Hear Ye! Hear Ye!

4 years ago, I promised to marry the woman of my life, and I made good on that promise on Tuesday by proposing to her at Istana Park. Here are some pictures:

The original plan was to 1) steal her colleagues’ phone number and then 2) ask her colleagues to suggest an outing to a place where I’ll be waiting to spring the proposal surprise. I managed to execute part 1 according to plan, but part 2 was changed because I found out that they already were going out on Tuesday. I wanted to propose somewhere around mid-May, but she would probably suspect something amiss if her colleagues were to suggest another outing so quickly, so I decided to make use of this opportunity.

Since they had arranged to meet in Orchard, I went for a recce of Orchard Road on Sunday, walking the entire stretch from Wheelock to Plaza Singapure before deciding on Istana Park. Istana Park is relatively quiet, and there’s a nice long stretch of trees and flowers along the foothpath. I thought that it would be nice for her to walk in amidst flowers and trees. So, on Sunday night, I messaged her colleague and changed the meeting venue to Dhoby Ghaut. My fiancee actually wanted me to join this outing but I bluffed her that I had another meeting elsewhere, and she gullibly believed.

So the stage was set. I went to order a bouquet of tulips (she loves them) on Monday and collected them on Tuesday evening. Thankfully it didn’t rain, although I prepared an umbrella just in case I had to stand waiting in the rain. It was quite hilarious when her colleagues brought her to Istana Park. She saw me from a distance (say about 80m away) but couldn’t make out who it was standing there, nicely dressed and holding a bouquet of flowers. She actually tried to make a detour, which I later understood from her that it’s because she thought that it was someone else’s proposal and the bunch of them should just make a detour.

Her colleagues, with their wonderful acting skills convinced her that it’s alright to continue walking down the footpath and when she came closer, she realised that it was me and was completely stunned. Honestly, I have never seen her so surprised before. Then again, I should expect her to be so completely taken aback. After all, I told her I was at another meeting, and logically speaking, there should be no way her colleagues were in cahoots with me because I don’t know them well (I only met most of them once, for a short while) and I don’t have their contacts.

Well, to cut the story short, I proposed to her, and despite her dazed state, she said yes (maybe because she was too dazed to say no ). I was wondering if she might make things difficult for me by saying something like “Let me think about it and give you an answer tomorrow” but thankfully, I wasn’t made to stay in Istana Park for a day to get the answer. Now, we’re going to begin the journey of preparing for solemnisation, customaries, housing and everything else that’s necessary for marriage.

Special thanks to her colleagues Irene, Wendy, Chailian and Weixing for their assistance, especially Irene whose ingenuity ensured that my fiancee was kept completely in the dark until the actual moment. Also special thanks to Steven who so willingly came down to take a video of the special moment. I am really thankful that there are so many people who so kindly offered their help to make this once-a-lifetime event so memorable for me and my fiancee.

Now that I’m done with 4 years of university, one thing I’m toying with is joining an alumni association. The most obvious choice for most NUS graduates would be NUS Society (NUSS), since it’s the biggest one with more than 12,000 members. However, the question of need arises. Is there any necessity to joining an alumni association?

The single most useful benefit I can think of is networking at events. It might be useful to get to know fellow alumni working in different fields in case you might need their assistance some day. Of course, if one is interested to network, there are many other ways to do so than to join an alumni group. Further, it might be more useful for people to network within certain limited fields that they are likely to encounter in their work. An alumni association, being broad-based, would hardly be ideal for such networking purposes.

The next most useful benefit would be membership privileges. NUSS has 3 guild houses, including one in Suntec City. That’s quite an attractive benefit. The guild houses offer pretty nice services, such as gym, swimming pool, tennis courts etc. There’s also the DBS platinum credit card for members, which I think is a very good deal. I would also think that standard club privileges such as cheaper booking rates of facilities and lower prices for courses/workshops also apply.

The cost of joining is a one-time $2,000 fee (if you join within first 3 years of graduation), or $3,000 (set to rise eventually to $5,000 in 2009). The monthly subscription fee is now $47.25 a month. The question now for a soon-to-be graduate is whether it is worth taking up a membership, considering both the pros and cons.

