Queen Elizabeth - The Christmas Broadcast 1957

1 Dec World AIDS Day - Keep the Promise

It's World AIDS Day so don't be surprise to see people going around wearing the red ribbon. =) It's time we stop the stigmatisation of this disease and combat HIV/AIDS the way we do with any other diseases: through education and prevention.

Stardust

For some of you who have yet to watch the movie Stardust, GO WATCH IT NOW !!! If you like lots of magick, spells and a bit of fairy tale, this is a MUST watch! UJJ gives this movie a 9/10!

Oh...check out the offical site for hilarious games and many many more! http://www.stardustmovie.com/

OCIP... R&R.

Lao is a predominantly Buddhist country. Most of her people follows the Theraveda Buddhism, similar to countries like Thailand, Cambodia and Myanmar in the region.


In this temple lies one of the 3 legendary Buddha statues. One of the trio is none other than the Jade Buddha in Bangkok for whom the King of Thailand changes clothes for every season with much pomp. The final of the trio is lost beneath the Mekong River during the war. The legend goes that the 3 statues together will bring great prosperity to the country that owns them. For the longest time, many countries have been trying to lay their hands on them. I wonder if modern technology will actually help locate the missing statue under the murky waters of the Mekong River. According to the tour guide, this statue was made entirely of gold!


Statues...


Erm.. statue too.


Painting on the wall of a temple depicting the life of the Buddha. Reminds me of the Sistine Chaple in Vatican City.


More beautiful paintings.


Along Mekong River.


Here we arrive at a cave along the Mekong River where the locals kept their precious Buddhist artefacts during the war.


Giant flower!


Our fabulous host in Lao. This is Daniel, he is from Nagaland. Nagaland is by right part of India but if you look it up on the map, it's actually very far from the Indian Peninsula. According to Daniel, it's only recently that India included Nagaland to be under the adminstration of the Department of Internal Affairs. A sign that shows that the Indian government is trying to exert political control over that region. Before this, I never knew Nagaland existed. So ignorant!


A beautiful sight on our last morning there. These monks set off every morning around 4-5am to collect alms and along the roads, you'll see locals sitting crosslegged on the roadside, offering alms to the monks. The monks here eat meat because they are not suppose to be choosy of what people have to offer them. I think I've read this somewhere before.


Home sweet home!

Through the eyes of the Blueberry Mobil

Caught this while waiting at the lights the other day. Dark, gloomy and depressing. Got me into a thinking mood (again). :S

OCIP... (The days after day 2...)

I got tired of editing the hundreds of pics from the OCIP...so I've decided to post one more time about the 'service' part of the trip. After this, I'll be posting some of the pics from the R&R. :D


Having converted some of the service funds into KIP, the local currency, I turned into a millionaire suddenly! You can imagine my shock when Emily passed me the stack of money. :o


Dinner @ 'next door'. Throughout our stay there, we had numerous meals at this little shop beside the guesthouse. The owners were all women and were very nice to us. They gave in to the demands of our little singaporean princesses without any grumble. Thankfully, some of the princesses turned out to be gems and offered help to them on some days.



Houserules. Need I say more? I so need to have one of these in my lab next year. My favourite rule is rule #7: NO SCREAMING! The design group really did a good job in drawing this on the spot. We pasted this on the wall of the hall of the guesthouse.


Also done by the design group. The other groups were very enthusiastic when signing for their duties. We were all very heartened by this!


Sporty peeps!


Lunch @ Santhiphap!


Lunch came together with some performance put together by both schools. Here, our students taught their students how to play recorder! There were other performances like cultural dance etc. I was particularly impressed by how willing their students were to come out to show their talents. I'm sure those who were there will remember the guy who volunteered to play the keyboard and sang along with it. He went on singing even as we left for ARDA.


Our fabulous painters! They really did a fine job with the place and working till very late. By the time we walked back to the guesthouse, it was already pretty dark.


This is the place where they served endless springrolls. Scary.


Trying very hard to smile after eating so many springrolls.

OCIP Lao (29th Oct - 5th Nov) Day 2

Day 2 started off with everyone getting excited. Although we've been told that we'll be entering the classroom to teach the students basic English, we really didn't know what to expect. So, off we walked to Santhiphap High School from our guesthouse. The walk was a short ten minutes but the entire convoy attracted quite a bit of attention. Whether unwanted or not, I can't tell for sure. Along the way, we saw many streetside hawkers selling roasted BANANAS!!

