What A Mess - Some Solutions?

Kiddos, Wake Up, Will You?
I have spoken to a couple of kiddos and yes, they sound like those squeaky-voiced, foolish, little twirps living in a useless, academic-laden and exam-oriented world of their own, seeing no further than the distance between the bridge of their noses and the textbooks and ten-year series they are holding up.

First they are totally oblivious of what is happening around them. Second I had one citing how everyone else is doing it so we should follow suit.

So if I must use an old childish rebuff my teachers used to scold us with, then it must be this: If somebody eats shit, so you eat shit also har?

Half The Time Set Aside For Real Education (Somewhere Towards The Middle To High School Stages Of Education)
And as I am advocating, sure let us teach academic subjects like Maths and Science but the curriculum has to be tempered with perhaps half its time set aside for a dose of realism like getting in touch with the real world?

Near Perfect PSLE Scores, Ain't This? Anything Above 90% And Yes, Those 9A1s?
Well it is a near perfect or almost perfect PSLE aggregate score, isn't this? I mean I had asked around and someone told me he scored 274 (that is 91% out of a perfect 300) and I believe a high of 286 had ever been had in the PSLE exams.

Oo, don't forget the 9A1s?

Here Is More Proof Of "Foreigners" (True-Blue Foreigners And Permanent Residents -Naturalised Citizens Are Already One Of Us) Buying Up Our Public Flats And I Am Only Talking About The Resale Market
The Non-Citizen, Non-Citizen Family and the Orphans Scheme. Wait, in fact ALL schemes are extended to SPRs (whoa, aren't they just getting more than not one, not two but a manifold bites of the cherry).

Now contrast the Orphan scheme with the Citizen/SPR siblings scheme (which as its name implies extends to SPRs but of course).

You have to be an orphaned and unmarried citizen along with another similarly unmarried sibling to qualify for the Orphans Scheme while the Citizen/SPR siblings scheme has both their parents (who are non-citizens and non-permanent residents) alive. And two SPR siblings can apply!

What a poor and bad deal we single citizens are getting? Our parents have to be dead first before we can buy under this scheme.

So what privileges are citizens (single or married) getting?

Strangely they allow miscegenation between citizens/non-citizens and SPRs for all their spousal schemes (which is almost like very "single' scheme - oops double entendred) but there isn't any for a single citizen and a single SPR/or single non-citizen.

We only have Single Citizen and Joint Single Citizens.

How about extending those same schemes to singles?

Now For The Primary Market New Flats
Again the SPRs are included in all the schemes here.

But wait, orphaned single Citizens can jointly buy up flats here. Ok, so we are one up here.

Even More Proof How Foreigners Find It So Easy To Visit Or To Be Employed Here
A long term social visit pass for visitors (meaning foreigners) to find employment here.

And the same long term social visit pass for the parents, the spouse and the children of a SPR or citizen (meaning naturalised citizen) who is either studying or working here.

I am trying to determine the period of long term stay but I guess it is 6 months or more.

And now, there is even a personalised employment pass (or a working holiday pass as it is popularly known) issued for 6 months to foreigners who graduate from our local tertiary institutions in between jobs here.

Ombuddy, O Bloody, O Bladda (Part Of An Old Song) And An Independent Council Of Wise Men I have advocated an ombudsman in the light of the many policy grievances and misgivings the public and even corporations may have or have suffered.

It could be a kinda independent Council (and please enough of pro-estab shenigans, we want totally neutral, fresh-faced, new and all perspectived, holistic, able and analytical people here) who will establish the facts and then put right the wrongs and impose a penalty on the said agencies or whateva.

In fact I am not sure if such an independent Council (on top of our legislative assembly?) should not be put in place right at the start to scrutinise policies, correct or veto them if found wrong and so on before they even come onto the market to impact the rest of us.

Someone just isn't doing their job well or well enough, I feel.

