Singapore and Home
One of the reasons I love the blogosphere is that fact that it always has fresh and interesting issues for me to explore.
This time round its an issue dear to my heart, that of Singapore and Singaporeans. This was sparked off by a letter to mr brown by The Fool of a Took explaining her views on Singapore and on why she's glad she's overseas now. This led me on to the Knight of Pentacles who presented both sides of the story with a blog link to Justina, a girl studying in LA who can't wait to get home. Wannabe Lawyer who also studies overseas also has his say about this, although for him the topic turns to abstract concepts of nationhood and politics.
Here's my ten cents worth. And for what its worth I think I may have a slightly different story to tell, given that I've actually worked in Singapore before unlike the other two who have yet to enter the Singaporean working world.
Like The Fool of a Took, I'm glad I'm overseas studying now and not in Singapore and like her I often adopt a cynical view of my homeland. But on the other hand I do understand where Justina is coming from too. I may complain an awful lot about Singapore, but deep down I miss home like crazy. I miss my family, the public transport, the late opening hours of shopping malls and my boyfriend.
I have been wondering, ever since I read The Singapore Serf which details the progress of one man's journey to an Australian PR, whether I should apply for one or not. It is entirely likely given that I am studying here now, that I would be able to get one.
Unfortunately, I have no idea whether I should stay or not.
The boyfriend thinks I should, the family think I should.
The reason? They fear for the viability of the Singaporean economy. Unlike Australia which has a viable internal economy, Singapore is largely dependent on the whole import-export business. And for much longer than we should have, we have depended on our manufacturing sector which is as I speak dying a slow death. In the early 1990s, the starting pay of an average graduate was well over $2000, now people consider you lucky to get more than $1.5. This is of course, excepting the professional degree holders such as the doctors and lawyers who could still expect high starting salaries. The pay I mentioned is before CPF has been deducted of course.
I was unfortunate enough to be an arts graduate, in English Literature no less. Which is the epitome of a general degree. In that climate, arts graduates fell to the bottom of the pecking order and I was unwilling to enter the teaching sector. Once I'd had a good look around the employment market, I realised that there just weren't that many positions open for people with arts degrees. Journalism, which is a key sector for many arts graduates, is not that big a sector in Singapore as many must have realised by now. You have a choice about 2 employers, both of which are government linked. A friend I knew who graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science, took 8 months before landing a job in newsradio 93.8 and it wasn't a particularly good job either. He got Honours somemore, not just any old degree.
That was when my parents offered to let me come to Melbourne to study a law degree. The offer came with a price, which was to skip my honours year in Eng. Lit at NUS and go straight to Melbourne instead. I sold out and accepted that offer. In the meantime, I got a job.
Working taught me the mundaneness and long hours expected of a typical Singaporean worker. It also taught me the basic fact of life, which was that as prices of goods in Singapore rose, they rose unaccompanied by a rise in the average Singapore pay packet. In other words, stuff got more expensive but our pay didn't get bigger.
As mentioned by the Knight of Pentacles in his blog The Singapore Serf, the cost of living in Singapore is comparable to that of Australia. The difference is that Australians get paid much more than we do. Even at low end jobs like waitressing, one can expect to be paid around AUD$10 per hour at the least. I've lived in Singapore my WHOLE life and I do not know ANY waitresses that get paid that kind of money.( Oh and by the way, a girl I know who moonlighted as a cashier got AUD $16.50 per hour)
I love Singapore. I love its efficiency and stability not to mention its safe streets. But I must be realistic and I know that only a very small minority in Singapore get to live a good life there. When I think of the lifestyle my parents gave me while growing up; all those overseas trips and liberal pocket moneyand now an overseas education, I am hit by the knowledge that such a lifestyle is not easily affordable.
While my parents are not of the set spoken of byThe Fool of a Took , they did provide on a scale that I do not expect myself to be able to keep up with if I stayed in Singapore. That is not unless I married a very well off man.
The lifestyle spoken of by her and also rejected by her is the life many girls dream of. Among most of the girls I knew, most of them dream of marrying well and being able to maintain that type of a lifestyle. When a tutor asked people in my JC class what their dream was, some girls actually said that they just wanted to marry a rich guy and be a tai tai.
They are not to be looked down upon. These girls are merely being practical. They know that a comfortable life in Singapore is not attainable by their own labour and they know also, that most fresh grad guys would not be able to achieve all that unless they came from a very well off family.
While Justina sang praises of the the public transport system in Singapore, many girls in Singapore actually refuse to date a guy unless he owns a car and can drive them around.After all, what is the good of efficient MRT and train rides if one has to be squeezed up against smelly ah peks during the rush hour? While public housing is cheap and decent, many girls I know would rather live in a condominium and swan around with gold cards in their LV wallets.
