That Stinking Feeling 1:03 pm

The Final Sip...

Took my final sip of Gorilla Coffee this afternoon. After drinking from the same local coffee shop nearly-daily for a month, the start of September rains play my exit music out of Brooklyn, out of New York. What a month it has been here on the East Coast of America; the Elections, the arts, the finding-kyself, the financial meltdown, the mega-consumerism...Finally I can say to myself the next time I watch "Ugly Betty", "Sex in the City", "Friends" (yes yes, the re-runs ONLY BECAUSE friends around me watch it again and again) or some Hollywood scene with surgically-dashing actors run through New York subways or blow up yellow taxis, I can say I have been there, done that, and got the "I Love NYC" t-shirt.

And so I take my final sip of the Brooklyn I have grown to hold so dear.

That Stinking Feeling...

It's stinking. It catches my attention. Even as my mind loiters towards thoughts of near-futures, dreams, aspirations, evil plots to take over the world, lust, hunger (i'm a foodie), that feeling grabs my attention like trash on the streets that grabs your eyes by the ankle and tugs at you.

That feeling that I will miss Brooklyn so much that I will start comparing Singapore when I finally return to the sunny island in a year's time. Yet, that lingering stench also tells me that I need to go back to Singapore to find some permenant footing to take steps towards my dreams, my aspirations.

Tools in Hand...

Having lived in London and New York, and in the new-found pastures of modern art and insights into the working world, I am now armed with the hammer, the nails and planks of wood. I am now ready to start building the foundations of my life ahead. But I must patiently wait to return to Singapore before I can start. The design is slowly taking shape in my head. Now I must nurture myself to fill this construction with the spirits and cultures of this world.


But in the end, I'm just a little boy in a crazy world, who does miss his kopi-peng along Thomson Road, Singapore.

Uncle T

How I wish our MAJULAH SINGAPURA was like this too... 9:22 pm

Move over Prada & Nike; here comes national solidarity...

"Would you now please rise to proudly sing our National Anthem..." the announcer from MFA emphatically said. It is early September 2008, Manhattan, New York. It is the celebratory dinner of Singapore's National Day held by the Singapore's Permenant Mission to the UN. The turnout is good; students, families, diplomats, kids who seem to have come in a busload of their own.

Everyone stood up awkwardly. I could have sworn I saw some rolling their eyes, turning to their friends and giving awkward smiles, sheepish grins, a scratch to the head. If you walked into the room, you would have thought you walked into one of those awkward Hollywood wedding ceremonies where someone says he loves the bride (but he's not the groom). No. This was just before MAJULAH SINGAPURA. "Shit, I never sing this song for 4...no no 6 years oredi. Cham," was what I heard someone whisper in the not-so-loud-Singaporean-whisper.

And the whispering "marikita...." began. Barely audible. The kid runs across the room laughing...So many people came to this National Day dinner, yet when it came to the Anthem, many go quite. If I had not known better, one would have thought many just came for the food.

But I know that is not true. Many Singaporeans miss home. Especially being away from home, this was like homecoming. Be it missing the food, the friends, the Singlish la-lohs, its still coming home. Yet it saddens me to see how the "system" (whatever that is) has made us roll our eyes, feel sheepish proudly singing the national anthem, that represents the sovereignty and independence of what we call home. Can you imagine a Singapore, that small, belonging to another modern country of today? Would we be what we are today?

National education has often been decried as propaganda, and treated with contempt by most (I'm not saying all) younger Singaporeans, and singing the National Anthem even at this event has been subconsciously rolled into that cynical fold.

I am looking forward to the day we Singaporeans can sing the anthem proudly, be it at home or abroad, just like the way the New Yorkers sang theirs at the Yankees game and at the local marathon that I witnessed in the summer I was in New York.

I know many are proud to be Singaporeans. And I hope that someday we will step up to wear it proudly on our chest, the way we wear Prada, Gucci, Nike, Adidas daily.


Uncle T