I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round, as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys.
- Charles Dickens
Pillow talk
PILLOWS are essential for a good night's sleep. Top-tier hotels keep a wide range to suit the various preferences of guests.
The choices available on request extend beyond the regular foam, feather and polyester. They come in a variety of sizes too.
Here is a list of pillows offered by the Shangri-La Hotel and Swissotel Merchant Court:
Bolster pillow: long and cylindrical to conform to the shape of the body
Natural buckwheat hull pillow: made of cleaned and processed hulls, it helps relieve tense muscles and ease back and neck pain
Contour pillow: made of natural latex and contoured to fit the shape of the head
Snore reduction pillow: made of polyester fibres, it keeps the head and neck aligned to prevent snoring
Herbee pillow: filled with polyester and a mixture of herbs, including lavender, rose petals, oregano, rosemary, peppermint, sage, marigold and lemon verbena
Linear gravity pillow: filled with blended fibres, it reduces stress and muscle tension in the neck
Cherry stone thermal pillow: filled with cherry stones, this pillow helps to alleviate stiffness in shoulders, soreness in the back and general aches.
- Straits Times, 20 Dec 2005.
Requiem: Devan Nair speaks out, March 26, 1999
A serious threat of closure faces the Worker's Party led by Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam because of failure to pay the forbidding damages awarded against the Party by a court in Singapore. One hopes against hope that this might be avoided at the last minute. It is a slim hope. The world has come to assume, rightly or wrongly, that the political tactics used by the PAP against opposition politicians have for some time come to include suing their pants off, forcing them into bankruptcy and losing their seats in parliament as a result. Now the same device is resorted to against opposition political parties themselves, as registered institutions. The onus of proof is on the government of Singapore, not on global public opinion.
Nothing that smacks of opposition seems safe in Singapore any longer. Singaporeans must sooner or later come to realise the harsh truth that nobody in Singapore is truly saved unless all are seen to be saved. The post of no return has long passed for Singaporeans, and one fears they will perforce learn this lesson the hard way. In the ultimate analysis, this is probably best. The more painful the price paid to learn basic human lessons, the more firmly might they become embedded in the national fibre. A free Singapore will arise and justify the sacrifices and efforts of undaunted Singaporeans, now including the courageous Chee Soon Juan, who had immolated themselves on the altar of freedom. Phoenix-like, their dreams will rise once again from their ashes. Were this process not true, the world would have come to an end long ago.
It is just as well that I release this Requiem now. If not timely yet, it will be soon enough. Here goes, for good or ill to myself.
Some months after I was kicked upstairs to the presidency of the republic of Singapore in October 1981, there was a by-election in the parliamentary constituency of Anson, which I had held prior to my ill-fated elevation. I had won that seat with a comfortable majority of some 80 percent of the votes cast. My opponent was the Worker's Party leader J.B. Jeyaretnam.
Today, looking back, I realise that it was not the PAP that had won that seat with such a thumping majority, but I myself who had won it almost entirely in my personal capacity as the unchallenged leader of the free trade union movement in Singapore (no longer free). True, I had persuaded the trade unions to cooperate with the government in its attempts to ensure that the economy of Singapore was kept on an even keel. They overwhelmingly voted their approval, because I had successfully convinced them that the organised greed and reckless disregard for the social good represented by British style trade unionism of the day would clearly not do for a small island state like Singapore with absolutely no natural resources of any kind to boast of apart from God's own fresh air. In doing so, my members knew that I had not surrendered an iota of the institutional independence of the NTUC (National Trade Union Congress). Indeed they knew that at every Delegates Conference of the NTUC they had unanimously endorsed a firmly worded resolution I had introduced from the platform reiterating what they most highly valued - the institutional independence of the labour movement.
These days, you won't find a single reference in any of the resolutions passed by the NTUC to the priceless oath of institutional independence a few colleagues and I had entrenched in our founding constitution. Let me make it clear. The PAP had no hand in the founding of the NTUC.
