Blog Prompt 31/3/2011

I think that age may or may not be the criteria which people look for in a candidate in the general election, depending on how one looks at it.

Personally, I think that age should not be the key trait voters should be looking out for in candidates in the coming general election. Most people would assume that young people are typically inexperienced while old people have tons of experience. However, this is not always true. Anyway, in my opinion I think that experience is not so important in managing Singapore. This is because the world is changing constantly, so in turn the situation in Singapore would also be changing constantly. Therefore experience would not come in very handy here. Instead, the leader of the nation would need to be able to adapt quickly to new circumstances. The leader of Singapore should also have a quick and clever mind to solve the problems quickly. Hence these are the traits I think that the leader of Singapore should have, but also not forgetting that the leader of Singapore should not be a newbie. He/she should at least be weathered and have seen the world, and have encountered some hardships or difficulties.

However, what the citizens think may be different from my opinion. Recently, the PAP promoted the youngest candidate, Tin Pei Ling, 27 years old. From then onwards, there has been an online buzz over here. A lot of people have been slamming and criticizing her, some netizens even bringing in her private life. I think that citizens mainly have 2 reasons against her. One is that because of her tender age, most citizens are probably older than her. Therefore, they may not like the idea of someone who is younger than them telling what to do. I think that this kind of thinking is wrong. I think that true, she has very little working experience, not even 10 years, and also should have just gotten her degree or whatever. However, she has been promoted by the PAP, and the leader of the PAP is none other than the old and wise Mr Lee Hsien Loong, and his older and wiser father, Lee Kuan Yew. So if the people respect and follow Lee Hsien Loong, they should also respect and follow Tim Pei Ling as she is also a representative of PM Lee and the PAP. The second main issue I think citizens have with Tin Pei Ling is that they probably think that she is too inexperienced to take up such a great responsibility of leading nation and do not have confidence in her abilities. This is true. What is more, there are also pictures of her in her Facebook account which shows her like any 27 year woman, taking pictures of herself posing beside her branded bag. This behaviour should be classified as being normal, but then again, Tin Pei Ling is not exactly normal. She is a PAP candidate who is supposedly readt to take over at the helm to lead Singapore into infinity and beyond. So on this point, I agree with the citizens of Singapore.

Picture Description

Today, we had to do a descriptive writing on a photograph taken by one of the world's most acclaimed photographers, Don McCullin.

BOOM!!! Me and my comrades dived toward all directions as the bomb exploded in front of us, a piece of shrapnel missing the tip of my nose by a mere millimeter. We took a hard tumble on the rock terrain, got up instantaneosly and continued our advance toward the enemy lines. A single bullet shot went off and one of my comrades tumbled to the ground, bright red blood spurting profusely from the wound. Blake, out sergeant, shouted, "Sniper in the trees, nine o'clock!!" He fired off a shot using his rifle. The leaves rustled in the tree. Another slug flew past my ear and buried itself in the sand. I whirled and fired all in one motion. There was a cry of pain, and a body dropped out of the tree, striking the ground with a resounding thud. Serves you right, I thought as we raced past his fallen frame.

Japanese soldiers came racing out of the thick fog. The first wave. Before they had a chance to respond, our rifles spoke and they were silenced, forever.

Silence followed suddenly. Blake motioned with his hand for us to crouch down, remain hidden.What's up with those accursed Japanese now, I thought, Just then, I thought I saw a massive shape appear within the fog. I rubbed my eyes and squinted. Then, my best mate, Nathan shrieked,"TANKS!!! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!!" Everyone scrambled to their feet and dove for cover, as a giant fireball erupted just where we where standing. I was fleeing for my life when Nathan caught my uniform and yanked me in another direction. "This way!!" he shouted. "Jump!!" I jumped, and a massive explosion sounded. We continued sprinting till we reached camp.

"Whew!! Thanks Nat, I owe you another one." I sighed with relief. "No problemo, matey. Just glad you're alive." What are friends for? I firmly believed in Nat's abilities and that we would live through this horrible war.

After a very short break, we grabbed our weapons, plus some anti-tank weapons, and headed out again. The tanks continued rolling towards us, raising up great clouds of dust. "Nathan, come here!!" I knelt down, balancing the anti-tank gun on my right shoulder. Nathan knelt down behind me. "30 degrees to your right, and FIRE!!" I pulled the trigger. A high-powered missile shot out, striking the tank. It went up in a immense fireball. I pumped my fist victoriously, but my celebration was cut short by Nat again pulling me away. I went down hard on the ground just as a slug got Nathan straight in the chest. The uniform stained a scarlet red. "NOOOO!" Arms flailing, Nat crashed to the ground, breathing heavily.

Nathan gazed at me, a wan smile on his face. "So, going to be my last battle, eh? Too bad... Well, it was great working with...you, Scotty..." He paused as a coughing fit took him over. He coughed so hard he actually coughed up blood and he clutched at his stomach in great agony. "Well, gotta go, Scotty. See ya later..." With that, his eyes closed and his head slumped to the side, blood slowly trickling from his mouth. I shook him violently. "NAT!! NAT!! WAKE UP, NAT, FOR GOSH SAKES!!" No answer. I screamed to the heavens. Well, if he could not make it to the end of this war, then I would not, too. And not because I could not. It was because I did not want to. I would die on this very battlefield.

Posh neighbourhood or tour bus carpark?

Recently, I have read a newspaper article entitled "Posh neighborhood or tour bus carpark?" in the Straits' Times, Wednesday 23 March 2011.

