Pasar Theatre (街头看戏乐)

These street shows are part of the Outreach programmes in the Singapore Arts Festival 2007. It was held at the open space in front of the People's Park Food Centre from 2 to 5pm, 2 & 3 June. There were also shows held at other venues.


Inside the make-up tent...
The performers of the first two items, the drummers and percussion group, bore the brunt of the scorching afternoon heat. After 4pm it was slightly better but it was still hot and humid. When the cantonese opera came on I saw the two shengs occasionally soaking up the sweat on the side of their faces. But the dan seemed ok; like she was not affected by the heat and humidity.

The opera was performed by Chan Fook Hong, Chow Chun Hong and Wong Mei Ling. Mei Ling is the leader of the Eunos CC Cantonese Opera Group. This was the first time I saw her do a comic role. I think she did the role well, amusing the crowds with her antics and comical gestures.


Chan Fook Hong and Wong Mei Ling...

This is Mei Ling.....

See this girl with advertising boards on her body. I saw this form of advertising at several places in Hong Kong but you don't often see this here.

粵曲 - 去年今夜桃花夢(任劍輝, 吳君麗)

The song is about 10 minutes long.

Record

Another interesting fact from the book:

In 1975, between April and August, Chor Fung Meng Cantonese Opera Troupe (雛鳳鳴劇團) came to Singapore twice and put up a total of 66 days performance at the Kreta Ayer People's Theatre. Leading artistes were the five phoenixes with Long Kim Sung (龍劍笙) as the lead sheng.

They did it again in 1976 - between July and November, they came twice again and performed for 73 days.

Fantastic, right. Nowadays foreign troupes come here to perform between one week to two weeks only.

This was a 'thank you ad' by KAPT and CFM Troupe to thank supporters and fans.

History

I was reading this book about the history of cantonese opera in Singapore between 1965 and 1983. There are a few old newspaper advertisements and posters in the book.

This advert below you have to read the chinese characters from right to left. In 1968 these two superstars came to Singapore to make special appearances in conjunction with the screening of their epic production Li Hou Zhu.

You can learn some history of Singapore too. At that time Mr S. Rajaratnam was the foreign minister as well as the minister for labour. (Now it is called manpower.) The show on the first night was to raise money for a 'defense fund'. Remember, we just started NS a year before then.

This picture shows two of our well-known personalities in cantonese opera. The actress on the left poster is Chee Kin Fen, leader of the Tung On Wui Kun Cantonese Opera Troupe. I don't know about the sheng next to her. The actress on the right poster is Joanna Wong, artistic director of Chinese Theatre Circle. At that time she was with Kong Chow Wui Kun. (Beside her is a female sheng from Hong Kong.) Joanna Wong had her 'Golden Jubilee in cantonese opera' show 3 years ago. So, you see, these two artistes have been involved in cantonese opera for half a century - from learning opera to performing, then to teaching and promoting opera.

Be responsible

Would you take a lift from friend whom you know has been drinking?

A news report a couple of days ago said a drink-driver had 4 passengers in his car. Didn't they know that they put their lives at risk. I presume they had been drinking too.

As friends of the driver I thought they could have advised him not to drive and all of them could take a taxi home.

It was reported that in Japan the police not only prosecute the drink-driver but they can also prosecute the driver's passengers. Not only that, people who drink with the driver and the owner of the pub might be penalized too.

Horror movies

Some people, Victor for example, say they won't spend money on horror movies to get themselves frightened. Others like myself like to pay to be frightened. But my interest is limited to movies and books. I won't go and sleep in a haunted house.

Here are some of my horror video discs. Psycho is an old black-and-white movie but it is a good horror movie. The actor is Anthony Perkins.


I wrote about this book 'The Day of the Jackal' not long ago. Forgot to mention that there is a movie based on the story. But the movie is lacklustre, lacking the suspense and excitement you get when you read the book.