We met up with the Principal of the school thatvery morning and almost immediately, the girls set off to work! As this was the first day, many of them looked inadequate in the classrooms. And to make matters worse, quite a fair bit of the classes had students who could speak pretty good English already. It was heartening to see how the girls fumbled but eventually managed to modify their lessons accordingly.

Towards the end of the day, everyone was looking pretty drained from the excitment of the day. We walked back from the school back to the guesthouse. Along the way, many things were running through my mind. I wonder what were the thoughts on these young minds. I wondered if they felt like giving up and yearn to return to the comforts of Singapore. I wondered if this trip would makea difference to their minds. How about those students we met today, are we going to make a difference in their lives? What is our purpose here in Lao? While these thoughts whizzed about in my head, we had dinner and had our debrief. I went to bed tired but still thinking...

To Be Continued...

OCIP Lao (29th Oct - 5th Nov)

Just came back from Lao last night. Very tired but I have to say that it's been an unforgettable experience. We arrive in Lao via Bangkok on Lao Aviation. It's my first time on a propeller jet. The airport is small even by Rockhampton standards and the air is fresh. Numerous hills loomed over the horizon, surrounding the airport completely.


We dumped our stuff at the guesthouse and immediately set out to orientate ourselves to service site. So we went to the school first. The sun was setting and the temperature was dropping. We were told that temperature could drop below 18 degrees and it did!


The classrooms were small, full of graffiti (see this is what happens when people damage public property!!), dusty without any lights nor fans.


To be continued... :D

"ASEAN cannot remain silent over Myanmar unrest: PM Lee"

And indeed. ASEAN issued a statement. Only a statement. I can't help but feel extremely frustrated with the incompetency of ASEAN. Several years ago, someone journalist referred to ASEAN as the "talk-shop", its policy of non-interference of member states has always been the main obstacle in turning this organisation into one that is productive and beneficial to the region.

Aung Sung Suu Kyi's party won the elections more than 17 years ago but was never given the chance to rule the country. Instead, she came under house arrest by the military who voided the elections. And for 17 years (even though Myanmar only joined ASEAN later), ASEAN did nothing. The current unrest is probably the best chance the country can see some form of reform. However,the situation seems to be spiraling out of control. Just two days ago a Japanese journalist was shot dead at close range, (ie. possibly intentionally).

Let's face it, how many military governments actually managed to rule the country properly? Most of them are only interested in building up their power and wealth. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. This is one of the things I learnt in my political science lectures. As long as there is not enough checks and balances in any system, corruption is bound to happen. Singapore included.

Was just discussing with Dominic the other day that I cannot fathom the idea of a soldier killing another countryman. If I'm ordered to kill an innocent civilian Singaporean, I don't think I have the heart to do it.

There appears to be no good way out of the situation for the junta of Myanmar. Already the global pressure on them is mounting. Perhaps what they really need now is for someone to offer them a good way out of this awkward position. An exit plan of sort. One good way would be to release Aung Sung Suu Kyi and reform the military to be one that will help in the new government. That's probably the best exit plan they can have. Any other moves to forcibly contain the protests will only result in a bigger reaction from the people.

All over the world and SEA, people are angry and upset over this apparently injustice. Here in Singapore, nothing at all. Kyaw Kyaw Min, Education Committee, National League for Democracy, says: "We want ASEAN to take action on Myanmar. ASEAN is so weak...they are responsible because Myanmar is one of ASEAN countries. European Union also gives pressures, US also gives pressure, UN security council also...only ASEAN is so weak." Sigh...

Blogger launches Blogger Play!

"Shortly after Blogger launched photo uploading two years ago, one of our engineers whipped up a web page that would show us the pictures that were being uploaded in real time. The result was fun, often beautiful, but above all, compelling. We couldn’t stop watching."

I saw this when i logged into blogger this morning. Wondering what this new toy is, i clicked the link. I was wow-ed and amazed by the pictures that I see. It made me feel so small yet unique in this world that we live in.

We're all born different. No one better than the other. Perhaps better or well adapted to live in certain environment, but never completely better. This is the basis of evolution and effects of genetic variation. What we perceive as correct or norms are merely social constructs. Boundaries that societies set so that we can make sense of this complex world that we live in.

