STB ad wants you to ‘get lost lah’

Posted on March 10, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘New tourism ad tells Aussies to get lost’, 10 March 2012, article in insing.com

A new ad campaign by the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) has got some Singaporeans questioning whether it is offensive. The 30-second ad is part of a new campaign launched by the STB on 8 March to promote Singapore to Australia, and will be shown in Australian cities including Sydney, Melbourne and Perth.

Themed “Get Lost and Find the Real Singapore”, the ad depicts a number of Singaporeans showing off different aspects of Singapore and telling Australians to “Get Lost”. It begins with a Peranakan woman saying, “Hey you Aussie, you think Singapore’s got no tradition? Get lost.”

This is followed by two young women saying, “You think Singapore’s all shopping centres? Get lost!”

Then a Malay satay seller appears and says, “You think Singapore’s just chilli crab? Get lost lah!”, followed by man holding a glass of wine, saying, “You think you know Singapore? Get lost!” The ad ends with the tagline, “Get lost and find the real Singapore, your Singapore.” The ad has already caused some controversy as some think it is inappropriate for the ad to tell people to “get lost”.

Some Singaporean netizens who have seen the ad comment that they found it “really awkward”, “silly” and even “offensive”. A netizen, “wong5505″ exclaimed that he did not understand the phrase “get lost”, and had found the ad meaningless. However, the STB has clarified with Shin Min Daily News that the phrase “get lost” is in fact not offensive to Australians.

I couldn’t find an official definition of ‘get lost’ as Aussie slang, but other than its more common usage in the context of ‘scram’ or ‘go away’,  it could also mean a  dizzying, mildly confusing, perhaps even addictive immersion in a strange and fascinating culture to the point of forgetting time and space, hence being ‘lost’, like how one would get ‘lost’ in a lover’s eyes or embrace. In short, it’s a pun. In the video, you also see a rather scrappy, extreme example of ‘lo-hei’, where groups of revellers are seen flinging yusheng with the same orgiastic abandon as one blowing suds at a foam party. The Malaysian Tourism board, with their own claim to yusheng, may be watching this with keen interest.

Any Singaporean hearing ‘get lost LAH’ for the first time, without having any idea of what the ad was about, would think this ad is doing the exact opposite of what it’s designed for, shooing  away rather than wooing tourists. ‘Get lost’ itself is already sending mixed signals, but the addition of the suffix ‘lah’ implies exasperation and impatience, as in ‘Go away LAH’ or ‘Please, LAH’.  Here we have a campaign supposedly telling tourists to bugger off on one hand, and convincing them that Singapore is all ‘Yours’ on the other.  They should have a Mandarin-subtitled version, which would translate ‘Get lost’ to “滚开吧” and show it to PRCs instead: ‘You think Singapore has more dogs than humans? Get lost.’

Maybe Australian humour needs some getting used to, for the wit of the ad was indeed ‘lost’ on me other than recognising the play on words. Or that’s just because the message was relayed by local actors unaccustomed to ‘get lost’ as anything other than telling someone to ‘go fly kite’, hence coming across as unnatural and forced. But let’s look at some awkward tourism ads The Land Down Under itself has produced: In the eighties, the man who would be Crocodile Dundee told viewers to ‘put a shrimp on the barbie‘. Like us, Australians usually call the same creature a PRAWN, but ‘shrimp’ panders to an American audience, just like how ‘Get Lost’ supposedly makes sense to an Aussie. More recently in 2006, a promo was actually BANNED in some countries (and censored  in Singapore) because the viewer was asked ‘so where the bloody hell are you?‘ (bloody hell was removed in Singapore) which makes the swear-phrase ‘bloody hell’  sound as cordial as ‘G’day’. Nevermind that it was spouted by a comely bikini model to soften the vulgarity of it. If you thought ‘get lost’ was rude, wait till you see a parody of the ‘bloody hell’ campaign by Australian comedians ‘Chasers War on Everything’ , where tourists are cordially invited to ‘get their fucking arse over here’.

About these ads

Filed under: 2000s, 2010, 2012, Advertisements, Campaigns/Elections, Foul language, Tourists | Tagged: , , , | 1 Comment »

Buffalo hunter caught with bullets at Changi airport

Posted on January 3, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Aussie woman found with live ammo at Changi airport’, 3 Jan 2012, article in sg.yahoo news.

An Australian woman was let off with a warning after she was found with two rounds of live ammunition at Changi Airport on 12 October last year. According to a Northern Territory News report, Jessica Powter, 34, had left the two 8cm-long bullets used to shoot buffalo in her camera bag after a one-off hunting trip three years ago.

