Khaw Boon Wan: So what if you have a degree?

Posted on May 5, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘University degree ‘not vital for success’:Khaw Boon Wan’, 5 May 2013, article by Toh Yong Chuan, Sunday Times

Singaporeans do not need to be university graduates to be successful, said National Development Minister Khaw Boon Wan yesterday.

What is more important is that they get good jobs after leaving school, Mr Khaw told some 160 students and young adults in an Our Singapore Conversation dialogue.

“If they cannot find jobs, what is the point? You own a degree, but so what? That you can’t eat it. If that cannot give you a good life, a good job, it is meaningless,” he added.

Mr Khaw was responding to a participant who said the Government should set aside more university places for Institute of Technical Education (ITE) and polytechnic graduates.

Said Mr Khaw: “Can you have a whole country where 100 per cent are graduates? I am not so sure.

“What you do not want is to create huge graduate unemployment.”

I’m not sure what our Minister meant by ‘you can’t EAT it’. Did he mean you can’t physically eat a degree? Or is ‘eat it’ his way of saying ‘can’t endure suffering’ in the ‘bite the bullet’ sense? In any case, Khaw himself graduated from Australia under the Colombo Plan Scholarship as a Bachelor of Engineering with Honours Class I. In 2002, he was awarded a Doctor of Engineering honoris causa, which makes him DR KHAW according to the University of Newcastle website, though his Cabinet Profile retains the ‘Mr’.

The Minister’s daughter, Khaw Chun Ting, has apparently caught the engineering bug from her father, herself an Engine graduate from the Class of 2010.  Daddy looks as proud as any father would in his position in the picture below, and it’s not clear if he had the notion in his head then that a university degree is ‘no big deal, really’. I’m sure if Chun Ting wanted to skip uni altogether and join an NGO to save endangered turtles from extinction, Daddy would understand perfectly. (Chun Ting has a Facebook profile that you’re free to Google, where you can tell she likes performing on stage, has worked for ST Electronics and ‘Likes’ the PAP Facebook page. Obviously.)

It’s a given that extraordinary success stories have come out of individuals without stellar academic qualifications, but it’s tempting to ask a graduate Minister with a graduate daughter if he would have been OK with any of his daughters opting for a polytechnic education instead, or as his boss would call it, the JEWEL of Singapore’s educational system. It’s like asking Minister of Defence if he would send his sons to war, or the Minister of Education if he sends his kids for holiday tuition.

There seems to be a recent surge of calls for Singaporeans to be less obsessed with the paper chase and settle for jobs like hawkers or crane operators, by leaders who are the very products of the said paper chase no less. In contrast, we were all told in the mid sixties that a University education ‘will pay rich dividends’, the only place of learning which can produce not only ‘specialists, but also well rounded, cultivated men and women of learning…with analytical powers and WISDOM..who can be FUTURE LEADERS’. An article in 1966 ends with the following smarty-pants prediction:

Despite fears about their monetary value, a degree in time may well be regarded as the ONLY academic qualification for most jobs.

Then there’s the other problem about marriage and birth rates. Singaporean women, particularly graduates, have been found to prefer men with ‘higher qualifications’. The lack of a degree but a decent job may earn you ‘a good life’, but getting a ‘good wife’, or ANY wife, is another matter altogether if you’re not of a certain ‘calibre’. It’s an ugly truth that we all have to deal with every single day. I’d love to see the look on the Minister’s face when he finds out that his future son-in-law turns out to be a highly paid crane operator. Still, if you happen to be interested to know any of Khaw’s lovely daughters but do not hold a degree, I recommend that you save the article above and print for safekeeping, so that when the time comes to meet the parents and Khaw interrogates your educational qualifications or lack thereof, you’d know EXACTLY how to defend yourself.

I guess this guy’s face from the Sunday Times photoshoot of the Conversation event says it all. THIS FACE. My sentiments exactly.

About these ads

Filed under: 2013, Kids, Politicians | Tagged: , , , | 1 Comment »

Polytechnics a Jewel in Singapore’s educational system

Posted on May 3, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘PM Lee: Polytechnics a jewel in Singapore’s educational system’, 3 May 2013, article by Robin Chan, ST

Getting a degree is not the only option for polytechnic students after they graduate, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Working for a few years or even starting their own business can offer important life lessons and help them go further in life, he said today as Ngee Ann Polytechnic celebrated its 50th anniversary.

“You will gain experience and understand yourself better and then be better able to decide what the next step will be. These life lessons will complement your polytechnic education and help you to go further in life,” he said.

Mr Lee praised the polytechnic education system calling it “a jewel in our educational system” that offers a first rate tertiary education to about 50 per cent of each cohort of students.

In 2008, it was reported that many bright students who could have qualified for JC opted for a poly education instead, which may explain our PM’s use of the jewel analogy to describe students who could SHINE bright as a diamond in a poly environment. Yet despite such lofty praises, our Government itself remains conspicuous by its absence of poly grads.  While the Workers’ Party have Singapore Poly grads in Png Eng Huat and Muhamed Faisal, Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC MP Charles Chong, who holds a Diploma in Aircraft Maintenance Engineering from the Sydney Technical College, was the only non-uni grad PAP MP in Parliament as of 2008. The lack of ‘jewels’ in Cabinet explains all the lacklustre policies, then. Some portfolios, like Housing for example, are probably better off managed by Bob the Builder than someone of university calibre but can’t construct a basic Lego house without an instruction manual.

