The Straits Times today touched upon the issue of foreign workers being housed in dormitories near to the HDB estates. Residents are mainly worried since the inclusion of those foreign workers actually increases their current population by 25%, which means in the future, one in five people there is actually a foreign worker.

It may sound racist, and even wrong, because everyone’s reasoning has a fundamental “flaw”, that is they seem to assume that foreign workers are the cause of crime, rowdiness etc. However I don’t think that it’s a flaw, but rather, all these shows how we are uncomfortable with the idea of foreign workers being around us, although we accept the fact that they are here to stay in Singapore because they are doing the work that we Singaporeans are not willing to do.

To digress a little, isn’t it funny how people are championing for it to be a right to have a university education? If such a case were to happen, everyone would be a degree holder and then everyone will expect degree level jobs. In the future, perhaps even our technicians, or our factory assembly lines would be powered by foreign workers. Because there is no one left who wants to do them. Everyone assumes that their degree gives them the right to demand better jobs.

Back to the point, I must say that I myself is uncomfortable with foreign workers. Do I have to do the same disclaimer that everyone does before they voice their views to the MP? Ok here goes: I have nothing against them. I appreciate their work in building Singapore blah blah blah. I think that’s nonsense. There is no need to say all these and justify that we arn’t being racist or whatever not. No one should have to be labelled a racist just because they oppose the housing of foreign workers near their estate.

Every Sunday when I go back home after my Japanese lessons at Orchard, I will pass by the MRT station Outram Park. At that station, and at that time period, there would be an influx of foreign workers coming into the train, and the whole place would be packed with them. (F*** the transport system for making it so damn packed).

I feel very uncomfortable when they swarm the trains. It’s probably because that we belong to different groups. Not based on elite ideals or what, but Singaporeans (people who’ve lived here for a certain period of time) vs these foreign workers. I find that they haven’t really acclimatised to our country yet, and there are many little culture bits and pieces that they do not grasp.

But the reason why I feel uncomfortable should be classified under a universal category, because I think everyone should understand it. It’s the concept of personal space. I hate it when people infringe on my personal space, whether its Singaporeans, non-Singaporeans, Aliens, fat, thin, rich, poor, male, female and what you have that’s contrasting. I am always rudely shocked to find my personal space being infringed upon by those foreign workers. I have no idea why they always like to squeeze me into a corner. When they come in, some of them grab two different poles with two hands, and they take up an awful lot of space. Their hands brush against my hair and they treat it like it’s something normal. I hate it. I don’t understand why people can’t position themselves properly when they know they are touching someone indirectly. It doesn’t help when your face is near his bloody armpit.

The thing is, I move, and I try to squeeze myself further in with limits, because I have to be aware that I cannot compromise too much on other people. I find my space getting lesser, and after 2 minutes that idiot’s hand is at my hair again. As far as it goes, I find myself having lesser and lesser space. What are they? Invaders of the MRT?

Not to mention that I find myself disgusted by one of the foreign workers recently. He was holding on to the hand grip provided by MRT. Those white triangular handles you can grab for stability. I was holding on to the one beside him. Suddenly, he held on to the pole (that links all the handles) and I don’t understand why he has to hold the pole in a way that his arm touches my hand. I mean, there is a distance between two handles, and why should you choose to hold it where someone’s hand is at? Knowing full well there’s the empty handle he just vacated.

He then proceeds to dig his nose in front of me. Hence, the former handle he grabbed is now out of bounds since it’s dirty. I know it’s already dirty because there’s other people who probably dug their nose and held there, but it feels worst when you KNOW someone dug his nose and grabbed that fucking handle.

My friend smsed me and then I use the handle hand to take my phone out from my pocket, since my other hand is full. That idiot took over my handle! Seriously, they are not foreign workers to me, but invaders of the MRT. They invade my personal space and invade the clean handle I was holding on to. Tell me if you’ll hold that handle again. And the best thing is? After holding it for 3 s he released it, and found a seat to sit. Whilst poor me have to stand without a mentally clean handle.

Hence tell me if the uncomfortable feeling towards foreign workers are unjustified. I think they are perfectly legitimate feelings. We are just not comfortable with them being too near us, for me when they compromise on my own personal space. If anyone of you haven’t realized yet, humans have a little space called their personal space. In a mathematical point of view, take the center of your body and draw a circle of radius r with its center being your center. r varies from person to person and we feel uncomfortable when strangers come close , however it’s perfectly fine when it’s a cute girl. I don’t mind the default squeezing. But what’s up with the indirect touches, even if it wasn’t intentional? What’s up with putting your hand near my face that I feel weird? That I’m suddenly conscious about how I breathe because if I breathe heavily your hand’s going to get the air?