Sale

Bought a few VCDs from Da You at Chinatown. (level 2, end of Smith Street) They are having a VCD/DVD 'warehouse sale'.

東安會館

Found this at YouTube although it has been posted a few months already. I have seen this on some website before. Chee Kin fun, leader of the Tung On Wui Koon Cantonese Opera Troupe talking about herself and her troupe.

港劇 - 黑夜彩虹

The english title of this HK drama is Fate Twister. Literally it means Rainbow in the Dark Night. The protagonist in the story is a simple woman but a woman of great courage and resolve.

The Jackal

I read this thriller many years back. Recently I bought this book from a second-hand bookshop to reread.


The story is about a terrorist group hiring a gunman to assassinate the president of France. At that time it was President de Gaulle. The ending of the story is not so important because we know it will not succeed. (According to history, there were a few attempts on the life of President de Gaulle but all were unsuccessful and he died peacefully at old age.) Also, according to the writer, the French Intelligence Service was one of the best in the world.

The thrills and excitements of the story come from the unraveling of the plot and the hunting of the killer.

The terrorists did not just hire any gunman but they looked for the best professional killer in the world and of course the price he demanded was also the highest.

The gunman, codenamed the Jackal, made his preparations. Meanwhile the France Intelligence got wind of it. But don’t forget, at that time there were no computers and hand-phones. They communicated using old-fashioned phones. They had to look through immigration cards one by one and check through airline passenger lists page by page – all very tedious and slow work.

The final showdown between the Jackal and the Detective responsible to hunt him down. Despite the watertight security by the police the Jackal slipped in. Also despite the meticulous preparations by the Jackal, the assassination failed in the last second because he overlooked one minor thing.

Maybe the writer wants to tell us Man can plan but God decides.

Cantonese Song - Xian Nu Mu Yang

This is the full song of the song clip video I posted earlier. The song is about 13 minutes long.

A very very small opera stage

I was reading Joey's blog. She is an opera fan. One of the posts is about the smallest opera stage she has ever seen.

I reproduce her post here. I think she won't mind. You can imagine how small it was.

The smallest stage

Recently I saw a Cantonese Opera in Seremban (a town in the southern part of Malaysia) & I really pity the performers. The stage is so small that all the costumes boxes have to be relocated to another place nearby. All the head gears and props have to go below the stage and to the extend 2 performers have to be located under the stage! There was only one roll of makeup boxes for the performers (6 numbers only) and one "ironing" table for common use. The lead actor makeup box was line up beside Wah Kong Sifu and the troupe owner's makeup box was pratically blocking the side entrance. The performers were bumping at each other in common corridor & dressing area especially when they were doing the 6 Generals. The 3 percussionist were practically knocking at each other if they were to do a bigger movement! That was only the back stage.

At the front stage, the 6 generals were all cramp up in to a "concave" line instead of the normal "straight" line and the chariots have to be very careful otherwise they will bump into the 2 generals standing in front or the 2 ministers sitting behind.

During the performance of Pak Loong Quan - both the leading actor and actress have to be extra careful otherwise they hit the junior performers standing as guards (in the end they quick enough to go backstage). During the scene where the 2 armies met, the stage is so full that they can hardly move (or maybe just 2 to 3 steps) and they will bump to each other (it just 3 performers from each side).

This is the smallest stage I've seen so far and pity the performers as they have another 10 days to go!

Homosexuality

Time and again there are people asking the Government not to criminalize homosexuality and to be more liberal with gays.

Legalize (or decriminalize, same or not?) homosexuality? Will it mean we may see two men hugging in a train. Or will it be ok to put up advertisements for gay parties at bus-stops.

A letter in yesterday’s papers said in the west there were homosexual teachers telling their classes it is normal to be homosexual. If it happens here, would we accept it?

Has anyone been jailed or prosecuted for his homosexuality? I think no, right? What homosexuals do behind closed doors or in the privacy of his home, no one will bother. You think the police so free to go and investigate people’s private life.