The poly route was not always held in such high esteem. In 1984, the Educational Ministry were worried about the BRAIN DRAIN caused by smart students choosing to go poly instead of JC, mainly due to their fear of the General Paper. Minister of State (Education) Tay Eng Soon said that these students should ‘make the most of themselves‘ by choosing pre-U instead of getting a polytechnic diploma, short of saying that it would be WASTE that top scorers didn’t pursue their education in a more ‘prestigious’ institution. Which had several students actually changing their minds about a poly education thanks to Tay’s sage advice. A year later, our then Education Minister and current President Tony Tan ‘urged top O level students to go to junior colleges first’. A paragraph in the article ‘Top grads at NTI took indirect path’ deserves to be reproduced in its hideous entirety:

It (the government) wants BRIGHT O level students to join junior colleges, where they will get a BROAD-BASED education, and not deprive LESS ABLE pupils of a place in the polytechnics.

I suppose we all know who the shining star of the educational system was back then. But wait, in less than 2 years, we would see the same Minister Tay do an astounding about-face upon realising that there was a shortage of students doing mechanical engineering in the polytechnics, expressing concern of the ‘large number who have joined JCs’ and thinks ‘it may be better’ for the WEAKER students to do poly instead. All the university and post-doc education in the world will not save you from making atrocious flip-floppy decisions and sabotaging the careers of budding poly luminaries who went on to waste their lives with GP instead. A blind, amputee clown could do a better balancing act with a unicycle on a fiery tightrope than the highest paid of ministers.

So perceptions of poly have changed for the better. Or have they? Up till now, poly students still do not enjoy the same travel concessions as their JC peers, which was explained away by Transport Minister Raymond Lim in 2009 that ‘some polytechnic students are better off than others’ (and latter clarified by the minister’s press secretary that he meant poly students were a ‘large and diverse’ group, which explains NOTHING). His successor Lui Tuck Yew continued to defend depriving poly students of concessions, saying that fare subsidies would cost transport operators $28 MILLION more. In March this year, chairman of the Fare Review Mechanism Committee Richard Magnus stated in a blog post that ‘polytechnic students AND the disabled are being considered for improved concessions’. Where’s the segment of the President’s Star Charity that donates to neglected poly students then? Full fares AND frequent breakdowns. Oh the humanity.

Calling poly the jewel of the educational system, though well-intentioned, may very well be as patronising and almost apologetic as calling the child who’s not tall enough to take a rollercoaster ‘a growing, striking lad’. Let’s hope no one up there scrambles to keep university places filled while our most inventive minds pursue the Jewel path like what happened decades ago (though they probably have foreigners to make up for this ‘reverse osmosis’ already). Perhaps one shouldn’t take PM’s analogies seriously. After all, he’s somewhat the consummate joker and called some waterway in the North East of Singapore the VENICE OF PUNGGOL. Like a jewel, his wit and timing is totally PRICELESS.

Filed under: 1980s, 2013, Kids, Politicians | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

14 year old student throwing cat down 10 storeys

Posted on May 1, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Cat thrown down 10 storeys; suspect is a teen’, 1 May 2013, article by David Ee, ST

A cat survived a 10-storey fall from a Nee Soon Housing Board block on Sunday. The animal is currently in a stable condition at Mount Pleasant Animal Hospital, but may have to undergo surgery for a fractured front paw, said the Cat Welfare Society (CWS) which is monitoring the case. The Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority said it is investigating the case. The Straits Times understands that the suspected culprit is a 14-year-old student studying in the area.

This is the first publicised case of animal abuse since the National Development Ministry accepted an expert panel’s recommendations to strengthen animal welfare last Friday. Among the recommendations are harsher penalties where convicted animal abusers face a fine of up to $50,000 and/or a three-year jail term.

…Cases of cruelty to animals have risen in recent years, with a total of 1,426 reported cases in 2011, up from 1,162 in 2007.

A study conducted on cats thrown off buildings in New York suggests that cats flung from higher than 7 storeys had less injuries than those than fell from lower floors. Although this ‘miracle’ that has attributed to the 9 lives myth is due to the feline having more time to perform its ‘righting reflex’, what’s more disturbing is that tossing cats out of buildings is common enough for scientists to generate sufficient data to study this phenomenon.  In 2011, a British cat plummeted more than 12 storeys after being thrown by ‘yobs’, suffering nothing but a broken tooth. She was henceforth named ‘Everest’. In Singapore, a cat that survives a 10-storey plunge will probably be named ‘Lucky’, just like 80% of all cats, dogs and hamsters reared as pets in Singapore.

