random thoughts from an incoherent giRaffe

of the magazine that ends up in the recycling bin without being flipped open once

2012-02-02T23:08:00.001+08:00

Has anyone heard of this magazine called "Duet"? No, it has got nothing to do with two people playing music together. Because you see, this "Duet" is another of this uniquely singapore thing. It is this magazine you will receive (no option to opt out of) once you graduate from the university, and YOU ARE NOT MARRIED.

This magazine comes with a free membership (once again, no way of opting out) to the SDU or the Social Development Unit for the non-Singaporean readers. SDU organizes all sorts of "fun" activities that lets you, who had been buried in your books the past few years at the university and forgotten what it means to have a social life, meet people of the opposite sex! Wow, you get opportunities to meet people of the opposite sex!

Yes, it is our dear government's way of eugenics. You see, one gets the complimentary subscription to "Duet" and membership to the SDU only if you are a university graduate. Because it means you are intelligent and the nation wants your genes. If you are simply a diploma holder, sorry folks, the government does not think your genes worthy enough to be passed on.

While I've no problems with people who may want to go to activities organized by SDU or any other groups and want to meet new people of the opposite sex, I have problems with the core ideas of SDU (and essentially, the government.)

Yes, let people who enjoy meeting new people, who wants to perhaps find a potential partner, go ahead and do it. But do not force everyone else to do the same. Yes, yes, yes, I know that I am not being forced to go to anything I do not want to, but I do not like the idea that I have no choice of opting out of the SDU membership or the "Duet" subscription if I do not want them. And even more, I hate the idea that only university graduates get this. So people who are not university graduates are not as important? Isn't this a message the government sends to the people? That you better not spread your genes around because we only want genes from people who can graduate from the university. Maybe they better start conducting IQ tests for people who wants to become parents too?

I'm extremely irked every single time I find a copy of this magazine in my letterbox because it serves once again to remind me, I am being coerced! I don't even have a choice of saying, hey come on, save the environment, I'm not interested in your magazine or in meeting anyone of the opposite sex (all my friends who are members of the opposite sex, don't get me wrong, I love you all. I'm just not interested in meeting members of the opposite sex to find my potential partner or in such a forced situation and circumstance.) I don't even flip open the magazine when I get it, I simply throw it into the recycling bin. Come on, save your troubles and save the earth. Give me an option to opt out of receiving your magazine please, and also give me an option of opting out of the SDU membership please!

Sometimes I think all these will look so funny from the point of view of someone who isn't Singaporean. It is really uniquely Singapore and uniquely hilarious, these things they come up with.

female driving...

2012-01-31T00:25:00.001+08:00

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5g9IEP18KwUHQ7xHZn6lm_IwfH3DA?docId=N0214071327922834548A

Ok, so why do I bother reposting this article? Honestly, I cannot care less if women can drive better or if men can drive better. What I care about is if the drivers sharing the roads with me are safe and good drivers. Who cares if they are males or females, after all I’m not like looking for a mate on the roads.

I reposted this article because I want to talk about this woman-man thing. For those of you who know me, and for the rest of you reading this now, I’m a feminist through and through. And to clarify things a little, feminism is not about woman first, woman great, woman must be the top of everything.

Feminism, as defined by Merriam Webster and yours truly, is the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes. So to me, feminism also means defending men’s rights as well, if in certain areas, they are being disadvantaged. But of course, being the extremely patriarchic society we had always been historically unless you are from some tribes in the amazon or some secluded mountainous areas or some other rare societies which practices matriarchy, females have always been the more disadvantaged gender. Which is why feminism has developed to become something of a female thing in the minds of many. But I must reiterate, this is not so. This is purely about equality.

Aside from the rare cases of people who are born with both sexual organs or maybe none (I’m not very sure, are there people who are born neither male nor female? I’ve read about those born with both male and female sexual organs, but never without yet.), roughly fifty percent of the world can be classified as male and fifty as female according to their reproductive organs. Of course, not all of them might identify with the sexual organs they are born with, but that is another thing altogether. And within this fifty percent of the people, I’m sure there can be found much more variance than between these two fifty percent. The point I’m trying to make is, if one insists on categorising people into groups according to the sexual organs they are born with, they are missing out on a lot of other aspects of this person.

I’ve had some people tell me, you drive very confidently. (Note, they are perceptive enough to compliment only that I drive confidently, not that I drive well or safely because sometimes I could be quite a reckless driver. Heh.) Well, of course I feel awesome after hearing that. But some of them will have to add in, “Most females are not confident driving, you know”. That takes out all the good feelings that came when they paid me the compliment. Can’t you just take my driving skills and compliment me based solely on that, without having to qualify my skills with your stereotyped ideas of females being a certain way? I’m sure many drivers, male and female alike share certain traits with me, traits which have absolutely nothing to do with their reproductive organs. For myself, I love driving. I love being behind the wheel, feeling the power of speed. And I have loved cars and driving for as long as I can remember. Since I was a child, my toys of choice were cars, vehicles, I rather play driving games than with other things. Heck, my childhood ambition was to be a firetruck driver. Not a fireman mind you, but just the driver of the firetruck because it is so awesome cool and can go faster than any other vehicles and they all have to give way to you. And because I love driving, I thus had more practice and therefore feel more confident at it. And practice doesn’t involve only the driving after I got my car, I started practising ever since I had my first driving toy! So naturally, driving comes easily to me. And I’m sure any other male or female who loves driving can share similar tales. Nothing to do with our reproductive organs.

Equality is a concept that plays a very important role in my ethical outlook. Of course, I understand that in this world, nothing can be absolutely equal. Heck there is nothing that is absolute for that matter. But in this grossly unequal world, can’t we all do what we can to set the balance right ever so little?

I’m always extremely irked when people have to refer to one’s gender in evaluating others. Aside from talking about whether that person can be a mother or a father biologically, or about their reproductive organs, or about the sexual relationships they might have; after all you cannot become a mother or a lesbian if you have male reproductive organs and so on (Or perhaps you can, if you have male reproductive organs but you do not identify with them and you want to have sexual relations with a female as a female, but ok, I’m getting out of the point), I do not think that one’s gender should be the thing affecting how others view oneself.

Of course everyone is different and in every attribute, we all lie on a continuum. But judge that person according to their individual characteristics instead of putting them into a box and labeling them male or female. I hate it when my friends will tell me, I have this FEMALE boss who is so picky and petty and whatever, emphasising on the word FEMALE. Or worse still, some will tell me, I’ve got this new boss who is female, I’m doomed, implying females will be terrible bosses, even before they got to know the new boss and find out what sort of a person she is. There may be lousy female bosses, but the lousy comes with who they are, not what gender they are. How unfair it is for good bosses if they happen to be female.

I know of a man who crochets as a hobby. He is not “sissy” in any way and he crochets simply because he enjoys making things out from pictures he has in his mind. I know of a female who is a very maternal mother and at the same time rides a humongous harley davidson and teaches martial arts. The reproductive organs they are born with doesn’t limit them to certain hobbies or certain professions - they chose to do what they are doing because they happen to be good at it and they love what they are doing. And in the same vein, any other person’s reproductive organs shouldn’t be limiting them to what they like and can do either.

A self-fulfilling prophecy is a prediction that directly or indirectly causes itself to become true, by the very terms of the prophecy itself, due to positive feedback between belief and behavior. Stereotypes are standardized and simplified conceptions of groups based on some prior assumptions. Both these mental heuristics are very clearly, extremely unfair for the disadvantaged group. To have a belief that one is good, and hence acting on the self-fulfilling prophecy and really becoming good is of course, great. But to have the misfortune of belonging to the group which is being stereotyped as lousier, poorer, more negative also means that individuals of this group tend to believe it and become this way as well, regardless of how good or bad this person actually is. Isn’t this something we who call ourselves progressive and advanced and enlightened should strive to eliminate? This unfairness and giving people labels before finding out who they really are?

As our world gets more and more advanced and physical hurdles can be more and more easily solved with technology, the differences between gender grows less and less. After all, who needs brute strength nowadays? Sadly though, plenty of our mindset do not change with the times.

Females, by depending simply on their brains instead of competing via physical strength, can be as good as males. Note I do not imply that females are BETTER than males. I believe both to be equal. There are just as many intelligent males as there are females, the gender shouldn’t play a part.

However, because of the deeply ingrained beliefs, many females are disadvantaged because they believe themselves to be not as good. And many people believe females to be not as good too, and thus give them a much harder time to prove themselves.

Whether you are male or female, think about it. Do you want the world to be so unfair? We are definitely not born all equal, but let this show through our real attributes, our real characters, our real abilities. Do not let the fact that one has a certain type of reproductive organs affect how you perceive who that person really is. Come on, do a little to make a world a better place and make feminism your way of life from today!

A lengthy post

2012-01-08T00:19:00.000+08:00

This may come a little late, but the more I pondered upon it, the more I felt I had to get what I wanted to say out of my system.

This post was penned by one who was born and bred in the upper echelons of life. Like many from a privileged background, they have no opportunities of seeing how the other group - the under-privileged group - of society lived. Actually, they are not to be blamed. Unless they are someone who, like the author, had a chance to live outside her cocoon for a while, or they are really people who take the huge amount of effort, outside their daily lives, to live and breathe and feel the lives of the other group of people, most are unable to comprehend how the lives of the under-privileged group are.

Think about it. If you don’t have something, warm food, warm clothing, you can imagine how it is like to have. It will probably even, be what is constantly in your thoughts. After all, we are wired in such a way as to want comfort, ease and pleasure.

However, if on the other hand, you have something. A full stomach, a roof over your head. Unless you force yourself to, you will not, out of no reason, keep thinking about being hungry or sleeping on the streets at night. And even when you do think about it, it will take effort to maintain this thinking because we are simply not wired to keep thinking and feeling unpleasant things.

I would believe this extends to other aspects as well. A well-paid surgeon, isn’t likely to spend a lot of her waking moments thinking about how a coffee-shop helper toils each day and the worries of paying for her rental one-room flat and buying that rice for the Chinese New Year. In all likelihood, the surgeon will be wondering how long she has to queue for her bak kua at the famous stall this year for the Chinese New Year and how it might make her late for her reunion dinner at some posh hotel later in the evening. I have to reiterate, this isn’t any uncaringness on the part of the well-paid surgeon. In her life, she is probably a kind and caring soul as well, going into her line of work because she wanted to alleviate pain from the sick. But like every other being, her brain is simply not wired to dwell on unpleasant things. And furthermore, she might not even be aware of the unpleasant things. How much does the coffeeshop helper earn each month? How does it feel like living in a one-room flat and having to worry about paying the rent? how does it feel like to worry that the boss of the coffeeshop might give her the sack any day because she is getting old and frail and cannot work as well as a younger “foreign talent”. How is it to get up everyday praying you won’t fall sick because missing a day’s work gives the boss even more reason to terminate you.