“The bullets were rolling about in the car so I put them in my backpack and forgot about them,” she was quoted by the paper as saying. The camera bag had supposedly passed several airport checks previously, including two at Brisbane and one at Cairns.

Powter, who was returning to Darwin via Singapore from a holiday in Thailand, said that she had been detained for 23 hours and that she had her passport confiscated, was searched and interrogated, then handcuffed and escorted from the airport.

Aussie huntresses who gun down innocent animals aside, Filipinos have also been known to be detained for bringing in live or spent bullets, commonly used as ‘talismans and amulets’. In 2008, a Malaysian woman was caught for wearing a belt made of empty cartridges, the reason given by a ICA inspector was that these could be ‘filled with gunpowder and used to hurt someone’.   It’s far easier to fill plastic bags with boiling water and drop them onto random passers-by from the top of a building, than find an underground local lab to synthesize gunpowder, then nick a police officer’s pistol to discharge your bullets. If I were to bring in a cannonball would I be detained as well, considering the nearest weapon that it can fit into, though unlikely to be shot from,  is at Fort Siloso, Sentosa? According to the Arms and Explosives Act, a cannonball would possibly fall into the classification of a ‘projectile’ or ‘missile’, though it’s unlikely that customs officers would be able to distinguish this medieval ammo from a bowling ball.

2 years post 9/11, anything resembling phallic ammunition got customs officers fired up into a frenzy. In 2003, dummy missiles on a model aircraft were mistaken for live rounds, leading to a Briton being detained for 10 hours despite the filial intentions of buying the offending article as a gift from Vietnam for her father.  Which means GI Joe toys or anything that so much as squirts shots of goo would come under scrutiny as well. Like Powter, a case of absent-mindedness was a convenient excuse for a Malaysian cop in 2002, when 1o bullets were found in his bag at Changi. In 2001 itself, a French soldier was caught by local customs for carrying a bullet as a souvenir in his WALLET. Incidentally, he also managed to whisk it past the Australian authorities at Sydney airport, which either suggest lax security Down under, or that buffalo-hunting equipment is as commonplace and acceptable as fishing lines and hooks.  The contraband was confiscated and he was let off with a warning, though one wonders what if he had bought a boomerang instead.

Today, you’re not allowed to bring in lighters that even resemble bullets, in fear that terrorists or bank robbers in the guise of taking a smoke, would suddenly wave it around threateningly at people going ‘Don’t move! I’ve got a BULLET!’. ICA officers generally give the benefit of the doubt for people leaving ammunition in their luggage, though the shameful handcuffing and warning is a slap on the wrist for anyone trying their luck and succeeding in lying their way out of it. Powter had to ‘bite the bullet’ through detention as she was a special case; a buffalo hunter, meaning someone who’s not commissioned to use firearms to enforce the law or protect a country, but more likely to succeed at a distance killing shot than the average person. According to an Australian report she ‘felt like a criminal’. Tell that to an animal lover, or the woman detained for buying a harmless toy airplane for her father.

Filed under: 2000s, 2011, Animal abuse, Bureaucrats, Changi airport, Tourists, Violence | Tagged: , , , , | 1 Comment »

Singapore is like a garden salad

Posted on July 23, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From various contest entries in  ‘If you were overseas, how would you describe Singapore to Foreigners’, article in Challenge online.

(Barkathnisha Begum Binte Abdul Razzak, MOE, winning entry): Singapore is like a garden salad, and its people like the different ingredients that retain distinctive flavours to make up the salad’s overall taste. We are made up of Chinese, Malays, Indians, Eurasians and increasingly, people of other nationalities with their own cultural distinctiveness and strengths, yet we maintain good relations with each other. The ingredients in a garden salad must be fresh, as depicted in our ‘new’ Cabinet formed after a watershed election and a ‘new’ Singapore for the future.

Wait a minute, garden salad has TASTE? Is this even the right food to represent Singaporean culture? How many of us actually eat salad and enjoy it? Salads are cold, bland, unsatisfying ‘meals’ which people eat just to feel good about themselves, only to reward themselves later during dinner with an all meat buffet using salad for lunch as a convenient justification. Why didn’t anyone think of ‘rojak’? It’s local, messy, sinful and tastes way better than rabbit food.

(Sanjiv Vaswani, AGC): Singapore is like yoghurt. It may appear plain and simple, but deep inside… it is full of live and active cultures. Just like yoghurt, once you’ve had a sampling of Singapore, you’ll feel good inside.

This is quite a silly play on the word ‘cultures’. Yogurt has a short shelf-life, is a food slowly decomposing away, and only tastes good if you have toppings to go with it. Like salad, it’s a Western import and the only reason people eat yogurt is to ‘feel good’ about themselves, when what they really crave for is ice-cream. If Singapore were a dessert, it should rightfully be ice kachang, multi-coloured, multi-layered and you’d have to dig real hard to savour the best bits of it, the atap chees.

