Originally posted by insidestory:its not just the informal internet typing. just listen to how these local 'grads' speak and their horrendous diction with their cheenapok accent..omg. most of them even those who do humanities at 'university' level can't plagiarize a formal paper without making simple primary school grammatical errors (!!), so no one harbours any hope in them possessing any intellectual currency or critical thinking. besides low intellectual ability there is also the frog-in-the-well quotient. ALL the local grads i've spoken to don't know the difference between partisan and non-partisan, the different between a politician and a civil servant, and the different between a lecturer and a professor. They're truly a disgrace when made to interact with foreign students and foreigners - every single one of my foreigner friend and Singaporean US/UK-educated friends made these remarks about them.
Ah.....I do admit that I sometimes have to edit quite a fair bit of basic grammatical errors for my friends....one of whom is destined to be a MOE teacher.
And knowledge is definitely lacking. I'm an undergrad myself and I do admit that I don't think very highly of my abilities either.
But if I may be evil enough, allow me to point out, an error I highlighted, which I hope, is a typo. haha
Edit: On hindsight, I hope you're not being sacarstic by using "different" twice.
Originally posted by insidestory:Singaporeans can go overseas for their university education first after A levels or O levels. Not only is it allowed, its very very common! Their parents simply have to file the papers necessary with Mindef, and put down a security deposit.That's what the parents of dozens of my classmates and my parents did. Parents get the security deposit back when the person returns to serve. I'd say about 1/2 of my friends who went to US, UK, Australia and Japan, went overseas first after doing the declarations then came back to serve like me. The other 1/2 did their NS first cos they wanted to get it over and done with. This excludes the scholar-group. The PSC scholars (SAFOS and OMS) naturally get to disrupt at 19 and fly off - its part of their contract. The stat board and corporate ones do not. If they wish to on their own accord, they have to file their own papers and put down the security deposit.
What these people are talking about and the fix they're in is caused by going overseas on other permits without doing the necessary declaration for NS liability and they now want to do NS just to be able to renounce their SG citizenship officially and be able to travel to SG freely. (i believe they followed their parents, who had gone overseas on job postings when they were very very young, and their parents and they subsequently obtained US citizenship)
The furnishing of a bond is common knowledge to most parents but why then do they choose to not to go through the system by applying for deferment and exit permit?
I believe the reason lies in the fact that you need to have your deferment granted first before you can apply for the exit permit in the context of pre-enlistees,even if the parents had the financial ability to furnish the bond.Such things are not automatically granted on request.
I don't think cases of people getting deferment to study overseas first is very common.You and your friends can be counted as lucky since not all such cases for deferment are successful,especially if it is for university education.I have friends whose application for deferment were rejected.They were all fresh A level grads at that time.
One of our famous recent cases:
I'm not aware of his educational background but I think he had O level qualifications at that time.
Willingness to furnish the bond does not automatically grant deferment like I said earlier on.If it were that way,it would breed the "money can buy you a way out" mentality and the less well to do households would be disadvantaged in a matter involving a common national duty.
If someone can come up with an alternative punishment that is on par with a jail term,I would be more than willing to support it.
Malaysia is in my honest opinion superior to Singapore in many ways. Certainly in the food department, it doesn't really pale to Singapore. I've made several trips to Johore a couple of times to visit family (I have family in both Malaysia and Singapore) and I haven't been disappointed with the food. Heck my Singaporean relatives often make the trip across the causeway just for the food. Of course my desire to visit Singapore has nothing to do with the food. Ah well.
As for English, yeah Singapore is in an unfortunate situation whereby the general aptitude in the language is (according to friends and relatives) actually decreasing. Even with the whole mother tongue department, I rarely meet young Singaporeans (overseas) who are able to string together lengthy spoken Mandarin sentences without using English or worse.
Personally I don't think Singlish is the problem. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a creole language that its users use affectionately as a tool for national self identity. The problem is when one is consciously required to cease its use and switch to standardized English when dealing with outsiders. And no I don't mean putting on a faux British/American/Aussie accent. Speaking clearly and lucidly is enough. Just look at a certain MM LKY. He is definitely a master of the English language despite speaking with a (albeit upper class) Singaporean accent. Ah well, I'm in no position to criticize. Just a casual observation from somebody who's pretty much a foreigner nowadays.
Originally posted by insidestory:That's because of the poor standards of the low-class universities here. Seriously, when I was in JC, everyone who wanted to be anyone begged their middle class parents to send them overseas. Those from well to do families knew they were going overseas after A levels right before they started JC. If you think you have a hard time understanding what they mean when you read what you say, it's ten times worse when you hear them speak. Their diction is totally inscrutable, most of the foreign students in the US I met from HK, China, who did not study and were not exposed to English as intensively in grade school as these Singaporeans speak way better than them. It is the reason why anyone who has any brains in Singapore high schools all went to overseas universities.
Which state are you living in? Are you in the east or west coast? Did you marry an American WASP? Hehe. A very small number of Singaporean friends who went to the US with me dated American girls, mostly the Chinese or the whites. I know such relationships will only bring pain in the long run since I had to come back, but its all good, cos I eventually hooked up and am marrying a Singaporean who was also US-educated. I really miss the big boxes and IHOP and even little things like TIVO. This (SG) is really a god-damned place, not because of its physical limitations or its leaders, but the majority of the people here sicken me. If it wasn't because of our business here, which really is everything our family is built on, we wouldn't be here at all.
