Singaporean Dreaming

Collapsing under the burden of tutorials and projects that seem to all converge at the same time, I managed to force myself to live up to my commitment to this blog. When Fabian first approached me to contribute to this blog, his email stated that I was the one of the first few people that came to his mind when he was conceptualising this blog. I must say that his ass kissing has improved tremendously since our Army Daze and it was on this point that I accepted his kind invitation. I chose Sunday because Sunday is suppose to be a laid back day, filled with trivial light hearted stuff like the Sunday Times for example or watching back to back episodes of CSI on AXN. And it is somewhere in between the Sunday Times and Couch Potatoing that I hope my blog posts will reside.
Sunday is also a day for church and I managed to drag myself up for mass this morning, half hoping that my attendance in church would induce God to bestow upon me the answers for my double tutorial tomorrow. Instead he gave me a half answer to a big question that I did not ask, which left me pondering and not working on my tutorials. Yet somehow, amidst all this walking in the 'wrong' direction, I did find a sense of fulfillment, not in the I've-solved-a-complex-problem sense but more like the I've-solved-one-side-of-the-rubiks-cube sense. In this morning's sermon, the priest shared with us an interesting story about money and happiness. And in order to take up space on this blog post, I will now share it with you. There was a fisherman who had just came back from sea. He had sold his catch and was sitting on the beach, smoking his pipe, relaxing. The perfect picture of contentment. A businessman walked by and started making small talk with the fisherman.
Businessman: "Why are you sitting on the beach relaxing when there is still plenty of time to make another trip out to sea?"
Fisherman: "And what would I do then?"
Businessman: "you can sell the extra catch for more money and if you keep this up you might actually save enough money to get another boat".
Fisherman: "And what would I do then?".
Businessman: "You can increasae your catch with another boat and earn even more money. And if you save enough, you can eventually buy another boat and expand your fishing fleet till you are as rich as me."
Fisherman: "And what would I do then?"
Businessman: "Then you can retire and enjoy life"
Fisherman: "And what do you think i'm doing now?"
I think regardless of whether you are a believer in God or not (and no $ is not a God), most Singaporeans chasing the Singapore Dream will find this a pertinent point. It seems to be the case that in Singapore, for one to enjoy life, one must have money. How much money? I think we seem to have complicated things by trying to put a material valuation on something intangible. It is as good as measuring an apple's worth with oranges. What then is the solution? Well, if I had the solution, I wouldn't be on the verge of death by homework. But most of the important things in life do not have clear cut answers. So maybe that is the key to the whole issue. To lead a happy life, one should pursue one's dreams but bear in mind that we should not measure happiness with money? Perhaps I am just being an apologist for the Singapore Dream. Perhaps perhaps perhaps. One thing's for sure, my pile of readings is still as high as
when I started this blog entry. And on this note it is au revoir till next Sunday where I promise at least a photo and less farting.