What Lie Is It Today?

When i open the newspapers, i am thinking “what are they going to lie about today?”. Newspapers are filled with lies of what they want you to believe in. They are funded by advertisers who want you to purchase their products. They will announce: 20% sale island wide! (When in fact they raised their prices 20% island wide so you will believe you are paying less for a good deal).

The downside of studying marketing in depth is that i don’t really believe in what advertisements say, especially when the label says “100% natural goodness”. Well, everything is 100% natural as it comes from the soil including chemicals right? The term “natural” is ambiguous.

The most terrifying sort of marketing is subliminal messages, little messages that you don’t notice. They can totally mindscrew the whole population into believing that they have they are good for you. A good example is Macdonalds sponsoring Olympics and branding their cups with different types of sports. Its a subliminal message trying to tell you eating lots of burgers will make you sporty too!

Sadly, we don’t have a “thinking population”, most of them follow what they see on without questioning. Thankfully, the ministry of education has realized they had churned out a vegetable generation and decided they should look into ways into allowing questioning in school (should that be the case in the first place?!)

Education Minister Ng Eng Hen said yesterday in a speech at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.

At the end of the day, he said, education in Singapore needs to ‘nurture each child to believe in himself and be self-sufficient, to care for his fellow man, and to be able to contribute to the larger society around him’.

What he is trying to say we currently have a bunch of insecure, pampered, selfish and narrow minded bunch of students who don’t give a dam about contributing to society but achieving the best grades in school and top positions in working life at the expense of everything else.

Makes alot of sense to me, majority of the people in my generation don’t really care what happens to “the society”, it does not matter to them, what matters is the fast cars, girls and brooze.

I am sure these people will leave Singapore anytime given the opportunity.

More brain drain hurray!

The Voiceless Nation

The future of Singapore is bleak, it is coming to a dawn… to an end. The reasons are clear and simple; most Singaporeans do not have the basic knowledge of forming an opinion. They seem to have no opinions on whatever happens. They just take it without questioning, accepting it is (good) for them. It is frightening to know this occurring in a democratic country. They do not know their basic rights, their freedom to exercise free speech… and even a free will of thinking. With a nation that does not think, the future does not look rosy for it either.

After reading a post on Mr Wang’s blog about “More than half of workers in S’pore regret choice of study” i feel compelled to write an essay on this topic. Everyday we are bombarded with propaganda on trains, buses and streets. Recently, the government have been promoting the food and beverage industry as a lucrative career to be in. Needless to say, people in the f&b industry are probably work the most hours and the are the most lowly paid workers around. With so many false images implanted into our minds, no wonder we are the most disillusioned people in the world, studying for the sake of studying, working for the sake of working… not liking any bit of it and probably regretting our choice of careers and studies (as indicated by a survey by Kelly Services)

It all starts at 12 years old, we are streamed into different classes depending on our academic ability at that age, to be classified as “special” “express” or “normal”. Those who are streamed into “normal” are frowned upon as being “stupid”. They carry this label in their whole lives and it determines their destiny in the working world. Those who are “smarter” and “hardworking” will try to climb out of this label and try to excel with their “smarter” peers - with a longer route to take.

Singapore is probably the most regulated country in the world with every rule set in paper for people to follow - without much say in how things should be run in reality. There is a determined set of routes to take to succeed in life - to be an engineer, doctor or lawyer. To be an artist is seen as absurd…. the primitive nation does not seem to appreciate art… or even take a second glance at it… after all.. it does not bring them any pragmatic value.

A nation that does not think is certainty a dead nation. Like the vegetable state of a person lost in coma, he thinks he is alive but he isn’t in reality. He cannot control what happens to his body, the external world determines what they do with it - to put him to sleep or to put him on the life support machine. If there is no financial resources in doing so, they will put him to sleep like the animals in shelters - unwanted outcasts of the society. If he holds the knowledge to eternal life, they will keep him alive as much as possible - for the day he would “contribute” his knowledge to the society.

