My One Cent Worth of Thoughts

Have you seen the “Phit Phit Shoes” that toddlers wear? The squeaking ones that go “phit phit” when they run in them, similar to the bells which farmers hang around the necks of their cows to keep track of them.  Well, I haven’t thought much about them, except that they were probably the most primitive “GPS” system used to track babies down.

TODAY! I discovered how absolutely IRRITATING they can be!!  The occasional “phit phit” can be a comic relief, but if you were to hear constant “phitting” for like 20 mins, you can really be driven mad by it!  I was totally absorbed in my book, while waiting for my turn at the hospital when a family of 3 turned up and occupied the seats in my seating cluster.  The toddler (he’s the culprit wearing the shoes), at first sight, was really adorable.  He must have just learnt how to walk and it must have been a novelty to him.  His father put him down on the floor and he happily ran around the place.  The “phit phit” sound from his shoes was bearable at first, until his father treated the waiting area like his personal playground.  He was chasing his son (yes, the FATHER) around the whole area in the hospital, shouting at the top of his voice, “come here, come here!” It’s no wonder, the kid ran around madly on his “phit phit phitting” shoes! Meanwhile, his mother was clapping her hands enthusiastically and shouting ” phit phit” along with his shoes. An adult imitating a pair of shoes. GREAT!  So this went on for 20 mins… (yes, that’s considered a short wait at a public hospital).  I was nearly driven mad by the constant high pitched sound.  Standing up, I was edging towards the happily clapping, “phit phitting” mother, to remind her that they were at a hospital where there were ill people around and peace and quiet would be much appreciated and the place was not their private playground, when my number flashed across the screen.  Lucky for them and for me as well!

I dodged into the scanning room for my scan, very much relieved that there would be some quiet moments in there.  As usual, I was directed to yet another section of the hospital (which was rather far from the previous scanning section) for doctor’s consultation after the scanning.  I made myself comfortable outside the doctor’s room, as I anticipated another long wait, with my book.  I was at my 3rd page, when from the corner of my eyes, three familiar figures were seen and an all too-close-to-heart sound was heard. Phit “>Phit Phit Phit!

I simply couldn’t believe my good fortune of the day…. the Phit family has just migrated from the scanning section to the very same consultation section as mine.  Why ME?!

Picture this – a maid feeding a boy who was playing his PSP (Playstation Portable – If you don’t know what this is, you are seriously “passe”).  He parted his lips and food was scooped into his mouth.  Make a guess at his age? 2 years old? Well, add another 10 years to that.  Yesss!! Even a 2-year-old can feed himself! 

I have seen this all too often in various parts of our small little country.  Is it because of the “maid culture” that is so rampant here? Blame the maids? I hardly think that it’s attributed to them.  Because I have seen even parents do this.

“Water! Evita!” screeched a parent with an outstretched hand.  Magically, a glass of water materialised in her grasp.  Hey! This is even more convenient than making a wish to the genie! Even Aladdin had to do some work for his wish to be granted, well, he had to rub the genie’s lamp, remember? 

“Feed Ah Boy!” (In case you are misinformed, Ah Boy is not the name of a dog.)

“Diana! Ah Boy doesn’t want his dinner! Bring the bean curd jelly to him!” (Ah Boy happens to have 2 strong legs, which for reasons I can’t fathom, simply can’t walk himself to the dining table, which was less than 1m away.) 

It was all too convenient.   At the command of a voice, the poor maid scampered around to perform the most trivial task.  Children, being children, imitated their parents, became leg-less, hand-less, spine-less, with the maids at the beck of their calls.  I find this phenomenon very disturbing indeed.  What was wrong with feeding yourself? What was so difficult to walk to the kitchen to get yourself a drink of water? (HDB flats in Singapore are infamously tiny. It probably took about 7 steps to get from the living room to the kitchen.)

With the influx of domestic help in Singapore, every family has a maid.  Parents simply glued their butts to the sofas and ordered their maids around, so do the children.  Children are little duplicates of parents. Now you wonder why more children are becoming obese in Singapore.  Perhaps, this is one of the reasons, besides the gorging of fast food. I cringe at the thought of teenagers who needed their maids to carry their bags for them or even tie their shoelaces for them.

Domestic help, well, are meant to be “helps”! Helping with the cleaning of the houses, they are not there to turn the present and next generation in armless, legless, spineless sloths.  Unfortunately, this is what is happening over here.  It has created a superiority misconception in children that they are masters or mistresses to the maids and they can be simply ordered around.  

I really wonder how we used to get by without domestic help? Starve to death or die of thirst, just because we didn’t have a maid to bring food to our mouths or water to our lips?  Parents, if your children do grow up to be worthless creatures, don’t blame the educational system, don’t criticise the society, look to yourselves, what kind of values have you imparted to them?!

If you stay on the little island of Singapore, you will not be surprised to see a mosque, a temple and a church being built next to one another. Therefore, it’s not surprising to have a Christian wake (or funeral) being set up on the ground floor of a block of flats and the next day a Taoist wake. However, this is not the main point of my blog, which I admit that I’m digressing from.