For example, many religions today claim that there is only one true god. Their god. But this belief system is very dependent on the cultural background of the person. In other words, what god I believe in actually depends on what culture and religion i am born into. The development of the human brain as we make sense of the world depends very much on our prior knowledge. In other words, what we both call green colour, may actually be different colours because our experiences and understanding with the colour green, were all different.

Interestingly, NGC is playing "In the womb" again. And I'm just so awed by the ever so diversified world that we live in. If the world is big, the universe is even bigger. But if our minds are small and narrow, humankind will never make progress. Geneticist Richard Dawkins wrote that biology raises the human consciousness and opens up the mind. It really does.

Don't give hate a chance.

Recently I've come across a lot of incidences personally and also on the news about hate crimes and discrimination. Be it racial, religion, body weight, looks, whatever...Discrimination comes from ignorance and ignorance breeds hate. Nobody likes the feeling of injustice so here I am doing my part by telling everyone, don't give hate a chance. :)

New toy!

As some of you may have noticed, I had a new toy last week! The hill bought in a couple of new tablet PC (T4220) from Fujitsu. Having used Fujitsu's tablet PC since my uni days, I was more than happy to be one of the few to try the gadget out and see how it can fit into our daily work. Already i found a bug in the system and also found the way to overcome the problem. Compared to "anti-codon" (that's the name of my own tablet PC which is a T3010), this new machine is faster. Anti-codon comes with only 2 USB ports which can be realy annoying but the new one comes with 3. In addition, this machine comes with a hot-swappable DVD rom whereas anti-codon has an external one. Overall i'll rate the new machine 4/5. I'm still at wits end as to what to do with anti-codon since i've just gotten a new desktop at home and i'm too sentimental to get rid of it. Afterall, that was the machine that accompanied me throughout my university years. My days in the hostels and all over the world. I think i'll clean up the machine to remove the unwanted programs so that it'll run faster. Then I can use it at home when I leave the hill's laptop at work.

Meet Anti-codon (left) and his new friend Mendel (right).

Reflection...

The celebs in the hills are fun fun fun yesterday. Although our joint performance item was short, I totally enjoyed it. I miss the days as a band member. Marching in the sun, doing formation display, painting banners, planning for concerts etc. Life as a student was just so fun.

4MM held a good munchies session for us too. The cake was oh-so-yummy! Thanks 4MM for making the day memorable. Looking back, that was the third time I had this sort of experience. First in FTPSS, then second year in SAS and third year, in STC.

The dinner was fun too. So much laughter in a day. I woke up this morning in deep thought. Reading the notes the hillers wrote for me. Sometimes we do wonder if we've chosen the right path. This job requires all 24 hours of our time that we sometimes neglect our families and the ones we love. One colleague lamented that he has not played with his daughter for a long time because everytime he is home, he is just so tired that he needs to sleep. Then there's the 'difficult-to-reach-out-to' hillers. They are quick to point fingers, to blame and the accuse. However, we understand and do not retaliate. This takes a lot of understanding, patience and heartaches on our part. Thankfully these incidences are still a minority. Dropped my teachers a few sms wishes. I'm sure they are busy now as well. The notes from the hillers were very encouraging. Am I in the right path? I'm not so sure at times but it's a decision I've made and I'll think i'll stick on to it.

Off to breakfast and then....SET PAPERS AGAIN!

PS: N Levels students please close the BROWSER NOW!

PPS: Yes... i said stop surfing and go study NOW!!!!!!! :)

WIDT

Woke up at 9am and couldn't sleep anymore (again). Still reeling from the joy of my latest purchase. A denis wick mouthpiece model SM3M crafted by the best British euphonium player Steven Mead. What a beauuuuuuuuuuty! MUACKS!

I think I'll debut this mouthpiece during the T-day concert if i'm playing the eupho. Else... i'll debut it another day. Gee!

Got lots of stuff to do today. Set SA2 papers, buy hearts for tomorrow's dissection. Only managed to get 3 of them. Guess i'll get the class to share while i demo on the visualizer. It's gonna be a fun fun fun week ahead! Less stressful (i hope). :)

Ranting...

I slept at 2am last night thinking that I'll be able to have a long day in bed today but here I am at 0918 blogging. I woke up at 0600, 0630, 0800, 0830....tossed and turned and decided that my biological clock shall claim victory today against the strong minded.