The Government are not interested in people’s homosexual activities. But they don’t want people to promote and publicize homosexuality or its activities or to influence the young.

I believe the Government will let go slowly and quietly. But if some of these people try to push too hard, I think the Government would decide to remain status quo.

Song clip

I was trying out how to combine pictures with audio so I used only a short clip. Hope you like the resulting song clip below. The pictures have nothing to do with the song, they are there to fill up the screen.

I think lovers of cantonese opera songs would know the name of the song and the singer.

Lucy

Do you read this comic strip Peanuts? The untidy girl with freckles is Lucy. She is always reluctant to go to school, irritates the teacher in class, copies answers, gets D- for tests and always talks nonsense. But she is very cute. The girl behind her is a bookworm. Hahaha...

coins

This is my savings, all 10-cent coins. But this is nothing......


compared to what this man did. (Click on picture to enlarge.)

Lesser-known artistes

From the all-time superstars 紅線女, 新馬師曾, 白雪仙, 任劍輝 to two lesser-known young artistes - 吳土观, 邱小娜. The sheng is from the Zhanjiang Cantonese Opera Troupe and the dan is from the Zhuhai CO Troupe.

Some photos

first three from right 陈惠婵, 钟丽容, 黄莉莉

钟丽容, 陈惠婵

朱振邦, 钟丽容, 戚超群

钟丽容

Taiwan drama

These few days I was watching this late-afternoon Taiwanese drama serial. I have not watched this for many weeks already. Wow! More than 200 episodes already and a lot of changes…

A man was united with his wife whom he thought has died. But she is blind now.

Another man built a hospital to fulfill the wish of his wife. But his wife has run away with their son.

A former character in the criminal underworld has become a politician, some sort of MP or mayor.

A woman has remarried another man and borne a child which belongs to her former husband. The present husband does not know the truth yet.

Plenty of drama and very long-winded.

Anyone seen the whole story already? Wonder how many more episodes before it ends. I don’t quite like dramas that drag too long.


Found some Nanyin videos at YouTube: Nanyin performance at Thian Hock Keng Temple

Love our Earth

22 April 2007 is Earth Day

Today, 18 April 2007, is BYOBD. (bring your own bag day) And the first Wednesday of every month will also be BYOBD.


Using plastic bag excessively is a waste of resources and do you know why our climate is getting warmer and warmer….

Plastic is made from Polyethylene which takes up to 1000 years to biodegrade. Most of these plastic bags end up in landfills that emit harmful greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (CO2). Now, CO2 and other heat-trapping gases are responsible for retaining the heat in our atmosphere and thus, contributing to global warming. There's no doubt about it. The Earth is sick, very sick. We read about global warming and how it's affecting the earth everyday in the papers. (This paragraph is extracted from Chris’s blog.)

Let’s do our part to support a worthy cause and help the environment. So don’t forget to bring your bag when you go shopping at the supermarket today and make every day a BYOBD.

Freedom

I am thinking about freedom. Not about marching on the street shouting or running about throwing stones. It is about the feeling you get when you are released after a period of confinement.

At the time I was called up to do NS, we the recruits were not allowed to leave camp during the first few weeks of our BMT. On Sundays, those who wanted to go to church would be taken in a military truck to a dispersal point in town from where they would go their different churches. They would have to report back at the DP at a certain time.

I still remember the first weekend when we were allowed to go home. My friend and I took a bus to Chinatown for dinner. We sat at an open-air hawkers’ center. It was dusk, crowds were walking along the road, neon signs started to light up and there were advertisements on two big billboards on the wall of the building near where we sat. I had this happy, comfortable and thankful feeling.

The weekend was spent at home. Waking up and then lazing around on the bed till 9am was a luxury. For the first time in days I didn’t hear the dreaded word ‘Fall-in’. The home-cooked food tasted more delicious, even the plain cold water was tasty and refreshing.

