Category: Uncategorized

I was one of those who sympathised with Amos Yee when he was taken to task for “insulting Christians” in that first video that brought him worldwide fame. I was also happy for him when he was granted political asylum in the US. It does not mean that I agree with what he said in […]

Images like this are still captured for advertising purposes, but the ones who are driving the advertising industry nowadays are young ladies who document their spending sprees and share their indulgences on social media. Some have even been granted freebies to say good things about luxury goods and services. Apparently, this sort of hype does […]

The Mughals were originally Central Asians who migrated to northern India where they defeated the Delhi Sultanate in 1526. Once settled in India, they adopted Islam and Persian culture. The kingdom grew into a prosperous and powerful empire when Akbar the Great ascended the throne. India was an open society with inter-marriages occurring between the […]

I’m not sure what they call this in psychology, but if unmet expectations are the biggest cause of disappointment, then exceeded expectation must bring about something close to elation. I first had a taste of this phenomenon on the streets of Kathmandu some 20 years ago. My friend Jason and I were walking down the […]

As someone who doesn’t read newsPAPers, I’m often slow to react to what’s new, trendy and stupid, but thanks to all the sharing from my Facebook friends, some of the juiciest bits do eventually end up in my IN tray. Here’s a letter to the Straits Times written by one Kelvin Hong. While Professor Linda […]

20 December 1954. Chicago, USA. A group of devotees gathered at the home of their prophet, Dorothy Martin. They sang fervently and they waited for the arrival of aliens in a spacecraft that would take them away before 21 December 1954 – when a great flood would drown out everything on earth. Earlier that year, […]

With elitism and inequality being hot topics these days, Trade and Industry Minister Chan Chun Sing cautioned that a distinction must be made between “elites who give back to society” and those with “elitist attitudes” who have closed themselves off from the rest of society. During a dialogue at a public policy conference on Oct […]

At the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS)’s 30th anniversary conference, Diversities: New and Old, Ambassador-at-large Prof Tommy Koh challenged the government’s idea that it has made strides in lifting the incomes of the lowest-earning Singaporean workers without the need for an absolute minimum wage policy. Prof Tommy Koh quoted Mr Lee Kuan Yew as saying: […]

A concerned mother (whose identity I won’t reveal as I don’t have her permission to quote this) wrote: 12-year-olds must sit for the PSLE which determines the track they are streamed to : N(A), N(T), Express, IP 16-year-olds on the IP track are deemed too clever to waste time sitting for the O level exams. […]