Be that as it may, a by-election had to be called in Anson. The PAP's candidate was a faceless civil service appointee of Lee Kuan Yew who had been seconded for service to the NTUC, while the Workers Party put up J.B Jeyaretnam. To the consternation of the PAP, Jeyaretnam won.
The day after the by-election verdict was declared, I had lunch with the Prime Minister (Lee Kuan Yew). I was amazed at how he fretted and fumed like a caged fury. As I saw it, Jeyaretnam constituted no threat at all to the PAP whether in parliament or outside it. For one thing, despite Jeya's courage, he displayed a woeful lack of economics. He clearly never knew at any point of time how Singapore clicked economically. And it was as plain as a pikestaff to me that in five years of free performance in parliament against the likes of Dr Goh Keng Swee, Mr Lim Kim San et al, he would stand exposed in public for his abysmal ignorance of economics.
In truth, if I had to cope with J.B Jeyaretnam as a hostile delegate at regular NTUC Delegates Conferences, I would have given him all the rope and more he wanted to hang himself with. And after free and open arguments over three days of conferencing, I would have beaten him hands down at the ballot box. I knew this, as did the workers. For they knew that in the colonial days, Jeyaretnam had never stood on a picket line. I had, not once but several times, not only stood on picket lines, but also bedded down for the night on the gravel with the workers whom I led.
I told all this to Kuan Yew. Nothing I said sank in. He fretted about a potential critical percentage drop in PAP votes across all the constituencies that could eventually bring the PAP government down, and he wouldn't stand for it. Only later did I realise that this was the moment that started his formidable brain box ticking away furiously at the fecund gerrymandering schemes he was to introduce later to ensure that all opposition parties would be put in a Gordion bind that would make it impossible for them to ever achieve control of parliament, unless an Alexander came along. Such a possibility appears impossible now, unless it takes the awesome shape of shattering geo-political circumstances already building up around Singapore.
Immediately, however, Kuan Yew's attention was concentrated on how he would deal with J.B Jeyaretnam in parliament. I was quite alarmed at some of the things he told me at that lunch. "Look," he said, "Jeyaretnam can't win the infighting. I'll tell you why. We are in charge. Every government Ministry and department is under our control. And in the infighting, he will go down for the count every time." And I will never forget his last words. "I will make him crawl on his bended knees, and beg for mercy."
Jeyaretnam was made of sterner stuff. To his eternal credit he never did crawl on bended knees, or ever begged for mercy. And it is to Lee Kuan Yew's eternal shame that Jeyaretnam will leave the political scene with his head held high, enjoying a martyrdom conferred on him by Lee. Lest I be misunderstood, let me state that Jeya more than deserves the crown of the martyr for his indomitable courage and dignity in the face of the vilest persecution.
Even greater human spirits than Jeyaretnam had refused to bend their knees to Lee Kuan Yew. It is my considered view that the greatest human being living in Singapore today is one who declined to surrender to the intimidation of prolonged incarceration and restrictions imposed on him without trial for a total period which exceeds that suffered by Nelson Mandela. And here was the mark of true greatness. He emerged from the experience like a god unembittered. His name is Chia Thye Poh. And it is Lee Kuan Yew who emerged from the episode as the knave and fool of his own mindless vindictiveness, while the real conqueror smiles benignly - unnoted, of course, by the local media. For only sound waves from the Istana Annexe are picked up and regurgitated by His Master's Voice.
There is no political justification for obliging the Workers Party to close down. And not a shred of moral justification. What lies behind the move is among the most brazen vindictiveness ever shown in the political life of Singapore. It merely adds one more nail in the coffin of the PAP's reputation when the true history of the party will be exposed to the world, as it surely will be one day in the coming decades of the third millennium. As mankind accelerates to the abyss, the shining memories of the past will certainly not include Lee Kuan Yew and the department store dummies he boasts today as his acolytes. He clearly does not possess the foresight to avoid such a fate.