Last year, a $1K reward was put up to find the person responsible for throwing and killing Cheeky, a black and white cat in Ang Mo Kio. This was later raised to $6k by an anonymous donor. Yet, in most cases of animal abuse, the killer usually goes scot-free, with or without a bounty on his head. Behead a cat, or toss an entire box of kittens down your flat and you have a good chance of escaping jail-time unless you’re dumb enough to record your stunt on your mobile phone. Spray paint ‘Democracy’ on a war memorial, on the other hand, and the police will run extensive investigations day and night to haul your vandal ass into court within 3 days, that even without anyone paying you a single cent for clues.

Why the lack or urgency in catching animal abusers then. Isn’t mutilating an animal a more ‘deplorable’ act than defacing a wall? Do we need to have a bounty hunter system just to entice people into bringing perpetrators of such gruesome crimes to justice? But the real question here that no one can answer is WHY is this even HAPPENING. A booming economy and a prosperous nation without wisdom, humanity or compassion, and having to create the illusion of that so-called humanity through ‘the arts’ and severe penalties, is a failed society, one driven by the basest of impulses, whereby an educated adolescent may excel academically but is nothing but a heartless wretch inside. No, it’s not just a kid with a sick agenda and very itchy fingers that needs help. It’s all of US.

Community work or probation may not be the ideal punishment here. This kid could still fantasise about running kittens through a paper shredder. Cruelty against animals calls for brutal conditioning. Strap the bugger down and have a bunch of vengeful cats use his legs as a scratching post, to an endless loop of copulation induced meowing for 48 hours. Rest assured he won’t be going anywhere near a cat, not even an adorable video of Lil Bub, without first foaming at the mouth.

Filed under: 2013, Animal abuse, Justice system/Lawsuits, Kids, Violence | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

Kids clapping between movements in Esplanade concert

Posted on April 15, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Children need better guidance in arts appreciation’, 15 April 2013, Voices, Today

(Liu Yiru): I watched a wonderful performance at the Esplanade last Friday evening by the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA) Orchestra and Chorus, in celebration of NAFA’s 75th anniversary. Among the audience were distinguished composers, NAFA alumni, as well as guest performers from London’s Royal College of Music.

Also in the audience was a class of Primary 3 or 4 students accompanied by two teachers. I must commend the school and teachers for exposing their students to classical music and cultivating their interest at such a young age.

However, I believe many in the audience were, like me, shocked when the students clapped between rests that marked an end to significant sections in the fourth movement. It is recognised and accepted that the audience applauds only at the end of a piece and not at the end of every movement or worse, whenever they supposed the piece “seemed to end”.

What does this say about the’ teachers? Do the teachers have an understanding of concert etiquette? Do teachers have musical background or basic musical knowledge to guide their students’ appreciation for music in the right direction? Were there enough teachers to handle the number of students? This incident shows that our teachers’ competence in developing and educating Singapore’s future in the arts has much room for improvement.

If in doubt, always take the cue from others when you’re a concert novice. Untimely clapping can earn you dirty looks as much as sitting cross-legged with your shoes off. These kids were just being polite even though they’re likely to be bored stiff, and you’d be sending conflicting instructions if you told them that there are only certain points in a performance when they’re ‘allowed’ to clap, a mentally strenuous task that gets in the way of one’s enjoyment of the classics. It’s like I’m not allowed to use my hands to tuck into the pincer of chilli crab, and can only do so for the purpose of dipping the buns into the gravy.

I doubt the teachers themselves were aware of such a custom, and most people, myself included, would shift nervously in their seat if any performance appears to end and there would be this nagging, awkward pause or the nervous, muffled cough before hesitant applause. As a consolation, even President Obama himself once joked about the No Applause rule, which itself deserves a topic in musicology and seems to have its origins in cranky maestros and composers who abhorred over-clappers and didn’t care about the fact that their salaries were paid for by their audience. Such restrictions were in place even in the 70′s, when intrusive applause ‘disrupts the pattern’ of the programme and found to be ‘very irritating and distracting’, making otherwise harmless applause sound as disruptive as blowing a trumpet into a surgeon’s face while he’s performing emergency heart bypass surgery.

I’ve never attended an SSO concert, but only because I have no idea where to get a monocle, a shiny cane and can’t clap my hands in the dainty manner or timing befitting of concert etiquette.  I’d have to restrain myself from expressing my joy if I were to find a piece so haunting it moves me to tears, that if I couldn’t bear it and had to give a standing ovation clapping my hands sore and weeping my grateful heart out, my outburst of spontaneity would be rewarded with the harsh shushing and tsk-ing from a couple of concert snobs like some menopausal librarians shutting a genius up when he’s having his ‘Eureka’ moment. If I’m really unlucky, the conductor, furious that my clapping cramped his style, would grab the nearest cymbal and try to decapitate me by throwing it in my direction like a frisbee.