This is not simply about being compassionate. It is about having the experience of living in the shoes of others.

And the way I see it, this is where the problem lies nowadays. We can complain endlessly about how lives are getting more and more difficult and the leaders of our land can reassure us they are looking into it and they are finding the best solutions for us, but getting nowhere in the end. Not because the leaders make empty promises. No, I still believe, whether competent or not, the leaders of our land are still relatively conscientious people. They do, to the best of their abilities, try to do the best they can. But how far their abilities go is another matter.

A part of the problem lies in the fact that there is a widening income (and status) gap forming in our society. Decades ago, we could boast that we have one of the highest income-mobility in the world. Not so now. We are getting to be like many other societies where if you were born to a lower income group, chances are likely you will stay there for life. And so would your next generation, and the next, and the next.

The rich can afford a lot of tuition and other academic help for their children. And these children have nothing to worry about except go for this class and that. And if in the end they are still unable to get good grades, well forget local universities. There are plenty of overseas universities to choose from. And they do not have to worry about the tuition costs at all.

The poor on the other hand, might find it difficult even to make ends meet. But many will still scrimp and save to let their children who may not be doing too well academically to go for some tuition, in the hopes that they might, just might, do well enough to become a little less poor. Even those children who are academically bright, might have to work during the school holidays or even term-time, because everyone needs to have a computer nowadays, everyone carries a handphone. And overseas exchange trips costs a whole lot too. And if they do well enough, even with the government’s tuition grants, the cost of a local university education is at least 20-30 thousand. The very very bright might get scholarships and bursaries, the rest, it means to be slapped with a 30k debt the moment they graduate.

Yes, they can use their parents’ CPF monies. But if their parents have spent the money on paying for their flat, they won’t have much left. (I’m talking about normal everyday people who have a monthly pay of 1-2 thousand, not obscenely paid people.) Or even if they have, what if they have a few children they need to see through university? AND even if this particular child uses his/her parents’ CPF, they will have to pay it back the moment they graduate. And interests start accumulating the day they graduate. And if this child is the first child to use his/her parents’ CPF for university education, and uses up the money in it, he/she might also have to think about helping out when his/her younger siblings enter the university. Even before this poor youngster has stepped out into the society to work, he/she is already being sucked dry.

How many people are aware about this fact? Perhaps all the policy-makers are aware, but only at a hazy, I-know-such-a-think-exists level. They have never felt it deeply in their bones. But all of us, children of families of the middle to lower income group, live this awareness. My family was not very very poor; we had roof over our heads, we never had to go hungry although posh meals are out of the question, but paying my loans and debts and helping out with my family’s finances is something that is never far from my thoughts all throughout my school days. And even now. Although with a higher income than I had during my school days, this worry is diminishing a little.

What about people who are trying hard to make ends meet? The tired truck driver who drives 12-hour shifts because he wants to earn a little more, and because if he didn’t, the boss might just decide to get a foreign worker in his place because they can be paid less and they can work for longer hours since they do no have to think about going home for dinner with their families. Is it because this truck driver is lazy and that is why he makes so little? Those in the higher-levels of society who have never lived such lives might believe that our society is still based on meritocracy. That if you work hard enough you will definitely earn more. That if you work really really hard, you can become one of the rich too.

Well, sad to say, this is really not the reality for the tired truck driver. With all the overtime pay and no vacations or time offs, he might make enough to 1) pay for his HDB loan, 2) buy the basic necessities for his family, 3) give money to his aging parents. Beyond this is just pure dreaming. So you say it’s because he didn’t have a good enough education? He had to work his way through school, and that left no time to focus on his studies. And now, it is impossible to go back to school to get a higher qualification. Aside from the fact that making enough money for the above 3 points is hard enough not to mention having to set aside some for school fees, if this truck driver took time off from work for studies, this employer might just get someone else in his place. A cheaper worker.

So where is meritocracy? Meritocracy happens only for the upper echelons of society. That is where it is.

Now you might think it is the unfeelingness of the employer of the truck driver that made things so difficult for the poor truck driver. So this employer has to give higher pay to the driver, grant him time off from work for furthering his education, time off for his family. Now what happens to this employer? Is anyone going to give him enough subsidies for this? If not, who is going to help him if his company goes into the red? Yes, there is subsidies from the government to these people and companies who encourage their employees to upgrade themselves. But is it really enough to cover the costs?

And what are these courses about? Basic English, computer skills, how much will these help a truck driver if he wishes to work as something else? Yes, he can slowly work his way up to the ITE in some engineering courses perhaps, and even part-time diploma courses further on. So how long will this all take? 5 years? 10 years? How is he going to ensure his family survives for this 10 years?

I’m not saying there is absolutely no way for someone to climb up into a better life if they really want to. I’m just saying, its really very very tough to do so.

For the information of those in the upper class of society, many of the middle to low income group earns about 1 to 2 thousand per month. There are in fact many who earns even less. But we shall just take the upper limit and work our sums around there.

Let’s say a person earns 2000SGD.
He has to contribute 20% of it to CPF.
He gets $1800 each month.
He has aging parents to look after and his parents are unable to work. He gives them $500 for their monthly expenses. ($500 is barely enough to make ends meet for two people and it really isn’t a very fair way for people to come to the end of their useful and productive lives only to have to live frugally and worry about health and finances all the way until they expire.)
So this guy has $1300 left.
His meals at work everyday and his transport makes up $300 more.
(Think a bit about it. This meagre amount means no taxis at all and nothing more than mixed vegetables rice with a cup of coffee for lunch.)
That makes $1000 left.

He has a wife who earns the same amount as he does and who also gives the same amount to her family and uses the same amount on her daily expenses.
So the combined amount they have for the household is $2000.

They have just gotten a HDB flat, which cost them $200k. They paid the 10% down payment with their CPF which means they have nothing much left inside. The 90% left, they took a 20-year loan. Which means they have to pay perhaps $1200 per month to service the loan. (I’m not very sure about the exact figures but I think my rough estimate is close. Correct me if I’m wrong.)
So $1200 means they have $800 left for their monthly household expenses.

Utility bills take up $100, phone, internet bills another $120, $580 left.

They have to take their breakfast and dinner at home, which means perhaps 2-3 hundred for food. $300 left.
$300 left means no going out socializing with friends mind you, because going out means extra costs too.

Now that is on the basis they do not have a child.
What happens when a child comes along? If a parent stops working to take care of the child, it means $2000 off their income. If both parents continue working, who is going to take care of the child. What if the parents on both sides of the family are too old and frail to take care of the child? How much does a childcare centre cost? How much does milk formula cost? How much extra costs if the child goes into primary school? If the child is going to have tuition? What happens if there are 2 or even 3 children?

What if one of the parents fall ill and has to be hospitalized? Hospital bills, even subsidized hospital bills can wind up to be quite substantial. What if an accident happens and either spouse cannot work for a while or has to be hospitalized? How much will it cost? Where can they get the money from?

And remember, I took $2000 as the couple’s monthly pay. Don’t forget there are plenty who earns much less. And perhaps not both will earn the same amount. There may also be some, for one reason or another, has a spouse who is unable to work. Not unwilling, but unable. These people will definitely be much worse off than the couple in my example above.

What about people who do not want to, or can not, for some reason or other, get married? I’m not just talking about the LGBT community; there are plenty of straight people out there who can not or do not want to settle down too. These people will find it almost impossible to have their own place if they do not earn obscenely high pay. I do not think that carrying on living with parents is very healthy for the society, but that I will have to explain in another post.

And what about people who are separated and have to raise their children on their own, and who just earns a normal amount of pay like most of us? It is definitely going to be a huge financial burden, not to say support for this group of people in our society is really way too little.

Somewhat long-winded, but you get the idea of things.

Or does it mean if you cannot earn enough, then you are not suited to raise a child? Or to have the privilege of living in your own place? Or to enjoy a lot of things people in the upper echelons of society never even think twice about? Well, it probably looks so in our society here.

People in the upper echelons of society, take a look. Things are very different down here.

So now, back to my premise.
The main problem we have now, is that those who are supposed to be the leaders of our nation, most if not all, come from this upper echelon of society. Like what I’ve said before, it’s not because they are cold-hearted or in-compassionate, they just have never been in the shoes of most of us.

It is about opening of the the eyes and minds and hearts. Yes, it may be crazy, but perhaps everyone has to experience living as a normal everyday person on the streets before they can make decisions as a leader. No, it doesn’t just mean perhaps having a go at spending only $2000 for a month or two and then byebye, back to my ivory tower. It means really feeling the worries and burdens of having to make ends meet, with the prospect that it might be for life. That will definitely open up a totally new perspective.

Of course, it’s easy writing about it, but you can never really have it be this way in real life. Unless you take socialism to the extreme. But it will end up a different case if we were in a socialistic society since our problems arose from being in a capitalistic society. But I’m sure socialism is not what we want either.

So is there a solution? I’m really not sure. The only way out for us now is to re-channel our efforts at leveling the playing field, so to speak. To provide equal opportunities for the rich and the poor. And the easiest place to start would perhaps be in the schools. A free education, education that does not promote elitism, that does not overly emphasize competition but cooperation. If children need computers for their daily homework, provide free ones for every single child. Even though almost every child has access to a computer nowadays, many people have no idea how much it took for the family of a poor child to scrimp and save and come up with enough to buy one.

While it is encouraging that there is so much overseas exchanges taking place in schools nowadays, perhaps sponsoring for such trips might be a priority as well. If a child is from a rich family, they can go to every trip there is. But a child from a poor family might pass on every chance of an exchange not because they do not want to go, but because they know that it is impossible for their family to squeeze out the extra, be it even just a few hundred, for the trip.

Yes, all these takes money, a lot of it. But isn’t investing in this much more valuable than investing in anywhere else? After all, this is going to change the whole of our society. With the cut in ministers’ salaries, the huge amount they get from foreign workers’ levies, from fines and ERPs and what nots, I’m sure they can cover the costs to make sure the playing field is leveled a little more for the next generation, if not for this.

And for the rest of us, I think it’s time we opened our eyes more, open our minds and hearts. Our country is small, that cannot be helped. And a lot of problems thus arise because of our small size, including lack of choices and variety and opportunities (I might elaborate on this in another post if I feel not so lazy). But the least we can do is to step out of our comfort zone and look at how much differences there are in the world. And it does not mean any way of living or thinking is better than another, just different, and each way may be best suited to cope with certain needs of a certain society or problem.

Look at the variety of possible ways of living and thinking. And some solutions to seemingly insolvable problems might stare at you straight in the face if you can open your mind enough to it.

