The Little Red Dot

There’s no place like home.

I’ve always held that phrase close to my heart. No, home doesn’t refer to what I come back to every day from school. It’s my country, the little city-state I was born and raised in, the place that has moulded me (and my accent) into who I am today.

There’s been many a time virtual strangers (mostly from FictionPress) asked where I’m from. I hide that fact at times but don’t when I feel like it (it’s a me issue), and it’s a veritable fact that ninety percent of said strangers ask if ‘Singapore’ is in China. A lot of us locals find that rather amusing, as do I. Just because the majority of us are Chinese doesn’t mean we have to be from China! But most of us have roots tracing from there. My own grandfather was a Chinese national who fled the Communist reign during World War II and ended up here. It’s probably lucky that he did, or he’d have remained in China with his wife instead of marrying my grandmother and having three sons with her, one of whom is my father. (It was dictated that he couldn’t return to his homeland or he’d risk death by the Communists.)

However, Singapore is nowhere near China geographically, nor in terms of size or population. We’re just a little red dot on the world map right below Malaysia, hence the nickname. A city in the US is probably bigger than us, never mind a state. It takes two hours by train to go from one end of the country to another. We’re more or less surrounded by water, but are protected from natural disasters from surrounding lands. Being a tropical country, we have four seasons: the hot and sunny season, the hot and wet season, the cold and wet season, and the shopping season. All of us speak a form of English unique only to us, also known as Singlish. It’s not uncommon to see signs written in four languages, a shopping mall every 5 minutes of travelling or so, and people dressed in shorts, a wife-beater and flip-flops in public. But all this doesn’t even begin to describe being a Singaporean. Frankly, there’s no beginning and end to it!

Singapore is a multi-racial country. Chinese are the dominant race, but Malays, Indians, Caucasians and other ethnic groups make up a large percentage of our population too. From young, we’re taught racial harmony – and yes, there’s even a Racial Harmony Day when we dress up in other races’ ethnic costumes in school and put on cheesy concerts. All of us start nursery school around age 3 or 4 properly ensconced with people from our own and other races. Public holidays are given in lieu of every religion particular (or not) to a certain race. Chinese New Year, Hari Raya, Deepavali, Good Friday, Vesak Day, you know it.

But under all that? Most of us like to rib other races, even our own. It’s a done thing. There’s no point in trying to be secretive about it. However, we all still maintain a certain amount of respect for each other – one of my best guy friends is Malay. It’s one of the things I think makes Singapore such a great place to live in. There are cultures to be learned, so many different people to meet, but you never get bored.

Because of our multi-cultural society, food here is well-known. Visit a hawker centre (a slightly less classy version of a food court) and there’s a yong tau foo (a sort of Chinese food) stall beside the drinks one. There’ll probably be a group of middle-aged men yelling over the football match showing on the mounted TV next to you, or people gazing at some corny Taiwanese drama. The people who take your drink orders shout your choices like bullhorns to the person manning the stall, instead of going over and telling them the proper way. My friends and I walk 10 minutes and have roti prata (an Indian food) at one in the morning. Breakfast can be porridge, nasi lemak (Malay dish), noodles or fish and chips, all available within one area. Fine dining, restaurants, fast food outlets, coffee shops, seedy food outlets, all in one country. In fact, there are so many choices, you don’t know what to choose half the time. Conversely, you’ve visited the hawker centre near where you live so much, you’re sick of it.

We don’t call it apartments too – instead, it’s HDB (Housing Development Board) flats. In a single block of flats, you can have a Malay neighbour above you, an Indian couple living next door and a Chinese family the other side of you. The first floor is actually the second because the ground floor’s the void deck, where people play chess or kick around a football even when there’s a sign prohibiting that. They hold funerals there on a semi-regular basis as well. (It’s not as creepy as it sounds…) Beside your flat is a condominium, complete with swimming pool and beefy security guards. Down the road, there’s a wet market, a shopping mall and a kiddie playground. It’s not a big deal – after all, Singapore’s too small for much leeway.

