Revision for letter-writing

There is another excellent letter in the Straits Times Forum today!

More than 40-min wait for bus

I WAS going to church for Good Friday service at 3pm. The church was a 20-minute bus ride away.

When I was about 150m from the bus stop, I saw bus service 14 whizz by. It was 2.17pm. I didn't expect to wait long for the next bus. At 3pm, I sent an SMS to Iris (Intelligent Route Information System).

I got a reply saying that the next bus was due to arrive in three minutes.

The bus arrived on time at 3.03pm, but it was unusually crowded because of the delay. I was late for the service by more than 25 minutes despite leaving home before 2.15pm. Waiting time: 40 minutes. Total waiting plus journey time: Slightly more than an hour. Is this an acceptable standard?

Corry Sutandi

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Students should learn from Mr Corry about the finer points of elaboration. Many times, students don't elaborate enough when writing their compositions (or when attempting polite conversation), often causing them to be marked down.

Mr Corry's point is a very simple one: He does not know whether or not waiting 40 minutes for a bus is an acceptable standard. In attempting to seek an answer, however, Mr Corry, being the concerned and diligent citizen that he is, managed to put his talent for elaboration to good use, and, along the way offered us a glimpse of 1) his religion, 2) his programme for Good Friday, 3) his ability to use IRIS [and 4) his ability to receive a reply from IRIS], right down to 5) the time and distance he saw bus number 14 'whizz' by. It is all very useful, informative, even enlightening!

If only students can elaborate like Mr Corry, they might also get to see their utterly insignificant queries published in the prestigious Straits Times, and achieve national fame! Not sure if waiting for 15 minutes for a cab/boyfriend/plate of char kway teow is acceptable standard? Write to the Straits Times! Is Economics or Literature a better choice? No idea? Write to the Straits Times! Should you continue to read crap like the Straits Times? I bet you don't know, so write to the Straits Times! If a delayed bus is such a serious matter that evidently threatens the survival of Singapore, it seems everything can potentially be a matter of grave importance! Just don't forget to include as many details, and elaborate as much as you can!

*whizz!!!*

moved to Melbourne

-- journal, April 09

It's been almost a month since I moved to Melbourne. Packed everything into a rented car and drove across, staying overnight at the coastal towns, had a little whirl around Canberra, and then savouring that long-awaited moment of seeing the Melbourne skyline rising in front of my eyes, beneath its rusted southern sky.

That's the way with Melbourne, the city will change, but its light will remain. That's the way with old friends you first met right here, and whom you meet again after all these years. That's the way with memories, that once lived in time and were real, and that come alive once more, but are never quite the same again.

Never quite the same again indeed, that time then has now gone. But it's still Melbourne, the laneways, the cafes. The coffee, the bookshops. The university, the trams, St. Kilda, the Melburnian air. I cannot even begin to describe how much I love this city, and how absolutely happy I am to be back. Everyday I walk the streets I collect myself with this city before me and that I am walking these streets that I've always dreamt about since I first left it, since then.

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the cold and grey of this morning were unexpected, this being april. it reminded me very much of those shivering and wet melbourne mornings i used to trot through to get to class, snug in my trusty levis and woollen jumper, invigorated by the wintry air. i had lived behind lygon street, the italian alcove famous for its cafes and restaurants. very few things change at lygon, though the crass and the vulgar (e.g. starbucks) have lately begun their invasion. but most of the cafes that had sprouted along it after the war still stands, run by the same quibbling italian families dashing around with pasta and pizza and shots of expresso. and then of course, there are the students and artists - keeping alive the spirits of generations of impoverished melbourne university students, ex-students, faux-students, angry-students, refuse-to-graduate students, struggling writers, dishevelled poets, apprentice philosophers. all who have, over the decades, indelibly left their artistic and intellectual marks - along the sidewalks, by the shopwindows, in the coffee cups. one could almost still hear echoes of their debates, conversations, commiserations. echoes, because like the invasion of fastfood and fastcoffee, so too the harlequin yuppies have begun their intrusions. but it is of course, always easy to pick out these philistine poseurs. the genuine lygon intelligentsia and literati are somehow invariably unkempt and beggared - there they would sit, swigging strong coffee, scribbling into unintelligible notebooks, peering furrowed brows into tattered copies of camus, kerouac and kafka, exhaling cigarette smoke and discarded thoughts, cogitating with the auburn evening as it tanned into the night.

-- journal, April 06

Jin

It was a dream, but like all dreams, it was real while it lasted. And what a long absence it had been, not having seen her all these while. From a distance, the vantage point of something ridiculous that only happens in dreams like an escalator passing by an open-air classroom, her pin-drop face. From that distance I thought how pretty she was. She hadn't grown older at all. 