I began to value ordinary things I had taken for granted a bit more.

李後主之去國歸降 - 任劍輝, 白雪仙

Sorry

I have deleted these videos from YouTube accidentally:

廣東小調 - 換到千般恨
抗旨 Opposing the imperial decree
合兵破曹 - 新劍郎, 李龍
鬼怨 A ghost's grievance
香港名旦 - 吳美英

Beijing 2008

I am not much of a sports person but I do watch sports and games.

The news said Chinese athletes were under great pressure to get medals in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

I remember this news feature about how one coach in China, Ma something, trained his marathon runners. The athletes were confined in their training camp. They could not contact the outside world; no recreations, not even television Their daily routine consisted of running, eating, attending lectures, going to toilet, sleeping. Humdrum and rigid. Every day the same thing for 2 to 3 years and they ran 40km everyday. Terrible isn’t it, and they were only teenage girls.

That was quite some years ago.

I remember watching Li Jia Wei’s game in the table-tennis live telecast a few years back. I don’t know about techniques and skills but I liked to watch their faces, concentration, sweat, emotions and the little yelping noise they made when they scored a point or made an error. I took a picture of Jia Wei off the television screen – the emotional one, with tears in her eyes.


It is more exciting if you support one side and you see the score goes up.

The Olympics is still more than one year away. Singapore has won one and only one medal in the Olympics and that was 47 years ago. Hope we will win some medals including gold in Beijing. Too optimistic?

Link

In case you have not noticed, there is a link to
Chinese opera performances
on the right ===>>

Cantonese wayang at Sims Drive

On the first day of the second month in the lunar calendar there are cantonese street opera shows at some temples. This is part of the thanksgiving to the Gods. The opera troupe is from HK but it may also include a few performers from places like Macao, Malaysia and Singapore. Most fans usually come to see the lead stars from HK.

On the first night there is always this piece of opera called Liu Guo (六國大封相). The full version lasts more than an hour; but for street opera it is usually about 45 minutes. The street opera group will have to get extra performers for this.

There were three such thanksgiving opera shows - at Toa Payoh, Whampoa and Sims Drive. They lasted between 3 to 4 days.

I was at Sims Drive because it was the nearest.

The stage at Sims Drive was quite small and the backstage was very congested on the first night. It was very warm and humid. Imagine more than a dozen people putting on their costumes and the dressing-assistants going round to help them. Among these were 6 who were acting as warriors and had to put on their armour costume together with flags sticking up on their back.

The lead xiaosheng was Lau Wai Meng and the lead huadan was Ko Lai. The second sheng was Aw Bun Feng. I think it was the first time I saw him. He is quite good.

There were about three young performers I have not seen in the previous year. Later I went backstage to talk to one of them. She said it was their first time here. I asked her if she belonged to any troupe in HK. She said they were not actually ‘performers’ yet but were students learning the art in some association. I think they were here to gain experience and exposure. They were acting only minor roles like palace maids with few singing parts and little dialogue.

This troupe is not bad, at least they got more maids, villagers, etc. There was one year the poor princess didn’t even have a single palace maid to accompany her in one scene.

lead sheng 劉惠鳴

lead dan 高麗

second sheng 區品峰

second dan 翠縈

palace maids, Lum Lum & Vivian

frontstage

the messy backstage

backstage

Wu Opera 婺剧

These 3 Wu operas were performed by the Zhejiang Qu Zhou Wu Opera Troupe. They were part of the Chinese Opera Festival organized by CTC at the end of 1999 and crossed over to 2000. I only watched 1 Wu opera show.

The Monkey God

Empress Wu Zetian

The Beauty and the Warrior

Opera magazines

Here are some Chinese opera magazines I have.

I used to buy these 3 magazines every month. They take up a lot of storage space. So now I buy occasionally. I Judge by the content page. If got my favourite artistes on the cover I also buy.

