A Singaporean In Australia

Wrestling the Internet away from civil servants in the name of security, outlawing the people for voicing opinions that reeks of the burning of books in ancient times, installing thousands of survilence cameras and a GPS monitoring sytem. With propaganda towers, "national education" and an impermeable network of cronies stoutly set up over the years, are these really necessary? With almost no channel of peaceful protest left for the people, why would you be surprised to hear someone declaring, "People support CPF cuts because there are no protests outside the parliament (which was made illegal)." Perhaps some people cannot sleep well at night after all, living a cursed life of insecurities, too cowardly to step up a ring without having the opponent's hands cuffed first.

Tough times breed strong people. Strong people make good times. Good times breed weak people. Weak people make tough times. No dynasty can deviate far from this lifecycle. We had our tough times and we had a group of good people who slogged to bring on the good times. Here we are at the 3rd stage of the life cycle. The signs are everywhere. A weak leader who has created a system of aristocracy and injustice for the commoners. A band of weak lieutenants hiding behind their aegis of inaccountability. A cancer of cronies. The strong bullying the weak with law. The sharp increase in youth suicides. The elites taxing everyone but themselves through creative taxation. A population without the ability to see beyond the cloak of materialism.

How long this stage will last is anyone's guess. It can take decades or happen overnight to a scandal big enough to take us down. For now, we have the money to burn as firewood, as the weak breeds and dance around the campfire. The population ponzi is fueling our coffers. It should cover gaps for another good two decades. However, the times where the elites start to craft policies without the welfare of the people in their minds are already upon us. Things will go on an inevitable downward projectile from here.

******

There may be some aspects of a quitter that many do not know about. A quitter is either a grower or a builder. Both recognises the resources and conditions he needs to grow or build. A peasant finds a plot of land in a faraway place to grow more pots of gold, quietly in solitude while his old pals laugh at his foolishness. Another peasant builds his tiny empire, striving to conquer the three properties he attains before turning 40, fully owning them in his lifetime he plans to try.

A grower and builder knows the third stage is not a stage to stay to fight. When all forms of non-violent resistance is eventually removed, it'll leave violent revolution the only option left. If a leader is not wise enough to understand this, the 4th stage forthcoming is inevitable. When tough times eventually come, the builders and growers will return. New ones will pop up like mushrooms, emulating them, building strength yet again.

They propagated lies about the wonders of stress and have a whole nation believing in it. Stress, they say, is good for progress. It drives one to greater heights. Parents take it all in, hook, line and sinker. They try turning their kids to spinning ballerinas, spell casting mathematics wizards. They jump or turn loony. The survivors die at 25 but only cremated at 85, spending their time spreading their zombie-like affliction in the middle, echoing propaganda messages of plague.

Stress is merely a common factor of cancer. If you are regular recipient of stress at a level you cannot handle, say hello to cancer. Go talk to any cancer patient and ask if they have suffered from extreme stress in some periods of their lives. Only with passion, stress can be processed into a useful by-product in the form of challenge, determination and perseverance. Without passion, unnecessary stress can never be good for any young child, who is ill-equipped to handle it. I have not seen a single successful person who reached the pinnacle of his or her field based on dealing with stress alone. What drives Buffet on is not being the richest man on earth but the thrill of getting his bets right. Soros thrives on the motivation derived from his trauma when his family lost everything from wealth to identity, in order to survive the Nazis.

Joseph Schooling's recent rise to being the King of Butterfly is a product of his innate passion. According to his father, there was an episode when his 8 years old son woke him up at 4 am in the morning, asking to go for his swimming practice. Imagine the opposite, where the older Schooling tried pushing his son to be a future swimming star, who did not have the passion and interest in the project. Will he have became a champion Olympian? If Joseph Schooling has been fueled by his relentless passion in the past, he probably have to handle the real stress now.

His bandwagon is growing at an incredible rate, filling up with toxic balls of white thrash, I'm not sure if donating a few Toyota Hiluxes to him is enough to handle it. You would think the best reward for Schooling's gold medal effort is wiring him one million bucks before sending his girlfriend to his hotel room but no, he had to pose for pictures with glory snatchers, SIA girls and whatnot. After training like crazy for more than a decade and now to deal with this shit, if I'm Joseph Schooling, I'll think twice about winning in future. That must be the hardest way to win a million bucks. No wonder parents are turning their kids into spinning ballerinas, spell casting mathematics wizards. Better to sleep in Parliament than to swim your guts out only having to take obligated pictures selfies with glory hunting scum.

Only 30km west of Busselton, there lies a place called Yallingup, an aboriginal name that means "Place of Love". For me though, Busselton is the place of love.

