Basket.

9th March 2005 seemed so far away that bright and sunny morning of December 10th 2004.

But now it is late February 2005 and I'm near the end of a long, long journey. One that has pushed me not only as the opening video promised, to my very limits, but far beyond them.

So there are one-and-a-half weeks left; next week is the last full week I will (hopefully) spend at Singapore's Basic Military Training Centre on Pulau Tekong. Somehow, I just know I'm going to miss the place after I get out of there.

In what seems like an echo from the distant past, results day draws near. Although we don't know when exactly.

But aren't we all always waiting for something or another?

Somehow managed to haul myself through yet another exhausting week - this one especially so due to the amazing day temperatures, which at one point reached forty degrees Celsius. Aside from successfully negotiating the obvious threats to health the scorching sun posed, I also survived a highly dangerous slip-up on the infamous Jacob's Ladder, which I swear could have got me killed or worse still, out of course. All without visible wounds, except those I got from scratching my mosquito bites/rashes/whatever the fuck they were a bit too hard.

It's another week down, and I am proud of myself. Just two-and-a-half more to go.

Catching up on the news as usual, I notice that little debate on foreign students posing a threat to Singaporean students has not completely died down yet. The issue of foreign talent and its helpfulness and importance seems to be big lately - another debate rages prominently in the sports pages. But I'll talk about the one I'm more familiar with.

The newspaper report last Sunday presented the views of the Singaporean parents and students - and in true Singaporean fashion, most said the foreign students were posing a threat simply because they were consistently doing better in school in all areas, and that the government should do something to help the locals. The ugly Singaporean comes to the fore again. I (or my child, rather) must always be the first and the best! Etc.

Of course, then, the basic function of an educational institution is overlooked. Its purpose is to, what else, educate. One goes to school to get an education, not to compete with one's peers to see who gets the highest marks or who gets the most CCA points/gold medals/trophies. But I guess that's the Singaporean way. I can't do a lot more than comment on it and shake my head at the myopia of these greedy parents and their equally short-sighted offspring.

Then there is the other extreme of the debate, represented by an editorial in the Straits Times some days ago and written by a rather famous (or infamous, maybe) local columnist. She a little too optimistically feels that local students will be inspired by their illustrious peers from China, in particular, to do better, and this will help the country. What is more, the quality of education our students receive will be raised by the "best brains bouncing bright ideas off each other". Upon reading this cheery assessment, one forms the image of a classroom utopia where discussions are civil and fruitful, with each and every student having constructive comments to give and receive, as a teacher gazes on benevolently.

And that's obviously fucking stupid.

Unlike the author, I can speak from personal experience.

And my experience is that students from China are more exam-smart than smart, more quietly industrious than outspoken and much prefer to read dictionaries in English class than present any well-thought-out views they might have - not that they will have any, because all their time is spent cramming the English language.

In any case the author makes a huge generalisation - she seems to assume foreign students permeate every aspect of the Singaporean education system. Of course, that is not true. they are overwhelmingly Maths and Science students. It isn't a stereotype; it is the plain truth, and I invite those who disagree to prove me wrong.

And quite honestly - tell me - are Maths and the Sciences subjects where one can have many class discussions? No, because the answers are largely fixed. The best one can do is find more efficient ways to solve Maths problems. I don't really think that is going to help the quality of education by a huge amount.

The place where one can truly have lively class discussions is the place where foreign students are conspicuously absent. Even when they were (had to be, rather) present, they did poorly. Yes, I am talking about the Arts and Humanities subjects. Economics, you say? If you ask me, it's more like a Science than anything else, so that does not count. Give me a China scholar who can debate the significance of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty with me, and I'll show you a sow with wings.

If that sounds arrogant, too bad. Because it is the truth. Ultimately what are the foreign students here for? To get an education. By Jove, then let them get one. Let them do it and get the hell back out; why care so much about the results they are getting? So what if your son can't get first in class? The fuck is the big deal about it? Why send him for tuition everyday to catch up with his classmates from China? Why turn everything into a competition?

They aren't going to eat your babies. They aren't going to improve the quality of our system. They are just going to be... there. So let them alone.

Playwright Arthur Miller dead at 89

Rest in peace.

3 more weeks to a time of decidedly mixed feelings.

It has been exactly two months since I underwent the life-changing, very Singaporean ritual of conscription. The coming year, I knew, would be like no other; a new experience. Yet even before I entered the military, change had visited with a vengeance; I went in uncertain about myself, about others, and about others in relation to myself. All the old rules had been broken, the old images shattered, the old limits exceeded. I had to pick up my own pieces and wonder how the others would pick up theirs.

It has been two eventful months indeed; filled not traditionally with cynicism but with a fresh new breath of optimism. Change was and has been in the air and everything, anything seemed possible. Paradoxically I felt more free - unlike when I was in school, the time spent outside my place of work was truly mine and no one else's. It was a La Belle Epoque*, and it still is, to me. Change and possibility still floating around in great quantities - nothing seems insurmountable anymore.

Is this all the result of finally managing to believe in oneself? Is the cloak of cynicism and nihilism merely a cage with gilded bars that so many have for so long imprisoned themselves within? Now I wonder what good it ever served except to provide some very memorable sound bites.

To me, it seems, liberation has paradoxically come with physical imprisonment. Or maybe I am mistaken and this is merely the calm before a very, very big storm.

No one can say for sure anymore. The old boundaries simply no longer exist. I overestimated their resilience.

Now we'll see what freedom can do.

Off that island and back on this one for a good five days. The feeling is fantastic. Despite the fact that they refused to spare us some hair to look a bit better during the festive season.

I returned home with a number of injuries, thankfully none serious. My right foot is slowly recovering, with the enormous blister I had during Sitest completely dry and peeling now and the smaller one on my last toe flat and well on the way to recovery. The most worrying is my dead 3rd toenail. It's got to come off one day and I don't think that will be pleasant.

SOC gave me a most wonderful gaping wound on my left palm ("Hmm, why is my skin hangi..." and then THE PAIN hits) and a crocked ankle. There are still sandfly and mimosa scars on my hands. But things could be far worse than that, with the mutely dangerous monkey bars inflicting fearsome blisters (I only got one) on unwary us and the PTI's stories about the SOC "ball-buster" (yes, those two).

So it was an immense relief when I somehow survived strength training (try catching medicine balls and lifting dumbells with an open wound on your left hand; it's no fun) and boarded the amusingly-named fastcraft for the bright lights of Singapore.

The New Year was like every other. But I like it that way.