2012-01-01T00:19:00.000+08:00

First day of the rest of the year.

The past year have seen endings, and new beginnings. I could choose to look back and be sad, but I can also choose to remember I dared to let go and I dared to step out.

Remembering that life is ever changing. Perhaps something which we hold dear is no longer the same, but I want to remember to have the courage to put it down if it happens, and look at the future with anticipation. That is better than living in stagnation, no matter how terrible it is going to hurt at the moment. I want to remember that.

To have the courage to feel every emotion. That means I’m alive! And not fear and shut out a part of my feelings.

I hope for an exciting year and may I have the courage and the zest to experience every single moment, be it good or bad.

of lice...

2011-12-21T00:18:00.000+08:00

Lousy. That’s how I feel right now.

Anyway, is lousy derived from louse?
As in the singular of lice?
Because if it is, why does lousy mean lousy?
Because I think lice are not lousy at all;
They are tiny, they move fast, they evade all attempts to catch them, they reproduce like mad, they drive anyone with lice in them crazy.

So, lousy isn’t really lousy is it?

obsession

2011-12-20T00:17:00.000+08:00

Been obsessed with this recently.
So beautiful!
I love the Marius in the 10th anniversary, and I love the Gavroche in the 25th.
Lea Salonga rocks and I can’t decide which Valjean I like better.
Now these videos are on loop over and over and over and over….

2011-11-25T00:14:00.002+08:00

I wasn’t from a well-to-do family. All through my growing up years, I was constantly reminded that we couldn’t afford this, we better make do without that, we do not need to spend such money, it is hard to come by. It was a way of life, that after coming out to work for many years, I’ve left far behind. I cannot imagine myself now scrimping and saving like I did years before, or perhaps, I do not want to imagine myself that.

But don’t get me wrong. This is not to begrudge my poverty-stricken childhood. In actual fact, I didn’t think myself or my family under-privileged then. Because my friends, my neighbors, everyone around me were just like me. None of my friends went for any ballet lessons, enrichment classes, and I’ve never ever had tuition my entire school life. (For the information of non-Singaporean readers out there, tuition is part and parcel of a child’s school “curriculum” now because marks is everything and parents will do anything to make sure their child gets the best marks, even if it means nearly killing the child.)

Actually, I was slightly more privileged than some other friends because I got to learn the piano. (And partly it was because of a lucky coincidence that the community centre near my house offered lessons at $25 per month, for many many years; I learnt there until I completed my grade 6. Can you believe it, less than $6 per lesson!)

By the time I was in Secondary 4, my weekly allowance was $10. WOW! That $10 included all my transport costs, and whatever lunch I might need to buy if I had to stay back in school for the afternoon. But amazingly, I managed, and could even afford new music books and even some cassette tapes once in a while. (I’m not that old to be in the pure cassette tape era - there were CDs! but cassette tapes were selling much cheaper than CDs so I bought cassette tapes, and I still have my collection of cassette tapes now.)

Oh, but of course I supplemented my income by working in the school holidays. Going overseas for a holiday with the family? Neither me nor my friends ever heard about such a thing except in the TV serials. Extra school activities in the school holidays? Somehow there didn’t seem to be as much activities then as there are now. We could work full-time in the school holidays. And what jobs didn’t my friends and I do? We took whatever work we could find, whoever would employ us. It was a joy when we turned 15 because then we could be more “rightfully” employed. I think there still is a law which prevents people from employing kids younger than 15 if I’m not wrong. We could only distribute flyers on the streets or in letter boxes or work in macdonalds before we were 15. But after that, the range of jobs widened.

Fast forward to my junior college days, I started giving tuition. Yes, tuition was becoming more and more important. An extra $200 per month made me feel wonderfully rich! But by then, I paid for my own piano lessons. And I had already finished grade 8 (and was no longer learning in the community centre) which means my piano fees were a whooping $180 per month. Ok, $20 left for my “other expenses”. But my friends and I continued to work in the school holidays and I believed I was able to afford certain luxuries once in a while, although of course there were no iPhones or iPads or high tech stuff to tempt me then.

After A-levels, we had half a year before going into university. What else would we do but FIND WORK! And this was the first real longer-term full-time work we did and let me tell you, I did feel wonderfully rich then! I could finally afford erhu lessons, and even buy a violin of my own, albeit a cheap one.

And in between the semesters during our university days, what else did we do but, WORK! Overseas exchange, going on holidays with friends, that was all a dream. But I guess it will matter much more now than last time because everyone seems to be doing it now. Then, going overseas was something rare. But now I think not going is the rare thing.

I remember we had one occasion during our secondary school days when there was an overseas trip. I went home and asked for permission to go. Of course I was blasted about that for a very very very very long time. “What a waste of money, you think money grows on trees? You won’t get your O-levels going there. I bet you all are going there just to have fun….and so on and so on.” I never ever bothered to ask again if I might go on any overseas trip because I couldn’t afford anyway.

And after I graduated from university, guess what my friends and I did? Go on a graduation trip? Yes, in my dreams. My friends and I went to look for temporary work. So that we could earn some money before we each find our respective long-term employment.

Now as I look around, besides the few friends who have been with me through my growing-up years, I don’t think anyone has those same experiences we had. Many friends I know who are in the same age group as I am, never had to work during their school holidays. I think it is also safe to bet that no one can imagine living on a $10 weekly allowance which includes transport, meals and buying school stuff.

I look at all my students, their parents send them for lessons and it’s not just erhu lessons. They have all sorts of other enrichment classes and activities, and each school holiday, they go overseas for a getaway.

Schools, even as young as primary schools, have overseas trips and huge groups of students get to go and see and experience another country, another culture, other people. What a wealth of experiences these young people are going to accumulate!

My students, as young as 7 or 8 get to have iPhones, their own computer, iPads, gameboys, xboxes, what have you, while I got my first computer at the ripe old age of 19, thank you very much. Just recently I overheard my 14 year-old student talk about html coding which I was learning about only at the ripe old age of 20, after plugging in to the internet for a year since I got my computer at 19.

My primary school students are talking about what apps they can download in their iPhones while yours truly got her first iPhone at the ripe old age of….heheh…I shall not reveal.

I’m wondering, if it is really a different era I grew up in, or was it a different strata of society I grew up in. Somehow, I found the people around me, all my friends, were in similar circumstances as me. But now, besides those few very good friends I still keep in touch with, other friends whom I get to know after my growing-up years, do seem to have a very different life when they were growing up. And needless to say, my students from the younger generation are a in a way different league.

Probably, no, most likely, I grew up amongst the less-privileged, and it seemed just normal because people around me are in just the same circumstances as me. As my life changed, I gradually moved away from the society I grew up in, not because of anything else but simply because our lives do not cross. I work, and the people I meet are my colleagues who do the same things as me, and off work, I meet up with the few good friends I have who are also living a very different life from when we were all growing up. I get to see students who are mostly from the more fortunate walks of life because after all, their families can afford to send them for costly music lessons.

But this does not make the group of less-privileged people disappear. They are still there - there is a group of people who are still trying hard to make ends meet. There is perhaps a little girl out there who has to work through her school holidays to afford things that she wants. There are probably many young people out there who wishes to learn a musical instrument but they know their family can never spare the money to send them for lessons.

And these are the group of people I want to remember I want to work for. I want to teach in the Chinese Orchestras in schools because that might be the only chance these young people get to learn an instrument. I want to give these young people a chance to learn and appreciate and enjoy music and not for schools to simply want results. To squeeze the students to make them get as many gold awards as possible but in the end to walk away from it only remembering a bitter aftertaste of learning music. I hope none of my students will remember only that.

moving...

2011-11-20T22:54:00.002+08:00

Can't find me here?
Probably it's because I've moved here!

when a green pea becomes a formidable weapon

2011-11-03T20:39:00.002+08:00

If you know a giRaffe well, you will know that she loves green peas.
And because giRaffe loves green peas, she cooks green peas.
And green peas come in frozen packs.
And giRaffe is not the sort who will patiently defrost stuff; she throws frozen things, especially peas, directly into the pot.
And giRaffe does not even bother to take part of the peas out from the packet (because she is not cooking the entire pack) and put them into a container and then lovingly scoop the peas from the container into the pot. No, giRaffe gives the peas a few hard knocks to break up the whole frozen chunk and drops the amount of peas she wants directly from the packet into the pot (of boiling water).
Which leads to today's story of how a green pea (frozen) can be a formidable weapon.

You see, giRaffe's Little One loves to follow giRaffe into the kitchen when she cooks because there are so many things to poke around. So when giRaffe was attempting to get the huge chunk of frozen green peas out of the packet into the pot, one beautifully shaped, perfectly spherical, perfectly frozen little green pea decided to take a different trajectory and flew straight at the cute little nose of giRaffe's Little One.

And from the whines emanating from giRaffe's Little One, killer green pea almost killed him.

So here's a Public Safety Warning for anyone cooking green peas.
Either defrost them carefully, or make sure your loved ones are not within the pea's range of trajectory.

hopes

2011-10-31T14:34:00.000+08:00

This is hard.
Hoping this one will get carried full term.
So many copies still stuck halfway.

In other news,
remembering to take things slow.
step out into the unknown.
giRaffe wants to live life,
not rush through life.

have you ever been there

2011-10-30T21:40:00.000+08:00

have you ever been there
to the place
that is so dark
when you want to stop thinking
because not thinking means you do not have to face the darkness
the darkness that never seems to end
and you do not know if you can ever find your way out
and you do not want to know
because knowing means thinking
thinking means facing the darkness
and you simply do not know how to do that
without breaking up into tiny pieces
have you ever been there

the fine line

2011-10-24T23:03:00.003+08:00

it's a fine line to tread between accountability and good governance and how much freedom I'm willing to sacrifice.
after all, no government is perfect.

usually, giRaffe tend to favour much more on the freedom side.
give me freedom and I might close half an eye on your accountability but if you cannot be accountable, and you still want to grip people tightly by their throats, I think that is way too much.

I also think we are way too small to achieve equilibrium in the long run.
Too small for diversity.
To be sustainable, there has to be a certain population.
But for our population to achieve enough numbers to be sustainable, we won't have enough for diversity.
And people with differences will want to move out.
And the country has to take new people in for sustenance.
But that will upset the equilibrium, that is if one can achieve equilibrium in the first place.

stifled

2011-10-24T22:45:00.000+08:00

It is way too stifling.

Yes, suddenly it all struck home.
I understood totally.
Because I felt that stifling grip.
Nothing here is free.
Not a single spot of land, not a single whiff of breeze, is really free.

Yes, it is way too stifling for a giRaffe here too.

Day 10 - Taiwan Finale

2011-10-19T19:33:00.001+08:00

你說你有個朋友　住在淡水河邊
     心裡有事　你就找他談天
     直到月初東山　你才滿臉抱歉
     告訴我你怎麼渡過這一天

淡水....what I always remember about this place.

