together. Children want to live near parents, Govt give them money to be filial. Like that cannot say bad, tiok boh?

What, three generations flat also very small inside? This one I dunno.  Never mind, have faith in Boon Wan. He will make them right, bigger flats, bigger rooms, for happy family ties. Give him a bit more time, and allow the Govt to bring in more foreign workers to help him do a good job. Maybe the small mickey mouse flats were due to labour shortage, so build smaller flats can build faster right? Then again, if the flats are built bigger, got to pay more you know. Nothing is free.

Boon Wan is trying his best. The problems were created by his predecessors, not by him. And he volunteered to do the right things. See, now no more housing problems. Maybe the price is still affordably unaffordable.  Only two years on the job and he solved housing shortage problem. He is good. The National Day Award I want to recommend him for the highest award in public service. What bintang or star they called it?

Maybe he can do more, bit by bit, one at a time. There is this complaint that visiting parents is becoming very expensive. Children want to spend time at parent’s home or grandparents want to help out in children’s home also very expensive. Every time visits parents must pay except on Sunday or public holiday. Maybe Boon Wan can look into this. Oh, he already thought of it, that’s why 3 generation flat, stay together, no need parking fee.  Did someone say don’t drive, save money? And the media also have been encouraging the people to take public transport. Private car ownership no good, take public transport betterer.

This one I dunno want to agree or not. Got car can bring whole families to ‘chiat hong’ either in East Coast Park or go to Malaysia. Whole family, 3 generations all can go, better than staying inside mickey mouse flats. If no car, no choice, mickey mouse flats also must pretend to be good. Quality of life is not about big space small space. It is how you make do with it, go around it, buy small furniture, everything smaller, then can feel big space.

After building so many micky mouse flats, cannot simply demolish them right? And how to cope with 10m population if flats are built bigger and bigger? Like that how? Big is not necessary good you know. This one, a bit physical constraint, can’t be helped lah. We need to have 10m population to have growth and better quality of life. So no car, smaller micky mouse flats must bear with it lah. Today someone wrote to Today forum, make car use prohibitive. This is a brilliant psychotic Sinkie mind at work. And no car can save so much money, no need to pay parking when visiting parents or parents visiting grandchildren.

Ok, now I help explain leow. Take it or leave it up to you. Boon Wan good or bad you all can see. So don’t anyhow hantam him. He is good man, the best in PAP. If he is bad, then no more good man in PAP. You people so lucky to have Boon Wan in the PAP and still want to ask him go back to Malaysia? You dunno how bad things would be without him.

What the IBs and his party stand for

Spewing your rubbish again Redbean. The old folks having to work as cleaners and dish collectors at the foodcourts are just making a living. If you think that is harsh then change the system by standing for election and have a voice in the parliament. There are oppositions in the current parliament and why are they not doing something for these unfortunate folks? You have written about this issue before and we are all tired of reading this topic over and over. Do something about it. Do not just spew this issue over and over. Singapore will always be this way, a system with the haves and the have nots. It is the way Singaporeans are. As long as I and my family are OK, it is none of my business if others around me die. Nothing will change. So, stop writing about this inequality issue. You are just wasting our time and your time. STOP IT.

June 21, 2015 6:36 p.m.

 

The above is written by an IB posting as anonymous in my blog. And he more or less threatened me to ‘STOP IT’, ie that I must stop writing articles or else. See the gangster like behaviour of this IB. He mentioned ‘we are all tired of reading…and, You are just wasting our time’ meaning he is a member of an organisation or party. I am not sure which organisation or which party he belongs.

What is important is what he said, ‘Singapore will always be this way, a system with the haves and the have nots. It is the way Singaporeans are. As long as I and my family are OK, it is none of my business if others around me die. Nothing will change.’ This is what is important to him, he and his family while others can die never mind. Is this just his view or also the view of his organisation or party?

Whichever organisation or party he is representing, we can figure out what kind of organisation or party that is and whether they care about the people or only for themselves.  To them, the big divide in the haves and have nots is natural and they would not do anything about it and this is the kind of Singapore they believe in.

Try to find out or extrapolate who he is representing and if it is a political party, you should know whether you should or should not vote for this party with this kind of values, a party that cares for themselves while ‘others around me can die’ is not their interest. They don’t care. And they behave like gangsters, threatening people as if they own this country.

Can anyone track down this IB and expose the party behind him? It is frightening to vote for a party with members behaving like gangsters and with this kind of thinking.

Agree or not?

Australia – The boy pretending to be a man

Australia is thinking seriously about sending military aircraft and naval ships to skirt Chinese territories in the South China Sea. It did that during the cross strait crisis by sailing a few warships through the Straits of Taiwan as a show of force, a flexing of military muscle at a time when China was still militarily inferior to the Americans. Standing on the shoulders of the Americans, the Australians are howling how strong they are and wanting to taunt and even go to war with China.

A midget militarily and no better than the Philippines, they still think China is the China they could push around. Remove the American military umbrella, the Indonesians could run through that island continent they robbed from the aborigines and make it part of greater Indonesia like a piece of cake.

