Sunday, December 18, 2005
Sad
I have a new head minion!
Unlike his minions, however, mine doesn't do sexy lesbian kisses or sexy lesbian dances.
However, she does do dinners at nice places, and windows. (It was in the contract)
All for minimal pay, long hours overtime, and no health benefits whatsoever.
:)
*****
There's a form of sadness that's pretty pervasive in Singapore. It's not quite depression, with its associated anhedonia... just a gentler, subtler absence of true happiness.
I think it stems from something integral to our culture. It's an insiduous sickness inculcated into all of us since childhood, that a few of us (especially those who have lived abroad) - when we become aware of it - begin to struggle with.
I'm not sure I can pin it down to any one thing, but I suspect it has to do with repression, and a lack of... freedom.
It's not overt - it isn't as if all of us need, or even desire absolute political freedom, or the freedom to, say, dance on bartops, ahaha. It's more subliminal.
I think a reporter named Laurel Teo touched on this, once, during the depths of the nation's economic crisis (which miraculously ended the day BG Lee ascended to his hereditary throne, ahaha, I jest of course. BG Lee earned his right to his hereditary throne through blood sweat and good genes, ok?) when she suggested that the goalposts had shifted with the onset of widespread unemployment, and that perhaps it was time to relinquish, at least in part, the great Singapore dream of the five Cs - cash, car, credit card, condominium, and country club, and settle for just being happy with what we already have.
There's actually a bit more to the Great Singaporean Dream.
Love (L), Marriage (M), or at least posessing a partner (followed by baby) are amogst the unspoken quasi-"status symbols" we get hung up on a lot. (eg : This is my husband.. oh are you still single? Or : ____(generic daughter's name) ah, why aren't you marred yet? (daughter's friends name) is already married, have children already you know! When are you going to give us grandchildren?!? etc)
Worse still, there's an immense (and again, unspoken) pressure to satisfy the C/L/M requirements ludicrously quickly - before youth begins to slip away at.. 24? 25?
To make-up for the gaping, letterless voids in our lives, we find surrogate happy-makers. Blading, computer gaming, clubbing, drinking... and it's good while we do it, sure. But when we wake up tomorrow, we're still C-less, L-less or M-less.
And therein lies the problem - we're all so hung up on "material" (here I include L and M since they're often more prizes and status symbols than acts of sincerity) wants and desires that we can't see the wood for the trees. Being happy isn't about having things to touch, or people to command or be commanded by.
Being happy is about being happy.
It's all in our heads.
All of us are different - it takes different things to make us happy. To subscribe to a universal template of "perfection" is ludicrous unless one truly believes that the powers that be have created the ideal, homogenous society.
So we're all (well most of us) dark haired and slit eyed in this country.
Big deal. Some of us find happiness in film-making, some in photography, others in... err wantonly trimming hapless eyebrows, still others in attempting to kill their friends during extreme sport. I find happiness living by the sword (it's been a while now) and in a cup of chai (preferably a vat).
It's all good. If you really, really want to be happy... then you probably won't. You just gotta slide into it... a bit like looking at a 3D stereogram, methinks. It just happens. And it comes from inside your head.
You have to be happy with what you have, already. Take a chapter from the ozzies. And if you can't, take a chapter from the Brits - go out and get pissed. Laugh.
Why, then did then Patriach, PM Goh Chok Tong in his inaugral national day rally speech admonish irresponsible elements of society for daring suggest we pause for a moment to smell the roses? And why do so many of us hanker for the serenity and beauty of Australia, nevermind that it is supposed to be full of racist bigots who openly hate yellow people, as opposed to racist bigots who secretly hate indian, malay and "others" people? (ah yes, still waters run deep even in sunny singaland.)
And why then, did the poor reporters who had tried to do nothing more than think and dream about another Singaland wind up in the presidential palace being rapped sharply on the knuckles by our ubermensch (over dinner).
I think it's because the government needs its sheep to be slightly kancheong, very jealous, and very very materialistic.
We've heard the catchphrase a million times. We have no natural resources - all we have are our people.
And guess what? That's what we do, as a nation. To stay ahead... we mine our people.
We mine the happiness of our people, to be precise.
There's a reason why people in this counry get so upset over not finding their perfect partner, their car, their condo etc quickly enough (ie, by 24). Don't get me wrong - this train of thought exists the world over - but it somehow feels especially prominent here in Singapore. And the reason isn't Them, the ubiquitous men in white. It's us, with our secret jealousies and our hidden envy of our neighbours and friends, who already seem to have that first or second C (or M, see above) that we're still searching for.
Perhaps it is in the government's interests that the people stay competitive and materialistic, so that the country will stay "ahead". Or perhaps that's just a misguided ideal... who can truly say.
But the truth is... we're doing it to ourselves.
We're pushing ourselves into cranky, bitter depression.
And until the day we grow out of it... we will never truly be a mature, or gracious people.