I gladly salute J.B. Jeyaretnam and the Worker's Party at this highly deserved requiem, even if I never once had shared their platform.
...Like what they say...a man has no life...without a wife.
- Mr Kholi in 'Bride and Prejudice'.
...life is not made sacred by going to a place of worship; life already is sacred and that is why it moves to a place of worship.
- Ravi Zacharias.
Few Aussies against Nguyen hanging, says addict's dad
AN AUSTRALIAN whose 40-year-old son and daughter-in-law are drug addicts has e-mailed Foreign Affairs Minister George Yeo supporting Singapore's decision to hang Nguyen Tuong Van on Friday.
The man, who asked to remain anonymous, described the anguish his family faced due to his son's drug habit, and expressed anger at those who showed sympathy for drug peddlers like Nguyen.
His e-mail, coming amid criticism from human rights and other activists, suggests ordinary Australians hold a different view and back Singapore.
The writer said as much: 'Most of the objections are coming from people who obviously have never had to go through, and continue to live with, the devastation that drugs cause to thousands of people in this country.'
Describing his son's addiction as a 'curse' and a 'nightmare', he said he took his son and daughter-in-law into his home for four years to provide stability and prevent their four children from being taken away by social services.
'It was the most emotionally draining four years of our lives. I have had the heartbreaking experience of dragging my son from our toilet with a needle in his arm, and he had stopped breathing. If it hadn't been for his wife knowing what to do, he would have died.
'Unless anyone has experienced this, they would not know what it is like to worry yourself sick every time your child goes to the toilet, is late home from wherever, or your grandchildren don't know where their parents are.'
He also criticised proposals for a minute's silence when Nguyen is executed: 'I travel extensively around Western Australia and I can tell you I have not met one single person who believes this man should not be hanged for his crime.
'If politicians proposing this ... think for one minute the majority of Australians agree with their thinking, they had better get out into the real world and listen to the people.'
He believed few Australians disagreed with the execution decision and few would be observing a minute's silence.
- AsiaOne, 30 Nov 2005.
Herald Sun
Should Singapore execute Tuong Van Nguyen for drug trafficking? (Nov 18)
Yes: 1024 (53.2%)
No: 898 (46.8%)
Think Centre
Death Sentence for Nguyen Tuong Van is cruel, inhumane and degrading punishment, for a non-violent crime like drug possession.
Commute death sentence: 1
COMMUTE to life sentence: 120
NO to death sentence: 295
YES to death sentence: 102
Interactive Opinions
Should the Singapore government allow physical contact between Nguyen Tuong Van and his mother before his execution on Friday?
Yes: 88%
No: 13%
Don't know: 0%
Will you boycott Singaporian products and services in protest against the Singapore governments planned execution (by hanging) of Australian man, Nguyen Tuong Van?
Yes: 24%
No: 66%
Don't know: 10%
AsiaOne
Do you think the planned execution of an Australian drug-trafficker will affect Singapore?
Yes: 21.0%
No: 54.2%
Only time will tell: 19.5%
Finding the perfect Mee Pok Man
My brief was to be a fussy customer and check out what kind of sterling service you can get from foodstall holders who are on their feet more than 10 hours a day, seven days a week. I chose four mee pok stalls featured in local food guide Makansutra and the newspapers, and at each, I adopted a different persona. At one, I confronted the stall holder about his dirty trays. At another, I pretended not to understand Mandarin while ordering from two hawkers who could speak nothing but Mandarin. My aim was to be a pain, the customer from hell. This is what happened.
Stall #1: Ang Mo Kio
Who I was: I put on my best manners and ask for noodles in perfect English.
Service standards: Weekday. Noon. A bad time to be a fusspot. The stall assistant is not the friendliest.
I order. 'Mee pok, a little chilli, packet.'
The cook starts to cook my noodles and pours in vinegar for flavouring.