Since 0830, I've packed my room, cleared out most of the unwanted stuff, cleaned my working table and coffee table and now my room is nice and neat (for a short while) again. My next victim shall be my bookshelves with all the books I've had since pri - university days. Sigh... I've always felt this inertia to pack this shelf becos I don't want to throw away a lot of those things with sentimental value. As a result, I hoard, hoard, hoard and hoard and...the shelf is one long lifestory of myself. Perhaps it's time to let logic rule. I keep telling myself that if I have never searched the shelf in the past 2 years for things, then, I do not need any of the things there. But...but... what if? Yeah it's always the what ifs, should've, would've, could've that has been the main sources of the inertia. I need to get out of this mental model. Arghh..........

Things on the hill got pretty quiet this week becos the hillers are having the exams and CA. This was the peace before the storm. Now, the storm has arrived. Sitting in my room, staring at me screaming for attention. And there's no sun today... how to play beach vball without sun?

1 bday, 2 crashes

Yesterday was mum's birthday and we went out for our usual birthday dinner. This year, we went to Jumbo at East Coast Seafood restaurant. Food was pretty good and but the crab was only so-so. As we were eating, we were treated to endless rounds of Apache helicopters turning within yards from the our table as the NDP rehearsals proceeded.

Now, the bad news. My desktop hard drive crashed. It started off with clicking sounds and then after a while, it died. That's the 2nd HD crash i had in two weeks. All my data I had since my JC days are all GONE. I'm gonna drop by sim lim sometime this week and see if anyone can recover the data inside. It's a physical disk failure so it's more difficult to recover the data. Need someone with that special talent and skill to bring my disk back! Sigh... :(

Talking about talents, here someone with a talent and managed to hide it for so many years. Paul Pott sings Nessun Dorma from Turandot.

*zonked*

Yeah, I know I haven't been blogging for a long time and day in day out, i'm reminded by the pple on the hills that I haven't been blogging. The past 2 weeks had been pretty busy. No. Busy is an understatement. It's been pretty mad. Deadlines are all drawing closer but thankfully as of now I've been keeping to the deadlines. Phew...

Even though I was very tired last night, i woke up at 9pm for my favourite show on NGC. :P

Need to go back to work somemore... work work work... :S

SYF Opening Ceremony

Had an extremely long but fruitful first week up on the hills. Yesterday was the 'finale'. I finished lessons at 2, immediately had to rush for the IJ-board induction for newbies then at 5pm had to bring my band babies to the SYF opening. Initially I thought that I will immediately zonk out the moment I reach Indoor Stadium but I didn't. Instead, i was dazzled by the items presented at the ceremony. Of course, our fabulous dance girls were there!! Was happy to see our girls cheering for their school mates. There were many band performances including 1 from St John's Institution from KL. The one that left an impression in me was the combined primary school performance. Those kids were so cute and wore flowers on the bells of their instruments. That made me recall me primary school band days. How we prepared for the SYF competition. I can still remember the pieces we played. I can even remember the solo parts and how it should be played, even after more than 15 years.

Then of course, there's my secondary school. In order to recruit members, we'll plan outdoor band displays for the sec 1s and it's always the most difficult and tiring activity but we all enjoyed it when the product was ready. Then there was JC, NS and then university. Gee...seems just like yesterday.

So what did I accomplish was a youth? Academica achievements aside, I think I had a hell lot of fun. Isn't that what being youthful is all about? I'd like to believe i'm still a youth and will spend this youth day holiday doing something youthful. Haha...

Dug through a whole lot of old pics but could only find some of them. So..this is me, when I was slightly more youthful. I'm youthful. Still. :P

This picture was taken for our year book. A decade ago. I'm seated first row, 6th from the right, beside the band major.

In JC, we made banners for EVERYTHING. This giant one spans 3 storeys and was hung on the rooftop. See how small the stone table looks compared to it. We didn't set out to do one that was so big but because I made a mistake in calculations, we ended up with a cloth that was so big.

Recruitment banner. We had so much fun planning and painting it.

There were only so 'many' guys in my JC class.

We call ourselves the crap-family. Cos we're always so crappy. We all came into JC and into the same class, doing the same triple science combi cos we wanted to be doctors. As fate would have it, only 1 of us made it. The rest of us are, however, happy where we are and doing our share for the community. Let's see, from the left (seated): pharmacist, teacher, business-woman, business-woman, radiologist, doctor (OMG i still cannot believe this crazy woman is a doctor now! :P) Standing: physiotherapist, physiotherapist, pharmacist, nurse.