The benefits are attractive, but what is NOT attractive is the $2,000 one-time fee. It’s almost a month’s salary for most fresh graduates. NUSS makes things easier by offering a 20 month interest-free installment scheme, but $2,000 is hardly spare change for a fresh graduate with study loans to pay, a wife to marry and a house to buy. And, miss the first 3 years, you’ll end up paying $5,000 (that’s the rate in 2009), which is a larger financial disincentive considering that by then, there’s a housing loan and car loan to pay for, and maybe milk powder and diapers too.

I guess that the implementation of a one-time fee is to give a sense of exclusivity, but it’s a barrier, especially for fresh graduates. I am not surprised if the take up rate among fresh graduates is very low. The monthly subscription fee is still reasonable, but the one-time entrance fee is not, even with an installment plan.

One feasible work-around would be to waive the fee if the graduate remains a member for X years. To me, it doesn’t make sense for an organization to lose potential members because of a high entry barrier. It makes more sense to lower the barrier to entry, get the members in first, and make them want to keep the membership. If the association doesn’t grab the graduate before they step into the working world, it’s going to be hard to get them later. Even if the graduate earns big bucks in future, I’m sure they would go for more prestigious country club memberships (at least I would).

All said, I’m undecided for now. The perks are good, but I can do without them. Besides, the NUSS brand doesn’t appear trendy to young graduates, and joining alumni associations is not a fad at all these days. I bet there are many current undergraduates who have not heard of NUSS, which doesn’t really help things either. They should really do something about the way they market themselves. Whatever method they are using now, it isn’t working. I only know of NUSS because I once held student office and had to work with them. The ordinary student would probably not even know of NUSS’s existence (or maybe just vaguely heard about it), much less bother about the perks and what-nots. If I’m not convinced to join now, it’s probably harder to convince me in future.

Dick Lee pokes fun at Singapore, and in particular, the Lee family.

I wrote an entry with the same title on my Chinese blog following MM Lee’s speech at St James Power Station yesterday. I’m not going to do an exact translation here because it’s not exactly possible to capture the same essence in another language, but I’ll just list down the main points.

1. Does it mean that without the PAP, it will be doomsday for Singapore?
2. We have a far more educated society now. The number of people who are capable of holding public office are much greater compared to the past. Why do we have to worry that there are no people capable of taking over the PAP?
3. Even if Singapore lurches into a real crisis without the PAP, it is not necessarily a bad thing. I would like to see how many million dollar ministers would stay and stake their fortunes with Singapore.
4. In times of crisis, people will stand out to serve the country, whether there is PAP or not. The PAP would do well to be more humble and not think that it is indispensable.

In anycase, regarding my last point (which I didn’t write in my Chinese blog), I thought humility is an “Asian value”?

I received a request to add in a function that allows readers to be able to send to their friends entries on my blog via email without having to go through the trouble of manually cutting and pasting the entry into their email client. As you should have noticed, the capability to do so has been added.

I’ve also added the ability to generate a print friendly page, and you can now rate how good each entry is on the main page of this blog. And, if you have not noticed by now, I added a function a couple of weeks back that allows you to be notified of any new comments being posted on any entry on this blog.

If there is any other function that you would like to see on this blog, please drop a note. I’ll try my best to cater to your request in order to make this blog more user-friendly. Meanwhile, here’s wishing all Christians a merry Good Friday and Easter.

I read about the plight of a poor Singaporean family who were unjustly detained and harassed by a bunch of airport security officers from Tomorrow.SG. Seriously, I don’t understand how come some people are just so obssessed with going by the book that they throw their brains away in the process. The original entry was quite long, so I’m extracting some of the more relevant parts to illustrate how “smart” the security offiers at the airport were.