(Kristy Lim, CNB): Singapore is like a doughnut – best defined by what’s not there. If you visit Singapore, you won’t have problems finding tasty food, potable water, convenient transport, memorable sights and plenty of shopping. If you work here, you won’t have problems finding world-class infrastructure, business opportunities, fair competition and a frustratingly fun time trying to understand Singlish. If you come here to set up a home, you won’t have problems finding religious freedom, racial harmony, decent healthcare, education opportunities, and understanding the joys and pains of home karaoke systems. If you are a Singaporean, you won’t have problems finding long queues, sales to take advantage of and, of course, something to complain about endlessly.

Coming from the CNB, one wonders if this description of Singapore as an American staple was aided with confiscated hallucinogens. There’s something metaphysical about the role of the doughnut hole; it’s empty but without it the doughnut as we know it wouldn’t exist. Kristy then uses brain-wracking double-negatives to highlight the positive traits of Singapore, none of which has anything to do with eating a doughnut. Again, a Western import like the two analogies above. If Singapore were a light snack, I’m more keen to call it roti prata. We need to be flipped and tossed about, smacked on a hard hot surface a few times before becoming what we are now.

(Zahri Kasir Mohamad, PUB): I would describe Singapore as the king of fruits, the durian, which is sharp, thorny and dangerous on the outside but juicy and delicious inside. Similarly, Singapore might look unattractive with its ‘harsh’ and ‘strict’ rules but once a foreigner gets to taste the real Singapore, he will love its delicious taste. To taste the durian, some effort is required. To see the beauty of Singapore, one needs to get to know its people, places and food. Good-grade durian is expensive and Singapore is expensive. Welcome to one of the most expensive places in ASEAN.

Well, this is more like it, though it’s more a national fruit than something to present Singapore as a whole. Singaporeans are a thorny bunch indeed, but a durian speaks more about a sense of the exotic and adventurous, a trait more suited for other Asian countries where people actually climb trees to harvest durians for a living, whereas  people here climb up carpark rooftops to suntan or goof off. If Singapore were a fruit, I’d pick the starfruit. Not just for the symbolism of stars on our flag, but that it’s so unremarkable if sampled raw that you can only taste its goodness after squeezing the life out of it. A close second would be the chiku, but only because it sounds funny and everyone  makes fun of it.

Filed under: 2011, Local food, Tourists | Tagged: , , | 1 Comment »

Expats sure know how to have fun

Posted on July 10, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘In a sea of foreigners’, 10 July 2011, article by Sumiko Tan, Sunday Times

…I was at the Kylie Minogue concert and one thought struck me: ‘These expats sure know how to hang loose and have fun’. It’s a common sight at concerts. Save for pockets of more demonstrative Singaporeans, it’ll be foreigners who look as if they’re really having a good time.

…At the Kylie gig, I was seated in a row of about eight people. They must have been Singaporeans because we all remained seated throughout. The most energetic thing they did was to wave the light stick, and even then feebly and self-consciously. Surrounding us, though, were hundred of foreigners – I am guessing Australians, Britons and Americans – who were partying away.  For a moment, I felt like a stranger in my own country.

…This feeling of dislocation surfaced again when I was shopping in Orchard Road… It’s the same at all my weekend haunts, whether it’s Ngee Ann City, Great World City or Little India or a suburban mall. I just feel outnumbered by foreigners. Singapore has changed.

Maybe the foreign fans attending the Kylie concert REALLY LOVE Kylie so much that they had to make a party out of it. Perhaps they were drunk, or they could just be tourists who paid good money to follow their idol on tour. And why ‘Americans, Australians or Britons’? What about Canadians, Spaniards or even the French? Do Americans even listen to Kylie? In her more than 20 years of showbiz, she has had only TWO top ten US Billboard hits (Locomotion, Can’t Get You Out of my Head). Sumiko’s selective observation doesn’t say much about EXPATS being fun loving in general, especially since there are supposedly more than a million foreigners lurking among us. I’m sure they’re those who’d prefer to stay at home and watch TV or walk the dog, instead of hanging around Clarke Quay watching EPL,  fooling around with local women or joining conga lines outside Ion Orchard. So in her midst of appearing victimised by this deluge of foreigners into our beloved homeland, Sumiko has inadvertently committed the sin of double-stereotyping here. One, foreigners are party animals who know how to enjoy life and get lots of sex. And two, Singaporeans are boring as hell.

