To look life in the face

I've lived in three countries over the 25 years of my life. Two are in Europe, one in Asia where I was born. Come summer, I will be moving across the Atlantic for three months. I believe I have seen enough to be able to think, much to be able to judge. I don't want to address the topics of friendships and relationships, love and trust, philosophy and psychology today. I want to reveal to you, reader, how I see my home country, Singapore.

Today marks two weeks exactly since I've left. I feel very much like a tourist, more than I've ever been before. Ever heard the chinese saying, "当局者迷，旁观者清“？For the two weeks I've been back, I haven't felt assimilated. Perhaps I never was, and sadly I never will be. It's too easy to tell by my accent - both in English and in Mandarin - that I'm "not from around here". But listen, it's not only the way I speak. The differences run deeper than that. 

Family and acquaintances keep asking me, "How many years do you have left? When will you be returning". And all the time I skirt the question, saying there are at least three years until I finish my PhD. What I am witholding is how much I am sure I will not return. Only close friends, and ironically my Dad seem to understand. The answer, a much better answer that would have only been truthful would be, "Let's put it this way, Singapore wouldn't have anything to offer for what I want to do."

I used to think myself weak and undesirable in the eyes of the Singapore system. Indeed, I have never been a scholar, I never 'won', for I failed to pass the second test for the 'gifted' education program, and I didn't get 4 As for my GCE 'A' levels. In the eyes of the Singaporean community, I am a failure, as I paid my way through a degree at Imperial. Yes, incredible, isn't it? Well, this is the fruit of a 'meritocratic' society. A 'meritocratic' society so focused on 'merit' in terms of academic results at school that they disregard everything else, especially creativity. Ironically of course, there is so much talk of nurturing creativity! Here's a story - I only really gained some confidence when I found myself a lab placement at Imperial during my second year there. Quite unfortunately, I was up against a much too self-confident A-star scholar, who consistently scored As and who was always comparing himself to me. More unfortunately, I thought he was a good friend. Well, he didn't take it well when I was taken on. Instead, he sent what I found out later to be a  'really nasty' email to the PhD student who took me on. And since then he had issues with the entire lab. 

Here's another - an ex-boyfriend and his family never took it well that I did one lab placement after another. For those of you scientists out there, we all know that getting lab placements are really not a big deal. The problem is, when you have a very competitive boyfriend and his family who are constantly comparing you to him and who are jealous of your success, you've hit homerun. Things start to get difficult, because you're not supposed to do well, since you're not a scholar, and he is… well… an EDB scholar, known to be one of the most competitive government scholarships. And of course you get labelled as lucky, paying your way to your future, and other ridiculous accusations such as bad upbringing.

Well. All that was in the past. The point is, how can one return to a country where:

• One is paid not by qualifications but by citizenship. Seriously - if I were to return and work in A-star, I would earn less than somebody else with the exact same qualifications as I do (or even lower maybe), but who holds an EU passport, for example. Incredible?

• One gets a promotion (in the government) not based on one's skills, but based on one's exam results at 18. Missed that? Ahemm where do I start? When you are 18, you take your GCE 'A' levels. Those exam results alone (although they say it's decided according to other achievements as well…) determine whether you get a government scholarship. And then of course, they put you on a fast-track programme so you sit somewhere at the top before you are 30. Which means that it doesn't actually matter how much experience you have, if you have never been a scholar, you'll hit the glass ceiling pretty soon. 

And most shocking of all,

• One is jailed because one is poor and cannot afford to pay PARENT maintenance fees. You've got to laugh at this. It is called the "Maintenance of parents act". Just google it. Well, I happen to know a middle-aged woman, single, divorced, two kids who've just started and finished Uni. She's had a difficult childhood, having been abused by her mother. For many years, she's been self-employed, a tuition teacher, which is a rather respectable job. But then the financial crisis hit hard and she found it difficult to make ends meet. She found a job at a chinese publishing company, but soon found herself on the retrenchment list when they decided to shrink their workforce. Then she found herself a position as a freelance journalist. Respectable job eh? Just didn't have a penny. Now her 80 year-old mother, who has a 5-digit sum of money in her bank account sued her, because she hasn't been paying the agreed sum of $150 a month for a few months. Of course, you see, she hasn't been very lucky with the finances. And so what did they do? (I'm summarising this up) They locked her up. Twice. A respectable freelance journalist making an honest living, locked up behind bars because she was poor, because she couldn't pay $150 a month for maintaining her mother, who has abused her when she was a child. Funny eh? I really would like to know which other country has such a law…

Well, if you can't beat them, join them. OR if you have a choice, think twice about joining them. This, my friends, is my home country. Welcome to Singapore!  :D