Peter Jennings, a military analyst, is pushing and goading the Australian govt to flex its muscles with China, to show that Australia can snub at China at will. And many Australian politicians also believe that Australia should prove its manhood to China and China would be cowered in fear.  The Alice in Wonderland mentality or is it Crocodile Dundee, is still prevalent in this British colony. The Australians still believe they are a big player in geopolitics. They still could not see why their mining industry gone turtle up when the Chinese stop buying their iron ores.

The provocative measures the Australians are flirting with to test the resolve of China is comical. The dragon has awakened and the crocodile will become crocodile meat in Chinese herbal brew. It would be safer to send Crocodile Dundee to New York than to the South China Sea.

Grow up mate, the world has changed.

New tourist attraction – The Pride of Paradise Island

‘We have all seen them – the elderly folks who toiled away at our food centres such as hawker centres, coffeeshops and food courts, cleaning tables, collecting dishes and sweeping floors.

They have become such a ubiquitous feature that we hardly notice them anymore.

But even so, sometimes certain situations we witness still raise questions about our society and how we treat these folks.

At about 10pm on Saturday night, Ms Jenny Quek was at the Kopitiam food court at Vivo City. The unusual thing about what she witnessed was the number of tables which were littered with used and uncollected dishes – and that there was only one elderly cleaner toiling away trying to do her best to clear the tables.

Ms Quek took a video and posted it online:’


The above is posted by Andrew Loh in the TRE. Though the content and description of senior citizens at work was not treated as a glorious thing, I will take it as a difference in opinion. In some quarters, the opportunity for senior to work is a great privilege and a very desirable thing. It gives them financial independence and the dignity to enjoy what they are doing without becoming a burden to children and the state. I cannot quarrel with this view either. It sounds so logical and noble and I am won over already.

I think this is one of the great policies that keeps Singapore thriving and the envy of the world. The old folks of the world would love to be here to enjoy the opportunity and the dignity of financial independence. PMETs must be very encouraged by this since many found themselves redundant, unemployable by the time they hit 50. Now other than driving taxis they can look forward to a new career till 80 or more, working as cleaners in the food courts. No diplomas or degrees needed.

This is an Uniquely Singapore thing, old folks working happily and integrating with the young people, and making themselves useful instead of wasting their time away. I don’t think there is another country that will buy this philosophy of working their seniors to the last day as part of their retirement privilege. No need to worry about not having enough savings to retire. And no need to withdraw their CPF savings and can watch their savings grow and grow and grow.

The govt should table this as a paper to the UN for consideration and for praise. And the Tourist Board can promote this as the newest attraction in Sin City, a near miracle. Come to Sin City and see how our old folks are happily working to serve the young people in the food courts. It is a social symbiotic relationship that reduces wastage of human resources to near zero. And there is no need for retirement savings or retirement funds. That is why they don’t have to withdraw their CPF savings and letting them grow in the safe custody of the Govt.

To make it more interesting and participatory, the Tourist Board can conduct a Spot the Happiest and Oldest Cleaner Contest and tourists can also participate. The business in the food courts would be good. And if the prize money is big enough, Changi and the airlines would also be making big money as well, with eager tourist coming to see our happily employed oldies. And instead of sending our ministerial delegations to learn from other countries, other countries will be sending their delegations here to learn how we treat our senior citizens so well.

The old folks are very rich, with a lot of savings in their CPF, and very happy. See how dignified they go about cleaning tables and dishes. There is no thought of retiring to watch the sunset.

Politicians scoring brownie points

The AHPETC case has given the politicians a lot of opportunities to score brownie points. And they appear to be quite successful and some were even thinking that the Aljunied GRC is going to return to the ruling party. Excellent jobs for the goal scorers.

I am wondering why the opposition MPs are not trying to score points on bigger issues using the same premises and arguments? There are issues like CPF, Aims, TC funds, GIC, Temasek and even issues like Roy and Amos that could arouse some emotions on the ground. But the bigger question is whether the ground will be moved by these issues or the AHPETC issues. Are the voters looking at these issues on the grounds of facts presented and how clever the arguments are? 

On the other hand, given that voters are emotional and unpredictable and at times daft when they did not do the right thing, would the voters be looking at the current controversies objectively? Or would they look above the skirmishes and at the intent and motive of the tussle. If it is the intent and purpose that they are looking at, what would be the intent and purpose of the fight? And if they could figure out the intent and motives, that it is all about politicking, would they see through all the hypocrisies and vote according to what they perceived the issues were about and not as they were told? 

And if they are looking at the intent, how would they perceive the politicians politicking for the sake of politicking instead of trying to serve the people? Intent and motive are very important factors in judging what the issues are about and not the issues themselves. If it is so simple, then the outcome of the next GE would be so predictable. 

Sometimes people vote for or against a party or candidate based on the spite factor rather than a simple right or wrong or good or bad. Sometimes too much of a good thing could turn bad and nauseating.

Has the ground shifted because of the AHPETC issues? Has the ground shifted because there are other more important issues that were swept under the carpet or not spoken about?