According to the SCO website, it is ‘best not to clap’ between movements of a larger composition, but it’s perfectly acceptable, maybe even recommended, to blare ‘Bravo’ and ‘Encore’ as loud as a soccer hooligan when it’s finally completed. No, you can’t wolf-whistle or yell ‘Awesome!’ too. At least the kids didn’t break out into a spell of ‘annoying, distracting’ coughing for a full 80 mins of SSO concert, or play with their mobile phones, munch crackers or giggle among themselves. Clapping between movements has its supporters who deem it a necessary, reverent inconvenience as there are those who dismiss it as fatuous snobbery. If I were in a band I’d imagine playing to a bunch of disadvantaged orphans or handicapped kids to be a more fulfilling experience even if they clapped every 5 minutes, than to some snooty folks who know everything about my music and etiquette, but might as well be ‘enjoying’ themselves with a mp3 recording of my music in the privacy of a cemetery.

Filed under: 2000s, 2013, Art, Concerts, Kids, Music/music videos, Noise, Teachers | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Satanic soldier having sex with 11 year old cousin

Posted on March 12, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Soldier jailed for sex with two minors; told one minor that he was a Satanist’, 12 March 2013, article by Elena Chong, ST.

A 21-year-old army regular was jailed for 20 months on Tuesday for having sex with two minors. Neither the accused nor the two girls, then aged 15 and 11, can be named as there is a gag order. A district court heard that he was initially given a 12-month conditional warning for having sex with his girlfriend, aged 15, at his home in November 2008. He was then 17. The girl, now 19, became pregnant and underwent an abortion.

He breached the condition of the warning to remain crime-free for the next 12 months by committing similar offences. This time, he preyed on his 11-year-old cousin. Claiming that he was a “Satanist”, he told her in October 2009 that since she was the first person to touch him, she must have sex with him or else “Satan” would “come after her”.

The girl became disturbed and later on, began to believe him as she started seeing “figures” in her bedroom. She was often scolded by her mother and she attributed the incidents of “bad luck” to the fact that she did not have sex with the accused.

Satanism is one way to use alleged powers of the occult to frighten gullible girls into sex, but the Horned One and the blood rituals committed in his honour have gone out of fashion in recent decades, which makes the victim’s fear of the Prince of Darkness rather surprising. Telling a kid horrific stories about Satan these days is as good as wriggling your fingers in a creepy fashion and summoning the Boogeyman. Parents no longer use scare tactics to send children to bed or ‘be good..or else’, when sometimes the threat of imaginary monsters may be more effective than a stern wagging finger and ‘rationalising’ with a brat who refuses to let go of your iPad.

There seems to be a trend of boys taking liberties with evil deities to deceive innocent girls. A certain ‘John’ fell into a trance in order to make girls succumb as he channeled Yan Luo Wang, the Chinese God of Hell back in 2011. Just earlier this month, Simon Wong Choy Chuan pretended to be possessed by ghosts whilst chanting and speaking in a different voice, calling himself ‘Gasura’, which sounds more like Godzilla’s bumbling arch nemesis than an embodiment of pure evil. For his theatrics he got 5 girls to submit to him, his hisses, fits and sputters probably more convincing than any of the professional actors on Channel 5′s Incredible Tales. But even blessed angels and saints aren’t spared from lecherous pretenders. You have fake monks ripping you off your ‘donations’ and priests touching boys where they shouldn’t be touching. If drawing inspiration from the pits of hell doesn’t work, there’s always the other side of the ‘supernatural’ to turn to.

The ‘medium con’ was first brought into public awareness by the shocking trial of serial rapist-killer Adrian Lim, who was an ‘ardent believer of the goddess Kali’. In 1983, he related to the courts how he SOMERSAULTED and rolled to the front of an altar, mimicking the ‘voice of an old man’. But it’s not just playing a vessel for spirit possession that makes people piss their pants. Conversely, you may trick someone into sex by convincing her that she herself is the one who needs a special brand of ‘exorcism’, taking ‘sexual healing’ to gruesome extremes. Lying alone is useless without a little persuasion, authority, plenty of charisma, and perhaps some gravity defying acrobatics for authenticity. You also have to choose your avatar wisely. It would be embarrassing to channel Hades, mythic Ruler of the Underworld and get a blank stare instead of reluctant undressing.

As customary as it is to symphatise with any victim of such a ruse, you’d have to wonder what good a little common sense and skepticism could do to save a child, or even an ADULT for that matter, from trouble. We teach our kids how to solve complex Maths problems but fail in our duty to protect them from malicious superstition or predators. Even if you’re the sort to be fooled by eyeball rolling and scary gibberish, at least ask yourself what our army is doing letting these wild, incestuous Satanists serve the country, what with their blood rite nonsense and heavy metal music and all. Let’s see what the Dark Lord has in store in return for this follower desecrating a nubile and blood relative like a good Satanist should. A hot tub in hell would be well deserved.

Filed under: 1980s, 2013, Army, Justice system/Lawsuits, Kids, Religion, Sex, Superstitions, Violence | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

My First Skool’s spelling is cruel and nonsensical

Posted on March 11, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Teach kids proper spelling from young’, 11 March 2013, ST Forum

(Estella Young):…A renewed interest in proper English might push pre-schools and childcare centres with misspelled names to reconsider their policy. Names like “Twinkle Kidz Kindergarten”, “Kidz Playhouz”, “Jenius Kindergarten” and NTUC’s “My First Skool” are not modern or cute. They are an eyesore.