We’re urbanised to the point where it’s almost painful, but there are little things around that remind us of what we once were. We’re a relatively young country (43 years old this August), but there’s so much history before the day we were coined an independent state. As we were once a British colony, most of us still spell the British way, and our laws stem from English ones, so much so that our government rejects liberal democratic values as they are ‘too Western’. Before we rose to become what we are today, there was much to overcome (rapid population growth, lack of food and resources, etc). It’s what we accomplished that makes us so proud to call ourselves citizens of the 6th wealthiest country in the world in terms of GDP per capita!

When you take to the streets here, you’d probably find a bus stop at every street corner, an MRT (train) station in every ‘town’ and inflating cab fares everywhere. (Anyone knows not to take a cab after midnight here, not because of pervert cab drivers but because of the additional surcharge. That’s how we roll.) Public transport is the shizz here, no lie. My elder sister’s 24 this year but doesn’t have her driver’s licence, simply because she can live on public transport. All of us commute to school or work by that, all made simple by what we call the ‘ez-link card’, which carries an amount of money and is deducted when you tap it on a reader whenever you enter/exit an MRT station or a bus. Students get special ones, as well as senior citizens.

We’re well known for our train system (abbr: Mass Rapid Transit). Marathons are held during the rush hour at MRT stations – you can never find people who run that fast from one train to another. Trains are always packed to the brim around the Central Business District, but it doesn’t matter, people still try to squeeze in all the same. The seats are always taken. Everyone who has a sense of hearing can recite the warnings in English, Malay and Tamil broadcast to the whole station every minute or so, and make a parody of it during Sports Day in school. Flatscreen TVs show us the danger of terrorism and to take notice of suspicious packages below the seats in the train. (Who knows, we might be blown up because of it!) Eating or drinking in the trains is punishable up to a five hundred dollars fine, smoking costs a thousand little Rogers, and bringing flammable liquids in jacks it up to five thousand dollars. It says so on the signs in the MRT, no kidding! Durians are also not allowed, but you won’t be fined if you bring them on (that would be way strange). You always know when the next train will arrive due to the automated signboards, but 3 minutes usually means 1. It’s never a good choice to take it literally. You’re also more likely to meet a friend on it than going home to see your parents kiss.

However, whether in the train or the bus, most Singaporeans give up their seats for the elderly or the pregnant. (No, it’s not because there are signs reminding us to do so.) It’s one trait I think I’ll take to my grave, even if I end up moving overseas!

Shopping is the embodiment of Singapore. Orchard Road is our very own Times Square, for lack of a better analogy. Sales make us more excited than you can imagine. Singaporeans are notoriously stingy – saving even a dollar on necessities cheers us up. The Great Singapore Sale somewhere around June is what we all look forward to – and it’s the school holidays, thus the bigger attraction. We’re so big on shopping, we have Suntec City, VivoCity, Ngee Ann City… and they’re not actual cities.

School here is a pain in the ass. That’s probably an understatement. I bet if you’re Singaporean and reading this, you’ll know what I’m talking about! Perhaps it’s our competitive Asian streak, but from young, we’re all trained to be mental marathon runners - at least it feels like it. Most of us are at least bilingual. English is our first language, our mother tongue our 2nd. Primary school starts from age 6 or 7, ending at age 12 with the Primary School Leaving Examination, also known as PSLE. Depending on your grades in it, each student can select the secondary school they want to attend after the results are out.

There are schools known as SAP (Special Assistance Plan) Schools which accept the top 10 to 20 percent of students nationally in each cohort. I was in one, and it was painful having to slot metal buttons in place of the usual plastic ones on our uniform every day before school. Most of them were Chinese schools before modernisation, thus everyone who attends SAP schools are Chinese (and have the stupid metal buttons). Once we reach the end of Secondary 2, we need to sit a series of exams that determines what subjects we can take for the rest of secondary school. From then on, we prepare for the O Levels at the end of Secondary 4, also known as GCSEs to the British. Sec 4 is basically hell year for all students who don’t go through the Integrated Programme (IP), which allows you to skip O Levels and proceed directly to A Levels/IB exams in the second year of junior college, the stage after secondary school. Your O Level results determine which junior college, polytechnic or academic institute you go to next.