Overdue photos

Salzburg

Vienna

Prague

J and F, who came down from Dresden to meet me :)

very dreamy...


Dresden

Berlin

L, who whirled me through Berlin in a day

The cafes in this city are UNBELIEVEABLE

Oslo

NY's Eve

Assorted UK

Haggis on Burns Night

fin. sigh. : )

# Sydney

I'm back. Amazing, four months gone, just like that. Back to the Sydney weather, its remnants of summer. Back to friends, and uni, and familiar things.

Not for long though, but that'd be for the next post.

The first thought that came to me as I walked out of the airport was: It's great to be home.

I surprise myself sometimes, thinking like I'm a Strine already. Haha.

# London

Last night. Dinner at Brick Lane, curry and fish. Tower Bridge all lit up, as S said, the bridge de la bridge. One could walk through this entire city in a night. Lovers stealing kisses everywhere on this mild Thursday night. Along Queen's walk, towards Tate Modern, and of course, one turns into the dome of St. Paul's, towards the Bank of England, and into the heart of England.

Last day. Woke up too late and dashed into the bookstores. Gower's Street, Waterstone's Academic at UCL. One could walk through this entire city in a day too. The British Museum, London Review of Books bookshop (of course). Friday lunch hour crowd, Ave Maria at Covent's Garden, beef pie, peas and chips, so that one could gallivant through Regent's Street, so that this air could be breathed for one more time, and so that one could squeeze into the tube with a luggage full of the last four months and onwards to Heathrow.

My last visit here was six years ago, and nothing much has changed. This city lives on a different time; time scale, time zone; and six years later, I'm the one six years older, a different I.

There's a beautiful poem by Anne Carson in the latest LRB, and the final stanza is just, utterly just, luminous:

. . . Raw | nothing I knew was of any use with you one day you clinged in the kitchen window poured raw rubies out on the table from a drawstring bag at your hip They look fake count on me to say the wrong no point comparing earthly, you could always pull out a girl a wound a shatter a bud to be nipped in the doom I wasn't half and when you left I sat at the table in my life. I sat at the table in my life . . .

I wanted to tell her, it was all because, very simply, she had stolen a kiss, and had to pay for it dearly with her life. 

And of course, she shouldn't have. 

Stole the kiss that is.

'So I thought I'd say Hello'

I like this feeling when drunk, where you're sorta swaying side to side in your head, lucid yet reckless, lightly deciding between saying I  L O V E  Y O U  to anyone and shouting F U C K  Y O U to everyone. You probably end up doing both, as I've done a couple of times, before collapsing in someone else's arms. 

My last two nights in the UK, and so been morose the past one week. Isn't it a cliche to just go, 'how time flies, yes it does.' When it's not just empty, abstract, 'time', but a few months of the prime of your life. And here I am, retrieving my footsteps I had made four months ago. The stopover in Korea, the airport at Sydney. 

A year ago, I was morose and was dying to leave Singapore. A year on, I'm morose and dreading my departure. Life's such a sickening bitch. :) 

I had meant to write about the snow. I first saw it in Oslo. Already-fallen snow. It came from nowhere, and had long stopped before I arrived. But everywhere was snow, snow, and snow was everywhere. Rooftops and sheds and letterboxes were caked with thick, creamy layers of snow. They were so soft and icy that when you scrunched a handful of snow in your hands you felt nothing for a few seconds. Skiied for the first time, up in the plateau where everywhere was white and light and the sun was just a few metres from yourself. When you held up your hand you could almost touch its face. But it wasn't that easy to get near it, for it's your first time on skiis, and you were like a child, learning how to walk, barefeet on soft snow.

And then snow fall. It was back in England, and I was in my room. Then a peculiar sound from outside the window, and then I turned, and there were white swirls everywhere. The sky was blindingly white, so the red walls and roofs of the houses opposite lent the backdrop for the snow, and it simply fell from nowwhere, in such abundance, such lightness, falling with such purpose, as if homing in on their rightful place on the ground. Nothing, absolutely nothing could be more romantic than to be lying on your bed and watching the snow fall outside, with someone by your side.

"Love, they say, enslaves and passion is a demon and many have been lost for love. I know this is true, but I know too that without love we grope the tunnels of our lives and never see the sun. We fear it. We fear passion and laugh at too much love and those who love too much. And still we long to feel." 

-- The Passion, Jeanette Winterson

Funny, I'd read the novel so many times, I can locate any line almost randomly flipping the pages, but I don't really remember having read this line. And how true it is.