Unlike his minions, however, mine doesn't do sexy lesbian kisses or sexy lesbian dances.
However, she does do dinners at nice places, and windows. (It was in the contract)
All for minimal pay, long hours overtime, and no health benefits whatsoever.
:)
*****
There's a form of sadness that's pretty pervasive in Singapore. It's not quite depression, with its associated anhedonia... just a gentler, subtler absence of true happiness.
I think it stems from something integral to our culture. It's an insiduous sickness inculcated into all of us since childhood, that a few of us (especially those who have lived abroad) - when we become aware of it - begin to struggle with.
I'm not sure I can pin it down to any one thing, but I suspect it has to do with repression, and a lack of... freedom.
It's not overt - it isn't as if all of us need, or even desire absolute political freedom, or the freedom to, say, dance on bartops, ahaha. It's more subliminal.
I think a reporter named Laurel Teo touched on this, once, during the depths of the nation's economic crisis (which miraculously ended the day BG Lee ascended to his hereditary throne, ahaha, I jest of course. BG Lee earned his right to his hereditary throne through blood sweat and good genes, ok?) when she suggested that the goalposts had shifted with the onset of widespread unemployment, and that perhaps it was time to relinquish, at least in part, the great Singapore dream of the five Cs - cash, car, credit card, condominium, and country club, and settle for just being happy with what we already have.
There's actually a bit more to the Great Singaporean Dream.
Love (L), Marriage (M), or at least posessing a partner (followed by baby) are amogst the unspoken quasi-"status symbols" we get hung up on a lot. (eg : This is my husband.. oh are you still single? Or : ____(generic daughter's name) ah, why aren't you marred yet? (daughter's friends name) is already married, have children already you know! When are you going to give us grandchildren?!? etc)
Worse still, there's an immense (and again, unspoken) pressure to satisfy the C/L/M requirements ludicrously quickly - before youth begins to slip away at.. 24? 25?
To make-up for the gaping, letterless voids in our lives, we find surrogate happy-makers. Blading, computer gaming, clubbing, drinking... and it's good while we do it, sure. But when we wake up tomorrow, we're still C-less, L-less or M-less.
And therein lies the problem - we're all so hung up on "material" (here I include L and M since they're often more prizes and status symbols than acts of sincerity) wants and desires that we can't see the wood for the trees. Being happy isn't about having things to touch, or people to command or be commanded by.
Being happy is about being happy.
It's all in our heads.
All of us are different - it takes different things to make us happy. To subscribe to a universal template of "perfection" is ludicrous unless one truly believes that the powers that be have created the ideal, homogenous society.
So we're all (well most of us) dark haired and slit eyed in this country.
Big deal. Some of us find happiness in film-making, some in photography, others in... err wantonly trimming hapless eyebrows, still others in attempting to kill their friends during extreme sport. I find happiness living by the sword (it's been a while now) and in a cup of chai (preferably a vat).
It's all good. If you really, really want to be happy... then you probably won't. You just gotta slide into it... a bit like looking at a 3D stereogram, methinks. It just happens. And it comes from inside your head.
You have to be happy with what you have, already. Take a chapter from the ozzies. And if you can't, take a chapter from the Brits - go out and get pissed. Laugh.
Why, then did then Patriach, PM Goh Chok Tong in his inaugral national day rally speech admonish irresponsible elements of society for daring suggest we pause for a moment to smell the roses? And why do so many of us hanker for the serenity and beauty of Australia, nevermind that it is supposed to be full of racist bigots who openly hate yellow people, as opposed to racist bigots who secretly hate indian, malay and "others" people? (ah yes, still waters run deep even in sunny singaland.)
And why then, did the poor reporters who had tried to do nothing more than think and dream about another Singaland wind up in the presidential palace being rapped sharply on the knuckles by our ubermensch (over dinner).
I think it's because the government needs its sheep to be slightly kancheong, very jealous, and very very materialistic.
We've heard the catchphrase a million times. We have no natural resources - all we have are our people.
And guess what? That's what we do, as a nation. To stay ahead... we mine our people.
We mine the happiness of our people, to be precise.
There's a reason why people in this counry get so upset over not finding their perfect partner, their car, their condo etc quickly enough (ie, by 24). Don't get me wrong - this train of thought exists the world over - but it somehow feels especially prominent here in Singapore. And the reason isn't Them, the ubiquitous men in white. It's us, with our secret jealousies and our hidden envy of our neighbours and friends, who already seem to have that first or second C (or M, see above) that we're still searching for.
Perhaps it is in the government's interests that the people stay competitive and materialistic, so that the country will stay "ahead". Or perhaps that's just a misguided ideal... who can truly say.
But the truth is... we're doing it to ourselves.
We're pushing ourselves into cranky, bitter depression.
And until the day we grow out of it... we will never truly be a mature, or gracious people.
