How can I be reading this about the loss of culture?
So much feels so similar with the culture of Singapore, to the Singapore I grew up in.

Speaking English needs to return to the levels it was at in the 60′s,70′s.
A lot of the older people have really good English.

When I speak to a China National in Australia, it is always insisted of me to speak in English ( a good thing as I can only speak English).

Good English in Singapore is a competitive advantage for Singaporeans!!

actually it not that they don’t want their chinese surnames
they are not ALLOWED
decreed by sukarno eras
includin the THAIs government
when did you ever came across a thai chinese with chinese names on their passports?
thaksin
is he not a chinese by decendant?

We can’t see this clearly now. But once trouble rises or if a war breaks out, it is every man for himself. Ask around……How many Singaporeans are willing to put their lives down for their country?

Singaporeans today feel like Tom Hanks in Terminal…..we have no country……someway along the road, the influx of foreign invaders have taken it from us….

Maybe we can do what the people of the micro-islands are doing. They are buying other islands to live in as their island is being submerged under sea water. Maybe Singapore can buy another island from Philippines and we can all start again there…….this time with a different government

Whether it ends up as multi-culturalism or a melting-pot is, quite apart from government policy on race issues, a function of quantity: the sheer volume of immigration (a result of another government policy).

As I highlighted in my article on the “fallacy of growth at all costs”, when immigration is a trickle, it allows the newcomers to assimilate into society. When it is a flood, it overwhelms the hosts. Rather than pick up good habits from the host country, immigrants then form racial enclaves which risk becoming ghettos (the Geylang example). This is what is happening now, which is sad.

Unless immigration flows are controlled, we risk creating tensions in society and undoing a lot of good work of past years.

The PAP’s economic vision for Singapore has always been crystal clear. It still is.

The social vision was crystal clear, especially in the early days. It no longer is.

What is clear is that Singaporeans who do not belong to the elite (the top 10% to 12%) are subservient to the PAP’s economic vision ie the negative social consequences for Singaporeans are obviously deemed a necessary collateral damage.

What social vision do Singaporeans have for Singaporeans? How would you like to see Singapore evolve? What sort of society would you like your great grand children to live in? Do Singaporeans have a say?

We worry about a few shop signs in Geylang. For many years now we have had 300,000 or so maids from foreign countries to whom we have handed over the pastoral care of our children. What are the long term social consequences of this? What impact does this have on the Singaporean culture? Will our children develop the attitude that some people are simply superior to others. If I want something I just yell out to the maid, who is inferior to me.

We worry about a few shop signs in Geylang. There are now 1 million foreign workers in our midst who have put SIGNIFICANT downward pressure on the earning capacity of Singaporeans. Where will it end? The intake of foreign doctors into the hospital system each year outnumbers the local intake 2 to 1. Will doctors find themselves having to accept a lower salary.

What is the Singaporean culture anyway? What is a Singaporean? What are the defining characteristics of a Singaporean? Can we readily define what a Singaporean is? What are the defining characteristics of Singapore? Apart from chilli crab and shopping.

To Happyplace: I suggest that you do some research on Australia. The Hong Kongers you refer to were Chinese nationals, mostly students, who were allowed to stay on in Australia following the Tiananmen Square incident. The Chinese have been in Australia since the goldrush in the 19th Century and have always maintained a strong presence, especially in the professional and business worlds.

Where to Singapore? It is up to all of us. We cannot just leave it totally to the PAP.

http://www.feer.com/reviews/2009/may/constructing-singapore-elitism-ethnicity-and-the-nation-building-project

Yes, I do agree that it would be more interesting for us to learn Mandarin at our own pace & not force fed onto us when we were in school. I know my roots & I am proud that I am a Singaporean that could speak Malay, English, Mandarin, Hokkien, Cantonese, Hakka, Teochew & Singlish. Maybe I am Old School, but nowadays, I hardly meet anyone below 25yrs old that could speak good dialects anymore.

Hahahahaha, I hope one day the Malays or Indians could speak good Mandarin & have businesses in China; the other thing is, I feel that the many Speak Mandarin campaigns over the years have caused them to distant their relationship us Chinese! Perhaps, I am wrong.

i wonder how much those cleaners are paid…. :?

The people who stays face more and more shit everyday. Melting Pot? More like a big pot of shit to me, with PAP as the shit stirer.

Foreigners who use Singapore as a transit stop will benefit from its convenience and leave their shit for the Singaporeans to clean up.

Ref: http://www.moe.gov.sg/press/2004/CLCPRC.htm

(2) For example, MM Lee had commented that one reason for the Bilingual Policy is: (Without the Bilingual Policy) “We will lose our dynamism and become totally English speaking, Anglicized or westernized”.
Ref: http://www.moe.gov.sg/press/2004/CLCPRC.htm@

(3) That is to say, if we truly believe in fair-play or level-playing field concept, then, we can not enforce the use of English (a Western language) at the expense of our own Asian languages, thus Bilingual Policy is a fair choice for most fair-minded Singaporeans.

(4) Of course, as Singaporeans, we support the use of English as common working language because there are a lot of advantages, but there are also a lot of problems too.

(5) Besides the Bilingual Policy, the Asian Values debate, the Moral and Religion Education program, the Speak Mandarin Campaign (and we should support a wider, Speak Ethnic Mother Tongue Campaign for all races), the SAP schools scheme, efforts to encourage all races to preserve their traditions and cultures, etc., all these are Responses to counter-balance the various long-term effects of English-education.

(6) Thus, we must put the English-factor (both its advantages and disadvantages) in our considerations before we can fairly discuss the multi-racial, multi-language, multi-culture and multi-religion issues in Singapore.

my great grand parents came from India… they live in kampung and started learning malay dealing with the local people… three generations down, I can speak pretty good malay..[/i]
recentLEE i was in china as the communist china
in the provincial capital city
this indian boy yes he a trueblood india indian who went to the province to study IT/chinese culture
in the IT shop
i was amaze
i expect him to speak indians or english if he was tryin to bargain for a mouse
no not a petmouse
a mouse for his computer
he spoke FLUENT mandarin with the same hongkie accent as those turbaned bhaiis in the hongkie movies
guess what
he was only in the provincial china capital for under 2 years
yet he does what the italians did in rome beside tom hank’s davinchi italianos…..