All those names I once heard about, gets a picture tagged to them now.

淡水，漁人碼頭， they will always remind me of a friend now.

The 9th Day - Slow and easy old towns

2011-10-18T20:05:00.001+08:00

Catching the sunrise,

then getting back to bed and slowly easing into a beautiful new day.

A book, a cup of coffee and sandwiches, watching the world get up.
We need to remember to slow down and live life.

The 8th Day - of geological wonders and old towns

2011-10-17T22:42:00.002+08:00

Half of the day is taken up with rickety buses and almost feeling bus-sick.

But giRaffe's lovin' it!

Slow and easy - Taiwan Day 7

2011-10-16T21:57:00.001+08:00

Easy sunday morning, not a privilege a giRaffe has most of the time.

Going off somewhere on a holiday for a giRaffe isn't visiting all the famous or touristy spots. Many a time, giRaffe opts out of visiting those places that call themselves tourist attractions unless they could satisfy giRaffe's camera.

What is more precious for a giRaffe on a holiday is walking the backstreets and alleys, going along the everyday places. Because the feel of a place, the joy, the hurts, the nitty-gritty everyday life, they don't lie in the tourist attractions; they are in the normal everyday people going about their everyday lives.

This is what draws a giRaffe to travel. Because she wants to feel, the everyday, real, authentic feelings of a place.

It was a wonderful ending to a wonderful Hualien trip.

wet shoes - day 6 taiwan

2011-10-15T16:24:00.002+08:00

white-capped rapids
clear blue waters
rocks that come tumbling down
wet shoed but light heart

the long road - taiwan fifth day

2011-10-14T16:10:00.001+08:00

hualien....
will always remind a giRaffe of freedom.

day number 4 of a giRaffe bouncing around taiwan

2011-10-13T22:45:00.002+08:00

with the filth of living in a city of zombies, giRaffe, even with all her heart wanting to believe in the goodness of people, very often have trouble doing so.
a cup of coffee, a camera, and a smile, may just be the cure for giRaffe's cynicism.
arh...there yet might be hope.

around taipei on day 3

2011-10-12T22:39:00.001+08:00

four words.
a rather pointless day.

the need to be alone

2011-10-12T20:11:00.001+08:00

why does giRaffe keep on wanting to plod all over the place?
because it makes her feel free.
why is being free so important to a giRaffe?
because not being free makes a giRaffe fearful.
giRaffe is not scared of not being free per se though that is somewhat scary too, but rather, the state of not being free induces fear in a giRaffe if you get what giRaffe means.
it makes a giRaffe fearful of not meeting people's expectations, it makes a giRaffe fearful of not fitting into the box, when a giRaffe was never meant to be in the box.
and when that happens, a giRaffe will attempt to fit herself into that someone else's box, but never succeeding.
and because giRaffe cannot do that, her fear of not fitting into the box gets worse, and thus the vicious cycle continues.

so a giRaffe reminds herself constantly, to be free.
to get away.
to be alone.
to find what is true to herself.
to purge her fears away.

ps: the second picture has nothing to do with this post; giRaffe just found it intriguing because she realised only today that hipstamatic's blackeys ultragrain is not truly b&w but actually with the saturation removed until very little colour is left.

prancing around taiwan day 2

2011-10-12T01:00:00.002+08:00

and so comes day 2...or strictly speaking, the first real day.

what can be more important than kittehs?
if there is this kitteh village hidden somewhere in taiwan, of course a giRaffe has to go look for it!

if taiwanese knows how to appreciate kittehs, then they surely must be an awesome nation!

don't be deceived by her looks, she is very friendly! she follows giRaffe around looking for chin scritches and head rubs!

why is there a woofie in kitteh village!

handsome!

having gotten herself so thoroughly lost last night, and being so excited at going to see the kittehs this morning, giRaffe forgot all about noms. Until about 3 in the afternoon when she suddenly felt so hungry.
So she sat herself down at one of the roadside stalls and nommed!
And the stall owner seeing a giRaffe with a camera and probably with a funny accent guessed that giRaffe wasn't a local, and very soon struck up a conversation with her!
Taiwanese are friendly people indeed!

In the process of getting to raohe night market after being at the top of the world, giRaffe got herself lost again. And when she asked for directions about which bus to take, a lady, who is not very sure of the route numbers herself, helped a giRaffe to read all the bus signs and pointed her to the bus she ought to take.
And then blunderbuss giRaffe found herself having boarded a bus without the necessary change for the trip!
Mr Bus Driver told a giRaffe, forget it, the next time you board my bus again, then you pay me for this trip!
And Mr Bus Driver still went and made sure giRaffe alights at the correct stop.

Verdict: Taiwanese are not just friendly, they go the extra mile to help you! And it's all these tiny things that makes a giRaffe feel her trip to taiwan is going to be a wonderful one!

giRaffe's taiwan adventures day 1

2011-10-11T01:03:00.002+08:00

and so on the first night giRaffe arrives in taipei,

she attempts to take the train to where her hostel was...

and managed to get herself,
thoroughly lost.
From taoyuan airport, she ends up in songshan airport...
and then she took the mrt, and finally landed at the correct stop,
but started walking towards the wrong direction..
and she asked for directions...and the people who lived there didn't even know where it is....

and finally giRaffe ended with a guy who said he'll drive giRaffe to her hostel.
and being worried that giRaffe would be afraid to go alone in the car with him, he asked his wife down so she could accompany giRaffe.
and he drove giRaffe round and round and he got lost too but he continued until finally...at the stroke of midnight (really at the stroke of midnight) he found giRaffe her hostel!

taiwanese are really nice people.

R.I.P Steve Jobs...

2011-10-06T10:41:00.000+08:00

Apple just has to keep tempting a giRaffe with new candies!

This is just high high up on the want list now!
And the iPhone 4S!
It may not be the iPhone 5 everyone was waiting for, Siri sure sounds seductive!

What a loss to the world with the demise of Steve Jobs; giRaffe hopes that Apple will continue the vision of Jobs, in making technology simply magical.
And to continue shoving candies up giRaffe's face.

fuzzy...

2011-09-27T23:05:00.000+08:00

a fuzzy blanket and a cup of hot milo.
with giRaffe's two darling boys at her side.
giRaffe can brave whatever the world is going to throw at her.

TO NEVER STOP WRITING…

2011-09-27T00:12:00.001+08:00

It may not be much, but I do not want to stop writing.

Writing makes me think, and hence clear my mind of the clutter. The world may be moving fast without time for a breath, but I do not want to be led by the pace of the world. I want to lead my own pace. The pace of life that will enable me to feel every moment, deeply. The pace that may hurt painfully, but also live fully. I do not want a half life, a life just rolling along.

I want to remember to live every single day, meaningfully.

unsolicited...

2011-09-23T12:23:00.001+08:00

it could be that giRaffe is paranoid, but giRaffe is suspecting that her information is being sold by the bank.
Why did giRaffe come to this conclusion?
giRaffe has to go back many many years to the past.
You see, in the days of yore, Singapore decided that everyone who is Chinese has to have a hanyu pinyin (i.e. a romanized Mandarin name) in their identification.
But yet, we were all named with romanized Dialect names.
So it means that two people with the exact same Chinese names will have different romanized dialect names if they are from different dialect group. But they will have the same romanized Mandarin name.
Because of all this confusing naming things, every Chinese baby during giRaffe's era had their romanized dialect name in their birth certificate.
But in school, our dialect names were forgotten and we were all identified by our hanyu pinyin names.
And when we reached the age where we had to make our identification cards (which was 12 during giRaffe's era), we had to put our dialect names (which was on our birth certificate) as well as our hanyu pinyin names (which was what we went by in our daily lives).
So a person of the same era as giRaffe would have XXX dialect name (xxx hanyu pinyin name) printed on their indentification card.

And after that, the ministry for some reason or other, suddenly decides that hey, you were named according to your dialect names during birth, so let's honour that and everyone, let's just call everyone else by their dialect name. Bye bye hanyu pinyin names.
And so probably just 1 or 2 years after giRaffe had her identification card made, the whole world forgot about hanyu pinyin names and we were all yay, dialect names galore.

So fast forward many years down the road, giRaffe had to make a new identification card because the old one was....old.
So she decided, since her hanyu pinyin name was obsolete and honestly, she didn't really like the sound of her hanyu pinyin name, she should just take it out of her identification card.
And so from that time on, giRaffe never had anything to do with her hanyu pinyin name anymore.

Now back to the story, giRaffe's been getting all these annoying calls and SMSes promoting this and that, and in backward Singapore, it will still be a few months before the law is up that we can put our numbers under the do-not-call list and not be called.
And today, giRaffe received an SMS:
dear Miss giRaffe's dialect name (giRaffe's hanyu pinyin name) we are having a promotional launch blah blah blah....

Only giRaffe's long ago identification card had giRaffe's dialect name with giRaffe's hanyu pinyin name in brackets behind it.
number 1, if giRaffe ever filled in any forms on her own, she would never have put down her hanyu pinyin name.
number 2, any official things that a giRaffe registered for, eg new bank accounts, telephone lines, etc, would have a photocopy of giRaffe's new identification card which means no hanyu pinyin name either.
And the only only thing which has giRaffe's dialect name with giRaffe's hanyu pinyin name in brackets behind it, PLUS giRaffe's telephone number, has to be her very first savings account with our dear, biggest, national bank in giRaffe's dear country. The bank account that giRaffe opened when she was 13. Because this is the account that giRaffe still uses, she of course would have updated them with her new phone numbers, and because she could not remove the hanyu pinyin name from the account without closing the account (giRaffe asked about it once before), hence her hanyu pinyin stands. The only remnant in giRaffe's life of her old hanyu pinyin name.

And if giRaffe received the annoying unsolicited SMS addressing giRaffe by her hanyu pinyin name, she can only come to the conclusion that giRaffe's long-time bank sold her particulars to some data mining company.

Which really makes a giRaffe feel VERY VERY annoyed and unsafe.

random pictures...

2011-09-13T22:36:00.000+08:00

Once, giRaffe's friend wondered about the pictures giRaffe took.
You see, they went on a holiday together, and the pictures giRaffe took back didn't seem to document the trip as the friend remembered.
giRaffe told the friend, giRaffe is not a documentary producer or a journalist.
Her pictures do not reflect chronological happenings that took place, nor do they report journalistically.
Instead, giRaffe takes pictures to remember how she felt.
Looking at the picture, giRaffe wants to recreate the feelings that went through a giRaffe as she was in the midst of it.
And she wants to attempt to share these feelings with others, through her pictures.
That is why giRaffe like to play with photography.
giRaffe doesn't feel too wordy today.
So, just enjoy these randoms.

of rights...