Reifying common spelling errors only imposes an adult’s definition of creativity upon a young child already struggling to learn the basic rules of his world – ranging from social behaviour to grammar to mathematics.

Teaching him that his school’s name must be spelled “skool” is as cruel and nonsensical as telling him that red is blue, or that one plus one is four. Such a child would have a nasty shock when he enters primary school and discovers quickly that correct spelling does matter.

In 2009, NTUC childcare rebranded itself as ‘My First Skool’, explaining the deliberate typo as reflective of its philosophy of ‘encouraging children to be creative’ and ‘not penalising them when they make spelling mistakes’. That’s over-explaining it. I think it’s just simple marketing in an attempt to make pre-school sound, well, ‘kewl’. Critics bash the Skool for confusing small children and setting a bad example, but this ‘skool’ trend was started way back in 1994, by another brand known as ‘The Little Skool-house’. Well that explains our generation’s horrible shorthand spelling on Whatsapp and Facebook then; It’s because our educators told us it’s OK to spell something the way it sounds, u know, like dis. Wadever.

Purists argue that distinguishing variations in spelling to deliver tone or ‘style’ wouldn’t work for kids, who need to develop the fundamentals in the language before they start listening to rap music and get traumatised when they find out that ‘dog’ can be spelt ‘dawg’. Some work, while others, like the writer complained, are indeed an eyesore. ‘Kidz’, for example, has a zany exuberance to it, and is the ‘fun’ plural you’ll find on children’s TV, camps or breakfast cereal. ‘Playhouz’, on the other hand, sounds like Nazi kindergarten where they serve booze instead of milk and cookies, while ‘Jenius’ is the kind of slangy abomination that bimbos type on their status updates, as in: ‘Einstine is such a Jenius!’ I guess the people at Jenius have good reason could deny that they mis-spelled ‘Genius’ on purpose. I mean, who would have the ballz to give themselves that sort of pressure? J is also not a ‘hipper’ G. Joat, Jorilla, Jirlz all look jod-awful.

People who frown on ‘skool’ are also likely to take offence at neologisms like ‘skratch’, ‘rox’, ‘luv/lurve’, ‘teenie-weenie’, ‘midnite’ and argue over ‘hurray’ and ‘hooray’, yet are unable to account for the numerous ‘errors’ that abound in the same literature text that they hug to sleep with. Even if one did drill into kids that Skool should be ‘sCHool’, they will have to find out the hard way that the ‘CH’ sound is different in ‘chair’ vs ‘choir’ vs ‘chaise lounge longue’. English itself is exasperating in its usage, as explained in a 2009 piece by ST’s Janadas Devan, who revealed that the old ‘school’ used to be spelt as ‘scole, skule, skoole, skoll, scolle, scoile, scwle, schoule and scool’. Skoole, in particular, sounds like a nursery for pirates. If there’s anything that’s ‘cruel and nonsensical’, it’s not just the people at First Skool screwing up the language and hence the way we spell for the rest of our lives, but the creators and contributors to a confusing universal language themselves. Blast you, ye ole swill-sippin’ dandy scallywags!

Besides, which kid would want to go to the grave sounding ‘My First SCHOOL’ anyway. It’s like celebrating puberty with ‘My First Period’.

Filed under: 2000s, 2013, It Should Have Been.., Kids, Singlish/Broken english | Tagged: , , , , | 3 Comments »

Literature a casualty of an economically driven testocracy

Posted on February 28, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Is the subject worth saving?’, 28 Feb 2013, ST Forum

(Warren Mark Liew, Dr): AS A literature educator, I am troubled by the huge drop in the number of students taking pure literature at the upper secondary level (“More subjects to choose from, so fewer take pure literature”; Tuesday).

Senior Minister of State for Education Indranee Rajah explained that this decrease was the result of more curricular choices being offered to students over the years, particularly in the form of combined humanities. Students taking combined humanities at the O levels study compulsory social studies, but have to choose one of three humanities subjects: literature, history or geography.

Given these statistics, one is left wondering: Did “more curricular choices” lead more students to choose history and geography over literature, or even to avoid combined humanities altogether? More than 10 years ago, media reports suggested that literature was becoming less popular because many perceived the subject to be difficult to score in. According to official data, however, the pass and distinction rates in literature have increased slightly over the last 10 years.

…Educational research suggests that our nation’s economic growth has depended in part on a tried-and-tested “testocracy” – a system of meritocracy based on high-stakes tests such as the Primary School Leaving Examination; the O, N and A levels; and increasingly, the Scholastic Assessment Test and the International Baccalaureate. If literature has, in fact, become a casualty of an economically driven testocracy, then the real test is to answer the question: Are the “returns on investment” for literature profitable enough for the MOE to promote it as a subject in the national curriculum?