But the general impression that I get from her piece is how ‘Tell me something I don’t already know’ it all is. There’s nothing surprising about bumping into foreigners in major shopping malls, which are ‘tourist attractions’ after all, or at enclaves like Holland Village where expats reside, doing something most locals wouldn’t dream of doing: Sitting out in the hot sun people-watching. Suburban malls still maintain a distinctive local, though not entirely palatable, flavour. Personally, the only time when I would feel out of place in this country, when the infiltration is omnipresent, would be something as mundane as taking the MRT, which Sumiko fails to mention here. If nothing is done to curb the influx, it’ll reach a point where MRT commuters would evolve their own separate pidgin language just to survive in train carriages, in addition to developing adaptive skills of slinking past giant backpacks, filtering out harsh body odours or dodging pickaxes and other construction tools which workers bring on board. Feeling out of place is fine as long as our alien population behaves. The problem which Sumiko hints at but doesn’t expand further, is foreigners who screw things up; beating up taxi drivers, cheating at casinos, spray painting MRT trains, leaving their mess about or letting their kids piss into dustbins mistaking them for pissing wells back in their godforsaken village.

Filed under: 2011, Concerts, Foreign workers, Fun and games, Music/music videos, Orchard Road, Shopping malls, Tourists | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Singapore is a grubby, trash-laden metropolis

Posted on June 28, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Cleanliness on the decline’, 28 June 2011, ST Forum

(James Cruikshank): I AM a Canadian who visited Singapore in 1995 for two weeks. It was the cleanest city I had ever been to. I came back a year later, and again was impressed by how immaculate the country was.

I returned on June 2 this year to enjoy Singapore’s famous food and the Great Singapore Sale, but was very disappointed. The cleanliness of the city is gone. I spent days walking and taking public transport to various parts of the city, and noticed an appalling amount of paper and plastic rubbish in the parks and on the streets.

I asked those I met why there was a litter problem, and one common comment was that it was due to the people’s attitude. Another common response was: ‘It’s the immigrants.’

…I soon witnessed acts of littering and it infuriated me. A woman with her teenage son and daughter tossed a green plastic drink bag over a railing onto the grass. I yelled at her from down the street, but she just laughed. I saw a construction worker walking past a rubbish bin and placing a can on a wall a farther 10m away, before continuing on his way.

It really upsets me to see the once-pristine Singapore turning into just another grubby, trash-laden metropolis. This litter problem is a blight on Singapore’s reputation, and I hope Singaporeans will address this disrespect for their country.

One way is for people to take all rubbish with them after leaving public places and place it in a trash bin, and not on the ground, a wall, a bench or in the park. Community groups can get together to clean up the streets in their neighbourhoods. The city can promote cleanliness through mass media campaigns.

Has it come to this? That we Singaporeans have become so environmentally hopeless that we need a Canadian to give us a step by step guide to how to throw rubbish (place it in a trash bin)? Overcrowding is a key factor, and perhaps the ‘immigrant’ finger-pointers are on to something, though what’s sorely lacking in us as a people, is pride in our surroundings. Kudos to the writer here for the daring-do to tick off litterers and taking us for children when the enforcers  and ministry are sleeping on the job, though having volunteers to pick the streets clean will only fuel the servant mentality endemic in our people; that it’s someone else’s job, not ours. The secret to our once honorable reputation as a garden city is an army of foreign labour to do the dirty work behind the scenes, not  fines or campaigns, and even that can’t save us now. I’ve noticed the changes myself over the years; Rubbish bins overflow over weekends, people dump old furniture and obsolete gadgets at the void deck, empty bubble tea plastic cups get left all over the place, rats as big as kittens near kopitiams. A disgraceful accumulation of waste and vermin brought about by rampant affluence and complacent consumerism infecting a generation utterly dependent on maids and cleaners, taking for granted that someone will clear up the mess the next day anyway.  We don’t leave our stuff lying around at home, which goes to show how much we treat our country as one.

It’s interesting to see how foreigners have viewed us over the years, take some time to reflect on how we were once rated the ‘cleanest city in the world’, and ask ourselves ‘What the hell happened, Singapore?’

Untitled, 29 Jan 1972, ST, H.F Frost, London

Singapore seems well on its way to being the cleanest city in Asia

Looking forward to this, our fourth visit, 9 April 1981, ST, E.H Day, Australia

We have found Singapore to be without rival in the ranking for the world’s cleanest city

Japanese couple has nothing but praise, 15 Dec 1984, ST, S Kikuchi, Japan

My wife and I are from Japan. We love your beautiful and clean country. Your people are so friendly.

Surprises in City of Inspiration, 8 July1985, ST,  Richard Barone, USA

It is still the cleanest city of its size I have ever seen. It is still a shopper’s and a sun lover’s paradise.

