See How Creative Singaporeans Can Be

We have been complaining how uncreative Singaporeans are and how they are spoon-fed by teachers at school. The following illustrated how creative Singaporeans can be in making their dissatisfactions known:

Attack of the Eight Elephants

Eight paper cut-outs of white elephants were put up outside Buangkok MRT Station in August 2005 by some Raffles Girls’ School students to show their silent protest against its non-opening. Very innovative indeed. The ruling party may have got the ‘hint’ and perhaps forced SBS Transit to announce the opening 5 months later before it turned into a political issue against them during the General Elections 2006.

Online Petition - NKF

Also in 2005, there was an unprecedented massive online petition which involved some 43,000 netizens against the old management of NKF, in particular Mr T T Durai, who was the Number 1 target after the public found out about his extravagant spendings on public money like the ‘Golden Tap issue’. The government, in particular the Ministry of Health, and Mdm Ho Ching, wife of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong initially supported Mr Durai and contributed NKF’s success to him. They backed down after public pressure. Shortly after, the government launched a public lawsuit against some board members in the old management.

Odex Saga

Hundreds took up arms in a mass street protest against Odex’s hard line stance on Anime Privacy. Oh, not humans. Just anime figurines like Ultraman, Gundam Zakus, etc. There were anti-riot vehicles and policemen at the ‘riot’ scene but they all could not arrest the troublemakers.

All Black at Centrepoint

It was initiated by some forummers on Sammyboy Forum to protest against the compulsory annuity policy announced by the Government, which allows a payout only from the age of 85. Wearing black to shop on Orchard Road is not a crime but this event, although being small-scaled, certainly influenced the Government’s decision making on the policy.

Fast Detection Method of Bird Flu (H5N1) Found

Researchers in Singapore have created a handheld device that can detect the H5N1 bird flu virus from throat swab samples in under 30 minutes, raising hopes it will lead to rapid detection and containment of the virus.

Conventional laboratory tests take around 4 hours, and require machines to first isolate and amplify the virus before it is tested.

Writing in the latest issue of Nature Medicine, the scientists said the new device would allow decentralized testing of the H5N1 virus, especially in countries that lack basic public health resources.

H5N1, a disease found mostly in birds, is endemic in many parts of Asia and experts have warned for years that it could spark a pandemic, killing millions of people, if it learns to jump from person to person.

"The World Health Organisation containment plan aims to stop an epidemic locally in order to prevent a global disaster," the scientists said.

"In the event of a flu epidemic, its rapid containment would depend on the prompt identification of the first cases. But as routine surveillance may be problematic in countries with limited public health resources, low-cost, easy-to-use detection (procedures) would be advantageous."

The all-in-one device is able to isolate, purify and amplify the viral DNA from raw throat swab samples and put it through an H5N1 detection test.

"The answers you will get is: am I infected? If yes, how 'severe' is it?" one of the researchers, Juergen Pipper of Singapore's Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, wrote in an email to Reuters.

The team ran several hundred tests on the device.

"The accuracy is comparable to conventional equipment, although we are faster and cheaper," Pipper said.

The scientists hope to use the device to test for other viruses, such as SARS, AIDS and hepatitis B.

"In addition, it may be applicable not only to the flu virus, but could be adapted to other infectious agents, and to other bodily fluids like blood, urine or saliva," they said.

The article was obtained from Reuters.

Citizen Paparazzi on Stomp

Citizen paparazzi is not a new concept to this modern world of ours. In Singapore, we now have Stomp, a citizen journalism platform created by Singapore Press Holdings, possibly with the hope of getting more Singaporeans to get more involved in Singapore’s current affairs.

However, it seemed that it has deviated from its original aim. One look on the webpages of Stomp, you will notice they are full of colours and juicy news. Perhaps this is one way of getting more traffic into their website and generating more advertisement revenue while letting netizens to engage in some form of active journalism.

In my view, getting more citizens to get involved in current affairs of our nation is not the same as allowing a platform for more paparazzi style of journalism where day-in-day-out, you see people uploading photos of interesting happenings in Singapore, describing crime scenes in great details, or maybe talking about girls. Can this really help the society to progress? I think not.

Instead, Stomp should really consider taking up an active role in getting more netizens to voice their views and perhaps organise real-time online debates on real social issues such as poverty, increasing income-gap, human rights etc.

Why should Stomp take the initiative then? The blogosphere we have now is too ‘scattered’ and certainly does not have a huge financial backing like SPH. Writing letters to Straits Times can sometimes be too much of a hassle, too formal and might put off the younger generations who might only be interested in short, more adhoc form of discussions.

Let’s put a stop to the apathetic nature of Singaporeans towards current affairs. Proper civic engagement can really make a vital impact on Singapore.

You've Got A Problem With Gays and Lesbians?