Being a bookworm doesn’t guarantee a calling for English Literature, as I found out for myself the hard way, when mugging for the subject made me lose interest in reading other works by Shakespeare. Instead of being left in a pristine manner as all great classics ought to be, my copies of Julius Caesar and Merchant of Venice were vandalised with scribblings and yellow highlights. Unlike the rote ease of history and geography, literature requires the flexing of a different set of brain muscle, and if you’re selective in your readings just to score in the exams, you’ll find yourself not just failing to appreciate double entrendres or the subtleties of human conflict, but embarrass yourself in trivia quizzes where you’re forced to recall names of Shakespearean characters beyond Shylock, Hamlet and the proverbial lovefools Romeo and Juliet, and the only line you can recite from the entire collection is ‘To be or not to be…’.

Besides having a vested interest in promoting the subject, the writer also suggests that our being a ‘TESTOCRACY’ has something to do with the decline of Eng Lit, though Testocracy sounds like a system of chest-thumping government where the only way to ascend to the elite is getting pumped on steroids and there is a clear bias towards alpha-people with balls the size of young coconuts. I would hazard another guess as to why Literature no longer enthralls us like it used to: Kids just don’t READ any more. If they could find the time to squeeze in some books outside of Facebook and online gaming, it wouldn’t be based on material that would be adapted into plays, but blockbuster trilogies in 3-D with all the nourishing nuance replaced by explosive visuals . Hardcore literature isn’t for the faint-hearted nor those with the attention span of a gnat. It struggles to remain relevant in a fast-paced world saturated with social media, shorthand messaging and other flashy, addictive distractions that cry for your fleeting attention rather than an in-depth analysis of character. It’s like flower arrangement class for race-car drivers.

If you have kids reading Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings for an exam instead of A Tale of Two Cities, you’re likely to get high scorers, because students would willingly form communities to discuss JK and JRR’s works without being forced into project groups in class. You don’t see fanboys and girls gushing over King Lear, yet you can’t choose a subject that kids actually LIKE reading for fun. Yes, a literature text is meant to be ‘appreciated’ like one siphons insight off the Bible. A ‘breezy’, light-hearted romp would make literature class a bookworm club that dabbles in the exact opposite of literature: Pop fiction. It would make a stuffy title like Professor of Literature sound like Chief Librarian of the Teenagers section.

The standard argument for literature is that it’s the Chicken Soup of O Level subjects; good for the soul. Some advocate it for ‘inculcating moral values’ and ‘enriching’ us all with ‘independent thinking’ and ‘creativity’. In that sense, Eng Lit puts the ‘humanity’ in our ‘humanities’. History never teaches us anything objective and Geography teaches you what an isthmus is but not how flash floods occur. It is, however, impossible to prove that literature actually makes us better human beings or speakers/writers of the language as lovers of the subject like to claim. I would argue that having responsible parents, a benevolent religion, keeping up to date on world events, well-travelled, a volunteer, a general lover of non-fiction or philosophy or even joining the debating club would make you a ‘complete’ human being without the hassle of memorising what Brutus said before he slew Caesar for an exam (which you may even have trouble passing).

It’s not so much the pursuit of excellence that makes Literature unsexy but the runaway treadmill that is modern life. Literature should remain strictly for those who love it, like vintage cheese that smells sweet to a epicurean but like sweaty underpants to the novice. Many highly successful people have no shame declaring that they have never read a single novel in their life. So what good is the subject for in this age of the 140-character limit? To me, it’s knowing how to cheekily slide your way with semantics out of a mutilation (pound of flesh), impressing a date (a rose by any other name…) and being absolutely essential if you wish to pursue a career as a ‘hip-hop artist’ or a lyricist for a crossover New-age choir of Gregorian monks. It also comes in handy if you intend to craft either the most touching proposal letter to your fiance, or the most heartbreaking suicide note in history.

Filed under: 2000s, 2013, Kids | Tagged: , , | 1 Comment »

Married Men sacked for child abuse prank call

Posted on January 18, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Prank that got The Married Men in trouble involves mention of child abuse and molest’, 18 Jan 2013, article by Maria Almenoar.

The radio segment which led to the termination of The Married Men’s contract with HotFM 91.3 involved a telephone prank on a woman who was apparently going to take up an early childhood course. On Thursday, deejay Andre Hoeden called the woman claiming to be an officer from an embassy who was doing a background check on her.

He asked if she hit children, to which she said no. Mr Hoeden then advised her to only hit children from poor families as they would not have the money or time to come after her with lawyers, unlike “expat children” from “very rich” families who could afford lawyers.

The call, which was part of the morning show’s “Kena Pluck” humour segment where people are tricked, also involved Mr Hoeden telling her that hugging children was considered molestation in some countries. He then asked if she had ever hit on any of her pupil’s fathers.

Hot FM91.3 said on Friday it terminated the services of The Married Men with immediate effect, citing a breach of the terms of its contract.

Barely a month ago, the Married men team were interviewed regarding their reaction to the nurse who killed herself over the Royal couple prank. They acknowledged that Kena Pluck had ‘limits’ and screened their prank requests carefully, rejecting anything to do with ‘death, disease, race, religion and national security’. In a follow up ST article on 19 Jan 2013, it was revealed that a listener had called in to complain about the prank. There was also mention of how the victim could do ‘favours’ for two officers to get visa approval more quickly, which suggests that the target was a foreign worker. If the station had been more discerning in light of the Royal couple suicide, and also consider how quickly our authorities crack down on defamatory material of late (especially anything related to corruption), perhaps Rod Monteiro and gang would have been spared this harsh twist of fate. They aren’t the first to be fired over inappropriate jokes though; Sheikh Hailkel was sacked from 98.7 FM following complaints for talking about ‘white panties’.

