Basket.

"Thank you for writing to us. We do appreciate your making the effort."

... so long as your letter is painfully polite, sycophantic and/or toeing the government line. Not that the last two are necessarily mutually exclusive.

"We receive 70 letters on average each day. Limited space means we can publish only about a dozen every weekday. This means having to make often-difficult editorial judgments on which letters to publish."

Hilariously untrue.

"We regret we are unable to publish your letter this time, and hope you will appreciate the constraints on space we face every day.
We hope you will continue taking an interest in the Forum Page."

Etc.

Not that I expected to get published, because the Straits Times takes the term "family newspaper" to extremes and always has. The classic rejection letter written by a classic Singaporean civil servant - clean, politically correct and carefully calculated not to offend.

Well, if they won't publish it, I will - right here.



"I read with great dismay the report "Pianist Melvyn Tan to play here after all" (Life!, 19 May). After cancelling his scheduled performance last December, it seems that draft dodger and renowned musician Melvyn Tan has managed to schedule a performance in Singapore next April.

Draft dodger and renowned musician - indeed, in my eyes he is first and foremost a draft dodger and secondarily a renowned musician, for the inescapable fact is that this man unlawfully skipped his sacred duty to the nation; that he refused, point-blank to fulfill that most sacrosanct of obligations - National Service.

He has, of course, attempted before to explain his decision, in that if he had served NS he would have lost his opportunity to pursue further studies in music. But we all make sacrifices to serve, and many of us do so willingly because we know that it is important to safeguard the sovereignity of the Republic of Singapore. Some have, even, in the course of serving, paid the ultimate sacrifice - most regrettable, but hardly avoidable considering the necessarily hazardous nature of military training. Being a full-time national serviceman, I understand this perfectly, and I ask: has Mr Tan ever faced any military training? Has he ever made any sacrifices of any nature for the country of his birth? Being now a British citizen, will he ever?

Instead, when his chance to repay the debt he owed Singapore, he selfishly turned his back on the country that nurtured him and his talents and gave him, in the very first place, the very chance to pursue his further studies in music abroad. This behaviour is nothing short of disgraceful, and shows that while Mr Tan may be a first-class musician, he is also a first-class ingrate.

I applauded when, last year, he cancelled his performance in the face of mounting public uproar. Yet now, the government is rolling out the red carpet to him once more? Why, I ask, should the government and people of the Republic of Singapore welcome back a "prodigal son" who no longer sees this place as home? Why should the people of Singapore enrich this ingrate, who declined to defend his country of birth and his fellow citizens to pursue a purely
self-centred dream? Why should he be allowed to step one step within Singapore borders when he never saw the need to make personal sacrifices in order to preserve and protect these selfsame borders?

Mr Tan has made a mockery of one of our most sacred national institutions. I call upon the Government of the Republic of Singapore to take the appropriate action and bar this selfish ingrate from entering our sovereign borders. Borders that he never did find worth defending."



And if you know me, you will probably find that I already held back quite a bit in that letter.