Thank god my blog doesn't keep breaking down the way Quet's does.... although I have to admit, her new blog does look pretty damn cool.... NVM... wait for this one to get the hang of her webdesigning once n for all... hee.... :p

Anyway, anyone read my previous rant on the low birth rates in Singapore? Well, if you see today's Straits Times, there's a little graph there with a line that's shooting all the way to the bottom. Yes that's our birth rates. We need at least 50,000 births to sustain our country's needs, but last way, there were only 40,864 births. ( Wonder if there was something unauspicious about that way. Would explain it a bit. Our country planners could try asking the geomancers for advice instead )

And remember why I said this was the case? Cause everyone was subliminally conditioned into thinking about money first? The paper states that "The poor economy this year probably contributed to the drought, as couples tend to put off having chidren until they think they can afford to." and Ms Tan Yen Nee, 24, says: "We can't expect a decent standard of living with a child. We've got our housing loan and we're saving up for a car."

What this means is that this Ms Tan actually feels that having a decent standard of living, [whatever that may be to her. 5room? Maisonette? Condo?] and a car is currently higher on her family's priority list than having a child is. Could we infer from this also that her material needs come before her maternal ones?

Admittedly, I am utterly blur about Ms Tan's income and her husband's income and her reasons for not wanting a kid at this point of time. [in response to Kairos' comment, this is why I can't write into the forum, cos I'll get totally blasted to bits by other less open-minded souls.] But I really have to question if she's that poor that she can't even fulfil the 2nd level of Maslow's hierarchy. I also have to question what she means exactly by "decent". My parents, at the time that I was born, didn't even have a house of their own. And even after getting a house, they managed to sustain 2 kids at the same time, at a "decent" standard of living, meaning we had food to eat and clothes to wear and a car for Daddy to drive his ungrateful kids off to school.

Better economy then? Simpler way of life? I don't know. ANd the govt's measures aren't helping. Supposedly the gahmen has this entire basket of subsidies and rebates given out to families for their 2nd and 3rd child, so all these should help financially right?

Once again, nipping the symptom, but not the disease. If you look carefully at the stuff they offer, the bulk of the offers come in the form of cash, rebates, subsidies, with the exception being the extended maternity leave. Do they think that just by throwing money at us, we'd be immediately inspired to procreate? ( Hey honey, forget the Pill. Let's just do it and get the cash! )

Yoo-hoo, Mr Gahmen, if we have all those kids you want us to have, how'd you like to take care of them for us? Here's a great plan: You can keep the money, ( Which will only minimally sustain us for the first 6 years of the kid's life, and hereby saving them from paying for the time in the kid's life which gets really expensive ) and take care of our kids for us instead! Open up the Istana every Mon - Fri from 7am to 7pm and turn it into a giant nursery house! With all that space, I'm sure you have enough room for at least 40,000 babies and toddlers. And with the national guards, we sure don't have to worry about security now, do we? Maybe if we did that, you'd have a slight inkling of just what a DAMN HECK OF A TROUBLE it is to raise a kid!

And all that's just when they are toddlers! What happens when they go to Pri Sch? Meet other kids? Meet bullies? Get picked on? Can't do their homework? Can't understand Chinese? Need tutors, cos we, their parents, don't get Chinese as well? Go to Sec Sch? The Os? Get into JC? Meet members of the opposite sex in a co-ed environment ( some, for the first time ) at the most hormonally charged stage of their lives? The As? Uni? Graduation? All this is a freakin' 20-odd year process, of which the gahmen is only helping for the first 6 and then you're on your own! Good luck and try not to trip on the way to nursery school!

Whoever's in charge of this birth rate problem, pls come up with some new measures that'll actually help. We need our CPF. We need shorter work weeks. We need longer maternity. We need more family-friendly measures in the work place. We need bosses that don't see us as asset machinery that lives to work for the corporation alone. And we can't have all this, until you make the right moves in the right direction. If all you can think of is the monetary side, then that's all we, the citizens, are gonna focus on. And we're just gonna end up paying ( No pun intended ) for all this while you sit in your pretty little house with the damn huge golf course and wonder why we're not having more babies.

If you haven't seen the article, [or don't subscribe to Straits Times, hint hint wink wink tsk tsk], here is the link:
Singapore Sees Lowest Birth Rate in 26 years

It's Official: My exam dates come back on the 19th, so on that date, I can see if I have to continue worrying about getting a job, or worry about seeing my damn lecturers again next sem. My sole comfort is that I don't have to agonize over it over Xmas.....