A lot of what we learn kills brain cells instead of enriching us. Curriculum here kicks ass in a very bad way. When we leave uni, everything’s thrown out of the window, but it’s a way of life – Singaporeans know how to work hard, and if you’ve survived what’s known as Project Work, KUDOS TO YOU!

Singapore loves campaigns. There’re campaigns everywhere. During election time, there are PAP and Worker’s Party (parties in the political system) banners all throughout the country, but everyone knows the PAP will be the reigning party again as they have been since we were independent so it doesn’t really matter. The government wants us to speak more Chinese, but wants us to stop speaking Singlish too. There are banners stating ‘When We Breed, You Bleed – Prevent Dengue Fever’ across the road from your usual bus stop. They also want Singaporean women to have more babies and reduce the risk of our aging population, stepping up maternity perks. Every single year, there’s a new one, and it just makes us all the more excited.

So, what is Singlish? It’s this fancy term that combines Singapore and English together in one word. Basically, we don’t speak standard English – it’s a mix of broken English, Hokkien (a Chinese dialect) words, and various other languages. ‘Cannot’ is a complete sentence by itself. Trufax. Common examples are ‘leh’, ‘lah’, ‘lor’ at the end of sentences, switching of ‘lend’ and ‘borrow’, and ‘he always like that one lah’ in place of ‘he always acts that way, don’t bother bringing it up anymore’. It’s true, English is our first language but we don’t speak it properly. Even though the government’s been trying to curb the habit, I doubt it’d really work!

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We ban chewing gum but smuggle them in from Malaysia/Thailand all the same – but after the ban was lifted, we still think it’s illegal.

It rains in the East but doesn’t in the West till 5 minutes later when the rain in the East has stopped.

Public libraries are so computerized, you can reserve a book without leaving your own home.

People go to the airport for fun, as compared to going to take a flight or welcoming somebody back home.

We call foreigners ‘ang mohs’ and hem and haw whenever somebody asks what language we speak at home.

It’s not ‘cell phone’ but ‘handphone’, and ‘sms’ instead of ‘text’.

Fairprice plastic bags are part and parcel of our lives.

The Merlion makes us snigger.

Our soccer team sucks more than when Britney Spears shaved her head.

We’ve grown so accustomed to seeing trees lining the streets that other countries’ ones look naked to us.

We leave tissue packets on chairs to ensure we have seats. People know not to occupy them then.

Every healthy 18-year-old male is sent to the army for 2 years of National Service, only after which they are free to attend uni.

The National Day Parade is the closest national grand event we can find. There’s a new National Day song every year, and somehow, it keeps getting cornier.

People camp over at a McDonald’s outlet, the library or assorted public places during exam time.

There’s always an off chance that the ice cream man at Raffles Place went to your school and hailed you because of your uniform.

When we won a silver medal in the recent Olympics, the whole nation went crazy.

We abbreviate about every single thing, like ERP (Electronic Road Pricing), ORD (Operationally Ready Date – used in the army), ECP (East Coast Park), PIE (Pans-Island Expressway), JAE (Joint Admission Exercise – after O Levels), COE (Certificate of Entitlement), etc… a whole lot more.

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All of that, and so much more, makes up Singapore.

Yep, this is home, truly.

A/N – Hey, y’all! I hope this gives more insight as to where I’m from, and to any Singaporeans reading this, do shout out to me! I’d love to see how many more locals are on FP. And COME HERE FOR VACATION, all you others. No, kidding :p I wrote this in a blur because it’s 5.30 in the morning here and I’m really supposed to be sleeping (I have a fevah), but for some weird reason, I can’t seem to. There was a topic discussing what you’d miss about Singapore if you had to leave in my O Level English essay exam last year, so I thought I’d use the opportunity to share what wackiness my country is made up of. Other than this, I’m still on hiatus. Check my LJ for updates!

Don’t play play like me lah.

:D

-Louisa

P.S. Sorry darlings, my typo for how old Singapore is was horrible. Eek.