NEOPRINTS! Haven't seen these guys for almost a year. Must have a class outing soon again! Arghh....

JC life was such a daze. It came and went very quickly and before we know it, we're in NS! OMG....

dead beat

Last night, I blogged while lying on my bed using my Atom. Unfortunately, after I'm done with the entire post, i accidentally tapped the 'back' button and the post was gone. Forever. Was too upset to make another post and I just went to bed hoping to wake up 2 hours later to do some work. I didn't wake up till 6am today.

Yesterday was quite an emotionally sapping day. The mobile phone event triggered off everything and I spent almost an entire period blasting. Still not the kind of blasting I did in another place but enough to make so want to give up. This generation is unfortunate enough to be born into a world of so much distractions. Only the ones who can prioritise will survive. Nothing is more important that getting an education. Up on the hills, people are too sheltered. They do not know that they are competing with everyone else in singapore. They do not know that they have an excellent environment for maximum growth and development, away from the daily fights and frequent disruptions. The only disruptions they have are self-created. Their incessant talking drives me crazy. Their indifference drives me mad. Perhaps I just care too much.

This morn, found out that 2 of them deliberately skipped afternoon lessons "because they dun feel like coming". This time round, I was more composed. I even smiled and replied that I will treat it as a truancy case. They are not the malicious kind, just very playful. I really wish I had a way to make them see that they should really grow up now and be responsible for their own future. Yeah, grow up. Just two days and I'm actually quite drained. Physically and emotionally. Thankfully I've still got plenty of focused and motivated ones whom I don't mind a bit to stay behind after work to help. Sigh...

Kids...

The unthinkable happened again yesterday. Mum's friends were in the house again! Ahhh... They're actually pretty nice people but really, it's the monsters they bring along that annoyed me. Thankfully for these monsters, they've been here often enough to know that my room is out of bounds. Even the area outside my door is out of bounds else this teacher will probably grill and eat them. Somehow these kids have a certain fear in them the moment they know i'm a teacher. Perhaps it's the amount of books plastered all over the walls that scare them. Perhaps it's my killer stare...perhaps perhaps. Whatever it is, I'm safe within the confines of walls of my room. The noise however was most annoying. Nowadays mum has taken to saying "Hey you all better lower your volume ah.....else the teacher will scold!" When I first heard it I was like "What?!" Since when did I become the "karang guni man" or the "policeman" who will catch little kids if they misbehave? These kids will probably grow up with twisted childhood who thinks that teachers are well.... monsters.

Too much blabbering. Anyway, i left the house before it was officially declared a war zone so that I will be spared of the psychological trauma. Lots of things to prepare today cos... school opens tomorrow! Wheee..... :D

Hooked!

Just like Kimberly, I've taken a fancy to chinese songs recently esp to the song below. I first heard it a couple of days back in a cab and since then I've been playing it 10 million times annoying everyone. I'm like that. When I like a song, I play it until i'm sick of it. :P

你那么爱她 by 李圣杰 林隆璇

直到爱消失你才懂得
去珍惜身边每个 每好风景
只是她早已离去


直到你相逢他早已经
不在对你留恋
最后的你 开始了一段挣扎


你那么爱她
为什么不把她留下
为什么不说心里话
你深爱她
这是每个人都知道啊
你那么爱她
为什么不把她留下
是不是你有深爱的两个她
所以你不想再让自己无法自拔


直到爱消失你才懂得
去珍惜身边每个 每好风景
只是她早已离去
直到你相逢她早已经
不在对你留恋
最后的你 开始了一段挣扎


你那么爱她
为什么不把她留下
为什么不说心里话
你深爱她
这是每个人都知道啊
你那么爱她
为什么不把她留下
是不是你有深爱的两个她
所以你不想再让自己无法自拔


你那么爱她
为什么不把她留下
为什么不说心里话
你深爱她
这是每个人都知道啊
你那么爱她
为什么不把她留下
是不是你有深爱的两个她
所以你不想再让自己无法自拔

And here's a fake MTV I found on Youtube. Quite funny!

In the Womb (Twins, Triplets and Quads)

Nat Geo: 24 - 29th June! All those with cable must SEEEEEEEE!!!