Hence to me I feel that I understand. Safety issues, well, I understand too. It’s all part of how you are willing to accept other people. It doesn’t help when there are many stories about invaders of mrt touching girls in the orchard crowd during new year, or the maid with invaders having fun in the master’s bedroom. Or them loitering and looking at you, making you feel uncomfortable like you’ve been mentally raped.

Whatever it is, I understand their fears. But I don’t wish to debate on where they should be housed, because it’s a huge problem.

This month I overspent my budget. Or rather, the correct term to use is allowance. To put it in plain mathematics terms, if x is the amount of allowance I get, I spent x+30. I overshot by about $30 dollars this month and it’s largely due to the start of school this month.

The first major event of the month is the O week which started at 1st August for the councillors and 2nd August for the freshies. I paid $15 for the O Week, excluding food meals which we paid an extra of $2 per meal for catering. Not to mention one of the meals was short of 1 due to freshies coming and going without prior notification. I spent the $2, and had to add in $5 to get two items from Delifrance. Total damage, a $7 meal. Not to mention the suppers we had.

During the O week we had external hunt too and had to travel. However this was probably offset by the fact that I stayed in school over some days and didn’t spend on travel during those days.

I also had to buy my ink cartridge at $29.50 for blank ink so I can continue to print my notes at home, and this is a one off expense that probably occurs once every semester, and I probably buy only 3 cartridges a year.

I went to Popular this month to get some supplies. I got a A5 size file with A5 writing paper and it’s now going to be my notes library. I will revise and compile all the notes into the file and hopefully it helps in revision.

Another noteworthy thing to mention is that I’m spending more on food. I’m having 7 meals in school at least now, because on tuesdays and fridays, I have MA2216 which is from 6pm-8pm. Not to mention Sunday lunch and dinner when I study with my friend outside as well as have Japanese Language lessons. The amount of Old Chang Kee I eat should warrant a need for a membership discount card. Haha. I’m also eating more snacks. It seems to be a standard event to buy coffee on Thursday and Friday mornings. I’m also having to snack on Thursday morning because my day starts from 8 and the first break is at 2 due to my tutorial lecture timeslots.

Not to mention that food prices are increasing. Technoedge’s prices are increasing and the food quality isn’t going up too. Indon’s Chicken Chop at $3 is the best deal and the price hasn’t changed since I was a freshie. Mc Donalds already upped their prices in my second semester in NUS, and the other stalls increase prices by 20 to 30 cents for each dish.

Well I should expect not to overspend in September since there are plenty of miscellaneous fees that I won’t be spending on, like $15 for O week, $30 for ink and $23 for supplies. That’s already $68. Well then, perhaps Monday mornings I can buy coffee too.

Today I was listening to my mp3 and an old song was played. Before I say what that song is, let me bring your attention to another song, Love Me, which is one of my favourite songs.

Basically there’s a story for the song. At the start, the singer reads a note his grandma wrote to his grandpa. It spoke of how the grandma’s dad didn’t approve of the grandpa and how they planned to elope. The chorus part is the content of the note and it’s like this:

“If you get there before I do, don’t give up on me. I’ll meet you when my chores are through. I don’t know how long I’ll be. But I’m not gonna let you down. Darling wait and see. Between now and then, till I see you again, I’ll be loving you, love, me.”

Then the story continues on the day of the grandma’s funeral and how the grandpa cried when he knelt at the doorway of the church as they prayed. The ending of the song is the grandpa saying the chorus to the grandma (first is grandma to grandpa, now it’s the other way).

Ok now the JJ Lin song that played is “Hui You Na Me Yi Tian”. In the song, the grandpa leaves for war at the year 1943, World War II. Before grandpa leaves, he sings a song (the chorus) to grandma. It goes like this if I remember correctly:

我要离去。别在哭泣。不要伤心。请你相信我。要等待，我的爱，陪你永不离开。因为会有那么一天，我们牵着手在草原，听，鸟儿歌唱得声音，对我说声，我爱你。

Basically the translation is: I’m going. Don’t cry. Don’t be sad. Belive in me. Please wait for my love which will not leave you forever. Because there’ll be a day where we hold hands in the grass field, listening to the birds sound, and telling me “I love you”.

The song then continues, and the grandma is dying on her death bed, and then she sings the song to grandpa who is still alive, and she sings the chorus.

The two songs are so alike. In terms of the chorus being sung by the male to female and female to male in the songs. As well as the meaning is somewhat similar. And both grandma dies.

Seriously I think the inspiration came from Love Me. I used to like the chinese song a lot, but I thought Love Me was nicer and I still think it’s nicer. I just find it funny how I only noticed it like now. Well nothing wrong with inspiration!