For the NUS students:
Exam Results Hell Day

Wah Freakin' Lau
Once again I'm stuck deep in HTML mess because I glibly agreed to do SJ's website for her. Talk abt shooting myself in the foot, I think I kicked myself in the arse as well. Bleah. At least this time it ain't so bad, cos I've finally discovered the wonders of Dreamweaver 4.

[angels above: Hallelujah. come to think of it, has anyone ever wondered why we pronounce it "ha-ley-lu-IAH" when's spelt with a J? Hee...]

Now the only thing left is to figure how to get a form online.... urgh.... more trips to the library....... n more javascript madness........ will publish the site on this blog when it's done, cos right now, it's so under construction, it's liable to collapse anytime. [and we sure won't want you to walk around the site with yellow helmuts. Not to mention how incredibly stupid you'd look wearing a yellow helmut in your own house]

Also got a new tuition job, [FINALLY!!!] teaching in Geylang east of all places. The place is abt half an hour's MRT ride from my place, and the pay is less, but I'm despo so who's complaining? The kid is pri 6 come the new school year, and I'm teaching English only. At least there's a library near their place for me to hang out if I reach their area early.....

Watched LXG and Nemo FINALLY! Good movies, though LXG is kinda mindless hollywood entertainment. Animation in Nemo: Fantastic. Kudos.

We Don't Want Kids...Unless they pay their own way
And currently on the News as I hear it, Singapore experiences its lowest birth rate, despite Govt. baby bonus. Like, DUH! With all the education, tuition and other unsavoury influences to worry about, why the heck would I want to raise a child in Singapore and subject him to the same shit that I went through? Why, he could grow up learning Hokkien expletives, be an utter disgrace in Chinese, turn nigh-suicidal from the homework at school, turn into an overly-pragmatic, materialistic, money-grabbing glob [for lack of a better word] and *gasp* vote PAP and wear white his whole life. [while this might mean he could go to RI....]

Ok, forget about the above paragraph. I have nothing against the PAP or RI, so don't blast my mail or my blog. But frankly, there's very little in our society and culture today that's actually helping the birth rate right now. In Europe, they have paternity leave and maternity leave that's way, way longer than ours, and not to mention the shorter work weeks. On the other hand, you have our gahmen, CUTTING CPF, RAISING GST, in order to become more COST competitive with China, and urging us to not be so PICKY in jobs and TAKE what you can while you can..... I have to ask: why are they wondering why we're not having babies? Because it's not COST-EFFECTIVE anymore!

To put it into crudely concrete terms, a child is a money-losing investment these days. You pay for all those years of raising a kid and in the end, when you've drained all your CPF seeing him grow up, he's off making his own millions and leaving you in an old folks' home. [unless you had the foresight to instil a strong sense of filial piety in him] While I doubt that most people think in such monetary terms when it comes to kids, I believe with all the COST, COST and COST being mentioned in the papers today, our gahmen has managed to subliminally condition us into thinking about MONEY, MONEY and MONEY all the time. There are plenty of examples of this. When they ran an article on why service was so lousy in Singapore, they found out it was because we put price and quality over service. Look at the crowds at the Robinson's Sales. And when something is being given out free, you can bet there'll be a queue of people, whether it be free food or free bras.

Everything we do in our lives revolves around money, and how to maximise the money we already. When you've led entire generations to think this way, what makes you think we're gonna have babies? Because frankly, unless you have a really strong sense of parenthood, [not to mention god-like patience and self-sacrifice] you're not really likely to have a kid at all. With the pay we're getting, and the CPF cuts, our generation will be lucky if we can even save up enough cash for retirement if we're SINGLE. What about when we're married? What about when we have kids? If we ourselves are struggling just to earn enough for ourselves, how the heck are we gonna afford kids? The gahmen was so worried about us losing out to China, they forgot to worry about us losing out ourselves. [gee, did that last sentence make sense?]

The gahmen had better think real good about their long term plans for Singapore.

In the name of literary balance, I'm gonna write something light-hearted to compensate for the heaviness below, so here's:

Love Actually Is All Around

I finally caught Love Actually and kudos and credits to Quet for getting the tix at half price. [ha! Nyah nyah to the rest of you!]

NOte about this show: This is definitely something to catch if you have a bf/gf as a companion. Richard Curtis, who also created Bridget Jones' Diary, 4 Weddings, and Notting Hill, produced (I think he produced.... I think) this romantic comedy revolving around these couples who are loosely related. The relationships are something like:

The PM of Britain falls in love with Natalie, and his sister is
Karen is married to Harry, who's attracted to his secretary. Working in Harry's office is Sarah, in love with Carl, hot latin hunk.
Karen is also friends with Daniel, who's stepson is in love with a girl at sch, and Daniel is friends with
Jamie, who's in love with his Portuguese housekeeper, though they don't understand each other linguistically.
Jamie is friends with Mark, who loves his best friend's new bride.