Singapore, a mini world worth visiting, 9 March 1988, ST, Elizabeth Goldsworthy, South Pacific:

Singapore is an exciting kaleidoscope, a mini world worth visiting, to replenish the soul. Clean, green and beautiful…a sense of safety and security…

Filed under: 1970s, 1980s, 2011, Cleaners, Environment, Foreign workers, Tourists | Tagged: , , | 2 Comments »

Public sculptures burn people

Posted on June 19, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Treat sculptures with greater care’, 15 June 2011, ST Forum

(Jeffrey Say): I WAS disappointed to read that sculptor Chua Boon Kee was asked to relocate his stainless steel sculptures near Clementi Mall because of concern that the metal could potentially burn people (‘Open-air sculptures feel the heat’; last Wednesday).

This raises the larger issue of our attitude towards and regard for public sculptures. A public sculpture is created to be in dialogue with the site and the environment. Relocating a sculpture compromises both the intent of the artist and the integrity of the work.

Mr Chua was understandably ‘unhappy’ at the request to move his sculptures to a ‘shadier area’ as it would disrupt the aesthetic cohesion of the sculptures.

My own research has found that a substantial number of public sculptures – from the pre-war period to the 1970s – simply disappeared without any trace, especially when a site or old building had to make way for a new development. Even sculptures done in the 1980s and later are now untraceable after being moved from their original locations.

Public sculptures are meant to be seen and enjoyed. In the case of Mr Chua’s sculptures, an advisory could have been put up to allay safety concerns.

…Indeed, beyond their aesthetic and decorative value, public sculptures can be a source of civic and communal pride and identity.

The art scene is definitely heating up

It’s ironic how much time and money Singaporeans spend on education, subjecting ourselves to holiday tuition and enrichment classes, and yet lack the common sense to know that metal gets hot under the sun. Public art aside, how about cars then? Do we move them from open air carparks because they pose a hazard to kids who want to touch them? We can recite the elemental and transition metals in ascending atomic number but fail to apply metals’ conductive properties to real life experience. If someone gets a third degree burn from being ‘itchy-fingers’ and touching a piece of metallic art, would he sue the artist, the National Heritage Board, or, by golly, the sun? That aside, it’s easy for us to take public sculptures for granted if we pass it by everyday, blending into the background like the sight of a MRT track, or a Starbucks in a suburban mall, but yet flock in droves to FREE, fashionable events like the Biennale, feel all artsy and cultured about it on one hand, and complaining about our locally designed public art scalding our idiot children on the other.

It’s a shame that these are being tossed around from one venue to another, with some, like Ng Eng Teng’s work, having as much nostalgic resonance as the Merlion itself. But you wouldn’t consider moving the latter would you? On a personal note, I remember Plaza Singapura’s ‘Miss Wealth’ sculpture fondly (see below, Guide to our Public sculptures, 24 September 1984), and looking at the gaudy, forgettable mall it has become today it’s unimaginable that PS has been around since 1974. Miss Wealth has since been relocated to NUS, effectively removing it from the lay public view and into a more academic sphere where people are supposedly smart enough not to touch hot sculptures.

Which leaves another Ng Eng Teng work, Mother and Child, one of the few remaining public sculptures in the heart of town, though also moved from its birthplace outside Far East Shopping Centre (see below, Mum and child in Orchard, 14 July 1981)  to Orchard Parade Hotel, a less bustling area relatively safe from public molestation. Like Bukit Brown cemetery, I suppose the only way to get Singaporeans to take notice of heritage icons is to threaten to destroy them. Bring forth the ‘Sculpture Tours’. Perhaps this calls for a job for MCDYS minister Major Chan Chun Seng, who, instead of asking for ‘wild’ ideas like commissioned graffitti on HDB walls, should look towards preservation of such sculptures instead. And oh yes, ‘Do not touch’ signs too, please.

Filed under: 1980s, 2011, Art, Kids, Orchard Road, Public works, Shopping malls, Tourists | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Your bloody passport

Posted on June 18, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Why visit a place where we are not welcome?’18 June 2011, ST Forum

(Lawrence Koo): …Last Saturday, I left home at 7am to go to Malaysia for a holiday. I took the Second Link hoping to beat the jam at the Malaysian immigration checkpoint. It was rather smooth clearance at the Tuas side. But to my horror, it took me four hours to clear Malaysian immigration.

Just before I drove off, I said to the immigration officer attending to me that the new system was really bad and impractical. Instead of saying sorry for the inconvenience caused, the officer replied: ‘Then don’t come, lah.’

