staying together moving ahead?

e cat thinketh of:

two orphaned cousins whom its parents gave $$ to, cos taxi driver uncle's single income not enough....

another uncle retrenched by HDB....

illiterate gambling addict aunt who dropped out around primary 3, scraping by running stall in school canteen....

divorced gambling addict & former SBS bus driver eldest cousin who mixed with secret society people, still jobless....

aunts & uncles arguing over $$ to pay ambulance fee for sending grandmother to hospital after heart attack....

e grandaunt, whose adopted daughter's funeral e cat had to help organise....& e adopted daughter who earned ~$400 per month while alive, of which a large portion went to public transport expenses....

RSAF airfield maintenance technician cousins who couldn't even pass PSLE....

cousin's tour agency business that folded, despite heavy borrowing from its mum....

& a lot more illiterate/couldn't pass PSLE/addicted to gambling/alcoholic members of e big fat extended family, who need a lot of help figuring out government/CPF/IRAS/bank letters, bills, town council notices, not-so-EZ-link cards, etc....

dyslexic sibling (not everyone can escape to Singapore American School) who was constantly humiliated & punished by teachers....

uni friends who graduated with honours but had to accept poly grad pay in order to start paying off tuition fee & notebook loans....

uni friends who could only get hold of bursaries for a few semesters out of 8, & whose un-/self-employed parents had next-to-nothing in their CPF....& then their flat kena SERS/upgrading....

uni friends who accepted jobs in China, Qatar, etc against their parents' wishes not to split up e family, because they couldn't find jobs in Singapore upon graduation....

JC senior who had an arrangement with e chicken rice stallholder to sell him leftover bits (backside, neck, head etc) with rice so that he could have lunch on school days for just $1.00....

JC-mate who wore secondhand uniforms from e students' council room for his entire 2 years minus first 3 months of JC life, as he couldn't afford even one new set....(prompted e cat & Pig-pig to donate theirs to e council room upon graduation)

friend who was under tremendous mental stress & left uni when loansharks harassed his family for money owed by a parent....

classmates who drank water to fill their stomachs for recess....

JC acquaintance with second upper class honours retrenched by PSA....

JC juniors & sibling who were handed poly application forms by e principal & told to get out so as not to pull down e college's rankings....

primary school classmates who were kicked out after primary 2, 3 or 5....

primary school classmates scolded every month in front of e whole class by form teacher for not having enough $$ in parent's GIRO account for deduction of school fees (why your parents no money?)....

classmates who shrunk their handwriting to skimp on exercise books & foolscap paper....

friends who couldn't get into local unis because they were from poly....

old people who have no one to claim their bodies after they die in homes for e aged, & end up in e dissection hall....

visually-impaired old man who sells tissue paper in Bedok Interchange hawker centre....

old woman who sells tissue paper at Bishan Interchange....

old woman who combed through Science canteen dustbins for aluminum drink cans every night after 10.30PM during e cat's undergrad days....

super loyal & dedicated old institute building security guards & cleaners who were retrenched after e move to Biopolis....

aunties & uncles who spend their retirement years as contract workers cleaning up after foreign talents in offices & labs....

old aunties & uncles who demonstrate that straycats are not e only experts at digging through trash in their nightly search for drink cans in dustbins across Singapore....& who approach you to ask if you've finished your drink so that they can have e can....

grandmas & grandmas who scour e island collecting cardboard boxes that they stack on their push carts, & drink leftover coffee from mugs left behind on hawker centre tables....

old people who asked for directions at bus stops, on e MRT & within Dhoby Ghaut MRT station, only to discover that they have been travelling in e opposite direction for half an hour....because they are illiterate & cannot read signs, or can only understand Mandarin & dialect & not figure out that Redhill MRT is e 'ang3 sua1'/Bukit Merah/hong2 shan1 that they are hunting for....or wu3 ji2 shi4 (martial auspicious HUH?) is e MRT station nearest to si1 beh4 lor3 (lit. four horse road) now called Waterloo Street....

e amputee (probably diabetic based on appearance of remaining leg?) who removes & sets aside his prosthetic leg to sleep at a bus stop outside one of Singapore's most world-famous hotels every night....

& another uncle who sleeps at another bus stop outside another hotel a few stops away....

very sob story-ish, but they are all real people. not mere statistics to be manipulated or glossed over. you may trumpet your achievements, but think of how they feel. to quote some of them: lir4 zai1 si4 mi4 kio1 zhor4 feng3 ci4?'

& to quote e cat's dad on certain policymakers: tak3 zhir1 kiang4 kiang3, sim1 gua mm3 giang3

to those bright-eyed bushy-tailed newbies who declared that they really want to serve e people & community, go be a social worker ;)

[ filed under: thewonderingstraycat ]