Unlike the random innocent bystander in most prank calls, Kena Pluck, or should I say ‘Kena SABO’, marked specific targets requested by listeners, who would fill the DJs in with the relevant background checks to make the caller as deviously believable as possible. Now why would anyone put their loved ones through such unnecessary evil for the sake of a couple of minutes of rib-tickling Schadenfreude?  Kena Pluck appears to be more of a petty revenge platform for callers to get back at ex-bosses, ex-lovers or a bad service provider. It’s one thing to be embarrassed, another to be freaked out, bullied AND embarrassed on national radio. At the end of each segment, the Married Men would let the victim in on the joke, though anyone in that position would be obliged to play along and laugh it off even though they may secretly be cursing the station for wasting their time. I mean, at least give the poor fellow a cash prize for being a sport or something.

Army gags seem to be a favourite of the Married Men. In 2009, Andre Hoedon commanded a boy to perform push ups over the phone. You actually feel sorry for the little squirt, even as you snigger at ‘Sgt Rajah’s’ antics.

If you’re an old man with a heart condition, you better pray your son doesn’t ‘pluck’ you out of nowhere by landing himself in ‘jail’.

Not all gags go smoothly though. In this jealous husband prank, you actually WORRY for the Married Men’s lives. Instead of funny, this is rather uncomfortable to listen to, with the DJs betraying a hint of nervous laughter rather than the usual maniacal version. Eerily, the victim threatened the DJs about ‘keeping their jobs’. Thanks a lot, wife, for not telling the DJs your husband’s a PSYCHO who forgot to take his daily medication.

In 1994, Class 95 FM reportedly pulled one where a producer posed as a head nurse to inform a new father that he had been given the WRONG BABY (Wrong baby prank on radio show draws listeners’ complaints, 11 May 1994, ST). Not so classy, or funny – especially if you pose as a nurse from KK Hospital.

Phone pranks are notoriously hit-or-miss, and you can’t have a hit without being somewhat MEAN or politically incorrect. They should also be kept short and sweet to end the recipient’s misery early in order to avoid any backlash of emotional distress. The longer the prankster carries on with it, the deeper he gets engrossed into the role, when he gets carried away with the manipulation of his victim and takes things over the edge, which is what could have happened in this case. Or they could have just messed with the wrong person with the wrong theme at the wrong time.  Tough luck to the Married Men, especially Rod Monteiro who suffered an acute stroke in early 2012. I wonder if the unnamed ‘saboteur’ who started all this rubbing his hands in malicious glee, is now holding his head with those same hands in guilt and shame.

Filed under: 1990s, 2013, Kids, Local radio DJs, Sex, Violence | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

Foreign student, 13, arrested for MBS bomb threat

Posted on January 1, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Boy arrested over threat to blow up MBS’, 1 Jan 2013, article in CNA

Police have arrested a 13-year-old boy who threatened to plant bombs in Marina Bay Sands. The boy had posted the threat on his Facebook page last Saturday. The boy cannot be named as he is a minor.

Police said the case is classified as a Breach of Prohibition Against False Threats of Terrorist Acts. If convicted, he could be fined up to S$100,000 and jailed up to 5 years.

Police investigations are ongoing.

What a way to start the New Year. The name of the culprit was withheld, but it’s likely to be a certain ‘Aditya Bhatia’, an Indian studying in the Global Indian International School according to his Facebook page (1 Jan 2013, ST). This is his ominous Facebook threat in its full uncensored glory.

Singapore: A piece of piece of shit

God knows what Singapore or MBS has done to incur the wrath of a destructive 13 year old, though you can’t exactly discount this rant as ‘mischief’ either, considering how kids these days could pick up bomb-building tips easily from Youtube. Maybe he thought the building was so ugly it had to be demolished. I doubt the US or Canadian immigration would accept him now that he’s getting a criminal record for terrorist behaviour, but I’m sure some Taliban scouts are interested. Spitting everywhere is a surefire way of getting caught, but Aditya Bomberman’s probably too preoccupied with angry thoughts of exploding things or too young to know what DNA is. Incidentally, on the same day this piece of news was reported, a crude bomb was uncovered in Delhi near the home of one of the suspects who brutally gang-raped a woman on a bus. For all we know Aditya (also from New Delhi according to FB) may have already been a amateur bomb-maker back home when other boys are spinning  tops or playing jump rope with the girls. Kids.

In 2010, another student posted his pyromaniac fantasy of ‘bombing all the top schools in Singapore’.  ‘John’ also made a public request to ‘learn terroism’. Totally unacceptable. Everyone knows that the first rule of being a terrorist is being able to SPELL terrorism correctly.

Other kids just wish for Playstations, dude.