Returning to Busselton again to walk along its jetty was my personal highlight of our trip. It was the only instance I didn't care if my visitors want it or not. The wife's decision to remain in the car also did not deter me. The past two returns have been disappointing. The first time was foiled by a stormy weather. They were doing renovations (after collecting enough donations) the 2nd time. This time round, stormy weather once again, threatened my opportunity to walk Busselton Jetty. It was pouring rain by the buckets when we were approaching the City of Busselton. My heart sank a little.

The weather spared us a little mercy and stopped the rain once we entered the heart of the town. The car park was waterlogged. Jen decided to stay in the car to feed puipui after hearing the howl of the wind outside. I, too, was a little hesitant but my yearning returned after little Albany rang out, "I want to go, I want to go!" So I dragged my guests along with me and told them we were in for a long walk. We paid the entry fee and started ......

It was in 2007 when I first saw this magnificent 1.98 km long jetty. It was my first ever trip to Australia and Perth to visit Jen who was doing her master degree program in Perth. Back then we were still, in her own words recently, "not a thing." Perhaps Busselton Jetty was the place our thing began slowly then. On a much bigger scale, it was the place I fell in love with Perth. The conditions were so suspiciously perfect that day, it almost felt like a scam. It was a clear sunny day. The sky was blue and the sea mirrored a brilliant deep blue across the entire horizon. There was not a single ship or boat in sight to break the picture of nature. The only thing that stood out was the endless jetty in front of me.

The kilometres of lush green grass abutting the shore looked inviting. I threw myself on a patch and laid down flat with limbs spread out with my lunchbox chucked aside a few steps from me, temporarily forgotten. There was no ants or whatsoever on the grass to give me a nasty surprise. The temperature was a comfortable low 20 degrees Celsius, rendering the grass so cool I shut my eyes to soak it all in. When I opened my eyes, the cloudless sky looked like an endless blue disc. I remembered thinking, "If only I live here." Sometimes, the insignificant things in life are the truly important ones.

So it was time to walk through the jetty. There was a pot placed at the entrance urging for donations from the public. They planned to put a working train back on the jetty, to give tourists rides to the end of the jetty in future. That was new to me. Imagine getting your neighbours to do a fund raising to build your covered linkway. We have reached a state where we are unable to do anything for ourselves in Singapore, regardless how simple or trivial and whine like bitches when the government doesn't help. I donated a coin and walked.

And we walked, and walked, and walked.

When we were halfway through, I turned to look back. It felt amazing to be so far away from shore, yet still walking on land. On my flanks, was calm limitless ocean. Being a city bumpkin, I was in awe how the second part of the jetty without any railing on one side, something that I would never see anywhere in Singapore. Anyone can easily fall off playing Pokemon Go or if a strong gust of wind suddenly come. I was beginning to understand how the term "Uniquely Singapore" came about. Every single thing in Singapore is under control by an authority down to a last screw. Even a rustic place in Singapore is manicured for the purpose. Every risk is assessed and patched. Mind you, that is not a bad thing for many. To them, it is the DNA of a paradise. To a handful of small minority like me, it was suffocating. It was easy for me to easily fall in love with a place like Australia (and probably many other countries) where they tend to leave things - and people - alone as much as possible.

I saw locals fishing. There was a large octopus-looking thing chucked on the jetty, so transparent that I could see the back of its tennis ball sized eyeballs. Then I heard a kid yell, "Whale! Whaaaaaale!!" as he dashed past me. When an event roused even the locals, you knew it was something special. That was how I got my first and only whale sighting to date. The whale was cruising along some distance out but near enough for us to see the corals on its body, as well as random seaweed being stuck here and there. I felt silly as I realised it was never going to be as smooth as what we see in the books. The whale did not disappoint when it exhaled, resulting in a magnificent spout with a clearly audible hiss.

The walk with Tucky and Louise was nowhere as spectacular as my first. For a start, the skies were grey, with a storm threatening to overcome us in a distance. The ocean was rougher and understandably greyer we well. The ground was wet and it was quite windy. That didn't damp my guests' spirit, especially when Albany's excitement was contagious. We saw some seagulls along the way, roosting on some wooden logs. Some were trying to hatch their eggs. The couple posed for selfies as Albany dragged me along. Louise was a fantastic photographer and granted me one scene that I would never want to forget for life.

We made it back before the storm came. On the way out, we heard the receptionist tell a tourist, "We are expecting an electrical storm soon, would you still want to try your luck?" In Singapore, you'll probably get a, "Bad weather. No enter," instead. One place allows you to think, the other expects you to do as they said. Makes me wonder how it would have turn out if they told a certain Singaporean boy to, "Serve NS, no swimming," and he conformed.