I know of just as many guys who make as little as $2.2k a month but who sacrifice more than half of that in order to buy and maintain a car. While I think it makes no monetary sense at all, I know what they mean when they tell me that without a car, they do not expect to be able to find a girl friend. A car is a piece of private space in a country where privacy and space command increasingly high premiums. The same goes for the popularity of condominiums. Why do you think property developers spend thousands on dreamy ads for their condos? For the average SG guy sitting in his 3 room flat having to use the local public facilities, a condo IS a dream come true and those developers play to that.
Justina spoke of the Singapore dream, that the leaders would be able to keep the nation strong and prosperous. I hope so too. Because what I have just described is the Singapore reality, where everything is driven by consumerism and materialism, something the Fool of a Took talked about as well.
A comfortable middle class life with one's own house and car is just easier to attain in Australia than a Singapore. As much as I miss home, I start to waver everytime I think of buying a car here with my first 3 months pay. I especially love the thought of the lifestyle evoked by Karen Cheng, who leads a very laidback life in Perth with her husband and children. A lifestyle that I suspect would not be as easy to achieve in Singapore.
I miss home; I read Mr Brown religiously, many of the blogs I read are Singapore or Asian and I perk up at the sound of a Singaporean accent. But I don't know if it makes sense to go home.
There are so many things to consider. If I had kids would I want them to go through the education system at home? Will the government's big gamble with the biotech/biochem sector pay off? They've spent millions on it so far, could they take it if it doesn't pay off? Will more of the places I love in Singapore disappear under concrete and glass?(I think this one's a yes) Will the government ever wake up and realise that the pragmatism and materialism they encourage is behind the mystery of the falling birth rate?
Finally, the safe and stable country I grew up in didn't have a casino, much less two. Will the home I grew up in be anything like the home I might return to? I doubt that the meaures take by the government are sufficient to keep the general population out of the casino. As it is, so many Singaporeans I know are 'du gui'(gambling addicts) who love buying Toto and 4-D and mahjong. These are people who go on cruises just to play pokies or gamble. I doubt the high entrance fees will keep them out.
My love for home must be weighed against knowledge of its reality. Right now, I just don't know yet which country to pick.
This time round its an issue dear to my heart, that of Singapore and Singaporeans. This was sparked off by a letter to mr brown by The Fool of a Took explaining her views on Singapore and on why she's glad she's overseas now. This led me on to the Knight of Pentacles who presented both sides of the story with a blog link to Justina, a girl studying in LA who can't wait to get home. Wannabe Lawyer who also studies overseas also has his say about this, although for him the topic turns to abstract concepts of nationhood and politics.
Here's my ten cents worth. And for what its worth I think I may have a slightly different story to tell, given that I've actually worked in Singapore before unlike the other two who have yet to enter the Singaporean working world.
Like The Fool of a Took, I'm glad I'm overseas studying now and not in Singapore and like her I often adopt a cynical view of my homeland. But on the other hand I do understand where Justina is coming from too. I may complain an awful lot about Singapore, but deep down I miss home like crazy. I miss my family, the public transport, the late opening hours of shopping malls and my boyfriend.
I have been wondering, ever since I read The Singapore Serf which details the progress of one man's journey to an Australian PR, whether I should apply for one or not. It is entirely likely given that I am studying here now, that I would be able to get one.
Unfortunately, I have no idea whether I should stay or not.
The boyfriend thinks I should, the family think I should.
The reason? They fear for the viability of the Singaporean economy. Unlike Australia which has a viable internal economy, Singapore is largely dependent on the whole import-export business. And for much longer than we should have, we have depended on our manufacturing sector which is as I speak dying a slow death. In the early 1990s, the starting pay of an average graduate was well over $2000, now people consider you lucky to get more than $1.5. This is of course, excepting the professional degree holders such as the doctors and lawyers who could still expect high starting salaries. The pay I mentioned is before CPF has been deducted of course.
I was unfortunate enough to be an arts graduate, in English Literature no less. Which is the epitome of a general degree. In that climate, arts graduates fell to the bottom of the pecking order and I was unwilling to enter the teaching sector. Once I'd had a good look around the employment market, I realised that there just weren't that many positions open for people with arts degrees. Journalism, which is a key sector for many arts graduates, is not that big a sector in Singapore as many must have realised by now. You have a choice about 2 employers, both of which are government linked. A friend I knew who graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science, took 8 months before landing a job in newsradio 93.8 and it wasn't a particularly good job either. He got Honours somemore, not just any old degree.
That was when my parents offered to let me come to Melbourne to study a law degree. The offer came with a price, which was to skip my honours year in Eng. Lit at NUS and go straight to Melbourne instead. I sold out and accepted that offer. In the meantime, I got a job.
