Thursday, March 03, 2005
first class country, second class citizens
found this article, really sums up the bulk of my grievances with singaporeans. isnt the most well-written piece, but it gets the point across.
Where Are My Manners?
by Mirza Malik
I was waiting for the MRT one day and as usual when the train arrived, alighting passengers were struggling to get off as boarding ones steamrolled in. A Caucasian man asked his lady companion, "Why do they not allow the people to get off first?" And she answered, "It's because they have not been taught manners."
What she said struck me not because I believed it was an unfair statement but rather I thought she struck the nail right through some thick bone matter and on the way speared right through a nerve. I see this every day of my life and it takes someone from the outside to make me stop and think that it is not ok that we behave this way...
...on a flight on a North American airline, a Singaporean lady was told very firmly by a flight attendant to sit and belt up when she was trying to remove her baggage from the overhead compartment when the plane was still taxiing toward the terminal. She... grumbled about how unlike the sycophantic SQ trolley dollies the North American airline staff was...
...for all the success that we boast as a young nation, amassing accolades of accomplishments many envy, on a level that involves something as basic as courtesy, we're still groping about with gawky inaptitude. We cannot adhere to something as simple as walk right, stand left when we travel on escalators. We make racial quips because we think they're funny. We litter, spit and jaywalk when we think no one notices. Our public toilets are appallingly filthy. We speak to taxi drivers and waiters as if they're not even people. Our mobile phones blare out tacky polyphonic ring-tones in restaurants or theatres. And businesses here tend to operate with the kind of customer service that makes you wonder how far the value of your dollar stretches...
...to begin on the right foot, I think we can all afford to be more humble. We are constantly told of how great we are at this or that, with constant pats on the back by our leaders and self-proclaimed tags of 'world-class this' and 'top-notch that'. We've reached a point that we've become so full of ourselves that we forget that to be better people is more than improving economic statistics, constant self-coddling and saddling our children to the academic grind in the endless pursuit of success. We are fervently proud of our successes, we boast about it often even when 'pride' and 'boastfulness' are not fine qualities to have.
The next thing to do is to break apart from 'kiasu-ism'... it is not at all a flattering characteristic... emphasises on winning no matter what and self-servitude with a subtext that says, 'at the expense of others.'
...we must first start to believe that the rights of others are as great if not greater than our own... it is about looking within and breaking a deeply wedged bad habit.
well my personal views aren't that extreme, i'd really just like for singaporeans to start learning basic manners. sadly though, it doesnt seem likely to happen anytime soon. oh well, there's always hope.
11:49 PM
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.. links ..