Have We Really Learnt From Our Mistakes And Why Administrators Can't Commit Too Many Mistakes
Well judging by some of our public housing projects, even today the same kinda design flaws are being repeated, it seems.

So have we learnt?

And we can't afford too many mistakes because we, at the ground level, have to bear with and suffer the consequences of your mistakes and we suffer.

More Proof Of Sensors And Circuitry Going Awry
I dropped my mobile phone the other day and guess what, it isn't running very well anymore. The day I dropped it, its swivel had come loose and there were all this flashing of lights on the buttons which had since subsided.

Now the battery goes flat very quickly and usually within a day and it shows different percentages of its battery life (from low to high and back to low again sometimes) all the time.

In other words it had short-circuited, much like what I had mentioned about sensors going awry.

Vagaries Of A Log On Even Today
And yes, even today, at different branches of Mcdonalds, they turn up a different set of log on problems. Like at CCK, I can't connect at all on the one occasion I visited.

Even at my regular spot, I sometimes get back that Certificate Security Error Page and if you remember my earlier blogs, I have to click the "not recommended" option to get to the logon page.

Make It A Short-Term Optional Annuity That Can Be Bought Anytime
The final word on the CPF compulsory annuity for those aged below 50 is this: You can't force the people to buy one at age 55 and then expect them to wait out 30 years before they can withdraw a monthly stipend at age 85.

That is too long a time and yes, you may claim that that is what a pooling of resources is all about - a longer period to justify a certain return and payout sum.

But truth is: that is just too long and there is now the question of inflation eating into the returns (as if the cost of living outstripping wages and savings haven't proven time and again) and of people not living beyond age 85, only to see their retirement money dissipate JUST like that.

A more equitable way is to have a 5 year (preferably much lesser) kinda annuity which the retiree can buy at any point he deems necessary in the course of his lifespan.

And one suspects this will be when he can safely determine the state of his continued good health (and the state of his savings) and which will prolly occur at the very very late ages, not any earlier.

Uproot, Marginalise And Replace The Natives Because We Have No Local Talent
Just in case Singaporeans don't already know, let me remind them a Minister once remarked how someone whinged about competition for the local girls from "men from overseas" (perhaps a rather veiled kinda poser).

He had then said that if the whole character of the population has to change, so be it.

To me that is the strongest statement yet from a higher-up authority that there will be some uprooting, marginalisation and replacement of some of our indigenous population.

We all know that Singaporeans who do not fit in with various national exhortations -produce 3 or more if you can afford it, aim well at urinals, please do not spit or litter, do not sport long hair or colored hair - could well be the targetted ones.

But What Caused These In The First Place
Unfortunately these could just be the same groups of people who could have started up some new economy which are at the moment absent.

And there were neither opportunities nor incentives to create them precisely because of the few dominant shenigans here controlling the economy or in the event that they were started up, muscling in, thus disincentivising any real wannabe creative or original entrepreneurs.

Furthermore if we examine the various policies (stop-at-two, feminism and equal rights for women) and the "system" (education which beats down the boys a lot, the exam-focus which seems to favor galls and what I wrote just before) , we find that these were partly responsible for producing and resulting in the state that we are in now.

Contrast The Galls And The Guys And See Who Has The Upper Hand Here In Our Society
Don't forget, galls can grow up very naturally. They have not very many prohibitions or restrictions. Hey, two galls can hold hands and walk along a street all lovey-dovey. They can be bold, rude and totally uninhibited (look at the way these galls sitting beside me here at the library - TOTALLY uninhibited, legs up on the chair, talking into their mobiles, chattering among themselves).

But the poor dudes are under such tremendous pressure to conform to many, many, societal-imposed standards of behavior and protocol. They have to be the strong silent types but the galls are ok being vocal.

Don't forget National Service also does a disservice sometimes. Aren't they supposed to obey more rules and regulations so that they are disciplined?

That doesn't do very well for their mental state nor their mental health, does it?

There are of course other factors.

Well, well, well, you have only yourselves to blame for the mess. What can I say?