2011-09-09T13:20:00.001+08:00

From Star Trek Voyager - Death Wish

Quinn: "They feared me so much they had to lock me
away for eternity. And when they did, they were saying that an
individual's rights will be protected only as long as they're not in
conflict with the state. And nothing could be more dangerous to a
society."

Don't we all have to remember that!

If an individual's rights extends only to the extend they do not conflict with the state, then that is not individual right anymore.

No state is going to be an evolved state if it is afraid of respecting individual rights because they may not be mainstream.

an almost free week...

2011-09-02T12:33:00.000+08:00

You know how when you have a day free, you start planning all sorts of ambitious things that you are going to accomplish on that day? No, you don't? You accomplish ambitious things everyday? Oh well, it's just a giRaffe then.

Anyway, giRaffe has a free day.
In fact, she has an almost free week due to the fact that Monday is her off-day, Tuesday was a public holiday, Thursday was celebration for Teachers' Day which meant no teaching, and Friday is the actual Teachers' Day.

So of course, what won't a giRaffe do but plan everyday to be such ambitious accomplished days with so many awesome things that ought to be done?
Like wash the car, like clean out the room, like finish the thousand and one books which giRaffe uncontrollably bought recently, like practice....yes, practice!

And so, it is Friday. The week has just zipped by so fast.

And a giRaffe is sitting in front of her computer, watching movies, sipping coffee, with an awful bed head, and the car is still unwashed, the room still...uh....well, you have to dig a while before you can find giRaffe's Boys.
And of course, giRaffe's instrument lies there untouched.

So giRaffe lifts up her cup of coffee to you here and says
"CHEERS TO AN ALMOST FREE WEEK!"

of waking up....

2011-09-01T09:03:00.000+08:00

After giRaffe's Boy woke her up for breakfast at 5am, giRaffe went back for a snooze. And during that about 30minutes of snoozing, giRaffe dreamt.
You know how you can dream of years passing even when it's only a few minutes in your sleep?
Well, giRaffe dreamt of the passing of a few years.
giRaffe dreamt she bought a BMW. (Why a BMW giRaffe has no idea since although it's a good car, giRaffe would have loved some other cars more.)
But anyway, in giRaffe's dream, she bought a BMW, and she drove it for a few years.
Until Miss Roti Lin became only a memory that she will tell her friends of, stories of how once upon a time she had a van that was oh so "fun" that everyday she would have to guess at what is going to malfunction.
And giRaffe drove the BMW for a few years.

And then giRaffe's Little One came and wake her up.
And...
giRaffe saw dear Miss Lin happily sitting in the carpark still.

of giRaffe's van that smells like the toilet...

2011-08-31T19:00:00.001+08:00

seriously, giRaffe should change the air freshener in her Roti....

Infestation...

2011-08-29T00:37:00.000+08:00

giRaffe's a bit freaked out now because her room seems to have an ant infestation!
giRaffe honestly don't hoard any food stuff in her room (anything vaguely resembling edible is consumed long before the ants have a chance to sniff them out; and anything a giRaffe doesn't consume, is consumed by her Boy).
So really, what led the ants here?
And giRaffe finds ants on the most unrelated things.
Like a crowd on her metronome....metronome! The ants must be trying to practice some weird piece of music. (Coincidentally, there is a piece of erhu music called....螞蟻!)
And a whole line crawling over her laptop screen....Probably they are near-sighted and want to have a clearer view of the movie that giRaffe is watching on her laptop.
And during the time she sits in her room, giRaffe gets ants crawling over her!

Help!

and on this cool night of cooling day

2011-08-26T23:39:00.001+08:00

A few more hours before a giRaffe is going to vote for the new president of Singapore.
But she has yet to decide who to cast her vote for!
giRaffe knows who she is NOT voting for, but there still leaves the question of who to put the cross against.

Over the past week, giRaffe has read, and watched and listened to all the candidates running for the presidency.
They have promised a great many things.
But giRaffe is not looking at the things they promised per se.
giRaffe is looking to get a feel of their values, their ideas, their character, their beliefs.
Because anyone can promise anything, but if their values and beliefs are not in the right place, their character is in question, then how can they be trusted to carry out what they promised?
And how can they be trusted to make the decision that is best for the people in the future? After all, 6 years is a long time and things are going to happen that are not being anticipated at the moment now. And they are going to have to make the decisions then.

A certain candidate has very early on dropped out of giRaffe's presidency list. The way he looks at people when he talks, the way he responds to others holding contrary views, the way he looks like (to giRaffe) he is speaking down at others, the way he goes round and around, as if he thinks he can cover up for certain things that definitely are not going to happen if he gets to be president. Number one was very easy to eliminate, even taking away all his past history, connections with certain parties and stuff, and just looking, purely looking at his performance in all his talks and interviews and rallies in this past week.

Then comes another candidate who over the course of this week, seemed to a giRaffe to be wavering in his ideas and beliefs, in the values he claims to be holding and then to be forgetting. He seems to be unwilling to make a firm stand on a good many things, like he was afraid of promising because once he gets to be the president, he is just going to sit back and just continue to let the waves wash over him.
And then he claims to believe that the death sentence is important to the moral fabric of our society. And it was not even about taking away the death sentence (although a giRaffe would love to have it taken away), but only about granting clemency.
Well, giRaffe won't root for someone who believes they can hold the power of another person's life in their hands. No matter what sort of crimes the other person has committed, no, no one has the power of life or death over another.

So giRaffe is left with 2.
But here comes the difficult part.
giRaffe is actually quite supportive of this candidate, who even though does not speak very well, gives the vibes of being true to the heart, of being true to serving the people.
And he has this track record of not being afraid to stand up for what he believes in, even if it means rocking the boat and making some waves.
Under the constitution, the president may not have much power, but even with that little bit of power, if he is one who is just going to run for the office that is, if he is one who is afraid of rocking the boat even when he sees there is something needed to be changed, then giRaffe does not believe he will be a good president.

Alright, so a giRaffe's choice seems to be pretty clear.

But,

the little problem is this.

giRaffe's candidate of choice, doesn't seem to be the most popular candidate.
Yes, giRaffe can throw in her vote, making it one more vote to the candidate of giRaffe's choice.
But, if giRaffe's candidate is too low on the list, will it be better off for giRaffe to play on the statistics, and cast her vote for the next candidate on giRaffe's list instead, because it will then be one more vote towards ensuring that the candidates out of giRaffe's list do not get in?

Anyone understands what giRaffe mean?

Arh....what shall a giRaffe do tomorrow?

watch and listen with your heart.

2011-08-22T23:49:00.001+08:00

Listen not only rationally, but listen with your heart.
Listen not only to the words, and what each candidate says and promises,
But listen also to how they argue their points.
Listen and see how they react when arguing with another with opposing viewpoints.
Because whoever is elected is not only just going to do the things they promised in this discussion (even if they ultimately do fulfill everything they promised here), but they are going to react and decide on issues that come up during their term of presidency as well.

How do you think they will carry out their duties?
It's not just the words they say here.
Look at how they handle new suggestions, look at how they handle opposing views, look at how they handle other people, look at their body language.

giRaffe thinks that is the most important thing to look for.
Take a look at the videos, and decide carefully.

and a giRaffe has nothing but disgust...

2011-08-20T22:09:00.000+08:00

How low can one get?
Chen Show Mao banned from attending 7th month dinners with residents by Paya Lebar CCC

This is so disgustingly low down unclean play that giRaffe does not have the words for it!

Come on, these people are voted in fair and square by the people. Now that they are in, although they belong to the opposition party, aren't they also part of the whole, of the bigger group who are serving the country, whom we entrust to lead our nation on?

It's already so many months on, how sore a loser can you get? Goodness!
Sorry, you may not invite opposition MPs to your dinner or we will refuse to approve your using the space.
So my constituency voted for the opposition. They won. But I cannot invite them. Really? Do I invite the PAP guys who stood for the election but lost?
giRaffe has no qualms inviting the PAP guys to public events, after all, they are for everyone; but to disallow the organizers to invite the MP of their constituency? Just because they are from the opposition? Really!
So next time any events I have, I shall not invite the MPs for my constituency but invite the PAP people who lost the election, yes?
And say they the PAP people are actually the real MPs, yes?
And pretend the opposition MPs don't exist, yes?
Even though they are voted in fair and square by the people, yes?

giRaffe may be wrong, but she does suspect, even a primary school kid can see the blatant unfairness of this logic?

The election is over. Whoever that got in, got in fair and square.
And now it's time to work together for ONE NATION, yes?
And stop thinking of ways to make things difficult for some MPs or to make the lives of some people who live in a certain constituency difficult, just because their ruling MP, just happens not to wear white shirts.

giRaffe detests low down unfair play.

A letter to all the fellow people who shares the roads with giRaffe...

2011-08-13T23:53:00.000+08:00

Dear Fellow-Road-User,

giRaffe's been having some thoughts and questions while using the road together with you.

Firstly, giRaffe does not understand, is the signal on your car pay-per-use? Or does it have an extremely expensive light bulb that you're worried might spoil with too frequent usage?
Because you see, giRaffe's not understanding why it is so difficult for you to just SIGNAL when you need to change into giRaffe's lane, or when you might be turning and giRaffe is waiting on the opposite side because she thinks that you were intending to go straight. Or if you are going to SUDDENLY stop at the side of the road and there are vehicles right behind you, including a giRaffe's vehicle.
Just wondering why your signal seems to be so difficult to use because you see, giRaffe doesn't feel that her signal is very difficult to use, even though giRaffe has a very lousy and difficult to drive car.

Secondly, giRaffe has this understanding that there are lane markings on the road for a simple reason, that is you try to see where the line is, and try to keep inside your lines. If you want to move over to another lane, please do signal, and move quickly into the new lane when there are no cars dangerously close behind. If not, then stay in your own lane. Perhaps a giRaffe does not understand, but she sees no reason anyone needs to straddle two lanes for any notable period of time. If you do want to change lanes, notify others behind with your signal please, not by trying to inch and edge and straddle between two lanes, thank you very much.

Thirdly, giRaffe does believe that motorcycles and heavy vehicles are entitled to use the first lane; giRaffe loves using the first lane as well. But, is it really necessary to use the first lane when you are moving at 50kph? No, giRaffe has absolutely no issues with you being on the first lane at 50kph if there are no other cars on the road. But, if there are quite a few squillion cars behind you and you are moving at 50kph, giRaffe is wondering if it is just possible, for you to move over, to the other lanes.