A lady officer asked me to remove my boots for scanning, and I did as told immediately and put my boots inside the basket provided, for it to be scanned together with my hand luggage. I then proceed to the metal detector of which I cleared without the gantry beeping or detecting any metal objects. I was then asked to collect my luggage and my boots. In the mean time, Belle was throwing away a sweet wrapper and retuning to me and saw me putting on my boots. Belle then asked casually “Mummy, why do you have to remove your shoes?” Whilst putting on my boots, I replied her and said that “they (the security officers) are afraid that we might keep bombs in our shoes (which is why I need to take it off to have it scanned)”

Immediately, a security officer standing at the conveyor belt (Stephen S Naidira) who was standing in front of me said with a very rude tone “repeat what you just said”. I clarified with him what he meant - is it for me to repeat what I had told my daughter? He said loudly again, to repeat what I had just said. So I did exactly what he told me. I said to him that “my daughter asked me why I need to take off my shoes, and I told her that you guys (the security officers) are afraid that we will keep bombs in our shoes.” He immediately asked me to stand aside and said that he had to report it to his superior that I said the word “bomb” twice. Then an Indian lady (Sivamalar) at the customs started hurling at me and my daughter and said that I said the word “bomb” twice and it is against the law and I can be sent to jail and they are calling the police. She (Sivamalar) was so loud and rude and she shoved us to the side, and refused to listen to my explanation. In fact, she got so aggressive that another officer Ricky Lim (I guess it’s her supervisor) had to come forward to stop her from further attacking me and my daughter verbally, and specifically asked Sivamalar to “shut up”. I told Ricky Lim that I would like to know the names of his staff because their attitude and rudeness were simply beyond any acceptable level. Immediately Sivamalar got so angry and aggressive that she started charging at Ricky Lim and hurled “What?! What?! What?! She (she meant me) said the word “Bomb” twice, so what is wrong with arresting her (which is me) and we were told that if we heard the word twice, we will arrest!!”

My jaw dropped open after reading the above two paragraphs. It’s obviously a case of a rule with good intentions taken to extremes by an ignorant person. The context of the conversation was totally ignored. It was just the case of a mother explaining the procedures of airport security to her daughter. What the heck was wrong with that? The security officer should have explained to the kid the importance of such checks instead of blindly follow the rulebook and arresting the poor lady. In fact, the mother was doing the country a favour by explaining the reason behind such tight airport security in a post 9-11 world.

I certainly hope that CAAS (or whichever authority for that matter) look into the incident and offer adequate compensation to the distressed woman for the ridiculous behaviour of their officers. Why do we need security officers if all they know is to arrest people upon hearing the word “bomb” twice? A robot programmed with voice recognition ability is cheaper and more effective. In anycase, a smart terrorist would probably be using a codeword instead of outrightly saying things like “bomb” or “explosive”. Geez… *smack forehead*

Go read the rest of the original post here. By the way, do not go around singing Ricky Martin’s “Shake your bon bon” when you are passing through the luggage check area at the airport. A hard hearing security officer will arrest you immediately because he/she would have thought you said the world “bomb” twice. And, go tell your friends not to sing the song as well.

I have received an official clarification from A*Star about the defamatory remarks in the AcidFlask incident in 2005, and I have decided to reproduce their reply below. This is because in this official reply, A*Star has granted permission for the defamatory remarks to be reproduced (under certain conditions), so the issue can now be openly discussed and objectively judged by everyone.

———————————————————————————————————————–

The Truth about the postings on A*STAR by Chen Jiahao/AcidFlask and those parts of the postings that were defamatory have been reproduced here in the interest of showing the gravity of these untrue allegations and the damage that they had caused to A*STAR, its officers, scholars and partners.

To this day, Chen Jiahao/AcidFlask appears to have taken the position that he was not aware of the defamatory statements made by him, but he nevertheless apologized on 9 May 2005. This was notwithstanding the fact that his attention was specifically drawn to his blog of 3 March 2005 in which the defamatory statements were made, when A*STAR sought from Chen/AcidFlask the retraction and apology.

Contrary to suggestions and reports that the statements complained of by A*STAR pertained to his criticisms of A*STAR’s GPA requirement before its scholars could apply for PhD funding, it is clear from the excerpts published below that the statements were indeed defamatory and went well beyond fair comment.
The defamatory statements made in Chen/AcidFlask’s posting have no basis in fact, are wholly untrue, and completely damaging to the good name, reputation and integrity of not only A*STAR and its officers but also its scholars, the universities attended by our scholars and their faculty members.

A*STAR therefore has no option but to set the record straight.