WITD

Woke up at 1000 and got an sms from a K. We're meeting somewhere in town to discuss the upcoming exams. Since I've been longing to pay the Singapore MINT Toy Museum, i suggested that we meet at the cafe for the discussion. I arrived there at 1145. Still in my dazed post sleep mood, I crossed the street talking to myself. Then I realised, K was already there waiting for me and caught me in my 'talking-to-invisible-friend' mode. Haha....so embarassing.

Anyway, we discussed and finished up quite a bit of stuff before starting to talk rubbish again. Then at 3pm I realised that I'm late for tea with D! Damn...so we quickly packed and left. Thankfully I was only meeting D in the next street. Phew! So we hung out till late and missed my gym. Argh! Nvm.. will gym and swim tomorrow instead. Today I'll take things easy.

School's gonna reopen again! Gosh...so fast! I'm so excited... :P

This is so (tragically) funny!

The guy actually pointed up and said that "that's the boyfriend! OMG...he will fall for sure...Nooooooo....." So FUNNY!

Mon and Tue: WIDT

On Monday, we participated in an IJ learning journey to discover for ourselves the IJ mission and what "being persons for others" actually mean.

And so we all went and had fun! Wheee....

First stop: Boat Quay! Though we don't know where exactly is the landing site of the IJ sisters, we do know that they landed somewhere here.

And then we followed the footsteps of the IJ sisters who went to the church beside CHIJMES. Yes, we WALKED from Boat Quay to that church. Thank goodness the weather was very good for walking. :) Frankly we chatted and walked so it didn't feel far at all.

At the church we learnt the history of the place. Next stop, CHIJMES, which is just next door.

Through the Gates of Hope. Apparently people had abandoned their babies here to the cared for by the nuns. What really amazed me was that within a few days after the sisters were given the Caldwell House to stay, with only scarce resources including just 1 frying pan for the whole group, they took in more than 10 fee paying students and even more orphans. Even though odds were against them, they did what they thought was right. How many of us can say for sure that we are able to do the same thing under the same circumstances? That really got me into a reflective mode.

The corridors of CHIJMES. How many had passed through their doors I can't say for sure. I think IJ students are really fortunate to belong to a school of such rich history and heritage. Unfortunately, I don't see the kind of school spirit I saw in other schools like St Andrews. The boys there sing their school anthem loud like a war cry that frightens enemies off. I've seen them fight in inter-school competitions, singing their anthem and cheering throughout the entire event. I'm not sure about IJ schools because I've never been to any such sports events as yet but I really hope such strong school heritage do not go to waste. Perhaps it's because I came from a school with very rich heritage too that made me feel so strongly about school spirit. Gan Eng Seng School (NOT Gan Eng Seng Secondary School PLEASE!) was established in 1885 for 'boys who were poor'. During my time, spirit was at an all time high. Now, I think the GESSian spirit is lost. No more pride. Just take a look at the way they wear their school uniform. Shirts tucked out, smoking etc. *FUMING MAD* NOT fit to wear the badge at all. ARGH! Ok too much ranting... IJ should never let their school spirit become like that of GESS.

We had lunch at BK of Cineleisure. So much junk food! I can't stand it! Haha...

And then we played our very own version of Amazing Race in Cineleisure! It's quite a good change considering we had a pretty emo morning with everyone getting into a reflective mode. So we did all sorts of funny things, DDR, Para-Para, Pool, Neo prints etc. Seems like my JC days are back again! I wanna take neo-prints with my best friends soooooon!! :D

We ended the day with some of the us going to Ding Tai Feng, Singapore Toy Museum or Eu Yang Sang. Apparently the Toy Museum group had the most fun. I wanna visit that too on my own next time! I was with the DTF group and we went to Paragon's Breadtalk and DTF to find out what made the company so successful. Just last month, I went to DTF 3 days in a row just to eat the same thing. My fav dish is the chicken soup with noodles thingie!! We had dinner at Fort Canning Lodge and though everyone was very tired, we did went back with quite a lot to think and reflect upon.

For me, I think what I remembered most strongly about that day was about the IJ sister's journey to Singapore and how they persevered against all odds. Human spirit, when pushed to the limit, can work miracles. Are we pushing ourselves enough? In today's comfortable world, are we getting too soft? Is Singapore turning into a nation of softies?