Why must it be that one day life is orderly and you are content, and someone comes along and your old world disappears? After more than a few nights that new world too disappears too. 

When you write Love a little long note to say goodbye and why, Love replies with just a line. A FUCKING LINE. And then the days roll into weeks, weeks into months, and months into something like discarded memories. 

And then a few days before the months and memories turn into a year, Love sends u an email: I wouldn't blame you if you'd rather not, it says. 

When Love has no right to blame you in the first place. 

Love never changes. It's always all about Love. Never about you. 

Do I love Love still? Honestly, I don't think so. 

Sometimes you remember that you had been hurt. Time is a great deadener. But so is the heart itself. So you remember a hurt that you now cannot make sense of. And therefore the hurt is stripped of pain.

But you do remember how it once hurt. Even though, again, the hurt is stripped of pain.

And when u see Love's name in your inbox, it's a wound opened afresh. 

But you can't remember why there's a wound in the first place, even though the wound there hurts you a little still. But it's a hurt that has no more pain. 

That Love's become an empty signifier, a lifeless sceptre. 

It's not hate. Just regret. Regret that you'd ever found and loved this Love. 

Teacher's report

In my earlier eagerness to laud the brilliance of Straits Times Forum writers, I forgot to extend my admiration for Straits Times propagandists journalists. 

So here's an ST article, along with my usual sweet nothings in red:

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Temasek, GIC losses won't drain reserves

By Mavis Toh, Straits Times Feb 15 2009

The questions came thick and fast, but Senior Minister of State for Finance Lim Hwee Hua responded assuringly. 

[Mavis, It's irrelevant to readers whether or not the minister responded assuringly, or uninterestingly, or hysterically. What's more important is what her responses are. Also, I don't need to know how thick and fast the questions were, I need to know what questions they are. Save the details about thickness for my later curiosity. If you must know, thickness never fails to excite me, especially thickheaded journalists (amongst other heads of various thickness). You have gotten me very excited, but indeed we ought to focus on these hard issues at hand.] 

Singapore's reserves will not be depleted by losses incurred by Temasek Holdings and the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC), she said.

[Dear Mavis, Temasek has lost S$58 billion in 8 months, with the GIC losing a reported S$200 billion. Now, that's almost all of our reserves gone. All the thick and fast questions and no one asked the most important question???]

Fixed deposits, urged by some, may be safe but will not provide income growth which is crucial to building up reserves.

[And my primary school cousins will tell you that 0.5% interest earned is still a more attractive rate than a massive 30-50% plunge in value. They'd also ask you: what building up of reserves? Our reserves are on the verge of vanishing. So how ah lidatt, this is like not building up, more like kena nuked!!!]

These and other key issues were addressed by Mrs Lim in a 90-minute dialogue titled 'Youth's Role for Budget 2009' with members of the People's Action Party's (PAP) youth wing yesterday.

[Got address the issues meh? You got the correct address or not? And why tell me about 'other key issues' if you don't tell me what issues they are? Are you trying to achieve your word limit by writing nonsense???]

Young PAP chairman Teo Ser Luck and vice-chairman Christopher de Souza were present. 

[Why is this relevant? I'm more interested in what they had to say during the event. If they hadn't said anything of importance, then they're as irrelevant as this sentence of yours. While you're at it, you might as well tell me how beautiful the decorative plants are and how brightly lit-up the stage was.]

In Parliament last week, Mrs Lim revealed that Temasek's net portfolio value dropped 31 per cent between March 31 and Nov 30 last year, from $185 billion to $127 billion.

GIC also saw a decline in the value of its investments last year but the numbers were not disclosed. [Why???]

Yesterday, Mrs Lim explained that GIC's investment in 'dangerous asset classes' was not a sudden move but a slowly evolving strategy. 

[Mrs Lim, my uni students will tell you the question is whether or not this strategy is a good one. Then my primary school cousins will tell you that in light of recent tragic developments, this strategy is no good. And I'll tell you why not you switch places with my cousins - they become ministers and guard our reserves, and you go back to primary school to learn simple Maths.]

She added: 'Income from reserves is crucial. We cannot have income growth if we just leave the money in fixed deposits.'

The key now is to make returns by putting reserves in good long-term positions, using a balanced portfolio to diversify risks, she said.

[The key now is not just where to make returns but also how to recover the losses, and how is the government planning to be accountable to the billions of dollars gone.]

She reiterated that the two state-owned companies are long-term investors and the Government is confident they will continue to deliver good long-term returns.