That was almost unpardonable coming from a government official who is supposed to be tourist-friendly. Who would want to visit a place that is unwelcoming to visitors?

It was reported that visitors from Singapore made about 13 million trips to Malaysia last year, which constituted about 53 per cent of Malaysia’s total tourist arrivals – contributing RM28.4 billion (S$11.6 billion) in receipts. Whose loss is it if Singaporeans stop visiting Malaysia?

The friendliest immigration officers I’ve met in my Asian travels were the Japanese, and the sulkiest sort were the Cambodians at Siem Reap who barely look at your face that you wonder if they’re doing their job or not. I suppose the grouchy attitude is to ward off any unnecessary feedback from the throng of strangers entering your country  everyday. It’s debatable if immigration officers, Malaysian or otherwise, are supposed to be service-friendly and polite all the time; after all they need to be stern when quarantining dubious characters so that they can administer naked squat body checks and such. The nature of their work is strictly business and one shouldn’t get too hard up on this scathing unfriendliness which isn’t entirely representative of Malaysian hospitality. I’m certain the offending officer must have gotten complaints the whole time (probably mostly from Singaporeans) while Mr Koo was stuck in the jam, and it’s not like he could do anything about it. Still, this outburst is tame, and even sort of makes sense, compared to the treatment dealt to Malaysians themselves in the 1970s (See below, Hard words and no chicken, 24 Oct 1970, ST Forum)

Of course, one shouldn’t flame Malaysian authorities and preach about service standards when our own immigration officers aren’t exactly tourism ambassadors themselves (See below, Our unpleasant return to Singapore, 12 Aug 2009, Today).

In terms of derogatory treatment, Malaysia’s notorious naked squat and strip searching is a stroll in the park compared to the POW grade detention practices of the Canadian immigration authorities in the 80′s,   that it actually drove a Singaporean tourist to commit  suicide right in their office (See below, Holiday girl’s nightmare in Canada, 8 November 1985). I myself was subject to an embarrassing ordeal by Canadian officials once after being initially deceived by what appeared to be friendly banter when it was in fact tactical interrogation, and in spite of how welcoming everyone else outside the airport were, it’s still one country I’d swear to avoid as much as possible. So, be respectful in front of an unfriendly officer, but be even more careful when he’s exceptionally friendly.

Filed under: 1970s, 1980s, 2000s, 2011, Changi airport, Customer service, Tourists | Tagged: , , , | 1 Comment »

MBS needs its 30% local gamblers

Posted on June 12, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘MBS does a balancing act with local gamblers’, 11 June 2011, article by Grace Leong, Business Times

The Singapore government has told Las Vegas Sands to ensure that not more than 30 per cent of all visitors to its casino at Marina Bay Sands are Singaporean, a top company executive revealed.

‘We are basically told that as long as only about 30 per cent of the people coming in are Singaporean, then it shouldn’t be a problem. If the amount of Singaporean attendance gets much higher than that, there may be some cause for concern,’ Michael Leven, Las Vegas Sands president and chief operating officer, said.

That 30 per cent figure isn’t published, he said in an interview last week with Inside Asian Gaming. ‘That’s what our numbers have been, roughly 30 per cent Singaporean. That doesn’t seem to cause any problem.’

To this day, only about 3 per cent of Singapore’s population has ever played in a casino, he said.

But a spokesman with the Ministry of Community Development did not confirm the 30 per cent cap, saying only that ‘the IR operators have been told very clearly that the casinos are tourist products and they are not to target the domestic market’.

…’You’re always going to have in the casino business some people who overplay. That’s part of the business, but the great majority of people can control themselves and I don’t think we’re creating more poverty in Singapore because of our presence. But if that were to happen, the government would have every right and every reason to come in and try to restrict play.’

But he said that Sands needed local gamblers in order to support its investment in integrated resorts. ‘We have to have some local play in order to be consistent when we don’t have conventions and we don’t have tourists. Otherwise, you’ve got an awful lot of overhead sitting there not generating any revenue.’

Let’s assume that the average number of daily visitors to MBS casino, according to this ChannelNewsAsia article in 2010, has been hovering around 25,000. 30% of 25,000 is about 8250 Singaporeans daily. According to the Singapore census for 2010, our Singapore residents number around 3.7 million, which is a conservative take on what one means by ‘Singapore population’. Which means 3%, or 111,000 Singaporeans have visited a casino at least once. ONLY 111,000 Singaporeans, as Mr Leven nicely puts it.

