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It Ends

It's my 95th post and it also signifies the post in which I am (unofficially) unrestrained by education in my life. Not to say that I totally abhor school, but there are indeed days in my 15 or so years of education that I feel sick, sick of studying in a pre-determined system in which only the strongest survive, and the weak fade away. It's the same with all levels, be it from the primary, secondary, college all the way up to tertiary education.

Admit it. In Singapore's education system, failure is not an option. Hopefully, it doesn't even cross your mind before. We were taught from young to only consider 100 marks (upon 100 marks) to be the acceptable, even normal benchmark that we have to hit. When we get 90 instead, we (and our parents of course) question ourselves (and themselves) what happen to the rest of the 10 marks. We never, seldom or hardly ever consider ourselves successful until we hit the benchmark of perfection.

Thus, the idea of perfection gets ingrained in the brains of bespectacled kids nowadays.


When the same kids grow up, they face stronger competition as they streamed into their respective groups. "Only those worthy of that group gets into it," they were reminded by their parents, most of whom would pride at having their kids sent into renowned instead of notorious neighborhood schools. Within their schools, the students compete among themselves, constantly reminding themselves that failure is not an option. A wrong move, a miscalculation, an error here and there, a misread could lead to severe consequences; they knew and they were all scared. If you slip and fall, don't expect people to help you out. Expect them to trample on your head in their position to overtake you instead.

Yeah, it is sad. But well, life is not exactly a bed of roses for kids who have their educational blueprints ready for them even before they are born. They have their expectations, and expectations are almost always double-edged, judging from where you see them from. I was just chatting with a friend who was on his way to a friend's wake yesterday and he nonchalantly (and irritably as well) said that it was his 4th or 5th wake for these past months. The people who passed away were all people of our age, even younger, and most of them had just popped pills or superman-ed their way off buildings for reasons we would never know. But I suspect pressure might be the final shove on their way down thirteen stories; pressure from academic work.

I watched "Meet the Robinsons" yesterday (yeah it was a kid's show afterall), but I thought it was really educational. In the movie, the protagonist failed to repair some device and the people around him actually cheered and applauded in light of his failure. Then, they explained that "they were happier with failures because you learn from them, unlike success, from which nothing is truly learned or appreciated". Secretly, I marveled at the "parents" in the cartoon and wondered how many parents in Singapore would really laugh and pat their kid on the back for screwing up their radio instead of fixing it. If you stub them there and then, there goes a little of their creativity and innovativeness. And they would be wary, even afraid, of making mistakes in this kind of harsh environment. They would grow up with the idea that mistakes are unacceptable, and only stupid people make mistakes. Hardly anyone would admit that they are stupid then.

The inability of the education system to create a stimulated, all-rounded and responsive child of the future is not the problem of the government only. The root of the situation lies with our idea of perfection, and the idea of unacceptable failures in the society. Such thoughts were so deeply etched in our minds and hearts that they were thought to be positive for one's success. Wrong! We must learn to accept failures and defeats in our face, before rising from the dust to clear the mess again. If we never fail, we will never learn how to win.

Teach that to the children now, before it's too late.

Like Pokemon?

While you are struggling with your lab reports and essays and assignments and projects, just wanna let you guys know that in the other part of the world, there are people who are very free and creative. And they put them to gooooood use.

Presenting "College Sage" done by students from Babson's College. Figure you guys needed a laugh anyway.

All Good Things

If you think your life is mundane, then something pops out from out of the blue to say otherwise. It may be a confrontation with a life-threatening situation, a face-off with Man's oldest enemy: Death, or simply a brush past something dangerous, something that can potentially cause immense damage to your life or others. Or you may be cubed inside an odd situation, hanging perilously by the edge, while the rest of the people could only sit and watch.

May Peace be to those that need it most.

P.S.: Dear, remember what I'd said? I will take care of you.

Runaway Love

Got this song called Runaway Love by Ludacris feat. Mary J. Blige and I thought that this is one of the few black RnB songs that actually are meaningful. Plus fantastic singing and rapping by the duo, nobody has any reason not to like it.

Check out the lyrics; they are crude but true. So sad.

Career Woes

Yeah, if you are reading this and you are over 21, welcome to the adult world. Or more correctly, the world of Adults, and I don't just mean the world infested by adult movies, videos or magazines. This is the time when you stop growing physically (so get used to seeing yourself like that), and all hopes and expectations fall upon you like balloons released from the ceiling (and falling on your head) just like how they would do on your impending Graduation Ceremony or Commencement. It is amazing how they can name something that symbolizes the end of something as the start of something else. But that's the whole point: A graduation only means that you are not under the protection of the school anymore. You gotta find your own keep in the society out there, and that, initially, is a pretty sucky idea.

Maybe I am just scared to take the wrong path. For the first time in your life (and mine), the blueprints have just been handed over to you. Education has been pretty much taken for granted for all your 20 odd years (you expect to progress and, surprise surprise you did progress) - this applies to an average Singaporean kid - and it is not until after tertiary education that you get a chance to really consider and think about your career. For the first time in your life, you are the captain of the ship and you have to navigate your future, without any help icons from your parents or the ministry or anybody else. I guessed this is just the problem of such an education system: it sets you up from primary to tertiary education. Then, when you think that you are all that mighty and young and clever, it drops you off a cliff and tells you to fly; if not, you'll just fall and die.

It is like riding in your Dad's car for 20 years and then all of a sudden, although you see it coming, he asked YOU to take over the wheel and ferry him around instead. You don't ask him where to go; he assumes that after 20 years of watching him and others drive, you should know where to go. And he is probably right. Everybody does know where to go. It's just that some people take the long way, perhaps circling familiar streets a couple of times, while some people just zoom down the expressway to success. Success is the end-goal, the final destination, but I doubt that everybody reaches it anyway. Along the way, you pick up extra people, those who would spend their entire lives in your cars with you; you may hit dust and bumps along the way and give up; you may run out of fuel in the middle of a desert and scream for help; you may be cool and calm and travel a miserable 20 meters in 20 years. It's all up to how you drive, actually. (Sidetrack: At this moment, I am amazed at my own ability to illustrate and explain an analogy so well.)


Think about it, now that you finally have the wheel to yourself, where would you really want to drive to?

What comes around... goes around

One of Justin Timberlake's new MVs (I am really into watching MVs lately), of the song What comes around... goes around. It starred the very voluptuous Scarlett Johansson as well, and it is really supposed to be a mini movie rather than a MV. Looks like he's onto new prey after Diaz.

Mr Black is a current undergraduate who resides in Singapore. This blog is a non-whimsical reflection of his life and the society in which he lives in at large.

- Confidental -

Music, Love and Freedom

May the One who Reins the World keep his fingers out of the bowels and holes. Okay, World Peace.

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