I'll like to return to this place again soon. The Place of Love.

Who's coming along this time?

I knew the answer because Judy could finish asking Tucky if he ever considered moving to Australia and he said, "No,"' and added, "Everywhere also got different set of problems."

Tucky was right. One of the problem of moving to Australia for me is that I have to cope living apart with my family and friends like him. For some, it meant giving up on a glittering career or an established business network to start from zero and so on..... Many migrants didn't even end up scaling back to where they last stopped even after spending many years in their adopted countries. You win some, you lose some, you end up about the same. So why move?

One of the main reasons why Tucky has been one of my best buddies all these years is that he always possess some kind of zen-like wisdom since we were young. Other than the obvious common interests such as football and gaming etc. that brought us together, this is one of the traits that I enjoy and learn from him. Tucky has his views of the world but he'll never impose them on anyone. Neither will he allow yours to change his. That is something I found frustrating about him in the early years but realised much later on that it is something I have been subconsciously emulating. Someday, I shall become the Master of I don't give a fuck like Tucky. Slow but surely.

I can't say I disagree how he put things down in general in terms of migration. In fact, these days, I am more reluctant to encourage Singaporeans to move out because of their wrong expectations right from start. You will be surprised how many Singaporeans are unwilling to do trade-offs like the others before them with the new "I win all" mentality. There is no such thing in the world, even if you are clown prince of lion land. The moment you have this mentality, you have already lost. So how do you win all then?

When I heard what Tucky said, I did not say a word but a lot went through my mind. Having made the move to Perth, I don't see things the same way. On the surface, regardless of where I go, I face the same painful cycle of life, run the same rat race, face the same global warming and dance to the tune of the same group of politicians fucktards. It is still the same old shit, no? No.

Things are and cannot be the same for two consecutive moments. I don't believe in the constant state of things, or the delusion of security or stability. Even if a coin flips an incredible 99 consecutive times on head, I will still insist the chance that tails will appear on the next flip is 50% and wouldn't bet my life fortune on head. This is a weakest of human beings. When things become so predictable, we become so cocksure that the future will turn out the way it is obvious to. When I was healthy, I never saw there would be a day I would be diagnosed with bladder cancer. After a successful surgery, the impermanence of life thought me never to assume cancer will never return to haunt me again. I am losing some sleep over the medical review the end of next week.

It also taught me that one can be happy no matter where he or she is. Theoretically. It is definitely possible, even easy, to be happy living in Singapore. You know, by being grateful to being born there, having food to eat, not being blasted to dust by terrorists before I lose my virginity, the presence of Lee Bee Wah and other great things by soaking up in blissful ignorance. Even as one who cannot unsee what I saw, I can still choose to be happy by assuring myself that the impermanence of life is definite and even fortresses of oppressive political regimes can fall to it; by valuing every moment and all the precious things I still have around me, like my family and friends like Tucky.

The above is hypothetically possible. However, there is also a good chance I am probably dead by cancer by now if I never left - and would never see the impermanence of life the way I see it today.

Since I am already here in Perth, it is quite clear to me I am able to turn the wheel of life in easy mode. I am not talking about jobs, opportunities, income or cars here. I am talking about the art of mindful living. The availability of space grants me peace and calm by shielding me from what I hate most - random human beings. I will probably die before I can overcome this hate. I am trying but I am no saint. At least I admit my weaknesses all the time, proudly, and I am constantly trying to battle them. How many are you are doing that? So, don't snide because I express my strengths either. The opportunity to be a master of time here in order to take care of my health, my loved ones and everything I cherish, living or not. The better control of time is a gift to minimise suffering or even change some into joy.

With better access to time and space, I think it is difficult to argue all things are the same - for now. As I said, no two consecutive moments are the same. That is why I am still blogging. To observe how today differs from the day before. If I die here today, at least my last breathe is still fresher.

When Jen sent Tucky and wife to the airport, Albany decided to tag along because she had grown so much into them over the past week. So I was left alone in the house with Puipui, who was asleep in his cot. When I emerged from the computer nook to get a drink, the house felt so quiet on a Thursday afternoon that I could hear an unfamiliar ring in my ears. For the first time, I felt a tinge of loneliness overcoming me.