Fourthly (and fourthly sounds a bit wrong doesn't it?), although vehicles are moving slowly in carparks and cars can almost certainly see you when you are walking in the carpark, please do still remember, it is a carpark. Not a pedestrian walkway.
Do not take your own sweet time walking in the middle of the carpark, or in the parking lots, especially when you see that a giRaffe is trying to park her little Roti into the lot. Do not take your own sweet time and walk right in front of a giRaffe in the carpark as well because you see, even though a giRaffe can see you and will most certainly not ram into you, it is still polite to remember, you (the pedestrian) is in a carpark, not your grand-daddy's road.

Finally, dear cyclists on the road, feel free to share the road with a giRaffe. giRaffe used to share the road on her bicycle as well, before her bicycles all got stolen and she got her Roti. But, please, try to keep on the side of the road, and DO NOT attempt to change into any other lane, in front of any vehicles, because no matter how slow the vehicle might be, it is still very much likely, faster than you. And much sturdier than you too. Also, do please try not to wobble in the middle of the road. In any case, if you are still wobbling on your bicycle, you really do not have any business to be sharing the road with any other vehicles. Try to practice somewhere first without any fast moving vehicles, yes? And after you manage to stop wobbling, why, feel free to share the road with giRaffe.

Yours truly,
a giRaffe who likes her roads to be safe to drive on.

of more thoughts triggered by the coming PE....

2011-08-13T11:06:00.000+08:00

It's been a good many months since the general elections that saw a sprouting of so many concerned opinions about the political scene of this nation. And a great deal of verbal bashing at the ruling party. And naturally a greater deal of fighting back by the bashed at party.

Concerns about the political scene in the nation is good.
Great in fact!
So much better than the political apathy we were so well-known for.
Concern about how our living, our future is going to be affected by the numerous policies, decisions made by the ruling elite (yes, we're still being ruled by an elite, not living in a democracy), interest, concern, ideas and suggestions - they are all important for the maturation of the nation.

But, for one, the bashing has led to an over-defensiveness on the part of the bashed.
Especially one which is so un-accustomed to having differing opinions, one which has more than 4 decades of "I say, you follow, no questions" ingrained in their mindset.

And this defensiveness has led to something even more scary. A segregation of you and me:
If you are not for a certain white shirt, then you are against.
We need to build a nation that is strong on a single-party rule.
If one day, the white shirts do not rule, there is going to be chaos.
We white shirts can make the best policies, after all we've been at it for 4 decades, and you are not supposed to question us.
We white shirts do not have to consult you when making our decisions.
And so on and so on.

And now it seems like, a certain group of white shirts have forgotten, what they are here for.
Yes, during the election campaign, you do have to think about the "me-group" and the "you-group", of course everyone wants their group to win.
And now that you have been chosen into office, hello, election's over.
You've been chosen as the majority (though not by giRaffe, but she accepts the conclusion), to serve this nation and move us on the next few years.
But there are also others, together there serving the nation.
Stop thinking about killing off anyone who is not wearing the same coloured shirts as you. Now it's time for working together to lead the nation on, and forget about the colour of your shirts!
It's time to remember the promises handed out during the campaigning period and act on those promises, isn't it?
Not pretend those things never happen, and keep harping on "if one day the nation is no longer under the strong hand of a single political party, we are going to fall".
Come on, grow up.
A better way to ensure your own continued existence within the ranks of the "ruling elite" (though perhaps the term ruling elite will also fall away with the falling away of certain white shirts) is to act on your promises made just a few months back, to play fair and square, to respect the citizens, to show us all you're here to serve. Not to rule.

Of course to be fair, there are many supporters of non-white-shirts who does a great deal of unfair bashing out at the whites. giRaffe does not approve of those either. No bashing is fair. Take out events, individually, and evaluate them, weigh them, decide upon them. And not just sweep everything together and bash out at certain groups wearing a certain coloured shirts.

So come on, work together as a country, a nation.
Be fair.
Remember respect.
giRaffe is no politician, and she knows it's impossible to keep everyone happy, but giRaffe thinks, the most important thing a good leader can do is not come up with fool-proof policies and decisions, because they are impossible, but to be fair. And to respect the people. To remember leaders are actually known as servers. That is all.

And on this day the nation celebrates her 46th...

2011-08-09T10:06:00.000+08:00

giRaffe probably has said this a thousand times.
But on this day, her nation's birthday, she shall say it once again.

giRaffe lives on a country that is just a tiny dot on the world atlas.
But for such a tiny dot, it has come a long way.
Technological progress, standard of living, all sorts of material comforts, this little dot is able to provide for.
giRaffe is fortunate to live on this little dot.

But,
giRaffe does not fly the flag on this day.
giRaffe does not watch the parade.
giRaffe does not wear red, or keep track of the latest national day songs.
giRaffe is in fact, quite loud-mouthed about some of the policies of the nation, some of the things those known as the government is doing.

But does it mean a giRaffe is not a patriot?
Perhaps if being a patriot is simply all the above things, giRaffe is not a patriot.

But a giRaffe believes,
being a patriot is not simply that.

Being a patriot means loving her country.
giRaffe does love this tiny little dot.
Not the flag, it's only a symbol.
Not the government, they are supposed to be the group we choose to work together with us, to shape the nation into something that belongs to all of us.
And if some of the policies they decide on does not appear to benefit the nation, giRaffe thinks it's her responsibility to voice it out.
giRaffe loves this dot because most of her friends and family are here.
giRaffe loves this dot because they make up a large part of her memory.
giRaffe loves this dot because this is where she grew up, where she is living her life now.
giRaffe loves this dot because this little dot is a part of her!

giRaffe does not believe in serving the nation by fighting a war or doing violence. Not because giRaffe is afraid to die for her country, but because giRaffe does not believe anyone should kill anyone else.
Because the lives of another living being should never be in anyone else's hands.

giRaffe does not believe that anyone should be discriminated against, and that everyone should be respected.
if certain powers in the leadership decides upon certain things which discriminates against certain groups of people, giRaffe is against them.
if certain powers in the leadership forget that they are serving the nation, but instead think that they are there to make decisions and have everyone under them just follow, giRaffe will never be for them.
Mutual respect.
Not talking down, not making decisions because they benefit you but to see that especially those under-priviledged ones are benefitted.
If not, giRaffe does not respect you too.
giRaffe does not approve of you too.

But yet, that said, it does not mean a giRaffe does not love her nation.
It is precisely more so, because she loves her nation, that she will get unsatisfied with the governing bodies.
Think about it, if it is not something that matters to a giRaffe, why would she want to waste her mind thinking about it.

So like it or not, giRaffe will continue to have many things to say about the policies made, about the decisions taken by those who call themselves the leaders (giRaffe does not approve of this term though, to really serve, they should remember they are the servants, not leaders.)
But giRaffe does love this little dot on the map.
This little place which is unlike any other places in the world, not because of the architecture, the geographical structures, the material things we have here, but because of the memories it has in a giRaffe.
Because of the way it is, a part of giRaffe's life that can never be changed.

And this is how, in giRaffe's own way, she shows her love for this tiny little dot she calls her country on this day of her birthday.

another sleepless night

2011-08-06T00:49:00.001+08:00

giRaffe's perpetual insomnia is plaguing her again but with Gertrude Stein, giRaffe is enjoying insomnia with a blast!

giRaffe is not pretending to understand a lot of what Gertrude Stein writes; sometimes it seems like a lot of free associations which intrigues a giRaffe, but sometimes they don't even make sense.

But it's the rhythm that got a giRaffe hooked. Just reading the words and enjoying the rhythm. Maybe there's a lot more about Gertrude Stein which one can read into, but giRaffe doesn't care, she is enjoying reading in her very own way.

And isn't that what reading is all about anyway? Enjoying it in your very own way.

my wife has a cow

2011-07-31T22:39:00.000+08:00

having just discovered another gem!
Gertrude Stein!

Have it as having having it as happening, happening to have it has happening, having to have it as happening. Happening and have it as happening and having to have it happen as happening, and my wife has a cow as now, my wife having a cow as now, my wife having a cow as now and having a cow as now and having a cow and having a cow now, my wife has a cow and now.

goodness....giRaffe is head-over-heels in love with Gertrude Stein!

giRaffe loves peeking into the minds of those with amazing intellect...

2011-07-29T22:35:00.000+08:00

Anyone who hasn't discovered Ursula Le Guin,
get yourself out there and discover her now!
Seriously!
Like NOW!

giRaffe's God...

2011-07-29T11:54:00.000+08:00

giRaffe is in a very serious relationship.
With her God.
And her God is fair and just and LOVING.
He includes every person. And EVERY person means EVERY person.
Not just the holy, not just the saints.
In fact, if giRaffe may be so bold to believe, He loves sinners just a wee bit more, because it is precisely for the sake of all us sinners, that He sent his only begotten Son to pay for our sins on the cross.
And sins means ALL sins. Big fat sins which make us wheeze with terror and shame, and tiny little sins which we sometimes just sweep under the carpet, they are all sins.
But He does not care if they are big fat sins or tiny little sins, because He came down from Heaven, specifically to carry ALL our sins.

And none of us who call upon Him are ever rejected.
Never ever.
As long as we call upon Him, we are guaranteed His loving hands.

So never ever, for a single second, believe it when someone tells you, you've done too great a wrong; you're unworthy; God won't save you.
Never ever, for a single second, believe that there are people who can fall outside of God's grace unless they themselves refuse to accept it.
Never ever, for a single second, believe that God will discriminate against anyone, any group of people.

How long more will the prejudices continue, how long more will the bigotry last, how much more intolerances are there going to be by the self-righteous using the name of God?

STOP! giRaffe says.
STOP NOW!
If you are prejudiced, if you are a bigot, go ahead, giRaffe has no power or right to stop you.
But never ever take the Name of giRaffe's God and use it for your own bigotry, that's all giRaffe is saying.
Never take the Name of giRaffe's God to cover up your own self-righteousness or your own idea of moralism.

Because giRaffe's God is all loving, all gracious.
And there is absolutely no room for discrimination or hatred.
And if you encounter anyone who says that their god is one who hates sinners, who hates you if you are not able to fulfill certain expectations, who hates you because you belong to a certain race, or sexual orientation, or does a certain job, or have a certain bad habit, remember,
that is not giRaffe's God.

Because giRaffe's God is
LOVE, and
GRACE.

at the age of 25...

2011-07-25T22:17:00.004+08:00

In the days of yore, when a eight-year-old giRaffe was not yet the enlightened feminist she became, she thought that everything she enjoyed about life will end by the time she was perhaps 25.

You see, giRaffe did not have anyone who knew better to tell her, not everything that people around her believes in is the holy truth.

Just a word of warning before a giRaffe carries on, this is going to be an extremely feminist, but extremely truthful post too. And if you are going to be offended, then giRaffe suggests you leave now.

Still here? Alright, giRaffe shall ramble on now.