[The great economist Maynard Keynes also iterated: in the long run, we'll all be dead. And you do not convince me of something simply by saying you're confident of it, e.g. 'Hey Mrs Lim, give me half of your million-dollar salary, I am confident that I can deliver good long-term returns for you. How and Why ah? Dunno also leh, nehmind la, just have confidence in me la, just believe. *Wink wink*.' That's why con-men on the streets are getting very worried. Not only is the economy worsening, ministers are also trying to snatch away their jobs. As they would say: siao liaoz...]

She said both have also weathered similar downturn cycles and come out strong.

[No leh, when the government was shirking the responsibility for incurring such huge losses, you guys were saying this downturn is the biggest and most severe downturn. My primary school cousins will tell you 'different' is not the same as 'similar' - got difference one ok. Don't play play.]

In response to a question on banks' reluctance to give loans to businesses, she was confident that 'real evidence of flow' will be seen in the next few weeks.

[Out of point. Mavis ah, this article is about how Temasek/GIC won't drain reserves, not about banks' reluctance to give loans to businesses. Are you trying to distract, tempt, and seduce? You're not my type so I'm not interested. I'm just interested in the issue at hand: Temasek and GIC's losses.]

In last month's Budget, a Special Risk-sharing Initiative, with the Government taking on more of the risk in bridging loans and trade financing, was revealed.

'We're working very closely with the banks and the Government is taking on greater risks to give assurance to banks,' she said. 'From anecdotal evidence, the lines are flowing again.'

On a personal note, she said that she found this year's Budget, her fifth, the most exciting because 'there was no shortage of challenges'.

[Yah, I'm sure if I had S$300 billion to burn at the casino and lost half of it within a few months, I'd have a very exciting time too. It will be such a challenge to provide some answers as to how I lost these money. Very suay loh! What else? Tonight go casino again, hopefully can recoup hor.]

Singapore's strength is in its adaptable, honest, competent and hard-working people, she said, adding: 'We're better equipped than anyone to cope with this downturn, so don't give up.'

[Mrs Lim ah, this is saying nothing. If I lost my primary school cousins' life-savings in the casino and then come back and tell them, 'eh cousins ah, your strength is being adaptable, competent and hardworking, so don't give up hor.' You think I'll get walloped or not.]

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Grade: A for Bootlicking; F for Propaganda; F for Journalism; D for Entertainment value.

Overall grade: F

Teacher's comments:

Dear Mavis, 

I understand that you may possess strong interests in the time-honoured art of bootlicking. In this regard, you have exceeded my expectations, as well as demonstrated extraordinary talents. 

However, the whole point of writing an ST article is that it must be a good piece of propaganda. A good piece of propaganda is one that goes undetected by readers. Thus, you have shown yourself to be very complacent, if not incompetent. If your intentions to bluff readers continue to be exposed, no one will believe in what you write anymore, and the reputation of the school may be tarnished. Worse, the whole of ST will have to shut down. Who else is going to read the ST if everyone knows it is government propaganda?! 

As I see that you have some potential in providing entertainment,  I advice that you consider a future career as a circus clown rather than a propagandist journalist.

Mr Tan.

Letter writing to the ST

Reading the Straits Times everyday still, I am struck by the consistency of quality letters published in the Forum page. They remind me so much of those Secondary school 'complaint letters' that I used to mark. Either these letter writers never grow up or they were such good students they never forgot what their teachers taught them. Maybe in remembrance of their wonderful childhood memories and enduring admiration of their former teachers they attempt to relive those happy years by writing love letters to the Straits Times praising the gahmen to the skies. 

Now I see the importance of brainwashing teaching Singaporeans when they're still young, and indoctrinating inculcating them with the right Singaporean values: study hard, work hard, be eternally thankful to the government for everything on earth, and please retire in JB when you can no longer work thankyouverymuch. 

Sometimes I really think that Singaporeans are dumb because of the education system AND reading the Straits Times. Singaporeans have so much potential to be better and more intelligent...

In the spirit of upgrading and self-improvement before you get banished to JB's luxurious nursing homes, and given my wealth of experience in marking these sort of exercises, as well as my irresistable urge to admire ST propaganda on a daily basis, I am providing what I think is an even better template for sending letters to the Straits Times. Try practising a few times and send them in while you apply for your overseas PR and assorted migration papers. Your improved English in the process will be an invaluable advantage when being considered for permanent residency abroad.

The names and places can be changed of course, but the rules of thumb are: 1) provide as much unnecessary details and useless information as possible (long-windedness is a plus in this instance), 2) express as much indignance and righteous rage as possible, 3) remind our fellowmen that Singapore is a first-world country, and 4) invoke national catastrophe and unavoidable perdition if such tragic incidents are left unchecked. 