Let’s try to put this figure in perspective.  There are as many local casino visitors as there are voters in Bishan Toa Payoh GRC (111,677).  There are almost thrice as many casino visitors as there are doctors and nurses combined in 2010 (37,872) (Singapore in Figures 2011), or the total number of babies born in 2010 (37,967). There are more casino visitors in less than 2 years than the total number of visits to the Singapore Phiatelic Museum in 10 years. (107,400) (Yearbook of Statistics 2010).

The point is, how do we know when it has become a ‘problem’? And how do we know that this ‘problem’ isn’t already happening? Can someone please define what this problem is? On what moral grounds do we have luring foreigners here and then shifting the burden of their habit, perpetuated through our casinos, back onto their own countries? By all means, protect our own citizens, but our sense of social responsibility shouldn’t be constrained within our home boundaries. In fact, a recent surge of scams from foreign fraudsters among other crimes, soliciting included, is exacting costs on our police force. It is also foolish to assume that 1) Tourists are all clean, gullible, rich and can afford to lose, and 2) If they get into trouble they’ll pack up, go home crying to their own people and leave us alone. The fact that the two casinos were in a sneaky free shuttle bus bid for heartland gamblers last year is proof enough that they can’t survive just on tourist traffic, and the fact that our government is pussyfooting on a ban on locals entirely just means that even they know this to be true as well.

Filed under: 2011, Casino/gambling, Fun and games, Tourists | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

National Museum for fashionistas

Posted on June 12, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘National museum or fashion show?’ 12 June 2011, Your Letters, Sunday Times

(Rose Hasumi Lui): I visited the National Museum of Singapore last weekend, and my experience made me feel as if I had mistakenly stepped into a Museum of Contemporary Lifestyle.

First, there was the ‘Beauty in Black’ exhibition…which offers a gender-biased take on female fashion in Singapore (implying that there was no such thing as a fashionable man in Singapore from the 1950s to the 1970s)

…The upcoming Vacheron Constantin exhibition featuring timepieces…would be more appropriate at a vintage watches trade show.

…As I made my way through the dimly lit gallery (Singapore History Gallery), I found that the exhibits were aesthetically pleasing, yet lacked emotional resonance and connection

…I would assume that the role of a National Museum would be to tell the history of the country, so as to promote pride and foster rootedness among its citizens. Instead, what I learnt mostly from my visit…was what it means to be a fashionista.

The concept of museum as time machine no longer exists. Visitors don’t pay money to be transported into a land before time, to be guided through a maze of rooms detailing our roots from fishing village to bustling city in chronological order. It would have been a novel, brilliant idea if you were a first timer and had a sense of childlike wonder, but like most attractions and businesses, see it once and you’ve seen them all, which explains why the National Museum needs to constantly reinvent itself to keep visitors coming, even if it needed to cater to a niche clientele like vintage watch hobbyists to stay afloat. The same argument applies to tourist spots like the Night Safari organising Halloween events which have nothing to do with nocturnal wildlife; judging from the dismal rates of locals paying to visit museums that you need to tickle their arty bone with something faddish (and mostly free) like the Biennale, it’s inevitable that sometimes you have to spice up your permanent , stagnant exhibits with a little high-end irrelevance, but more importantly irrelevance that pays the bills, that’s why they’re called  ‘Special exhibitions’, on for a limited period only. If the complainant had viewed the ‘What’s On’ section of the website prior to her visit, she could have saved a wasted trip, as well as sparing us her opinions on men’s 50-70′s fashion.

Still, it’s rather sad that we need a repository in the form of a museum to remind us of our roots all the time. Our ancestors spread the word through storytelling and myth, while our grandfathers used to tell it through old photographs or newspaper clippings, while our generation today is imprinted by modern society to live for the future, and treat the past with obligatory sentimentality, that if they ever forget about our roots an exhibit on Old Singapore is right around the corner, or at the click of a mouse to remind us. We teach our kids two languages to equip them for school, but don’t tell them how we were once all Chinese migrants in a British colony. We read to them fictional bedtime stories of fantastical machines, robots and talking trains  but not the games our grandparents played, or the vehicles they travelled in. We let them watch Japanese cartoons about battle-bots but forget to mention how we used to be a Japanese colony ourselves. We’re faced with the incredible burden of making our history, in the realm of Facebook, iPads and Xbox, even remotely entertaining to our quick-tempered, borderline ADHD, easily bored kids. And therein lies the rub: History, in the context of the spick and span, high-tech, wired, global juggernaut that is our country, has become interminably boring and unmarketable, because we’ve lost it in the living and relegated it to an unremarkable  space, in an unremarkable building, with all its colours and meaning nullified by a frame or an ‘interactive laser light show’, its story told by a caption if not a stranger, depersonalised, defanged and utterly demoralising to anyone who still believes that The Singapore Story must be told through the eyes of Singaporeans who have actually lived it, and not scripted for tourists.