The article was about tourist buses parking along the roads of upmarket Draycott Park and Ardmore Park. The residents there are very fed-up with buses which pull up daily to park illegally in their neighborhood. The area is so crowded on weekends that it looks more like a temporary carpark for tour buses than a verdant, exclusive residential area just off Scotts Road.

The residents are making noise for a reason, and I will list the major ones here.

1. With so many huge buses just standing on the roadside, there is bound to be traffic obstruction which will surely frustrate any Singaporean, not only these unfortunate residents. Waiting in the car for who knows how long is surely very frustrating, especially when one is in a hurry to go somewhere.

2. These tour buses are waiting while their passengers shop and also waiting to pick up guests from Orchard Road for city tours. Of course, these waits will be quite long and therefore no bus driver, no matter how good teir education is, will be stupid enough to sweat profusely in this hot weather instead of letting the engine run to get that precious air-conditioning. Leaving the engine on in buses will result in the engine making booming, rumbling noises the whole time the bus is waiting there. And there is not only one bus there. Tens of tens of buses, all with their engines on!! Imagine the noise! How can one focus on doing schoolwork, work, housework or anything else?? No wonder even these civilized people are also making a scene.

3. The residents also complain of heaps of shopping bags, boxes and even broken suitcases left behind by inconsiderate tourists after the buses drive off. Who likes their posh neighborhood, where only loaded people live, looking more like the city dump?? Who likes tripping over stuff which should not be there?? Those broken suitcases aren't a pretty sight either and what's more, nobody wants them except for the rag-and-bone man.

I think that the people who should take the responsibility, not the blame here should be the bus drivers. They should not be parking their buses along the roads as these will cause a lot of inconvenience to others even if it benefits themselves. they should also try to caution tourists tactfully that they should not leave their unwanted items along the roadside. After all, tourism is a big industry and hence we should not chase them away by chiding them lest they get offended.

Blog Prompt 24/3/2011

The question for today was: Why, in your opinion, should we care about what happens in places far away from where we live in general? And also, whether or not we pay attention to event which happen recently and why we do or do not and what is the importance of doing that.

Yes, I do pay attention to events in other parts of the world. This is because I think that it is good to constantly update myself on the current events in the world i order to be well-informed and also because some, if not most current events would have an effect on me and those around me. There are so many examples of events, not necessarily occurring in Singapore, but still affecting her and her citizens, which includes me and my family.

One good example would be the global economic crisis in 2009. Many countries were affected, includingj powerhouse America, in which numerous banks folded. Singapore would ultimately still be affected becuase of its reliance on other countries. And so it was. Because America was affected, the currencies of many countries like Malaysia and Indonesia fell against the American currency. Singapore was among the least affected in Southeast Asia, with the Singaporean dollar dropping only around 20%. This might seem good, but in reality it meant that the labour costs of neighbouring countries were much lower than that of Singapore and therefore making them much more attractive to investors. To solve this problem, the Singapore government and also companies in Singapore began to retrench workers. And guess what?? My father got retrenched. I, in the end, was still affected.

This is why I think that keeping up with current events, becuase the world is constantly changing and things often happen unprecedented. Therefore, the earlier we know about evemts which might affect us, the more time we have to react to them.

Student Exchange to Brisbane, Australia

I have just returned from a trip to Brisbane in Queensland, Australia. It was a very memorable trip which lasted 8 days and was a real eye-opener for me in several ways. First of all, this was my first time taking a plane and it was a very exciting experience to me. At first, I thought, because of the influences from many of my friends, that I would surely be sick and want to retch. However, it was very normal and I did not feel sick in any way. Furthermore, there were miniature TV screens on the back of each seat. Therefore, we could watch movies on the screen on the back of the seat in front of us. So the flight was relaxing and enjoyable.

Secondly, the school which we were visiting, Citipointe Christian College, worked entirely differently compared to Hwa Chong Institution. Lessons started at 8.45 and ended at 3.20. The timetable went like this: One and a half hours of lessons, morning tea, one and a half hours of lessons, lunch, then lessons all the way until 3.20.

One thing which I noticed was that the school was very relaxed and did not emphasize on studies and degrees and good jobs even half that of Singapore schools. Instead, it emphasized on Christianity and free will i.e whatever the student wanted. I really envied the fact that they had no CCAs!! That was really sticking the knife in and twisting it. Why, the school ended at 3.20 and was nearly emptied by 3.45 while Hwa Chong ended school at 1.30 and was not even emptied by 5 because of all the CCAs!

I really enjoyed the homestay. The hosts were warm and very kind and made me and my homestay buddy, Brandon, feel very at home. They also had 2 young kids, Rachel and
Benjamin, who were in Primary 4 and 2 respectively. They were 2 really mischievous, sweet kids and we had tons on fun joining in their ridiculous games. The food there was really appropriate, appealing and suiting to our tastes and very quickly, I was really looking forward to meal-time.

Another thing which really changed was the sun. It was really bright around 6 in the morning, which naturally became the time we woke up, and set around 7, really early. I was shocked when I realized that the kids slept at 8.30 and the parents at 10!! 10 o'clock in Singapore was extremely early. An early night for me was sleeping at half-past 10 and my parents sleep around 1. Therefore, there was a real change in our sleeping schedules.

I also really enjoyed the excursions we had, to the Australian Outback, Zoo and Movie World which was a really great themepark with the theme of cartoons like Looney Tunes. I had so much fun there and I hope I can go back there again.