Out of the whole sequence, seemingly, is Colin, self-proclaimed sex god who flies to US for a shag, cos he's convinced that all American girls think British men are hot. And Billy Mack, whose Xmas spoof on Love Is All Around beats Blue's single to become the top single for xmas. [his single is played in snippets throughout the entire show]

V.funny show, though the British slang and accent may mean that you might miss a few jokes. Also amazing is how they managed to sew in the stories of so many disparate characters and yet not make it confusing to watch. [hint to all: don't think about the relationships between the characters. just concentrate on the love that is all around.] Not too many love cliches also, thankfully, but then again, isn't love in the movies a kinda cliche already? The difference is that here, this movie seems to say, "Yea, I'm about love, so what about it? Sod off, mate"

Fluffy, comfy movie. Watching it at xmas is kinda like curling up in front of the fire in a pile of blankets and a mug of hot chocolate and marshmallows. :) Gives you that warm, cosy feeling. [or maybe it was 'cos I was wrapped up in my shawl throughout the whole movie.]

For more pro reviews, check out:
IMDB
The Official Site [ Might take a while to load ]
and for a more balanced view,
Rotten Tomatoes

Can't stand my parents
damn damn DAMN once again I type in a whole chunk of stuff and when I leave to answer a call, the blogger server kicks me out and now I've to rewrite everything. damn damn DAMN!

Ok, as much as I can remember I was griping about my parental units. [i coined that phrase with the slayer] I started off with: My parents have been pushing for me to work in the same place that my cousin does, 'cos they say some money's better than just sitting at home. Downside: My cousin sorts and delivers mail at $5 an hour. That is one damn lot bunch of peanuts.

Q: If I decline this seemingly-generous offer, am I being the picky graduate that everyone picks on in the papers?

The problem with our parents is that they grew up in a totally different environment, with a totally different and narrow perspective, and somehow, they think this infuses with the wisdom of the ages and that it is their sublime and holy duty to make us that us, their offspring, follow their wisdom, otherwise all manner of disaster and mayhem will befall us. This is the problem with my units. From primary One they've been telling me to do things the way they like, only that now that I'm older and obviously have a thinking mind of my own, it's a bit harder for them to do that. Then to them, I become selfish, materialistic, picky and snobbish.

[i'm now posting this para by para so that I don't lose anything]

I missed a tuition offer over the weekend. The agency called when I was in Jap class and I didn't get the call, cos my phone was on silent. A potential channel of future income: Gone. The best thing about it is that they called my house then, so my mum sent me an sms and that's how I finally got to know about it. I couldn't call back the agency cos firstly, it was late [who's at the office at 630 on a sat nite??] and also becos my phone was on low batt again and I wouldn't have been able to talk to the lady for more than 5 sec without it dying. [some of you may know about this curious trait about my phone]

Anyway, I got a bit upset about it when I heard about it, because hello, come Jan, I'm on my own, and I like, really need the income? And my parents' way of comforting me? Telling me that I should have gotten my priorities right. [ie take the call and leave the jap class] So sue me if I follow a basic courtesy practice that HALF the population of Singapore doesn't, even if I've been doing it all my 3 years in NUS.

The irritating thing about my parents is that they think that their narrow perspective on life has somehow given them the wisdom of seniority, and that if I don't follow that wisdom, I will be struck down by God or something. Never mind that they grew up in totally different eras, or that they are 2 different people from me, or that they didn't follow the same educational path that I did, they somehow think that they can impose their way of thinking over me, because they're always right and I'm always wrong or at best, misguided. They're always harping about 'my priorities' when it's perfectly clear that they don't know what my priorities are, and couldn't care less, unless it was out of line with what they think it should be. They did it in pri sch, after my Os, after my As, and now they're doing it after I graduate.

Like, screw you. I have my own goals in life, and I don't need you to decide them for me.

Now I can only pursue my goals in silence, cos if I tell them what I really want to do with my life, their response will be so predictable. MONEY. It's always about MONEY and even though I know there's some truth in it, I'm sick of the way they keep harping on it, and the way they keep pulling me to join their path of monkeyhood. I know I need money to survive but I don't see why I have to become a damn wage monkey to a multi-billion corporation who's more interested in their shareholders than the needs of their employees. [and that I have NO illusions about, becos that's exactly what they taught us in bizad]. There are more than one ways of pursuing money, why can't I, for now, try a different way?

The worse thing about my parents is that they don't give a heck about my priorities, unless it's out of line with what they think it should be.