For example:

I write to express my anger/disgust/alarm after surviving one of my worst dining experiences. On Tuesday at 1p.m where the sun was shining and the breeze was calm, my friends and I went to X Y Z restaurant that is situated at the second corner from the third turning off Too Lan Road. After waiting for a good 15 minutes, the waitress finally ushered us to the table by the window, as opposed to the other tables not by any window. We sat down and had a look through the menu. I was thinking of ordering Mee Siam. I have heard from many of my friends, colleagues, family members, and even complete strangers in the MRT and on the Internet that this eatery is famous for its Mee Siam.  [unnecessary info & useless details: tick]

But imagine my horror when the menu stated that the famous Mee Siam dish comes with cockles! Look, this is utterly ridiculous. Mee Siam dishes do not come with cockles! Indignantly, I summoned the manager to the table [Indignance: tick]. I duly informed her that they were making a serious mistake and insulting our local cuisine. I said I would order the dish nonetheless, but only if the Mee Siam did not have cockles. So I was shocked when she told me that this would be impossible. She related how this innocent local dish gained national fame a few years ago after being introduced on national TV by a prominent cabinet minister. [note: 'shocked' is a very useful word. Use it generously whenever you can. Rule of thumb: if it aint shocking, it aint worth writing.]

However, I was adamant that there should be no cockles in my Mee Siam. I am a very conservative Singaporean, and I strongly believe national cuisines, just like our national values, should never be adulterated and impugned. Cockles, however delicious and tempting they may be, should remain where they are. Can you imagine if Section 377A of our penal code was repealed? Can you imagine the endless cockles being shoved into our dishy Mee Siams? Mee Siam today, Back Chor Me tomorrow? Soon, our country would be invaded by cockles left right centre, front and back! [Righteous rage: tick]

Unfortunately, the manager remained equally adamant that their brand of Mee Siam not be besmirched, and insisted that I try their specialty. 

I think this is extremely absurd. Is it so difficult to request that a harm-less dish of Mee Siam not be added with cockles? Singapore is a first-world nation with first-class infrastructure, and it has one of the highest GDP per capita in the world. We have a cohesive, well-educated population with a strong track record of productivity and excellence that have contributed to building our large national reserves. Needless to say, all these are only possible with a well-trained armed forces, a harmonious tripartite labour movement, and an eternal ruling party. In addition, we have an independent judiciary, a responsible press, and our people are free to voice their opinions and speak truth to power with neither trepidation nor fear. All these have ensured that we have become gracious society, a garden city, and, it is worth repeating: a first-world nation with first-class infrastructure, with one of the highest GDP per capita in the world. All in all, Singapore is undoubtedly our home that we are proud of. As Singapore forges more good years ahead in the 21st century and enters another golden period as the premier global city of the arts, culture, and repression, it is time that Singaporeans be open to the idea that customers should have a say as to whether or not there are cockles in their Mee Siams. [First World Singapore etc. and neverending etc.: tick]

Cordon Tan Le Bleu

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This is only a guide, of course. For real examples, kindly refer to the Forum pages of the Straits Times on any day. 

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Been a bit brain dead the last one week, after writing a string of articles singing praises about the PAP and the wonderful people of Singapore, so no energy to write florid poetic self-indulgent prose singing praises to the fluff of light snow that's been falling on England. (It's been snowing beautifully the last two weeks, and I must write about it soonish).

Note to my ex students:

When you kiddies grow up to acceptable age, I'll show you my other M18 blog that contains everything you need to ace your GP and thereafter attain your B.A. Hons degree in political science (majoring in PAP De(con)struction and Condemnation of Chronic Singaporean Stupidity). Should you wish to further your tertiary education in the said disciplines beyond the B.A., I'll be happy to supervise your MA or PhD theses provided I've become a tenured professor somewhere by then. 

fatherhood

I must have written about wanting to be a father. It's a recurring thought that has intensified over the last one or two years. I think age is slowly catching up, my decade-long wild student life is coming to an end, and that paternal instinct gradually forming within me. I like to think I'll make a good father; I have my own dad as a fine example, though I think I wouldn't be as quiet as him. Just as strict and gentle. Just nice. I have had a wonderful childhood and family as a guide, I love kids, and even angsty teenagers can tahan me, so I think I'll do alright huh. Plus I'll make sure my kid shall never be in want of bedtime stories, storybooks, and that occasional teddy bear. And the usual things, you know, fetching my kiddo from school, chat with my kiddo over the phone whilst being stuck at work, weekends to the beach or the zoo, watch my kiddo grow up, hear my kiddo call me 'dad'. Or if kiddo wishes, kiddo can just call me J. Anyway, when that time comes, I'll be the best dad that has ever lived.