Release Me (Updated)

Moi Is Emotionally Spent And Needs A Shoulder To Cry On (Not Yours Nigel)
Moi will try to say very little in future on his blogs. If he does not, there will be just too many issues out there to grapple with, rebutt and write on. And guess what? He doesn't even get paid a penny for doing this. So what happened to the think-tankers and their ilks who are supposed to do the job?

Anyway, I just realised many truths have dawned upon moi while blogging.

I am sorry if the truth spoken has hurt anyone. It is all part and parcel of the process. We can deny it, we can have people deny it to us but the truth is the truth. Think about it and stop kidding ourselves.

You will excuse moi for being candid and frank and blunt. I don't mean any harm. I just speak what I feel and what I observe and what I experience and what I have a gut feel for what is true.
After all moi is just a hopeless, useless, homeless nomad, lonely, beauless (yes, on a room hunt moi spotted a hot hunk and hopes he bunks with him) and emotionally exhausted and drained.

But he can still have sex though........

I got the blues recently for whatever reason (maybe after a couple of months' medical leave and now that he can't run in the sun, he is even bluer and no hot hunks to catch, yes he is moving house again and the hot wimp is giving him trouble too)

Pointless Other Than To Be Heard And Seen - All Talk And No Action
I am glad political space is opening up and I really wanna think that this premiership is sincerely genuine about opening up.

However it is pointless we have debates, discussions, the Speakers' Corner and the like if what it all boils down to is mere talk and no change especially when we know the change is to correct wrong and to improve things.

And let us start by looking at all the policies in place. Ridiculous ones. Archaic ones. Inconsistent ones. Ambiguous ones. Stifling ones. Entrapment ones. Discriminatory ones. No brainer ones. Non-constituted ones.

Period.

Increase In Contribution Rate To MBMF
Anyway just a couple of words here and there following the NDR speech. First, contribution rate is gonna increase for the Mosque Building And Mendaki Fund and at a time like now, I can't be sure how the Malay community is going to take to it.

It has been suggested that old mosques be upgraded using part of this fund and again I am not sure what the Malay community leaders are gonna make of this.

GDP - Another Superficial Performance Mesurement
We all know that GDP measures the total value of finished goods and services produced in a country. I am sure it takes into account works-in-progress as part of its valuation like in all accounting procedures.

However we know that the GDP isn't really a good pointer towards a high standard of living. For example, as is the case with us, construction figures quite significantly in our GDP indicator. But how is that benefitting citizens if the boom is the likes of our IR projects?

It doesn't measure externalities nor does it impact directly the real living standards of people.

We begin to wonder if our high ranking in terms of GDP is thus just another statistical indicator for the world to admire us as having arrived and being up there among the developed nations.

In other words, image but not living proof of real benefits to the citizenry.

I say to hell with such figures and let us get down to really what benefits the people.

Making Babies For Singapore - Why Are Singles Precluded?
I totally switched off during the "Making Babies" segment of the NDR speech. Being gay, this was the most BORING part about hetero dating and marriages. When the population policy announcements came out later, I thought it had many generous handouts, monetarily speaking and yes some the extension of maternity leave must be most welcomed.

Certainly the paternity leave extension was also more generous than the 3 days given out previously but could it be more?.

And to extend nappy changing to the schools' home economics classes is just too much. I think the women are already dominating far too much everywhere so much so that the men are beaten down submissive and meek and shouldering what once were women's duties.

What about extending benefits to singles to adopt children. After all, gay singles like me like kids (the boys only), but of course minus the women for wives.

And I think I know what the women want. Maybe they want some cash handouts for every year they stay home to look after their children (thus giving up their careers) up to a certain nth year.
But I suppose it is the time you wanna spent with your kids that counts most. The formative years to bond, to learn, to play with and to teach your kids.

And moi has to think if he wanna drag a kid through the system here. He may not survive it. And the cost and no he doesn't wanna throw him to some infant or child-care or even to a grandparent, much less a foreign domestic helper.

So look women, I have spoken for you. Now you do the same for us gays. Women's Charter. Gay marriages. Adopt kids. Extend paternity leave, paternity benefits, cash, whatever to us too.

More Higher Qualifications Does Nothing - Can We Informalise Training Instead?
Again we equate quality infant and childcare services with higher qualifications, meaning certification when all it needs is to up their communication skills, their English language standard and sharing some tips and experiences to best manage and teach kids.

No need to formalise training like that. On the job, the teachers can self-learn, research and so on. No need for more stress.

It Is The Whole Environment Thingy Or Is It?
I believe things shouldn't be hot-housed or stressed or pressured too much. Like a sports school. Some athletes need loving, caring and nurturing. Some need a bit of scolding or pressure once in a while. Different people, different strokes.