Anyway, back to the Taoist wake which is being held at the ground floor (or affectionately known as the void deck) of my block. It is a rather grand affair with colourful flags and numerous blankets lining the entire driveway from the road, all the way to my block of flats. If you have been to my place, you’d know that it’s a LOOONNNGGG drive. So put your imagination to work and you will marvel and the sheer number of blankets. Not only that, you can’t even begin to imagine the NUMBER of cars parked on one side of the narrow road, leaving only a width of 1/2 car space for other cars to maneouver. Great estimation of space.

Now you realise the scale of this particular wake!! Being a Taoist wake, it entails a 24 hour (I hope not, but it really seems like 24 hours to me) of “singing” and chanting (I dearly wish that they have given the “singers” proper singing instructions, which is sorely lacking in this group). I hope I haven’t insulted them by thinking that it sounds more like high pitched screeching to me. Til now, I have not figured out why the “singing” has to be so high pitched, why can’t they get mellow tenors to belt out the songs instead of poorly trained sops. SIgh… Not only that, the well chosen instruments include cymbals (very generously used), gongs and other attention seeking ones.

They have certainly gained MY attention and my neighbours. Alas, it’s not enough for them. They just have to share their musical talents with my neighbouring… town. Huge AMPLIFIERS (yes! Really huge ones! Exactly like the ones you find at a pop star’s concert) have been brought in to maximise the effect!!! The marvel (or woes) of technology is now penetrating through my very walls, reverberating around my room.

I truly share the pain of the deceased and the people around them. At least I can muffle the sounds by closing all my windows. But, I simply pity the ones who have to be at the site for a prolonged period. However, the music may grow on them. Who knows??!!

Recently (ok, not so recently. I coined this posting in my mind but have only got around to ACTUALLY posting it today) I attended a team building workshop with my colleagues to set the you-know mission statement, vision thingy.

The trainer brought up a point about harnassing today’s technology to expand the business network and contacts, to bring the products closer to the marketplace. He mentioned marketing on twitter and facebook. Therefore, the facebook profile photo should be a well-taken one in formal business attire (Mine shows me eating seaweed soup in Korea – Failed the 1st criterion). And SINCE it’s supposed to project you in an utterly professional image, you are not supposed to put any “xia suay” (it means humiliating in the Hokkien Dialect) photo albums. (My photo albums have photos of me in various compromising actions, no nude ones though… – another big X.) The facebook page is meant for you to market the latest project and updates about your business. (My facebook page contains various snide remarks about my friends’ comments, photos, what-have-yous. – F9 there.)

Therefore, I have concluded that my facebook page is totally unfit for the business aspect. Therefore, he suggested creating another profile for business purposes. Hmm.. So I asked him, “what about you? Don’t you have your friends on facebook?” He replied, “My business self and personal self are coherent, therefore I need not create another one.” HAH! He must be quite a boring person.

Anyway, with that wise bit of advice, I have decided that if I were to create another facebook account, simply for business purposes, it will end up to be so UN-me. I will be passing comments like,”Wow! That’s a thoughtful action!” instead of “Don’t you have better things to do?!!” or “That photo is so wonderfully YOU!” instead of “Oh my goodness! Did you dig out that piece of drapery from your GREAT grandmother’s wardrobe?!”

I will become so utterly hypocritcal and boring. That would probably have severe repercussions on my mental health, maybe even resulting in schizophrenic (SEOW! Is this how it’s spelt??!!) behaviour. My dear friends, you wouldn’t want that to happen to me right? Because I’m the light of your lives.

Therefore, I have decided to make the ultimate sacrifice and give up the money making opportunities through my facebook profile so that I can continue to post ugly photos of myself and pass insulting but liberating remarks on all your entries! REJOICE!!

Do you remember when you were in primary school and your English teacher always wrote the first few words of a sentence on the blackboard (Yes… no white boards during my dinosaur era. I simply loved eating chalk dust. =p) and expected you to churn up a few pages of writing from that? Well, that’s simply what I’m doing.

I simply cannot understand why people would spend $7 per hour to employ a telemarketeer to do *cold calling. And YET instead of letting the telemarketeer call in peace, engage them in chit chat. Hmm… It doesn’t sound like a very good business plan to me because, aren’t they paying the telemarketeer to chit chat with them?! Hey! I can even do it for free!! Good money eh? So the telemarketeer called 1 person, got very kindly rejected by that person, turned to the “employer” and said,”how arh? got rejected.” Then the “employer” indulged in 30 mins of chit chat, out of which only 5 mins was dedicated to the original problem.

I simply cannot understand why people would pay $7 per hour for someone to chit chat with them. AND it’s not even dirty talk.

*cold calling refers to the activity of obtaining a list of contacts (usually made up of strangers), picking up the phone and calling them to interest in a service or product which one is marketing. If you need a better definition, there’s always Google out there. If you don’t know how to Google, please consult a kindergarten going child.