Working taught me the mundaneness and long hours expected of a typical Singaporean worker. It also taught me the basic fact of life, which was that as prices of goods in Singapore rose, they rose unaccompanied by a rise in the average Singapore pay packet. In other words, stuff got more expensive but our pay didn't get bigger.
As mentioned by the Knight of Pentacles in his blog The Singapore Serf, the cost of living in Singapore is comparable to that of Australia. The difference is that Australians get paid much more than we do. Even at low end jobs like waitressing, one can expect to be paid around AUD$10 per hour at the least. I've lived in Singapore my WHOLE life and I do not know ANY waitresses that get paid that kind of money.( Oh and by the way, a girl I know who moonlighted as a cashier got AUD $16.50 per hour)
I love Singapore. I love its efficiency and stability not to mention its safe streets. But I must be realistic and I know that only a very small minority in Singapore get to live a good life there. When I think of the lifestyle my parents gave me while growing up; all those overseas trips and liberal pocket moneyand now an overseas education, I am hit by the knowledge that such a lifestyle is not easily affordable.
While my parents are not of the set spoken of byThe Fool of a Took , they did provide on a scale that I do not expect myself to be able to keep up with if I stayed in Singapore. That is not unless I married a very well off man.
The lifestyle spoken of by her and also rejected by her is the life many girls dream of. Among most of the girls I knew, most of them dream of marrying well and being able to maintain that type of a lifestyle. When a tutor asked people in my JC class what their dream was, some girls actually said that they just wanted to marry a rich guy and be a tai tai.
They are not to be looked down upon. These girls are merely being practical. They know that a comfortable life in Singapore is not attainable by their own labour and they know also, that most fresh grad guys would not be able to achieve all that unless they came from a very well off family.
While Justina sang praises of the the public transport system in Singapore, many girls in Singapore actually refuse to date a guy unless he owns a car and can drive them around.After all, what is the good of efficient MRT and train rides if one has to be squeezed up against smelly ah peks during the rush hour? While public housing is cheap and decent, many girls I know would rather live in a condominium and swan around with gold cards in their LV wallets.
I know of just as many guys who make as little as $2.2k a month but who sacrifice more than half of that in order to buy and maintain a car. While I think it makes no monetary sense at all, I know what they mean when they tell me that without a car, they do not expect to be able to find a girl friend. A car is a piece of private space in a country where privacy and space command increasingly high premiums. The same goes for the popularity of condominiums. Why do you think property developers spend thousands on dreamy ads for their condos? For the average SG guy sitting in his 3 room flat having to use the local public facilities, a condo IS a dream come true and those developers play to that.
Justina spoke of the Singapore dream, that the leaders would be able to keep the nation strong and prosperous. I hope so too. Because what I have just described is the Singapore reality, where everything is driven by consumerism and materialism, something the Fool of a Took talked about as well.
A comfortable middle class life with one's own house and car is just easier to attain in Australia than a Singapore. As much as I miss home, I start to waver everytime I think of buying a car here with my first 3 months pay. I especially love the thought of the lifestyle evoked by Karen Cheng, who leads a very laidback life in Perth with her husband and children. A lifestyle that I suspect would not be as easy to achieve in Singapore.
I miss home; I read Mr Brown religiously, many of the blogs I read are Singapore or Asian and I perk up at the sound of a Singaporean accent. But I don't know if it makes sense to go home.
There are so many things to consider. If I had kids would I want them to go through the education system at home? Will the government's big gamble with the biotech/biochem sector pay off? They've spent millions on it so far, could they take it if it doesn't pay off? Will more of the places I love in Singapore disappear under concrete and glass?(I think this one's a yes) Will the government ever wake up and realise that the pragmatism and materialism they encourage is behind the mystery of the falling birth rate?
Finally, the safe and stable country I grew up in didn't have a casino, much less two. Will the home I grew up in be anything like the home I might return to? I doubt that the meaures take by the government are sufficient to keep the general population out of the casino. As it is, so many Singaporeans I know are 'du gui'(gambling addicts) who love buying Toto and 4-D and mahjong. These are people who go on cruises just to play pokies or gamble. I doubt the high entrance fees will keep them out.
My love for home must be weighed against knowledge of its reality. Right now, I just don't know yet which country to pick.
posted by adinahaes at 3:14 AM
2 Comments:
i can't help but point out the 40% aussie tax that cuts down the high pay. =)
i keep thinking there must be a way to strike a balance in singapore. you don't have to follow the well trodden path of your fellow singaporeans. you'll just get a lot of weird looks, and you may not get the girl/guy, but seriously, do you want to marry someone who only wants to be chauffeured around and live in a condo (but in huge debt)?
The 2005 Australian budget just came out. they're actually cutting down on some tax brackets =)
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