She was taught that girls are weaker and somehow less than boys.
She was taught that you cannot scream and shout and run and jump like a boy if you were a girl because that would be un-ladylike.
She was taught that girls will never be good in math.
She was taught that when girls grew up, they had to get married and have children, and be a good housewife and do the housework, and take care of the house.
She was taught that women have to yield to their husbands, because, well, because it was so.
She was taught a-plenty.

So a giRaffe thought, since most women will have to get married by 25, and have children and take care of their house if they do not wish to become old maids, that probably what she can enjoy about life, is going to end by the time she was 25.
And even though giRaffe was only a eight-year-old giRaffe, 25 seemed like a way too short amount of time for her to do what she wants before her life ends.

You see, giRaffe was taught that girls are weaker and somehow less than boys, but she beat up boys plenty of times, and she could climb better, dare more and think faster than many other boys.

She was taught that you cannot scream and shout and run and jump like a boy if you were a girl because that would be un-ladylike, but giRaffe cannot stand the thought of having to bottle things inside her and pretend to be the sweet and demure giRaffe which she never was. And anyway she could jump further and run faster than many boys who were her playmates.

She was taught that girls will never be good in math or science. But she tops her class in math and the whole school in science every year. Actually, she tops her class every single year and was usually first or second, among her entire year. And she has her report book to prove it if anyone has any doubts.

She was taught that when girls grew up, they had to get married and have children, and be a good housewife and do the housework, and take care of the house, but dammit, giRaffe doesn't care to have children, nor does she want to take care of the house. Anyway, who gave the ordinance that women will have to stay at home and do all the boring stuff while men have all the fun?

She was taught that women have to yield to their husbands, because, well, because it was so and to hell with that.

For a while, at least until a giRaffe was ten or elevenish, giRaffe didn't know that she could question these holy ordinances. She thought the lives of everyone around her were the holy truth, and well, giRaffe has never seen anyone daring to question the truth. And so whatever giRaffe wanted to question, were unsavorily swallowed down.

But you see, a giRaffe wasn't born to be so mild and accepting. And so as she grew, she had to start questioning. And she looked around. In places no one thought children should see. She saw things that the adults around her did not even dream of looking. And she questioned and questioned.

giRaffe didn't want her life to end by the time she was 25. giRaffe was a relatively intelligent child, and she enjoyed the games she played, she enjoyed the friends she had, she did well in school, she had her fair share of falls and beatings and scoldings, but they were what everyone else had. giRaffe's family may not be the perfect one you see on television, giRaffe might have to worry about certain problems even in her very young life, but still, amidst all that, giRaffe does enjoy living. And she really did not want her life to end at 25.

Well, fast forward giRaffe's life 2 decades down.

Even if giRaffe has not learnt any other things worthwhile in the interim, at least she has learnt this.

giRaffe has as much right as anyone else to do the things she likes.

giRaffe has as much right as anyone else to dream the dreams she believes in.

giRaffe has as much right as anyone else to achieve the things she wants to achieve.

giRaffe has as much right as anyone else to love the loves she loves.

giRaffe has as much right as anyone else to live the life she wants.

Never ever let anyone make you think that you are less than what you are.

giRaffe has seen it.

All these things, way too subtle, but they add up. Man, they add up to something very debilitating.

Small things.

Like girls should wear pink and frills and skirts and make-up to look pretty.

Like dismissive remarks of female drivers (sometimes by females themselves)!

Like geeky looking females who can change a light-bulb are a turn-off. (Why, giRaffe would rather spend her life with a geeky looking female who can change a light-bulb and has something inside her brain, than with a clod who can only think about getting girls to bed but is too slow to even string a coherent sentence together.)

And a zillion more such things, which if you do not think about it, seem so small and insignificant.

But precisely because one doesn't notice them, they slowly but surely insinuate into the subconscious.

It's not to say women cannot put make-up and wear dresses. On the contrary! If a woman loves it, go ahead! There is nothing wrong with wanting to look pretty in make-up and dresses, or being a bad driver for that matter.
The trouble is, many have become unable to see the difference between a single woman as an individual who loves pink and frills and barbie dolls from the whole group called females in the world.
There is nothing wrong with an individual female loving pink and frills and barbie dolls, but there is something seriously wrong in lumping the whole category of human beings known as females into a homogeneous whole.

How much potential have we killed in this world because people think that they have to be like everyone else?
How much have we lost because people are led to believe they are less than what they can be?

How much more are we going to destroy?

giRaffe is grateful for a mind that never stopped questioning.

And giRaffe is grateful for that love of reading she was introduced to.

Because it was her reading voraciously, everything single thing she could get her hand on, ever since she was a tiny giRaffe, that opened her mind to so many things she could never even imagine, had she just stayed rooted to what she could see around her.

And giRaffe didn't get married by 25, nor is she going to have children, or become a housewife. (PHEW!)

And giRaffe is going to enjoy living, doing things she believes in, living with passion, loving with all the love she can give, feeling with all the feelings she can have, be it warm and fuzzy ones or painful ones, she is not going to shortchange herself of any single bit of it.

Live free all my loved ones!

All of you out there!

2011-07-18T14:11:00.002+08:00

Oh man.....giRaffe DID IT!

now she is trembling...

2011-07-18T14:06:00.001+08:00

and giRaffe pressed SEND

help....

grant giRaffe wisdom

2011-07-18T14:01:00.000+08:00

A 45 word message, took a giRaffe a month to compose.
And she hasn't pressed the "send" button yet.

danger

2011-07-17T11:15:00.000+08:00

self-righteousness is a most dangerous thing in the absence of love and compassion.
heck, it is dangerous no matter what.

kaputt

2011-07-12T01:10:00.000+08:00

giRaffe thinks she kaputted her blog....
why does the html no longer follows what giRaffe asks him to do????

how?

2011-07-12T00:41:00.002+08:00

Should giRaffe?
Or shouldn't giRaffe?

2011-07-11T08:45:00.002+08:00

inconsequential, but yet so consequential revelation

2011-07-09T10:25:00.000+08:00

Revelation giRaffe achieved while drifting off to sleep last night:
Bach is to music, as Shakespeare is to English literature!

Centuries have passed, and both their creations are still applicable to the world today.
And centuries will pass, and their legacy will still live on.

And here's to Bach!
Cheers!

out of the ordinary

2011-07-09T07:35:00.000+08:00

And so it seems,
that the thing a giRaffe fears most,
is not pain, or anguish, or sadness, or loneliness,
but being ordinary.

That is something giRaffe cannot live her life being.
Ordinary.
Mere existence.
Just like the next person in the crowd.

Maybe being that will cause her less pain.
Less torment.
Maybe being ordinary will make her life a lot easier.

But giRaffe is not looking for a easy life.
But a fulfilling one.
One that is true to herself.
One that doesn't simply say,
because others are so,
so giRaffe has to be.

giRaffe has a fear of falling into ordinariness.
Of losing herself.

She hopes she never will.

very random things in a giRaffe's life right now

2011-07-08T11:38:00.001+08:00

so blogger is going to be no more and google blogs is the new thing.
and earl grey tea is a very romantic drink.
and giRaffe is not sure whether to get the 50mm F1.4 or the 50mm F1.8 lens.
and this sunday morning is something giRaffe is looking forward to and she hopes her expectations won't be dashed as usual.
and the advice giRaffe had been looking for, is still not forthcoming.
but a giRaffe went ahead and made her own decision anyway.
and she sincerely hopes it is the correct one.
no, this is not the decision you think giRaffe is talking about.
and out out out....oh, but not out yet.
and things from this side of giRaffe's life,
looks quite beautiful.

to live, love, dream

2011-07-05T14:41:00.000+08:00

And so a dozen years later,
a giRaffe has decided.

No more tying down of a giRaffe,
into what she is not.

No more hiding,
no more pretending.

No more things pulling a giRaffe back,
giRaffe is looking right into the face,
of her tomorrows.

Be they full of pain and struggles,
or sweetness and joy,
giRaffe shall face them on.

He took giRaffe, drew her out, helped her grow.
That was undeniable.
But giRaffe continued growing, bursting through the seams.
He refused to move on.
He pulled her back.
giRaffe thought she should stay back.
She stayed.
For a long time.

But now it is no longer whether a giRaffe is staying back or not.
It is no longer a moving forward, it is a regression.
giRaffe felt it time to cut the string.
Yes, the time is now.

If giRaffe cannot pull him onwards,
perhaps the time comes for giRaffe to move away.
Perhaps giRaffe is the one pulling him backwards?

Yes, that is probably much better.
Much much better.

And there is something,
about a giRaffe,
which he might never accept.

Something a giRaffe is coming to terms with.
She did not accept it either, before.
But now,
it seems the time,
to accept.
To be.
This is giRaffe.
There is nothing to hide.

So come,
it's time,
for us,
to move our separate ways.
To look for the life we want.

To live, love and dream.

the ending

2011-07-04T22:23:00.000+08:00

the end of it,
the beginning.
it all comes and goes in a circle.
when she has reached the lowest point,
she has to come up.
and up is where a giRaffe is going.
up and out and onward now.

de-cluttering

2011-06-26T23:31:00.003+08:00

throwing all the clutter away is therapeutic.

extremely.

plainsong

2011-06-26T21:29:00.002+08:00

it's been quite a while since giRaffe sat down and gobbled up a book in a single sitting.
And it's really quite yummy.

welcoming Mr Canon-Red into giRaffe's household...

2011-06-25T19:46:00.000+08:00

and now that this baby is officially giRaffe's,
she goes click clicking away!

Mr Retired-Canon,

started his service years ago, (and do notice the discoloration on the place where giRaffe's hoofs have held Mr Retired-Canon ever so often - sure signs of love!)

with this picture of giRaffe's boy.

so giRaffe felt it only fitting that Mr Canon-Red should start his service with

another picture of giRaffe's handsome boy!

how many times...

2011-06-20T17:55:00.000+08:00

Question: There are 24 hours in a day. So how many times can you repeat a 9 minute piece in one day?

Answer: Enough times to make your boy give you this look

when you look at him.

out of sorts...

2011-06-18T22:53:00.000+08:00

giRaffe is

afraid to sleep for the fear of dreams it might bring,
afraid to wake up for the pain of reality that comes along.

in the middle...

2011-06-16T14:37:00.000+08:00

spending the day trying to get the notes into giRaffe's not very cooperative fingers.
it's sort of what a giRaffe wouldn't mind doing the rest of her life,
but at the same time, not precisely so.
not at the expense of having to spend her entire time cooped up in a tiny room and repeating and repeating and repeating and repeating herself (though it does have a certain hypnotic effect).
so here,
giRaffe is spending her day,
sort of in the middle of being happy and not being happy.

another year

2011-06-16T02:34:00.000+08:00

So here it goes.
Another year.
Older.
But wiser?
Will giRaffe dare to throw away the things holding her back this year?
Will the increase of another year give a giRaffe added clarity and courage?
A giRaffe has changed much in the past year.
What changes will this year bring?
Well, here giRaffe strides.
Into the another year older.

memories from the land of Amoy...