Filed under: 2011, Art, Dress sense, Kids, Public works, Tourists | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Tissue chope-ing a Singaporean tradition

Posted on April 26, 2011 by gdy2shoez

From ‘At Changi Airport’, 26 April 2011, My Point, ST Forum and ‘It’s uniquely Singaporean and very rude’, 26 April 2011, ST Forum

(MR JEREMY CHIAN): ‘I recently went to Changi Airport to pick up an overseas guest. While waiting at the arrival hall I cringed on seeing huge posters informing visitors that if they saw tissue packets placed on foodcourt dining tables, it meant the seats were already taken…How embarrassed I was when my guest inquired if this was the culture in Singapore. Publicising this practice gives our country a bad image.’

(Su Timmins): …At a well-known food chain, just as my husband and I were heading towards a table with our food, two girls walked in and headed straight for our table to place their tissue packs. I told them it was our table and they moved to ‘reserve’ another. We finished and left before they even got their food.

As we left, another two girls placed their tissue packs on our table and there were at least 15 people in the queue ahead of them.

When I complained to the owner, his reply shocked me. This was the custom and culture of Singapore, he said, adding that he did not think he should reject the traditions followed in the place he operated.

Since when and how has this practice become a Singaporean cultural tradition?

The humble, practically worthless tissue pack has the perfect size and visibility as an object to stake claim on a space, compared to say, a watch, a pen or anything that one is less willing to lose. By its function, it is understood that someone wants to eat there, and the very fact that it is so dispensable means patrons  are aware  of the tenuous hold  that the tissue pack has on eating space, since no hearts would be broken if someone swiped it.  Likewise there’s no authority or  SOP on tissue chope-ing, and nothing illegal too if someone throws it away or assumes that it was left behind by a previous patron and sits down anyway, though you would earn some scowls throughout your meal as a consequence of your tactless flouting of the Singaporean ‘chope’ custom.

Singaporeans nonetheless have grown to accept this ‘unspoken rule’, just like how it’s accepted to slurp your ramen loudly in a Japanese noodle shop, waste water at a Songkran festival in Thailand, or run with the bulls risking a butt-gore in Spain.  These customs aren’t pretty, even absurd, but our perceived ‘rudeness’ of seat chope-ing can’t possibly be worse than our reputation as ruthless vandal caners. What matters is that we have achieved a social equilibrium and mutual understanding of the  gesture amicably without ending up in a brawl tossing chilli at each other. Some foreigners even claim that reserving seats (including using someone to ‘jaga’, a staple method for those who eschew the tissue-chope) is unheard of in their country (see below, Is anyone sitting here? 8 Feb 2001, Voices, Today).  The science behind ideal turnaround times at hawker centre tables is as fuzzy as traffic prediction, so it’s hard to tell if a free for all no reservations system  as the writer below suggests would ensure that everyone walks away satisfied and without a black eye. In fact, with prohibitions on reservations, you’d see people rushing for seats, clashing trays, spilling food all over the place and fighting because of the two predisposing factors to an ugly situation: Hungry. And being Singaporean.

In fact, some would even argue that tissue-choping is a time saver (Tissue system’s a time saver, 17 April 2007, Voices, Today), ensuring that tables are occupied for less time since the group would otherwise have been waiting for the ‘choper’ to finish his meal before giving up the table together. Which probably explains how this ‘system’ has evolved from the stress of a tight lunch hour, sometimes half-hour even, that most Singaporeans are allowed as a side effect of our obsession with productivity, unlike the leisurely hour and a half long lunches (power naps inclusive) which our complaining tourists are used to.

The problem really, is ENDORSING through posters as what Changi Airport does that tissue chope-ing is our de rigeur way of doing things here, alongside say getting the death penalty for drug trafficking. One might as well include it in the disembarkation form for tourists to check the acknowledgment box that says ‘I will not sit at tables with tissue packs on them while eating out’.  This effectively tilts the delicate balance in favour of the tissue-chopers, who would otherwise be forced to compete with the likes of people who just throw their tissues away or ignore them. It also means that you can get away with the ‘phantom tissue’ argument, whereby you accuse an innocent random patron for stealing your tissue pack just so you can squeeze into his table at the expense of his lunch companions. In any case, there’s nothing anyone can do about such deeply entrenched behaviour (at least 10 years) short of imposing a fine for ‘littering’, if not for ‘reserving seats’. So other than just making do, we might as well make the tissue pack a national icon too. Hey, it’s uniquely Singaporean, what.

Filed under: 2000s, 2011, Changi airport, Hawkers, Local food, Tissue paper | Tagged: , , , , , | 5 Comments »

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