Rally Fevers continues with audio feeds

It was pretty eye-opening for me to be listening to Hokkien, Teochew, Malay, Tamil, Mandrain and English speeches all in one night. I cannot remember when was the last time when someone spoke in dialects in public spaces. Pity there was no cantonese, else I would have NO problems at trying to figure out what their content was.

I understand that there is a need to manage the different dialect group speaking groups, races carefully to avoide racial disharmony but I also long for that sense of closeness, familarity when you meet with someone who speaks the same dialect with you. I've got an administrator who speaks engllish with a clear cantonese accent, it was fast & easy to identify her through cantonese conversations and I can say that, she's usually more generous with her help than perhaps to others?? These days, even when I approach a hawker in my half-baked hokkien to order hokkien mee, he/she will reply in mandrain (at best english) with "Wan chilli or not? How much? $2 or $3?" so sad, there's little chance for me to pick up good conversational dialects. *bleah*

anyways... sorries for the digression, just feeling nostalgic about losing my roots as a cantonese (which explains why I persistently subscribe to TVBJ hee....)

With all the saga on James Gomez, I was truly excited to see and hear him. What does he have to SAY? is he a real Liar? He spoke of issues close to my heart. The young Singaporeans and those who are young at heart. What is there in stored for us in our future? To build a career? To start a family? He highlights the real stresses and pains of starting a family as young parents. Yes, I do know of many friends who seems to breeze through all these financially-challenging stages easily, with alot of help from their families usually. But take a step back and think, if you had not recieve a single cent from anyone in buying your home, in renovating your home, in caring for your kids while you work (with a peace of mind), can you do it? Could you have set up your family and have such a lovely time as you are having now? Just think for a moment.... then, realise that for many many many Singaporeans out there, they DO live in such situations. Their parents have trouble feeding themselves (maybe due to over-contribution to the Singapore Pools), their siblings maybe dependent on them for formal education (we are talking about completing their N or O'levels mind you, not university...), they could have alot of medical bills breathing down their necks....

And if you take a serious look around you, you'll find some families in this situation which i just described. Its REAL!

Like I used to say, I was a happy kid. I assume that everyone was happy, everyone had daddy to work and bring home the bread, mummies to stay home to cook and look after their kids, big brothers and sisters will take care of their younger siblings, weekends are to go to the beach, take overseas holidays (to Penang the furthest...) and everyone is happy.

At 16, I met the true-blue Singaporeans who live in fear of not having enough pocket money to go to school, fear of getting whack by their step-parents (just because they are in a bad mood), fear of getting whack by their drunken fathers, fear of when is the next time they have to sit in the corridor waiting for their step-relatives (who do not know of their existence) to leave their home so that they can go home. And much more. These are REAL people.

Here's James's audio feed:
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The James Saga, what do you know of it? Where do you get your sources from? If my memory serves me right, WP has not made any rebuttal to any of the accusations that PAP has been dishing out in the past week. What does it tell you about WP? & PAP?

When I was young, I always thought that whatever my mum told me, must be right. Afterall, she was the one who set all the rules, not to tell lies, not to steal yadder yadder... When I grew older, I realise that sometimes adults tell "white lies" too!!!! At 6 I realised that my mum was using me to answer the phone calls from my dad's "frens" who would call every weekend to date him out to some discos, karaokes, night clubs (because my dad's a generous man, so he's got lots of "frens"). Her specific instructions to me was:" Tell all the uncles who call, that daddy is not home yet." (but my daddy is infact taking his hour long shower... perhaps to get ready for some fun later?) My dad would wait for his "frens" to call for the night after they DID and he'll be a good boy and stay at home since he did not recieve his CALL. So was it wrong to "intercept" his call? Or was it more wrong to allow him take the calls and go have fun outside?

My point is: whatever media that you may be exposed to now may not be telling you the whole truths. so seek to recieve more information besides the usual mainstream medias. with internet, blogging, youtube, finding for more alternatives is less of an issue. the issue would be, do you want to continue to be following the "information" blindly or do you want to make more informed decisions? Its nothing wrong with supporting either parties based on their good manifestos, great ideas to bring Singapore into our next 40years. But do not vote based on petty arguments over technicalities, finger-pointing sagas, name-calling etc. We build our nation on hard-working capable people. Let's not ruin it on petty talks. Get serious, decide what sort of future you want to hold in your hands. In your children's hands. Have some conviction, have some ideals. Make your stand.

Here's LTK's mandrian speech, definitely peppered with more lingos/idioms and puns then his english speech. I'm impressed by his fluency in his command of the language. I guess, this is a must after 24yrs of being in politics serving in the WP.
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Hope you'll listen to him and hear how convicted he is in giving our government a check and balance in the cabinet. He's proud of this team this election, sharing that each of them are at the peak of their careers, that each of them has great opportunites if they were to work locally or internationally. Yet, they CHOSE to stay in Singapore, to be part of WP's team to allow Singapore to have more choices. We are talking about people who had to work very very hard to be where they are today. If they were anymore selfish, they would be hugging their salaries and reaching out to their glowing future and remain careless about our politics and governance. Yet, they stood up, stood out and spoke up. They want for US to have more choices. How can anyone deny them of this chance?

Before LTK's speech, there was another candidate, Mr. Tan Wui-Hua, Treasurer for the WP, running in Aljunied, an accountant. He started his speech by thanking his wife, for supporting him in his journey as a politician. Our guess is that he's had a rough road this past week and it was really a test of his family support and more so, how much our family means to us when we are facing new challenges. He also apologised to his son who has yet to reach 2yrs old. Because of his tight schedules with the rallies in the past week, his son barely saw him. One evening his son went to a chair which he usually sits on and put his tiny hands on it calling out for "Pa Pa". With this, he shed a tear. He was truly sorry for neglecting his son in his most impressionable, fun years to devote his time to shaping Singapore to another 40yrs. This man must have touched a few hearts up there last night. To me, if one can feel so close to his family, you can imagine how hard he'll fight to defend his country.

I know many out there are new parents like Mr. Tan, I think being at work for that 8 hours a day would make you want to dash home and check on your little one. You want to spend every waking moment watching his first crawl, walk, saying his first words, cushioning his first fall etc. Yet, Mr. Tan pulled himself away from his young son to spend time on giving Singaporeans a Choice in OUR future, in our Kid's future. Heartwarming.

The Rally ended on a high with the whole WP standing on the stage reciting the pledge in english and mandrian. I was happy to be doing so. Since we left school at A levels, there was little occassion to remind ourselves of what we live for in Singapore as Singaporeans. I always loved reciting the pledge and lunging out the anthem. Makes me feel like I AM a Singaporean.

here's the audio for the mandrian pledge, led by LTK:
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go and stand up and recite the pledge today. its the day when we make our votes. Make our choices. go go....
We the citizens of Singapore, pledge ourselves....