The Great Singapore Dream: Are they shattered?
"..they said our Swiss dream is shattered, then what about the Singapore..."
Following a series of economic downturn, wars, terrorism, plagues (Sars in particular, those "Anti-Foreign Talent" sentiment is catching up...) in Singapore, many have said that the great Singapore Dream is shattered. There is no way which we can live like the Swiss does. They said we can no longer have a high standard of living and have to make do with cheaper stuffs. They said unemployment is gonna be permanent... But, come to think about it, is it really been shattered? Let me give you an insight of my opinion:

Actually, I have no idea of what the Singapore Dream is. To achieve like what the Swiss is now? To me, it is possible, but it is too difficult. Think about it! We are a small country, no natural resource, no water (except for our longkang water that is so clean that Dr M has to resort to UN court to make us buy their water). We have no geographical attraction, and our people are made up of various kind of people, more rojak than the Swiss or even the Americans. Yes, we used to enjoy high quality of living a few years back, before some idiots out there spark a riot at Indonesia (FYI: this resulted in a blind man coming onto power only to find himself knocked onto a pillar and kena replaced by a woman...) That marked the beginning of economic unstability. That also marked some of the first retrenchment at Singapore, which resulted in people queuing up for Hello Kitty (cats with no mouth can comfort them?)

In short, we are reduced to compromising our high standard of living with cheaper subsitutes... (no wonder the ladies are wearing lesser now) A lot of incidents that happened down the road made it worse (those i mentioned at first). However, let's not forget one thing. Singapore is young. Our market place is still plagued with phlegm-spitting ah peks and the always bargaining aunties. As far as I know, people are still queuing for Hello Kitties... (sorry, those doggy cushions, coz they finally realised cats with no mouth cant comfort them :-p) We are actually still far from our dreams. I am not trying to say our dream is hindered because of the older generation, it's more about the mindset. Dependence on the government, education that creates arrogant people who called themselves 'the descendents of Raffles', etc. In fact, to me, it's not even shattered.

What I see in the future is that we will continue to standstill or fall a little behind, coz of stiff competition. But let's be optimistic, we do have lots of other competitive advantages. We still can change to move on. Let's not harbour the mindset about 'government will do everything one'. Let's be satisfied with the current situation (the current CPF cut) and move on. Think on the bright side! Always look on the bright side of life! At least, we still have our 600 million dollar durian! No one has such an expensive durian! We can never be like the Swiss (coz we are not), but we can make Singapore a better place to live in. Right?

Disclaimer: I am not an agent from PAP spreading propaganda! I am just voicing my opinions!