Above all, a conducive environment, natural progression, genuine interest and concern, passion , encouragement and so on.

For example, a new men's club has opened. It is new, swanky and classy. But somehow it misses what the clubs in Seoul and Taipei have that make them a more happening cruising ground. And I have highlighted this to the staff.

Another example, a teacher at a child-care centre while doing a routine of skip-roping with her charges was foucussed so much on skills that I notice the boys were just so afraid to try. But it could be that they are JUST LIKE THAT.

I know it will be very hard to milk Olympics medals out of our local athletes.

Maybe it is just our DNA? Maybe it is just the system? (Too much stress and hothousing, too scientifically systematic, too much focus on skills to the point that one is afraid to try and experiment and experience) .Maybe it is just Singapore Inc at work. Maybe it is the small pool of talent. Just maybe. But we can just guess at the real culprits here.

But we should still try (and change the system once we found out what is the real bug of the issue) and hopefully one day we will truly win true-blue Singaporean Olympics medals.

Improving Social Graces
I love this part best and totally concur with it. But perhaps certain targets were targetted wrongly.

Think speaking and talking too loudly. Taking the public transport or patronising air-conditioned food courts in dirty muddied work clothes and shoes.

ERP
We can all see how this is geared towards car usage but to encourage car ownership only to then discourage its usage (peak, off-peak, doesn't matter, ERP operates at different rates throughout the day anyway)seems like buying someone an ice-cream but to tell him to hold on to it and not lick it, in the meantime watching it melt away.

Yet I don't see free-flowing traffic. That means that someone is still licking away at that ice-cream anyway. So maybe we shouldn't have bought him an ice-cream in the first place?

Every morning moi takes the bus just before peak hours and during and it is stuck in traffic on the PIE and CTE.

Reservists, Home-Ownership And Other Issues
I guess that however a family agrees to own or co-own a flat is just their business. Especially for singles.

If Singaporeans are jealous, maybe they should take a real good look at how the foreigners are coming in by the numbers and they pose a more serious threat. Good for you Singaporeans, you deserve it!

After all, a home is for living, so why don't they punish those who partition their flats up (out of store-rooms even) creating extra rooms to rent out to umpteen number of foreigners? Your neighborhood is now over-run by them!

Assuming 30 days of annual incamp training and 20 years down the road, that makes about 2 years of one's time.

Moi is nomadic for 2 and a half years. We are on par?

Suffering and struggling and what non-sense to distinguish Singaporeans and Singapore citizens. Masochistic indeed and universal suffrage is not for moi when moi did not vote for the system.

Every Singaporean should know better how the system works here which isn't conducive for a family structure and the education system is still not getting it right. Cost is high and certain policies are just plain downright ridiculous. Does that explain why one's heart is not here?

So if a person has work here, of course he spends all his time here. Question is, is he even happy or performing meaningful work? I bet you a million dollars, he isn't. A mere money collector every month, possibly megabucks too, doing senseless work.

We don't have a job because it got snatched from us and it is senseless work anyway and usually cheap labor can perform the job.

I bet you some Singaporeans (yes foreigners too) are sitting on their butts, smoking, cafeing during breaks and outside breaks (one break too many?), enjoying sumptuous meals, surfing porn, watching the clock, politicking, performing meaningless work , goofing off, fawning but at the same time, collecting a tidy sum of money every month!

Oh, don't forget, owning cars and contributing to the traffic congestion!

You call that suffering?

Wimpy Wimp
I was pissed the last few months when people drop by to view the place with the intention to buy. At first I was informed but later this dwindled to zero. So I was asleep, half naked, on the way to shower and so on, totally unprepared. Totally disturbing.

Then when moi puts his washing level to high mode, water leaks. Wimp pronounces too much water. No normal washer would do that. Unless it isn't working or the tap leaks.

The last couple of times because he was annoyed,while moi hangs his laundry inside because of the rain, he cooks and I know some of moi's clothes reeks of oil. And he is home all the time!

He isn't happy with visitors though he has agreed to it initially and he knows I am unattached. What about the sex he has with his "clients", coming in and out on a daily basis on the pretext of a massage and more than one per day usually.

And we are all gays! What is the problem!

Totally evil! You will have your just desserts and I won't say a thing.

Please, Release Me, Let Me Go (Lyrics Of Song By Engelbert Humperdinck)
I am just very tired. I just wanna go home. To my own place, maybe with a beau. I am not in the mood to play some more political games at home with fellow tenants or landlords. I just want to be myself, have my peace, my quiet, my non-political moments.

Live my home life my way.

Only to be with my loved ones.

Period.