East coast. Grew up in New York and am now living in the Washington D.C. area. Have worked for various branches within the US government (Department of Energy, Department of Defense, and Health and Human Services). I also have received numerous grants worth tens of thousands of dollars from the US government to pay for my undergraduate and PhD degrees from tier one research universities on the East coast. Cannot say any of that for the Singapore government, all I've gotten from them is grief. Am so fed up with them. Oh, the new wife is a white girl.
why on earth are u biting your own tails for anyway?
there are many english speaking white dudes who dont know basic spelling and grammmer and often mix up" they are" as >>>>"their" and "there".and thats just for starters.......they have far worse english people who cant write a simple sentence with severe spelling and grammer errors every 5 words.and they arent even drunk or high on drugs.
these are from white english speaking dudes who have english as their sole communicating language!so what are u making so much fuss about???
and why do u want to complain about your own singaporeans and make excuses about having to stick to some family business at the cost of your personal life??if u dont like singapore...its perfectly all right to go setup your own english school in some other country or go relocate in country u can do business in.....no one is holding u back.so stop complaining bout the chaps n blokes you come across with everyday in singapore.
Was I complaining?
I was merely making a casual observation with regards to a comment (not started by me) about Singapore's general level of English. If you've taken offence, I apologize.
This thread has been derailed so I'll like to bring it back on track. Going back to the original topic I think that's that. I've let the government known my intent and they've disclosed their terms. As it is, their terms are far too costly. Psychojet, I believe its even less worth it for you than it is for me considering your career and recent marriage. Anyway that's it, can't blameme for not trying.
Originally posted by NeutralDensity0.6:Was I complaining?
I was merely making a casual observation with regards to a comment (not started by me) about Singapore's general level of English. If you've taken offence, I apologize.
This thread has been derailed so I'll like to bring it back on track. Going back to the original topic I think that's that. I've let the government known my intent and they've disclosed their terms. As it is, their terms are far too costly. Psychojet, I believe its even less worth it for you than it is for me considering your career and recent marriage. Anyway that's it, can't blameme for not trying.
I believe he was addressing insidestory.
I'm sorry to hear about your situation, but it won't be a big loss after all if you can meet your Singaporean kin in Malaysia. Many places have changed beyond recognition, and not always for the better.
Originally posted by HITMAN11111111111:why on earth are u biting your own tails for anyway?
there are many english speaking white dudes who dont know basic spelling and grammmer and often mix up" they are" as >>>>"their" and "there".and thats just for starters.......they have far worse english people who cant write a simple sentence with severe spelling and grammer errors every 5 words.and they arent even drunk or high on drugs.
these are from white english speaking dudes who have english as their sole communicating language!so what are u making so much fuss about???
and why do u want to complain about your own singaporeans and make excuses about having to stick to some family business at the cost of your personal life??if u dont like singapore...its perfectly all right to go setup your own english school in some other country or go relocate in country u can do business in.....no one is holding u back.so stop complaining bout the chaps n blokes you come across with everyday in singapore.
Maybe because Singapore has sold itself as an English speaking country to other countries, promoting that point to the world as 'the' definitive reason to set up business here? People tend to nitpick on something only after you use it as a leverage when in effect, the leverage commands no weight. Before that, they may not even notice it.
Or how about the fact that not only can few Singaporeans speak proper conversational English (not asking for Queen's diction or flowery vocabulary), they can't even master the mother tongue like the Chinese and Taiwanese do with Mandarin and the Hongkies can with their spoken Cantonese.
Have you heard the hideous mangled version of Mandarin the Singaporeans speak, save for a very very very tiny number of truly effectively bilingual elites like the president scholar this year from Dunman High who's going to China for her undergrad and graduate studies?
Worse, is how the government is trying hard to snuff out whatever that's left of dialect, which is spoken fluently by the older generation because they feel it's bad for business over the long run, considering how the people can't even master basic Mandarin or English..they thought to themselves in their usual pragmatic fashion: we have to wipe out what's left of dialect to start to untangle this horrible mess. But I don't blame them really. Because the situation IS a horrible mess, with the bulk of the population unable to speak intelligible English or mother tongue that is competent enough to compete on the world stage. What a pity..because at least these senior citizens are speaking something (their dialect) fluently and they would be about the only Singaporeans who can speak something fluently.
Seriously, put a typical local university undergrad with an American in the same room (i've seen how some of your undergrads come to US state schools on exchange programmes and make a fool of yourselves), and then put a typical local undergrad with a Chinese or Taiwanese undergrad, and watch the Singaporean local undergrad self-destruct in the face of competently spoken "world-class" (your favourite phrase, touche!) English and Mandarin.
I'd LOVE to relocate my family and all of our business to the states from this place, it's already partially there, but sunk cost from the 70s to now has gone too far now and the market has been established to a point that it doesn't make sense to reverse.
Frankly I love the place for whatever nostalgic memories I made in my growing years at home and in school here up to JC from a child, parts of the city with remnants of the past are (still) charming, and it has great, sound leaders with intelligent big picture thinking and foresight. Its the people that make up this place which truly make it a shithole.