These are souvenir magazines when foreign troupes performed here. Not many. I think on the average about three foreign troupes come every year.

These are souvenir magazines of performances of local artistes and troupes. Also not many. Two magazines in the picture are showcase performances by Christopher Choo and Aw Yeong Peng Mun. Christopher is a well-known lao sheng though he is actually a young man. Peng Mun is Singapore’s male hua dan.

These are magazines of performances I watched in HK and China. Very few. The troupes there usually don’t publish magazines of their performances because they perform regularly.

Make hay while the sun shines

I thought of this proverb when SFM Tharman said this is the right time to raise the gst. In case you don't know, hay is a type of grass farmers use to feed their cattle. The proverb means something like if you have the opportunity to do something do it now as you may not be able to do it later.

You can apply this to your life too.

Cameras

I was thinking of going to the IT show to look at some cameras. But then the news said thousands of people were thronging the place. So I didn’t go.

I have not bought any digital camera myself. The one I have was given by Starhub together with a 3-in-1 printer when I renewed my subscription. That was 3 or 4 years ago. This camera has 2 main disadvantages – the battery runs out fast and there is no ‘anti-shake’ software.

Nowadays I seldom use this camera. Most of the recent pictures you see in this blog were taken with my handphone.

For example, this one:
This one was taken with my MP3 player. But it is spoilt now because I dropped it into a drain.

Good and cheap

This evening I was waiting at a car park. Suddenly a van drove up beside me. The driver asked me for directions to the food center nearby. I told him the way. Then all of a sudden he asked me if I wanted some good quality sound equipment…very cheap he said.

I told him I was not interested but he kept on babbling away. Finally I said ‘told you not interested already; even you give me free I also don’t want’. That did it; he drove away without another word.

Then I remember last November or December a boy and a girl came to my flat to sell something (can’t remember what). The boy said they needed money to buy textbooks. I looked at them for a moment and said ‘you tell me your school, I ask your school to help you’. Apparently they didn’t like my idea; so they walked away.

From what I can remember,
Last year a woman came to sell key-chains, said she lost her job; a man came to ask for donations, said he got many illnesses; and recently two men came to offer me red packets with 4-D numbers inside for $2.

Local Chinese Opera

“I know if Pavarotti comes, we can pay $200 for one ticket because he is cool. But for local traditional opera, we have to give tickets away and plead for people to come. If that continues, we are going to kill our own culture.”…..Chen Soo Sen, MP for Joo Chiat, speaking at the budget debate in parliament.

Mr Chen was saying that the Singapore brand is good but is not cool. So in order to make people pay good money to see good performances of the local variety, we have to develop a cool Singapore image.

Well, how to make Chinese opera cool? Change? Reinvent? Chinese opera in English? I have no answer.

For Chinese opera, local artistes can tell you it is a difficult job putting up an opera show and trying to push ticket sale. Promoting Chinese opera is thankless and relentless work.

Some Chinese opera fans are not supportive of local performances, even good ones. They say foreign troupes are better. Quite true. But local groups also have good artistes and good shows, even full-length operas. And even if they are not as good as foreign artistes, I feel that many local shows are still worth watching and supporting.

Local artistes are generally dedicated to their arts and enthusiastic about their performance. I watched an excerpt at a cc last month. The hua dan was so immersed in her role. Her singing was not very good but her movements were elegant and her enthusiasm was palpable. It was like perfume, its vapour spreading to the audience. You could see that the audience enjoyed the show… and the artiste enjoyed performing.

Housewives

Housewives are not low-wage workers, they are the core pillars of the family. They deserved a lot more appreciation….said Mr Lim Swee Say, NTUC chief.

I agree with that. Children should show more appreciation to their mothers and husbands to their wives.

Not just on mother’s day or just buy them presents and bring them out to expensive meals. Show them more care, consideration and concern.