At some point before their arrival, I was unsure at how hosting them for a week would turn out. It was more about how they felt, not me. It was after all, their holiday but for me, it was my everyday life. I had to decide on an equilibrium where that it wouldn't be too boring for them and not too exerting on ourselves. Moving around with the whole village could be quite taxing. The road trip turned out pretty well, despite the rain. I didn't ask them how they felt about the trip in the end. Perhaps there was a slice of fear somewhere to hear it was actually shit and they wouldn't think of coming back again in future. I guessed I couldn't do much about it either way by that time so it was pointless to ask.

For myself, their visit turned out much better than I expected. I got to know Tucky's wife, Louise better. I always knew Louise was a super catch for a wife and I told Tucky so during the eve of their wedding when I flew back to Singapore to attend. It was a gut feel then as I didn't know her that well but after spending a week, living, eating and travelling together, my gut feel was confirmed. She was easy-going, humorous, put on no airs, knowledgeable, cooked well and was good with kids. Almost as good as my wife. My buddy got a rare catch, one far better than anything he can catch in Pokemon Go. I am very happy for him. Even better, our wives get along very well and they seem to love my kids. It is quite a shame we couldn't spend a longer time together for the road trip.

Let's see if life gives another chance.

If you want to read about our trip and the lame shit we did, let me know and maybe I'll tell ya when I have nothing better to do.

They say there are some things you can only learn in a storm, such as figuring out who truly cares for you - since anyone can love you on a sunny day. Wrong. A wise one can learn the same on a regular sunny day too. However it isn't as easy as it seems because things are never as obvious one would prefer. The only thing that is clear - nobody actually wants you to succeed. In any highly competitive society, the tall poppy syndrome is a given. The toxicity in such a collective mentality yields afflicted zombies more terrifying than any Pokemon Go hordes you may face off on the streets lately.

These abominations are unable to differentiate between public and private, work and personal. Their hearts are hollow and minds are washed beyond hope. So you come across people who secretly celebrate when you break off with your hot girlfriend or people who punch trees in the dark corners of Labrador Park after hearing about your double promotion at work. The scariest thing about these walking afflicted is, they learn to wear a mask of your friend's face. Identifying them proves near impossible for the untrained. For those who will be genuinely happy for you when you succeed are usually those who have always loved you through the darker times.

What makes it difficult to sieve through the hollowmen is that the afflicted are among those who loved you when you were not a success, because you were not a success. They tend to be the ones who will remind you most how much they care about you and what they did for you in the past, whereas those who truly love you would do it silently, while you are asleep, weak and sick - almost escaping your notice each time. So open up your eyes, gentlemen, to see who loves your heart and who can't wait to put a dagger through it.

On a similar note, not all who walk through the storm with you are friends. For some are sharing your woes and the others, will give anything to frolic in your pool of misery. Be it a stormy or sunny day, we tend to be too distracted to observe the ones keeping a watchful eye over you and those who hide in the shadows, wearing the mask of your friend, constantly plotting to outdo you in every competition you didn't choose to participate in, laughing at your blunders, celebrating moral victories as hollow as their hearts.

If you don't see, you bear no blame. For one can only see from afar, with absolute clarity of the mind.

Once in a while when I have nothing better to do I will do a short review on one of the biggest factor behind my decision to leave Singapore - population growth. It is probably unimportant to most and I don't expect many to share my views. I had guests over the weekend and there was mention of the possibility of returning to Singapore during the conversation. After living almost 5 years in Perth (and over 3 decades in Singapore), it gave me a clearer perspective about living in both countries.

I wouldn't have the opportunity for the eagle-eye view if I didn't take the chance to give myself a year or two by doing on a trip of self-discovery. My wife was pregnant and we were both flat tired at our work and lifestyles. We got our Australian PRs which gave us the eligibility to live and work in Australia. So I thought it would be a good idea to go on this trip to recharge our soul batteries. I tried to learn as much as I can about Perth over the last 5 years. There are still much more to learn, so much imperfections to pick on. I can probably write a book on it.

The long and the short of it, I found that there is something about living in a place like Singapore that just isn't for me. I always had some sort of an incurable disease that make me allergic to everything in the city. The queues for virtually anything, the rush to buy-out 5039 4D tickets, zerging at Hougang, sending kids for heavy tuition just to "stay average", the culture of everyone doing anything that everybody is doing everywhere. The noisy, the buzz, the lights are just too much for me to take. I don't think any of my friends or even my family take me seriously when I tell them that. Perhaps a few of them may even think I was trying to be funny. I don't blame them. You probably think the same for that dyslexic kid who can't spell.

The last time I checked, Singapore remains at 700 plus square kilometres and nothing in the URA Masterplan for the next 30 years suggest that there will be a significant increase in land mass by reclamation or invasion. However, 6.9 million population projection (remember, it is not a target), is still progressing really well. By the end of 2016, Singapore's population will be expected to reach a projected figure of 5,775,626.