2011-05-29T03:06:00.001+08:00

The flood of memories that swept a giRaffe off her feet.
Oh those two months.
Of sweat and toil,
Yet even more of bliss and joy.
下工下工下工工下工...
What a blessed giRaffe to have an opportunity of those two months.

And she turns her eyes to the now.
The calling of names and clawing of faces in the here.
And giRaffe is right glad she isn't in it any longer.

And she remembers her days of sweat and toil and love and simple happiness.
And she is glad she has that.

what sort of nation do you want?

2011-05-22T10:47:00.000+08:00

24 years ago, 15 alleged Marxist conspirators were detained. Without trial.
Mr Chiam, the only member of the Parliament from the opposition then, spoke for their release on the grounds that there were no basis for their charge - the summarized transcripts for the parliamentary sittings here and here.

As Mr Chiam says:
"What sort of Singapore do you really want? You have to tell the people. Do we want a Singapore where only because of a slight dissent against the Government, people are arrested? Do you want a country that has a widespread fear, apathy? Do you want to continue with your authoritarian rule? Is this the Singapore you want? I know there is apathy in Singapore. I walk around a lot of places in Singapore. There is a lot of apathy."

24 years down the road, some hope seems to be shining out from the vision of the nation Mr Chiam had from way back then.
Political apathy looks like it's starting to go away.
The climate of fear, although still present, is slowly starting to clear.

giRaffe hopes that 2011 is not just a point in history, but a watershed for a new journey.
HDB pricings, transport problems, living costs, yes, these are the problems giRaffe wants resolved. Who wouldn't want a cheaper home, better transport and a more affordable living?
But even more so, a giRaffe wants to see the root of the problem being solved.
Transparency. Accountability. Responsibility to the people.
You can make houses cheaper, but if there is no freedom of speech, freedom of actions, we're just blindfolded and put in a cage.
You can improve the transport but if new troubles arise and you just grasp at straws to find a scapegoat, we're still stuck in the rut.

giRaffe is always very ruffled at unfair practices.
At things done behind a veil of alleged "for your good".
At actions without accountability.

Let's hope and look forward to a future that is open and transparent.

The Cleric's Wife

2011-05-19T10:03:00.000+08:00

This is just extremely weird, but giRaffe dreamt distinctly she read a book.
The book was titled,
The Cleric's Wife.
Of all improbable things,
The Cleric's Wife!
giRaffe couldn't remember the author, but the title was so vivid she woke up and googled to see if there really was such a book.
What a disappointment there wasn't.
giRaffe would have liked to see what this book was all about!

Uncensored and from the heart

2011-05-15T16:36:00.001+08:00

Pablo Casals to a young Arnold Steinhardt on how a gypsy violinist tackled Bach:

"In our honor, he played before our table the very same Bach adagio (referring to Bach's G minor Solo Sonata) that you have just played. It was the most fiery, the freest Bach I have ever heard. Also the best. This gypsy had none of our fears and inhibitions about what to do, or not to do in Bach. He played uncensored, from the heart; and that is what I encourage you to do - put aside convention and play as I believe Bach himself played, with great freedom.

just going to pack up and go off?

2011-05-15T11:29:00.002+08:00

Singapore founding father Lee Kuan Yew resigns

Maybe a giRaffe is impossible to satisfy, but this leaves a bad feeling in giRaffe's mouth.

Many may have cast their vote because of these two seniors in the Cabinet, and now after their party have won, these 2 seniors are going to pack their bags and say goodbye?
And leaving the government in the hands of the newcomers, whom many might not have voted for in the first place?

If there are plans for retirement, shouldn't they be made before the elections so that the population have an idea who they are going to elect for their leaders in the coming years?
And not after the election when things doesn't look like they're going well?

Isn't this thing called responsibility something that should be present?
Shouldn't they at least go through this next five years before they can say they're leaving?

swap...

2011-05-15T10:54:00.000+08:00

Unhappy? Swap places with me

from todayonline.com

- This is from the post blogger ate up from giRaffe's blog.

Isn't this like

you've got a Toyota, and there is a chance for you to swap it with a Honda, and you really want to try driving a Honda, not because the Toyota breaks down or anything, but because the Honda has got the models you prefer.

And then someone driving a Hafei (for the information of those of you who have no idea what a freaking Hafei is, it is the moving piece of cardboard yours truly is driving around which has this idea that its aim in life to break down ever so frequently) comes by and sees that you have this thought of changing your Toyota for a Honda.

And this guy says,

you've already got a Toyota, why do you want to change it for a Honda? If you cannot be satisfied with a Toyota, try swapping it for my Hafei.

Come on, you've got a chance to swap a Toyota for a Honda, why in the world would someone in the right mind even consider swapping it for a Hafei?

You get what giRaffe means?

give giRaffe a dislike button!

2011-05-15T10:27:00.000+08:00

Blogger got itself down for 2 days and after it came back up, it nommed up giRaffe's blog posts!
*dislike*!

growing up...

2011-05-12T00:43:00.000+08:00

Growing up....
is not about getting older, but getting wiser in outlook.
is not about increasing the number of years under your age, but increasing the depth of your aspirations.
is not about the number of titles under your name, but the amount of responsibility you can be entrusted with.
is not about the amount of possessions you have, but the amount of love you can share.
is not about getting the last word in an argument, but staying calm so that no nasty words need to be exchanged.
is not about getting rid of all your enemies, but how big your heart has grown that you can have room for everyone.
is not about how many clever thoughts you can think or how many clever words you can say, but how your deeds prove your sincerity.

giRaffe wants to learn how to grow up gracefully.

a un-forgetful generation....

2011-05-09T08:21:00.001+08:00

"2011 has seen a generation that does not remember from whence we came, but that is to be expected. But I do, and those amongst you who are over 50 will remember"
thus quotes MM LKY.

Dear MM,
giRaffe is from this forgetful generation which you described.
But we are not forgetful.
On the contrary, we remember.
We remembered how your generation fought for independence and for democracy.
We remembered how your generation believed our people have a right to speak for and to build our own nation.
We remembered the tears you shed, and personally, giRaffe thinks that you're a most intelligent and capable man.

So dear MM, giRaffe hopes you remember too, the people of this nation STILL believe in democracy and NOT autocracy.
The people of this nation are STILL fighting for the nation your generation envisioned so many years ago.

Remember, dear MM,
this is a road that can never have an end.
If one day the people stop fighting for democracy, that will be the end of democracy.
The foundation that your generation built, giRaffe's generation will never forget.
And precisely because we remember, we know we cannot sit back and remain unchanged.
We cannot regress into a nation of apathy, of unchange.
We cannot let the democracy you claimed for our nation turn into a dictatorship.

Remember Sir,
giRaffe's generation remembers the fight your generation fought.
That is why giRaffe's generation will continue believing in democracy and NOT autocracy.

and to serve...

2011-05-08T15:48:00.001+08:00

Alright, one final rant and then giRaffe shall stop boring everyone with so much talk on the GE.

The polls are closed, the results are out. There are some changes, there are many other unchanging ones.

But regardless of which party the office bearers come from, giRaffe hopes that they remember:

A good leader should put himself down at the level of those he serves. Only then can he make good decisions. Because good decisions doesn't simply come from thinking about it; it comes from living it.

A good leader must respect those he serves. Not talk down at them, not lead them by the nose and say you follow because I know best.

A good leader must remember that hard down-to-earth work and understanding the people and building genuine relationships is more important than any educational qualifications or titles.

A good leader must remember, he is here to SERVE, he must be willing to be a servant and not a master.

So let's all see what the next five years hold!

giRaffe is voting for

2011-05-07T19:45:00.000+08:00

15 mins before the polls close.

giRaffe loves her nation.
Even though sometimes she gets embarrassed by the apathy of many who calls themselves citizens.
Even though sometimes others call her country "soulless".
Even though some feel that although this country has a living standard (and cost) of a first world country, the people's mindset are still third world standard.

Some of it is true.
But not everyone is like that.
And there are many more emerging, who have a heart and a soul, a genuine concern about the world around them.

That is why
giRaffe and her fellow countrymen do not want to be talked down upon any longer.
giRaffe and her fellow countrymen do not want their freedom of speech impeded.
giRaffe and her fellow countrymen wants to share in nation-building, instead of being told like a young child that their leaders will choose what is best and the people must just accept without questions.
giRaffe and her fellow countrymen wants to be able to obtain unbiased information from the media instead of having a "state media" who reports only what the ruling powers wants them to report.

No one is infallible. There are definitely policies that are good, and policies that are not. The opposition party if they are elected, cannot promise they certainly can make the best policies for the nation. But neither can the ruling power now. Because everyone is human and prone to mistakes. And it is also impossible to satisfy everyone.

giRaffe isn't voting for who will make the best policies (of course the candidate in question must be a reasonably capable, intelligent and moral person, and that aside, giRaffe is sure most will try their best to make the best policy), but more importantly, giRaffe is voting for a new generation of leaders who treat their people with respect, who doesn't simply say they are doing what is right, who listens to the people, who genuinely want to serve (even without the crazily high minister salary), who will question the people in power rather than accept what they say if what they say really are in question, who have a heart for the people and the nation.

This is what giRaffe is voting for, and whether these people come from the MAIN POWER or the OPPOSITION POWERS, that is not so important. giRaffe hopes to see something different in her nation from tomorrow onwards.

before a giRaffe turns 35...

2011-05-05T20:47:00.000+08:00

giRaffe is by nature a very impatient animal.
Especially when a certain idea bounces into her consciousness.
giRaffe usually cannot wait and wants to have it/do it/become it immediately.
Immediate gratification.
Truly ADHD.

But the older giRaffe grows, the more she encounters things that cannot be fulfilled immediately.
They irk her terribly.
But there are some things that a giRaffe wants badly enough.
And so they will continue irking her until giRaffe gets them/do them.

So, here are some things a giRaffe wants to do before she is 35:

buy and move into her own house.
go traveling somewhere she has never been to before, alone, preferably more than once.
read all of these books.
and these to go along even though it says that it's the MAN's essential library.
and these if she finished all the above or if she gets bored.
to play both of Bach's violin concertos for the violin, on the erhu, AND the violin.
to be able to understand Hebrew reasonably well enough to read the Old Testament in Hebrew without having to look up the dictionary every other word.
to keep and maintain 2 cents music and to start writing her book.

Seems quite a lot of things to keep a giRaffe busy!