Similarly I feel we should also not take our friends, even close ones, for granted. For example, we still have to say words like ‘thank you’ or to mind their sensitivities.


重按霓裳花絮 video

Jubilee Theatre, 4 March 2006

This is Ng Lai Si, 吳麗詩. I would give her the best performer of the night award. She gave a stirring performance of Lu Bu, 呂布.

盧少玲

陳淑華

I have no chance to take the photos of other artistes and some of the photos are quite blur. So just 3 pictures.

Car expenditure

Just paid my car insurance ($509) and 6 months road tax ($475) and also did a servicing ($170). The total came up to whopping $1154. So I did a simple ‘car budget’. Replacement of items, repairs, fines and inspection fees are not included. These are difficult to estimate.

Item	Cost
petrol	$1560
season parking	$764
outside parking	$480
insurance	$509
road tax	$950
servicing	$510
Total	$4773

See, average a hefty $398/month.

Petrol, the major item, could be considered transport expenditure as this money will be used for transport if I don’t have a car. One fixed big-money item is road tax. It is independent of usage, no difference if you drive 100km or 10 km daily.

Any ‘less road tax more usage tax’ would be good news to people like me..

Hopefully there will be rebates on road tax and season parking in future government budgets. Also hope oil prices will drop.

戰場 Battle scene

In Chinese opera a battle scene generally consists of several fighting scenes. This can be quite long. In such case there will a great display of acrobatic and gymnastic skills as well as some stunts and difficult operatic moves. A fighting scene usually ends with the warrior executing a few moves and then together with the soldiers, they strike a pose. The pose only lasts for about 5 sec. The audience will clap to show their appreciation.

This clip shows a general leading his men to battle. A short fighting scene follows. The warrior does a somersault followed by a ‘spread-legs’ jump and then another jump with a full-circle twist and finally they all strike a pose.

The actors with flags stuck in their back are warriors. The lad in green is the stable-boy. He leads the horse to the leader. The warrior in the foreground is Leong Siu Meng.

a somersault.....

.....a 'spread-legs' jump.....

Reminiscences - school subjects

I think you seldom hear people praise maths.

Maths is a lovely subject.

It was my favourite subject in school.

In pre-u the maths was more interesting. I enjoyed drawing graphs with beautiful curves from trigonometric equations (the types with sin x, cos x…..). I also liked to solve problems in applied maths (things like calculating velocities and resolving forces). And I find calculus, a important branch of pure maths, fascinating too.

As for the subjects I disliked …..

In lower sec it was History, in upper sec it was Literature (didn’t take History) and in pre-u it was Chemistry, especially Organic Chemistry.

These subjects have something in common – they require you to memorize a lot of facts.

What about English?

I treated it as an important subject. I put in good effort but there was little love or enthusiasm. My view is that if you write simple sentences with few grammatical errors you will get a credit. I got interested in English only when I was in sec 4.

Here is a funny ad video for China Mobile:

中國移動通信 China Mobile "溝通100 - 阿姨"

Self-motivation

Nowadays in schools there are maths camp, maths exhibition, maths treasure hunt (where you have to do some calculations, deduction or induction with the clues you get) and innovative maths teaching. These games and innovation could arouse pupils’ interest in maths, but to sustain their interest is not so easy. After the fun part the major part is still practice and solving problems.

When I was in school there were none of these things. Yet I was very interested in Mathematics. This interest was self-motivated; nothing to do with the teaching methods or whether the maths teachers were good or not good, handsome or not handsome.

You see a chinese opera actress gliding in small quick steps across the stage and flipping her sleeves effortlessly. Just some simple moves and just a few lines. But the movements are all very graceful and the singing beautiful.

As the chinese saying goes “on stage 3 minutes, off stage 10 years hard effort”. It takes passion, perseverance and discipline; otherwise she would not have succeeded. Others would have given up after a few months.