5,775,626 at the end of 2016

That is:

144 live births average per day

70 deaths average per day
231 immigrants average per day

Some of my friends living in Singapore still think the figure is around 5 million or so today.

At this rate, Singapore's population will definitely hit 6 million before the end of year 2020, which is only 3 years and 4 months away lest you didn't notice. The 6.9 million population projection (and not target) would be reality before the turn of the next decade. Of course that is not the target, they are definitely gunning for something more horrendous, like 10 million.

We already have some human congestion cases happening this year. As sure as someone's death is going to be directly caused by playing Pokemon Go, we are just a royal cock up away from a human crush disaster of Hillsborough's scale. With the way things are being handled around Singapore these days, I won't bet a dime against it.

Peace and security doesn't necessarily mean safety.

These are the type of conditions that prompted many friends to claim that having a car in Singapore is a "necessity". You wouldn't relish dragging your 3 kids along in that MRT crowd shown in the picture above, would you? Or your heavily pregnant wife. Every working day. Fair enough, I will give it to them but it also prove my point. There are too many pre-requisites to live a life in Singapore. It comes to a point no having children, travelling light all the time and getting out of Singapore for the annual holiday trip is a good living model until we get shipped to JB to die one day. The alternative is lifelong debt servicing, getting your kids through the tuition grind, chronic stress and bad sleep. With or without Marilyn.

It is a common knowledge that Singaporeans thought that way of their own kind who left our sunny shores to venture into the wild world out there. So I am not surprised to read this online once again. I would assume the third-rated country mentioned to be Australia, since it is the country with most overseas Singaporeans today. That makes me one of the weak-willed. The title characters limit prevented me from putting the full statement. In full, it reads the "disgruntled and the weak-willed flee to third-rate countries and get treated like dirt by the ang mohs there."

I do not know if the writer bothered to slot in a snide remark for his National Day wish list. To be honest, if I were a sandwiched elite in Singapore like him, Singaporeans trickling out of Singapore wouldn't bother me so much, especially if I see them as "weak-willed." You would imagine the pleasure of a manicured garden without a single trace of weeds. Oddly enough, something about Singaporeans leaving seem to gets on the nerves of these successful people for them to bring it up often in their public outbursts. Perhaps, one needs a bigger pool of lesser people around him to feel he has achieved something in life.

The notion of "weak-willed" has probably something to do with how Goh Chok Tong labelled Singaporeans who left as "quitters". It has since been stamped permanently into the DNA of Singaporeans. If you leave, you are weak. For a population who knows nothing but to win, almost at all cost, all the time, it was a cost-effective method to keep the cogs from spinning out of place. I am not going to argue on the validity of such a label. Anyone with any speck of common sense will know to uproot and settle elsewhere requires a lot of courage, especially if his financial resources is very limited.. That isn't what I think an ingredient I will find in weak-willed people. Besides, there must be something very wrong with Singapore if it required individuals to be "strong-willed" to remain there, if that makes any sense to you.

It really depends at which level are you looking at the matter. If you are a doctor, for example, working in Singapore, you would think it is foolish for your nurses to migrate to a country like Australia. For the nurses, it makes perfect sense to be treated like colleagues by the doctors they work with in Australia than to be treated like maids by those in Singapore. Likewise, a Singaporean nurse will think it is foolish for a doctor to migrate to Australia because it means he will all that prestige he enjoys in Singapore and suffer probable financial and career opportunity costs. If you know where you stand on both sides, you will have a good understanding which side actually treats you like dirt. I am not the least surprise to read myopic views on this as well as people justifying their staying in Singapore.

So how can Singapore prevent the "weak-willed" to flee to third-rated countries to be treated like dirt by the ang mos?

Do not give a fuck

Why would you even bother to pretend you care whether Singaporeans who left get treated badly overseas unless you are secretly gloating over your deluded fantasy? It is wise and best to not give a fuck and celebrate your own success by bathing in lard.

Be third-rated

If being third-rated attracts the "weak-willed", nobody will be leaving. So be third-rated. Or even better, fourth rated.

Treat the "weak-willed" like dirt

On hindsight, it is important to treat "weak-willed" Singaporeans badly in order to retain these quitters, since it is now known they relish bad treatment. It is not too late to do that now and reverse how well the Singapore government has been treating average Singaporeans.

Import more ang mos to Singapore

The "strong-willed" will relish the challenge, the "weak-willed" will adore their masters. Win-win situation.

Past Rants