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What fish?
I am fish. Full name Fish Turtle.
I absolutely adore turtles. And fish
Turtles are such cute little things!
Well, only baby turtles.
Sunday, August 26, 2007
The Singaporean in Me.

This post is one of my longest posts ever, and none of the content is to be assessed academically. =) So dun expect topic sentences or linkages. =) And it is super long. so i wun blame you if you give up halfway. HA!


Ytd lecture was and is still one of the most impactful lecture that SOT ever gave, or anyone ever gave me for that matter. Probably beacause it was about the Singaporean identity, relevant(or irrelevant, since we are so politically apathetic). It was, to quote and unquote Valerie, self-realization, and led to a deeper understanding of the Singaporean in Singaporeans.


One of the things i remembered, was the Train. The trains just kept coming on, one following another while passengers on board or off-board tries to keep up. Passengers friends with each other, akin and mirror our classmates who our friends, tries to comfort each other while looking over their shoulders for the next train(got the expression when Tong looked over hos shoulder for the imaginary non-existent train). We would say:"Don't be sad.""Don't be angry." "Don't be depressed." All non-sensical stuff and attempts to comfort, while anxiously awaiting the next train. But what we really are doing, is to create more oppression and supression for our friends whom we are trying to comfort. Tong told us the annecdote of one of his students, who used to tear in front of her friends, but gradually stopped when prelims are arriving, in order not to affect them.

Classic case of self-sacrificial martyrdom.


On a side-note, she went home and cry to herself. I wonder how many of you actually cry to yourselves, not to others. I'd wager, most of you. I know, because I do. Really think joanne is doing the right thing by complaining and confiding in others, because this way she relieves her stress. =D


I really hope that Tong had advised his student to confide more in her friends, tell them the problem. I believe that it would be a good therapy for her, because talking, whether you believe it or not. I don't confide, sadly, and never learnt how to. I do, from time to time, confide my small fears and insecurities, to a few of my closest friends(sometimes directly, sometimes so subtly they dont realise it), and i have derived a small measure of peace.


But back to the girl. Some might protest, if the girl confides in her friends, she was going to drag them down for prelims. Every min she spent confiding, it would mean that her friends would have one less min to revise. We all know how valuable a min is, how long(or how short) tt one min is, depending on your context. Yet, have anyone consider, how much that time spent on comforting and listening, i mean really listening and comforting your friend, you would oso achieve a real sense of friendship. A link. A bond. Most people don't realise it, but a real relationship between people is really one of the greatest feeling and joy(and peace) that anyone could achieve. No man is one-man island-we all need company. Humans are made to live together, in packs. Not apart, but A part. I don't have many close friends, having drifted rather aimlessly during my frist 2 years in sec1 and 2. Yet it made realise, when i entered sec 3 and 4, how much difference friends would make. I was Public Enemy No.1 in sec 1 and 2, but when Fate decreed that I shall be put amongst fellows of other classes and not be given biology and the class where most of my ex-classmates were going to, I was given a new chance, and yes, i found some sort of equilibrium. I had troubles still, but i am glad that they gave me a chance to be a real friend to them again.
*here i would like to thank Mau<3<3<3, esp to Ching, rou fang and yes, pris too.


So back to time spent on friendships. Tong told us about a guy(no names!), X,who went ard helping ppl, doing more than his fair share of work. Contrast him to another girl, who was always going around, raiding others' bags for information and see what they were doing(as 'raiding' suggest, she didn't have permission). The results:Band 1 for the girl, Band 3 for X. Tong recalled how, when he went to the class, they were in uproar, flinging chairs and swearing vulgarities. All for injustice for X. Recognizing that he could not teach, Tong went to X, askign him what grade he had. X replied Band 3.


The Paper did write 3 after all.


"No. Class, what should X get?"Tong asked again.
"Band 1!" was the uniform chorus, the strong outcry.
So he asked X again, what he got.
Tha ans was Band 3. So he asked the class again. The class soon caught on and kept insisting X had gotten a Band 1. Finally, X said Band 1. Flatly, then refuse to say anymore.
My point of this story(I don't know about Tong. Think it was on boxes and labels, buti shall sort of link them.) was on friends therapy. I can tell you, having not so many close friends myself, being confided in, is a great hounour and sign that someone trusted you. Trusted you enough that they would tell you, admit and confess to you, what their troubles were. I am not saying that you should listen to others, to feel good about yourself. There is nothing to feel good about when your friend was in trouble. All I am saying, this can lead to a positive reflection and realization of your self, and a confidence boost for you. In helping others, you help yourself grow. So who say helping others would drag yourself down? I really think that is what true friendships should be about. Seeing your friend fall out of the train, getting off the train to help them, but NOT looking over your shoulder for the next train, until your friend is fit enough to travel again on the train, without getting some sort of motion sickness.


Tong also told us about boxes and labels, a crisis that youths in Singapore face. We are always necessarily categorizing our steps, making boxes and labels, jumping with trpidation and fear into them, with a 'die-die must succeed' attitude. Thinking that if we couldnt make it to the next box, we would fall forever into the dark abyss without hope of ever making it into the next box. We are so very obssessed by making it, like in the story of X, who was so focused on the toilet paper (I wish Tong could have videoed it down, so that he can show it to X when he was older and more mature to realise how much value that paper should actually have), that we forgot there are other boxes too.Other boxes with labels of success.


There was another humbling yet inspiring story of a young man who tried retaking his As, i think 2 or 3 times. 3 i think. He didn't make it the first time, not the second time while he was in the army, and not the 3rd time, while he spent mornings on tuition and work, and nights at Tong's house studying till 4am. Wiping away his tears rather impatiently and also indifferently. He failed time and time again, when he finally resigned himself to failing and signed on the army.


What have these boxes and labels done to us? Efforts to demolish ranking status, abolish systems of streaming, all great ideas, but none actually working. RJ, VJ, HCI, TJ, AJ, all will always remain top and represent the ultimum, while SR YJ always will remain bottom. (forgive my freedom of speech here.) NY? Some never even heard of this JC.


Tong told us about his young life as a teenager, when he was retained and retained, even in uni(to quote him"You don;t get retained in U. Only losers get retained in U"). Unfortunately for him, his sister was a pedigree type, RGS, some Cambridge or Oxford or some big-shot graduate, now Director of Ministry of Health or sth, but you get the idea, the contrast.During social functions, his sister would always be introduced first, about all her qualifications, and when it finally came to him, his father would say:
This is my son. He is tall.
Then they would compare heights and see who was taller.

I didn't think it was funny, although i laugh, if not to laugh with them only. I don't know if Tong had minded when he recounted it. He probably won't having seen more of life and able to shrug it off, even laugh alogn as just another facet of life. But to me, it would have taken a great deal to admit that all i had going for me was my height. It's the sae situatio you have, when admitting you are not equal to others. Inferior. Esp when you are of the same bloodline and differences are so vast. Applause for Tong here, people. *CALP CLAP CLAP CLAP! =D

I am guilty of boxing and labelling myself, still am. I am desperately afraid of failing the As, and would be tragically sad, heartbroken,dejected,desolate and despondent. Such simple adjectives. Means anything to you?

I sat in the lecture, wondering:
What is the point of saying all these, recognizing what and how Singapore's system is like, yet helpless to do anything much. Because tomorrow, I would wake up, struggling like mad to cram facts in unsuccessfully, going through all the shit stuff, all the while recognizing that boxes and labels are there because I willed them into existence, are there for me to break. But no instructions coming along with it.

It eluded us then, but that's no matter-to-morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther....And one fine morning---
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

Congratualations to have come so far. I doubt that you would have read so long. =P