7 out of 10 Singaporeans have a problem with homosexuals. That was what I read in yesterday’s Straits Times report. It was based on a NTU SCI survey out of 1000 people. This high percentage of non-acceptance of homosexuals really baffled me. Who did they survey on? Could it be a coincidence that the surveyed ones are generally less receptive of the ‘social deviant’? From the people I know, friends, family members and relatives, who are all between the age of 10 and 62, I found out that more than half of them do not really mind having homosexuals around them. To them, homosexuality is created by nature and is not of a choice in life, so there should not be any discrimination against this group of people. I agree with this logic.

So I am curious. Is it just the people around me who are more liberal in thinking and does the Singaporean society generally find homosexuals disgusting?

I did my little ‘survey’ from a few popular Singapore blogs and websites and was pretty surprised to find out that the results were totally different from that of the survey done by the Straits Times.

From Tomorrow.sg, out of 1280 people surveyed online, almost 70% of people felt gay sex should be allowed. Although it is to be noted that having homosexuals around is pretty much different from approving gay sex to be the norm of the society, it is justifiable to assume that more than this 70% would find themselves ‘ok’ with homosexuals around. After all, we are not even broaching on the topic of sex which is still considered a social taboo.

And from an Attitude Survey 2000 found on PLU website conducted in Singapore to gauge attitude of general public to gay-related issues, a similar trend prevailed and most people think as Singapore is becoming more and more global, it should be a more tolerant society and all citizens should be treated with equality, irregardless of their beliefs, races and sexuality.

So why not consider repealing Section 377A of the Penal Code and remove this divisive curtain placed on the gay community and give them equal rights?

Also read "Nothing Wrong With Being Gay".

Culture Is Destiny; A Conversation with Lee Kuan Yew

"We have focused on basics in Singapore. We used the family to push economic growth, factoring the ambitions of a person and his family into our planning. We have tried, for example, to improve the lot of children through education. The government can create a setting in which people can live happily and succeed and express themselves, but finally it is what people do with their lives that determines economic success or failure. Again, we were fortunate we had this cultural backdrop, the belief in thrift, hard work, filial piety and loyalty in the extended family, and, most of all, the respect for scholarship and learning." - LKY, 1994


I've found an interesting article on Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew's views on Asian culture. In the article, he compared the asian culture with the western version. He also mentioned it's our unique culture in Singapore that created the economic success in our little nation. Read on @ http://www.fareedzakaria.com/articles/other/culture.html

Rare Article in Newspaper on Opposition

In the weekend edition of the Today newspaper on 15 Sep 2007, there was this article titled "50 years on.. What keeps Workers' Party going?". When I read the headlines, I thought that it might be another article to highlight the strengths of the PAP and weaknesses of the opposition parties in general. But I was wrong. Although in the first paragraph the journalist praised the ruling party for creating an economic miracle, the following paragraphs totally caught me by surprise.

The rest of the paragraphs described the history of Workers’ Party throughout the short history of Singapore. Few items caught my eye:

The title -"50 years on.. What keeps Workers' Party going?" seem to suggest that the party is able to withstand the constant onslaught from the PAP and being 50-year old, it is a party which is wise, experienced and still popular among Singaporeans.

“One exception was the WP's call for a "caring society" in the 1980s, which offered Singaporeans an alternative policy.” and “But even this platform was somewhat usurped by the PAP Government when then-Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong took the reins in 1990 and unveiled a vision for a "gracious society". – Isn’t this phrase suggesting that the ruling party ‘stole’ the Workers’ Party’s manifesto?

“That means working the ground — Mr Low reportedly attends as many funerals as he can in Hougang — and convincing the constituents that its members can do as good a job, if not better than, their PAP counterparts in running an estate and helping them solve their municipal problems through non-governmental means.” – Why is the media giving the WP free advertisement, telling the public that WP is a party with ‘human touch’?

In my opinion, the media, on the government’s behalf, is probably trying to show to the world that Singapore is a true multi-party democracy and not entirely dominated by the PAP. This is probably due to the recent exclusion of Singapore from the Global Club of Democracies. Also, the timing of this article further confirmed my suspicion. As WP’s 50-year anniversary is still almost 2 months from now, why must the media publish this article now and not closer to their anniversary to make it even more relevant? Or is the media really going to be more balanced now?

Real Actions Taken Only After Tragedy Happened

It is very common to see provision shop owners displaying their goods outside their shops. If you go to places like Toa Payoh for example, you would see lots of goods along the corridors such that any passer-by would find it difficult to move to the other side of the row of shophouse. Isn't this a potential fire hazard as well? If a fire were to break out during a busy Sunday, a chaotic situation might happen when the passers-by along the corridor try to run for their lives. Someone might seriously get hurt or even get killed in a stampede or by the falling goods. Maybe I'm just being too imaginative.

The Hougang fire tragedy photo was obtained from a fellow blogger's blog at

http://maestoso-amore.com/