On the statement that -:

“…a*star feels justified in bribing universities for taking in PhD students.”

Fact: A*STAR has never offered to pay or actually paid any university bribes or any other form of incentives to admit our scholars. All our scholars gain admission on merit and in accordance with the usual admission requirements applicable to all other applicants who apply to pursue PhD studies at the universities. A*STAR has neither asked for nor have our scholars been offered or given any special dispensations in this regard. Through our scholarships, and like any other scholarship body, we fund the applicable tuition and other compulsory fees charged to the students by the universities. We have no need to offer any bribe – our scholars apply to the best universities and with their outstanding credentials and the strong undergraduate academic performance our scholars are able to gain admission to these universities without special favours. A*STAR’s GPA benchmark ensures that only the best and scholars who show real potential to be able to undertake the rigors of PhD studies are given the privilege (and not an entitlement) of fully funded public scholarships.

On the statement that -:

“…a*star gives out generous funding grants to specific faculty members (to the tune of us$150k/yr or so) for accepting up to three a*star scholars into their labs,…”

Fact: A*STAR does not provide any such funding grants to overseas based universities, and certainly not as incentives for them to admit our students to their labs for PhD studies. A*STAR funds the local universities and locally based entities under our extra-mural grant programmes but these grants are unrelated to our students and our scholarship programmes.

On the statement that -:

“…giving out gobs of honey to universities who will sign back-door agreements for taking in scholars without going through the formal application procedure.”

Fact: A*STAR has not signed any agreement with any university to permit our scholars to be admitted without going through the formal application procedure - all our scholars are required to apply to the universities and subject themselves to that university’s usual application procedure. If they are not accepted by a particular university, then they will simply have to gain admission to another through the usual admission process. A*STAR has no “back-door” arrangements with any university nor has A*STAR paid any university in order to by-pass the usual admission criteria required by the university.

On the statement that -:

“A fellow alumna of UIUC once attended a Chemical Engineering class…suddenly the professor remarked: Oh, by the way, if any of you are in need of money, you should consider applying to this agency called A*STAR in Singapore. They offered my $150,000 for my research with no strings attached, plus an extra $35,000 for every one of their students that I accepted into my group.”

Fact: A*STAR has never offered to or actually funded any professor or research lab in any overseas university. Neither has A*STAR offered professors of universities cash payments to take our scholars into their labs.

On the statement -:

“…that “a certain high-up” in a*star has a tendency to recommend scholars to go to some institutions, like UIUC, U of Wisconsin, and UCSD.. perhaps it is those very schools that a*star has those connections with? and perhaps the reason for asking scholars not to go to the top universities is that they tend to be awfully expensive when it comes to tuition fees too (like Stanford, Harvard, MIT, Princeton).”

Fact: A*STAR has a list of selected universities. Our scholars are free to choose to go to any of them.

The details of the distribution of A*STAR PhD scholars at US universities can be found at our web-site at
http://www.astar.edu.sg/astar/attach/textlet/0e44d2035bWE/(US)NSS(PhD)_Scholars’_Choice_of_Uni_20062007_US.pdf
One only needs to look at the statistics and it will be clear that A*STAR only has 2 scholars at University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, 1 at University of Wisconsin-Madison and 3 at University of California at San Diego. On the other hand, A*STAR has 25 PhD scholars at Stanford, 18 at MIT, 5 at Harvard, and 4 at John Hopkins, 2 at Princeton.

The statements made in Chen/AcidFlask’s blog mean or would be understood to mean that A*STAR has acted corruptly in its dealings with universities and that it’s Chairman and officers have procured it to act corruptly or condoned such acts. The statements also cast serious aspersions on our scholars to the effect that they were not admitted to their universities on merit but only because their universities were bribed by A*STAR to do so.

All these allegations are totally false and as a result, A*STAR had no but option to require Chen/AcidFlask to remove these postings and apologise.

A*STAR did not at any time require Chen/AcidFlask to shut down his entire blog-site. We had asked that the offending and defamatory postings in his 3 March 2005 blog be deleted. Chen/AcidFlask chose to shut down his entire blog-site on his own volition. Any imputation that A*STAR had demanded that Chen/AcidFlask shut down his blog is untrue and misleading.