That same year, another teen posted a checklist of things that he ‘wants’ to do, like being a hired killer and bombing a secondary school and police station. Whatever happened to cooler stuff like hacking into government websites or getting a motorcycle licence? Both boys got arrested for their posts for merely ‘wishing’ to carry out violent activities, not to mention plot big, big revenge like Aditya here. Maybe these guys are all friends on FB, with their own page called ‘We Da Bomb!’ or something. Such bloody fantasies of annihilating everything in their path is not restricted to little menaces to society though; In 2011, an upset job candidate threatened to bomb Parliament, the police force and a prison, earning himself 9 months in the slammer. He didn’t even have the balls of a 13 year old to make the threat under his own name.

People do secretly want to inflict dramatic violence on others or public property occasionally, but where do the police draw the line? Would you get charged only if you mention the specific word ‘bomb’? What if instead of ‘planting bombs’ all over MBS, I mention something physically impossible like say, summon a series of lightning strikes to rip the Skypark off the top of MBS like Zeus, or cast an infernal zombie curse on its inhabitants? How do the authorities distinguish between a legitimate security threat and the black magic ravings of a lunatic? What if Aditya had said: ‘GONNA STEAL A RIFLE FROM ARMY CAMP AND SHOOT EVERYONE IN ORCHARD ROAD’? How serious should one view such a threat? Is the SAF going to ever sound the alarm and deploy troops to barricade every single armory in Singapore to prevent a 13 year old from going on a shooting spree? What is he, Magneto Jr?

 

Filed under: 2011, 2013, Casino/gambling, Foul language, Kids, Police officers, Public works, Violence | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

Double-barrelled surname sounding like CNY

Posted on December 30, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Bound together in name’, 30 Dec 2012, article by Lisabel Ting, Sunday Lifestyle

When freelance writer Yu-Mei Balasingamchow was in school, examinations were more of a nightmare for her than for most other students. “It was really troublesome to fill in my name on optical answer sheets. Sometimes, by the time I was done, it felt like half the exam had gone by,” says the 38-year-old.

Ms Balasingamchow’s unique last name is an amalgam of the names of her parents – Chow is her Chinese mother’ family name, and Balasingam is the name of her half-Chinese, half-Ceylonese father.

Her parents created it to “give people an idea of my heritage, although they did acknowledge that it would be troublesome”, she says.

…Double-barrelled surnames such as Ms Balasingamchow’s seem to be more acceptable now, and raise fewer eyebrows than in previous generations.

Mrs Wendy Chiang-Cheong, 40, who wed in 1998, recounts that her mother did not take similar steps to retain her family name as it was uncommon then.

…Mrs Chiang-Cheong, who is married to a 41-year-old IT project manager, admits that her last name can be quite a mouthful. “Some people have told me that my last name sounds very noisy and reminds them of Chinese New Year,” says the counsellor.

If you’re a member of British royalty in the 1930′s you could collect women surnames like Pokemon. There was an Earl of Buckinghamshire called John Hampden Hobart-Hampden-Mercer-Henderson, which made it much easier to just refer to him as the Earl of Buckinghamshire. Today if you want to sound like a conqueror you don’t need multiple surnames. You just need to give yourself a name like Romeo Tan. 

Having a double-barrelled surname that is onomatopoeia for cymbals clamging or almost a soundalike for a dim sum staple is awkward, but not as awful as the wacky permutations that Tweeters contributing to the hashtag #SurnameMashups have come up with. Here’s a sample of dual combinations of Chinese surnames that you may wish to avoid adopting or bequeathing to your children:

Hong-Gan, Chee-Tan, Long-Kang, Yam-Seng, Ngiam-Kheng, Seow-Leow. And the list goes on.

Some would use hyphenated/combined surnames to their advantage as a killer ice-breaker and personal marketing tool. Yu-Mei Balasingamchow herself mentioned in an interview that her surname made her more ‘Google-able’. Try it yourself (type Balasingamchow) and you’ll find her filling the entire first search page. And just about every page thereafter.

Even if, thankfully, your double-barrelled name doesn’t sound like food, drains, toasting or Hokkien expletives, there’s the question of order: Husband or wife’s surname first? This was a question posed since the early 1980s, when women were already using such combinations professionally. Without any formal convention on how hyphenated names should be arranged, you’d have people second guessing your actual maiden name.  Or perhaps the order is chosen solely to avoid the catastrophic reverse; Tan-Chee, for instance.

In fact, double-barrelled names were actively DISCOURAGED by the Registry of Births in 1981, when there was the possibility of quadruple surnames if two individuals with dual surnames married and had children. Things would get more complicated if you were of mixed race. If you took up your Caucasian husband’s name entirely, you may be accused of ‘selling out’ your Asian heritage. Yet, too much cross-fertilisation to the extent of triple and quadruple-barrells would make you sound like a theory discovered by a team of physicists or mathematicians rather than an actual person. And if pulled off creatively, that may not be a bad thing after all.

Filed under: 1930s, 2012, Kids, Marriage, Names, Parenting | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

Next Page »
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 170 other followers