For local chinese opera artistes, I think it is also self-motivated interest. Besides all the qualities I mentioned above, they also need determination and a lot positive thinking because there will be frustrations, setbacks and disappointments along the way.

Here is a rousing music by the 6 Roses to cheer you up:

賽馬 Horse racing

Opera @ CTC Chinese Opera Teahouse

Found these two short videos. I think it is an excerpt about General Di Qing trying to get the princess drunk. The sheng is Frances Wong and the dan is Joanna Seetoh.

CO video channels

Hello, cantonese opera fans,

If you like 龍劍笙, 梅雪詩, 任劍輝, 白雪仙 you can visit Melaniemlcheung's channel. Most of her opera videos are on these 4 artistes and some artistes in the 60s like 林家聲.
http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=melaniemlcheung

There are also many cantonese opera videos at Tudou. Just do a search for 粵劇. Three users have uploaded quite a number of cantonese opera videos, one of the channels is dedicated to
龍劍笙, 梅雪詩.

Unfriendly acts

I was thinking of writing about our neighbours’ unreasonable accusations and unfriendly acts like using sand to put pressure on us or blaming us for their floods. But this would require searching for facts, looking through the back news….better leave it to the journalists.

I don’t believe in trying to please or appease another country. Cooperate with them, help them if possible such as when they have disasters like floods and earthquakes but don’t expect any favour or even gratitude. Just help like you would help anyone in difficulties.

I think some politicians don’t believe in a win-win deal. As long as the other side loses they don’t mind even if they lose more.

Puzzled?

My friend Victor made this comment in one of the posts:

Frannxis, what's the "If I support Empty Paras" thing doing in your post?

I was quite puzzled and didn't know what he was referring to until I visited my blog in a friend's computer today. Then I saw this 'if !supportEmptyParas' or something like that after almost every paragraph. My computer does not have this problem.

I don't know how it came about.

So, friends, if that comes up in your screen just ignore it.

财神到

http://flash.sunvv.com/sunvv.swf?id=2046&swfurl=2046.swf

Capitalist head, Socialist heart

This headline in the papers made me recall my GP (General Paper) lessons at Pre-U. Occasionally, we discussed about things like communism and democracy. I think most of us students had only superficial knowledge of these. America was capitalism, China was communism and Singapore, democratic socialism.

I remember writing an essay, something about Nationalism. My scanty knowledge of nationalism was from a few articles I read in newspapers and magazines. But I wrote as if I knew a lot. Come to think of it, I was really a toad in a well.

But one thing, even in those days I was aware that race, religion and language are sensitive topics. Later I also understand why Malay is our National Language. I studied some Malay out of necessity but have forgotten more than 90% already because of un-use.

Last year, a newspaper in Denmark published some cartoons on Prophet Mohammad. There were protests by Muslims in many countries. I read some blog comments. A few Singaporeans have this view - After 40 years of independence, we are more mature now, so we can discuss racial and religious issues rationally. We should be allowed to debate them freely.

I find it hard to agree with this view.

Another news item – A brief ceremony to remember victims of the Japanese Occupation - peace is precious. (Singapore fell to the Japanese in 15 February 1942.) Peace and independence are linked to defense.

Some people feel that Asean countries are friendly and we have no imminent danger of being attacked, so Singapore does not need to maintain a strong armed force or to spend so much on defense.

This is another view I don’t agree with.

These two things (policies on religion and defense) you cannot try out first and if something unpleasant happens, then revert to original position.

New.....

A journalist wrote in a commentary that the ban on the sale of sand might not be a bad thing altogether. Who knows, we could come up with new sand just as we produced new water.

We also got new land – reclaimed land.

Exciting news – Singapore gearing up for a population of 6.5 millions in 20 years. Plans for housing, recreation and transport will be drawn up. Since we do not produce enough babies, I suppose the majority of the new people will come from other countries. They become our ‘new citizens’.