Updates On This Entrepreneur
Yes, the WYWY group is still here and they are one of the "exclusive" retailers for SINGTEL. \

But gosh, my heart goes out to you. You have all that competition and so many of them. You must be overwhelmed, poor soul!

M1, Starhub and so many other SINGTEL retailer shops.

What Use These Mathematical Data
As I sit here blogging at the Bishan Branch library, I notice all these students here at the study tables, head and shoulders stooped over their books. Some were nerds with their thick glasses or their awkward mannerisms.

But the overwhelming impression I had was the kinda studiousness and perhaps a tad too serious immersion iin academic pursuits (at the expense of social skills or some other life skills) that may well turn out to be very useless and inapplicable in everyday life.

Gosh, really. Some of the mathematical stuff they were doing were stuff I had done before. Like the plotting of graphs and a logarithm graph at that.

Well I mean the analysis of graphs would be useful as they tell us trends or something but what is the use of some of the other kinds of graphs?

What About The Use Of This Other Science That Is Not Taught
Our biology lessons focus on anatomy and biological processes (among others) but not so much on the physiology of diseases, their treatment and cure.

How many of us are actually gearing up for a medical career (but maybe now that things have loosened up, many more would consider this a choice option?) before we need to know this?

So when my Dad had benign prostatic hyperplasia or his cataracts or his glaucoma and Mom had her hypertension or congestive heart failure, I had to look this up in magazines or books (not found in schools' prescribed texts).

Like the Readers' Digest for example and do remember that this was in the pre-Internet days.

This Is Real Education In A Real World - A Medical World That Is
And it also explains my choice of another career path late in life. A medical representative marketing and selling pharmaceutical and medical products to the medical industry.

I wanted to learn how if a loved one were to be stricken by diseases, that I would be in a better position to understand the diseases (know the medical terms and the whole workings of the diseases and their treatment), pick a best course of medical action (know what kinda medication would be prescribed and what exactly it is for) and know who the medical practitioners I could consult.

Apart from that, I learn other stuff. The kinda intricate working relationship between doctors and drug manufacturers. The kinda drug patent and its shelf life. The generics. The indications and contraindications for a drug and its side effects (if any).

At The Expense Of Real Patient Care - OverReaction, Over-Diagnoses And Over-Prescription
Now the last is something I wanna elaborate.

But before that, I just hope science doesn't turn into another false science much like all that have gone on before it.

I mean we read about over-diagnoses, overprescription and above all, over-reaction on the part of people like you and me. All these in the name of creating a medical industry and a cottage industry growing up around it.

Create jobs, generate revenue and thus level up economic growth. More precisely, medical economic growth.

On the part of the medical practitioners : a state of sadness treated as mental depression, shyness treated as social anxiety disorder and treatment for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

On the part of patients: seeking treatment for food-related diarrhea (not food-poisoning) and a case of the simple flu and cold (not the virulent kind). Perhaps letting them run their course over a fair bit of time does the trick and there is no need for medical action?

More Information Please - Therefore Real Education
All these come at a price because there could be side-effects to taking these drugs when they alter your biological chemistry like when they perhaps increase your appetite and then you balloon in your weight.

Hopefully these are made known to the patients and the patients have access to the prescription phamplets or full prescription label (and yes, general science education should help you dissect this) that usually comes with the medication.

Unfortunately these do not come with the medicine because the medicine have been repacked into different packages at the various retail clinical or hospital outlets.

That means you don't usually know what you are taking (as in a full prescription phamplet with listed pharmaceutical contents, indications, contraindications, side-effects, the whole works)except for what has been verbally instructed and the perfunctory daily dosage label and the name of the medicine on the package front and what it is for.

How can you ever make an informed decision like that people? Aren't we disadvantaged and placed at the mercy of someone else if we have no available information? Shouldn't we know what we are orally taking? Can someone else have full control over us or shouldn't we ourselves have some say too?