The above clarification is made for the purpose of setting the record straight and because there have been lingering impressions that A*STAR had taken exception to comments about A*STAR’s GPA requirements. This is not the case and serious defamatory statements were made that damaged A*STAR’s good name and reputation. A*STAR has agreed to the disclosure of the defamatory postings for this purpose alone. Any or all of the defamatory postings must not be reproduced except in their entirety and must be accompanied by the whole text of the apology dated 9 May 2005 from Acid Flask as well as the full text of the clarification above. Selective reproduction of any part of the defamatory postings outside of their full context and without the full apology and the above clarification may constitute separate and actionable libel, thereby exposing the person publishing the same to the risk of potential legal action by the person or persons whom may be defamed and suffer damage as a result.

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The Truth about the postings of Chen Jiahao/Acid Flask.

Postings by Chen Jiahao/Acid Flask at http://www.scs.uiuc.edu/~chen6/blog/pivot/entry.php?id=318 (now defunct).
caustic.soda by AcidFlask

liminal musings of a graduate student
this is “a*star in parliament” by AcidFlask at 03 03 05 - 13:03. please leave a comment.

a*star in parliament
-03 03 05 - 13:03
Science, Singapore

which is perhaps why a*star feels justified in bribing universities for taking in PhD students. staggeringly enough, the cost quoted is very likely to be grossly understated, since I have been told that a*star gives out generous funding grants to specific faculty members (to the tune of us$150k/yr or so) for accepting up to three a*star scholars into their lab, as well as giving out gobs of honey to universities who will sign back-door agreements for taking in scholars without going through the formal application procedure. to the cash-strapped universities in America, the unbelievable godsend that visiting a*star contingents herald is something they can’t get enough of/f. after all, who else would be so incredibly naive and stupid as to throw money at other people instead of investing money to fund their own local research and developing their own r&d communities?

to quote a certain high-up in a*star: “if you don’t like it, then leave!” which perhaps explains the quiet turnover of more than one a*star scholar within the last twelve months. but at last, perhaps quiet no longer.

I would gladly do so, except that my sources are very likely to suffer the kind of spiteful retributive backlash that characterizes the public service. Therefore they can only remain hearsay and rumour under the current circumstances.

[AcidFlask] (email) (link) - 03 03 05 - 17:39

Lest I set myself up for libel, let me state what I know about this.
I do not recall the exact sums involved but this is the gist of what I had been told.

A fellow alumna of UIUC once attended a Chemical Engineering class in this university sometime in 2003. The subject of the lecture somehow went on to funding crunches faced by researchers in the US due to post-9/11 budget cuts when suddenly the professor remarked: Oh, by the way, if any of you are in need of money, you should consider applying to this agency called A*STAR in Singapore. They offered me $150,000 for my research with no strings attached, plus an extra $35,000 for every one of their students that I accepted into my group. Singapore seems to be a very rich country; they have money to throw at you, all you have to do is ask for it!

[AcidFlask] (email) (link) - 03 03 05 - 20:30

going further down the list.. a*star scholars seem to know that “a certain high-up” in a*star has a tendency to recommend scholars to go to some institutions, like UIUC, U of Wisconsin, and UCSD.. perhaps it is those very schools that a*star has those connections with? and perhaps the reason for asking scholars not to go to the top universities is that they tend to be awfully expensive when it comes to tuition fees too (like Stanford, Harvard, MIT, Princeton).

[AcidFlask] ( email) (link) - 04 03 05 - 11:30

==============================

Mon 9th May 2005

http://www.scs.uiuc.edu/~chen6/blog/

APOLOGY

I recognize and accept that a number of statements that I made on my on-line journal “Caustic Soda”, in particular the blog post of 3 March 2005, were defamatory of A*STAR, its Chairman, Mr. Philip Yeo and its executive officers.

I admit and acknowledge that these statements are false and completely without any foundation.

I unreservedly apologize to A*STAR, its Chairman Mr. Philip Yeo, and its executive officers for the distress and embarrassment caused to them by these statements.

I undertake not to repeat the statements, or make further statements of the same or similar effect in this or any other forum or media. I further undertake to remove any such posting anywhere that has not been deleted.