The big man & the boys

Photo from Google

Just done reservist military training. Preparing for and going to war is not something to be taken lightly. What's most irritating, to put it mildly, is that a war may be started by politicians who don't watch their mouths.

Sending young and not-so-young boys to die in the field of battle over some careless remark is nuts.

Having failed my Chinese Language for much of school years, here's an advice from a not-so-Chinese Chinese: 识时务者为俊杰. When your time's over, please leave the stage or the applause will turn into boos.

coup in Thailand

It's not so much that it has happened but getting fresh news & photos from a bunch of first-hand witnesses. Talk about up-to-date news.

It's about time that mainstream media wake up.
It's about time that dictators wake up.

And in case you're wondering, no I wouldn't welcome dictators here.

Oh, and one more thing: Suntec City Got Traffic Jam

Suntec City Got Traffic Jam

Photo from Google

A seemingly innocuous article about Suri (Tom Cruise + Katie Holmes' baby) in the Life! section of yesterday's broadsheet (Baby Blues, page 8) caught my eye. It wasn't because the family had gone public. I wonder how much Vanity Fair paid the Cruises for those shots of the family? The antics of Hollywood celebrities are about as predictable as the weather.

Anyway what got my attention was the way which the report was slanted. The rags are all commenting about how "Asian" Suri looks. An excerpt from the report: "Somewhere in the gene pool of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, some Asian influence has crept in," it said, refering to the child's "delicate, almond-shaped eyes, the milky, pale-ish skin tone, the striking mane of dark, dark hair".

Does anyone even have a firm grasp on the concept of being Asian? If you were to ask anyone in Asia, you'd probably get as many opinions as there are Asians. In the UK when someone uses the term "Asian" he or she most probably means a person from the Indian sub-continent. To the Americans, being Asian means someone from the Far East, for example China, Korea or Japan. To some others, people from the Middle East are Asians.

Being Asian is something which cannot be understood easily. There is no cookie cutter that produces a nicely defined Asian identity. It is easy to fall into prejudice when dealing with something or someone alien. For example, people with Down's Syndrome were known as Mongoloids and the condition was called Mongolism. These terms came about because an English physician thought that people with Down's Syndrome looked like Mongolians and Mongolians suffered from arrested development.

We are still working towards an age of enlightenment.

Technorati tag: Singapore2006

Suntec City Got Traffic Jam

Faith has her own mail now. So adult! Very soon she'd be making her own commercial transaction. I remember the first time I bought something (not with my own cash) was a 70-cent loaf of bread from the bakery behind the old flat in Queenstown.

Milestones in childhood. I am beginning to miss Faith's first months, already...

Technorati tag: Singapore2006

Suntec City Got Traffic Jam

Photo from Google

So the traffic blockade around Suntec City and Nicol Highway has begun. Commuting through earlier today, the 3pm traffic felt like 6pm traffic on a normal weekday. I wonder how the 6pm traffic will feel like over the next 10 days...

Anyway, drawing inspiration from the Remember Prison Got No Broadband meme by mrbrown, I think I will chronicle the events outside of the IMF/World Bank meet. I'm sure everyone's probably had enough of Singapore2006, Smile Campaign etc. So from now until 20 September I will blog about everything else commercial EXCEPT the IMF/World Bank meet and title my blog entries as Suntec City Got Traffic Jam.

I hope my faithful readers (consisting of me, wifey and daughter) will follow this meme. Here are the conditions:

1. From now until 20 September 2006, title your blog entries Suntec City Got Traffic Jam.
2. Blog about anything except Singapore2006.
3. Include some reference about money, commerce or trade but keep point 2 in mind.
4. Tag your entry as Singapore2006.

Tag: Singapore2006

A topsy turvy world

Photo from Google

I always say this to people who try to solicit political opinions from me:

When big boys play politics the ordinary people suffer.

It's strange how, 5 years on from 9/11, things have a way of coming around to haunt us. Even a small red dot isn't spared. Here's why.

On the English broadsheet this morning, two reports on local happenings got my attention. The first was about the IMF/World Bank meet (as usual, ad nauseam), about how the authorities in 1984-ville are putting much effort in physically fencing off areas around Suntec City with steel fences, to protect foreign delegates. A second story reported on how a family, consisting of a local man, a Thai woman and their small child, is about to be broken apart by uncompromising immigration laws. The mother is about to be deported while the citizenship status of the child is in limbo.

We cannot claim to have a compassionate society when the welfare of the everyday man, the working class folk is left undefended while "bigger" (read: hoity-toity) issues are pondered over.

Governments are growing bigger everywhere. The threat to the everyday man has never been bigger than now. It looks like the real fallout of 9/11 is the growth of governments at the expense of personal space and welfare. Every aspect of collective human decency and compassion, it seems, can be given up in the name of fighting terror.

I leave you with an excerpt of a speech given by Bo Wang, an academic, at the Iowa University in 1984, about the phenomenon of the Ugly Chinaman. The full text is available from here.

"The quality of the fruit is determined by the quality of the soil in which the tree grows. Similarly, people are the 'fruit' of the societies in which they live. The citizens of a country should cultivate the ability to judge their leaders; otherwise, they only have themselves to blame for the consequences. If we are willing to shout our praises for a man who is unworthy of our respect, who is to blame if he rides roughshod over us?"

Remember to run for cover when the big boys play politics.

Fall in at 4am!

Photo from Google

Read the BBC report which tickled me.

A widely circulated story about NS had a CO ordering his battalion to fall in at the parade square by 7am the next morning. One kiasu company commander then ordered that his company should fall in by 6am. The sergeant major, affected by the KS mentality, ordered that all men should fall in at 5am. The men, not wanting to sacrifice their precious weekend off by being late, got ready in full parade regalia at 4am the next morning.

Reminds me of a Chinese saying that the emperor remains unfazed while the eunuchs are panicking: 皇帝不急太监急

So what's happening? Nothing. That's it, nothing. And it seems that the IMF itself is getting irritated by the actions of our wise leaders in quashing every hint of dissent by locals or foreign talents alike. It's funny because I thought the 1984-ville leadership always kowtow to foreigners, even protesters. Well, perhaps this protest ban is an indication of the leadership slowly growing a backbone, at last.

Subsonic boom

Photo from Google

So I was packing things in the study when I heard jet planes coming in to land at Paya Lebar Airbase. Nothing unusual since the flat's directly under the flight path. However the engine sounded very different. More muffled, not as sharp as the usual F5's. Didn't have the propeller drone of the C-130's. Piqued, I glanced through the window and caught the tail silhouette. Two tail fins, twin engine exhaust. Unmistakably the F18 Hornet. Altogther 6 of them.

Looks like either the Yankees or Aussies are here for the weekend.

Protecting delegates for the IMF World Bank meet? Go figure...

Conversations with elite students

Teacher: Could you hand me that scissors please?

Student: (passing scissors over, sharp end first) Here.

T: Hey, don't you know how to pass scissors around safely

S: How?

T: Pass it with the handle first, like you would a knife. Didn't anyone show you? (groan)

S: (protesting) Yah, knife I know, but nobody taught me how to handle scissors!

T: (writhing on the floor, spewing blood)