I hope one day the nation does wake up and realizes that he can take control of his life instead of letting others decide what to do with him. He will be playing in his own dreamland for now…

Melbourne - The Most Livable City in the World

Lessons we can learn:

1) Reclaim our streets from cars
2) People need open spaces to enjoy and appreciate the city
3) Bicycle lanes will reduce the traffic on roads, it is eco friendly and a convenient way of commuting.
4) Vehicles causes stress and pollution to the people living in the city, steps should be taken for alternative modes of transportation such as shared buses, walking, cycling and maybe the skies should be utilized as well with aviation cars? (lol!)

I enjoy walking around the city, particularly City Hall in Singapore. There are many landmarks in the central area for us to appreciate the history and architectural of the buildings. However, the vast number of cars destroys the breath taking views into a industrialized warehouse. Setting up more ERP granties will not solve the problem of traffic, increasing the frequency of buses and mrt routes will improve commuting. Steps should be taken into expanding public transport routes.

The national environmental council has taken a great step in connecting our parks together to make cycling on the shorelines enjoyable. They should look into developing cycling lanes in the city to facilitate the usage of bicycles as a environmental friendly form of transportation.

Confessions of A Student

I realized i haven’t been writing much about my life (isn’t what online journals are for?) so today i am going to write about school. I am currently in the second year in university, most of my friends had transfered to Australia this semester and i am feeling really bored stuck-in-singapore. I want to transfer to melbourne too! I was looking around places that i could rent around the school and this is what i found.

Modern Contemporary Home in Melbourne
$135 per week incl utilities and internet
( $540 per month for a room!)

Not bad at all! There are vast open spaces with nice views… not to forget.. bigger houses. On a closer look, one of these houses costs an average of AUD $240 000 around Berwick in Melbourne (our equivalent of Jurong to City Hall). The come at the cost of a HDB flat, amazing! You will be sure that you will not be seeing me in Singapore very soon… (hahaha). An additional note, the median salary of a business graduate (fresh graduate) in the state of Victoria (includes Melbourne) is AUD $40 000. As compared to Singapore university graduates average of SG$36 000 ( if they end up in a $3k per month job, according to NUS Business school ).

On further inspection, although the lodging in Australia is cheaper, the cost of eating out is higher (due to minimum wage, which is a good thing). Overall, the quality of life there is so much better, housing prices are reasonable (not unreasonable in the case of Singapore). I don’t want to be stuck in a pigeon hole and pay for it for the rest of my life!

The miserable pigeon hole which 80% of the population lives in Singapore.

Everyday, my resolve to migrate seems clearer and clearer. This might not be the place for me, this country does not provide my ideal lifestyle. The income gap between the rich and poor is widening. There is a restriction in the freedom of expression, and even human rights. I feel constrained in this country.

I need a break through… space… to breathe. I can’t breathe when this place is so overly congested with people and more people. With more and more foreign immigrants occupying every tiny space in this island. I could hardly find a place for some peace and quiet. Maybe that is why i am accustomed to going out at night - to avoid the crowds and unbearable heat in the day.

I might be making Singapore sound like a really horrid place. You might politely disagree and say, “Hey, it isn’t that bad, we are a safe and clean city!”. I beg to disagree, i am living in an old estate in Aljunied constituency and you will notice that most of the buildings around here are very dirty ( what are they doing to our billion dollar constituency funds anyway? ). I don’t feel safe at all with the immigrant workers sleeping below void decks getting drunk on beer. Even the public is feeling uneasy after the leader of the terrorist operations walked out of his prison cell in broad daylight.

I am sorry to have shattered your crystal clear image of what a “fine” city Singapore is. After all Singapore is ranked 131 out of 178 on the Happy Nations Index. I think we are a very unhappy nation indeed, with rising inflation and cost of living, no wonder we could barely survive without working, thus, the need to work till we drop (and still be unable to withdraw our CPF funds).

Rest assured, you can still head down to your nearest kopitiam and enjoy great food no less!