Foreign students

Foreign students did well in the O-level. This is not surprising. They have been in our schools for a long time and generally they are very serious in their studies.

Around the mid 90s, there was already quite a strong presence of foreign students in a few secondary schools I knew of. Many of these students were from China and Indonesia, some from Malaysia, Thailand and HK and a few from Taiwan and Cambodia.

Many entered the school direct into sec 1 or 2 (not through PSLE) but they had to take an entrance exams conducted by the school. It usually consisted of an English paper, a maths paper and maybe a science paper. They paid full-rate school fees and I think they had to donate a sum to the school if admitted.

The China students were generally weak in English but good in Mathematics. But usually many managed to get a comfortable credit in English after 3 or 4 years with sheer determination and perseverance. But there were also a few who had to be retained or transferred to another stream because they failed English.

Naturally Singapore parents are worried that foreign students would compete with their children not only in schools but also compete for places in institutions of higher learning, for scholarships and later for jobs.

How to describe......

In today’s papers there was a report about HDTV (high-definition tv). Someone said ‘it is very hard to describe how good a picture looks’. He was referring to the image of HDTV which is more realistic and very much sharper. Those who have used it will not want to switch back to their regular tv. (I don’t have a HDTV set, so I don’t know how good the picture is.)

I remember reading this in a book - A person who has never eaten a mango will not know how a mango tastes like no matter how good your description is. You tell him it is sweet. “Sweet, I know…” this person may think he knows the taste of mangoes already.

But the sweetness of a mango is not the same as the sweetness of an orange or of any other fruit. There are as many types of sweetness as there as many types of fruits.

What about feelings?

I often hear this phrase in HK drama serials when a person tries to console another person – ‘I understand how you feel’.

She is sad or angry but you won’t know the exact feeling or the degree of sadness. Even if you have a similar experience, due to the difference in character your feeling is not quite the same.

Does a man know the feeling or pain in giving birth? He thinks he understands the feeling or he can imagine the pain but will he ever know.

There are things we think we understand or know but actually we do not.

By the same reasoning, we may not understand our friends, so it is better to be more tolerant and not to judge too quickly.

Thank you for reading this wuliao ramblings.

A different mindset

During childhood, occasionally my father took my sister and me to dinner with two of his good friends. Sometimes they also brought their kids along. After the meal, the three men would quickly fish out their wallets or money and offered to pay the bill.

(In those days a lot of people, especially blue-collar workers, did not carry wallets because apart from the IC, most of them had no other cards. So they just put the money in their pockets.)

No, they were not rich, or pretending or trying to show off. It was their mindset. To them, it showed that they were financially okay and others in the restaurant would also not ‘look down’ on them. Not doing so could make their friends think that they were in some financial difficulties. The offer-to-pay was good enough, not necessary must pay. Looking at it from another angle, it could be that they did not want to lose face.

I believe, subtly they took turns to pay. Because they knew the others also thought the same way. But as I said everyone would still do the offer-to-pay part and if he happened to nearest to the waitress and the waitress collected his money, never mind also. This is not the same as pretending. Pretending means you have no intention to pay.

At that time I also did not understand.

I don’t think people think this way now. But, I think it is a good thing to be able to give others a treat.

Politics

Let us distract our people from the problems we created.
Our disposed PM met their DPM, let us cook up some story.

Got floods in our country.
Because they reclaim land.

They are going to build the IRs.
Don’t sell them sand.

If we were a poor country or if our racial mix is more even, (say 45% Chinese, 40% Malay, 15% Indians & Others) I think our neighbours, particularly the two nearest, would not target us that frequently and the animosities not that strong.

I believe one reason is envy. They are envious of our good fortune. Not just our economic growth but other things like stability. I remember someone said ‘It is not what we do, it is what we are that matters’. I think even if we try to please or appease them, it doesn’t help much. Unless we don’t progress…..