'No vinegar please,' I cry out in mock alarm.
The assistant replies gruffly in Hokkien: 'Xiao liao lah' and mumbles something to the cook. I later discover it means 'already gone crazy'.
Cook dumps the vinegar and assistant hands me my noodles. No 'thank you'.
Five minutes later, I return to the stall. 'I want to eat my noodles here. Can you help me, please?'
Assistant cries out: 'You ah' and mutters to the cook that I have changed my mind.
His sentence ends with 'mati liao' or 'die already'. He hands me a bowl and walks off.
Stall #2: Upper Cross Street
Who I was: Office worker spouting Hokkien-accented Mandarin.
Service standards: A young woman fronts the stall and is one of the few hawkers who does not wear a grumpy frown.
I order. She nods. And prepares the noodles.
I ask for more bean sprouts. She doesn't use them, she replies.
I say: 'No vinegar then.'
'Orgh' is her reply, signalling she has heard me.
The customer behind orders mee gia or thin noodles.
I immediately say: 'You got mee gia, can you give me mee gia instead?'
She complies right away. As the cook prepares my noodles and adds what looks like soya sauce, I tell him not to add any vinegar.
He grunts: 'This is not vinegar.'
My noodles are served on a dirty tray and I complain.
The cook retorts: 'This is lunchtime, we don't have enough manpower to clean the trays.'
I shoot back: 'But don't you know that hygiene and cleanliness is very important in the food business.'
The cook keeps mum. His assistant looks nervous.
She hands me my noodles with a thank you. I appreciate the gesture. Few hawkers here bother to thank you for keeping them in business.
Stall #3: Toa Payoh Central
Who I was: A youth who can't understand a word of Mandarin.
Service standards: The cook says hello as I approach.
I ask for a bowl of mee pok with more chilli please.
As the cook pours vinegar, I say I don't want any. She nods and reaches for a fresh bowl.
As she's preparing the ingredients, I say: 'No pork, please.'
She gestures to the fishcake and mushrooms and I nod.
Ten minutes after I get my mee pok, I return to complain loudly in English: 'It's too hot!'
Cook and assistant look at each other blankly, obviously not understanding.
A customer translates.
The assistant exclaims angrily in Mandarin: 'She said she wanted more chilli at first, now she complains it's too hot.'
Even Ms Friendly Cook shakes her head in disappointment. She dumps my noodles and prepares a fresh bowl, and plonks the sambal chilli on the side instead.
Her assistant hands me my noodles with a glare. Wow, that's one chilli padi.
As I wolf down my noodles, she walks past and glares again. And a third time. Scary!
Stall #4: Another outlet in Upper Cross Street
Who I was: Cocky customer nattering in Mandarin and Hokkien
Service standards: This stall was singled out by Makansutra as one of the country's 'legendary' stalls . So if the food's legendary, how about the service?
A stern-looking helper in her 50s takes the orders.
I order. She says: 'We don't put bean sprouts in our noodles.'
I say: 'Okay, but go easy on the vinegar.'
Thirty seconds later, I say: 'Oh, and I don't want any pork oil or fats in my noodles.'
She maintains her poker face. She breaks into a faint smile when I comment that business is good.
But no 'thank you' when I pay.
- Straits Times, 29 Nov 2005.
My father-in-law and I often spoke wistfully about fine used bookstores that we have visited. He told one story, however, that has all the others soundly beaten.
He was in a sophisticated bookstore in Toronto that caters to the academic community, a bookstore rich in classical tradition. Suddenly, in came a roughshod man in greasy overalls, who bellowed to the owner, "How much does it cost to buy 128 feet of books?"
Obviously bewildered by this request, for never before had he sold scholarly works by the foot, the owner replied, "Uh… what exactly did you have in mind?" Meanwhile every customer within earshot had paused from reading, ears pinned for some new enlightenment.
It turns out the buyer had been sent by a group of trade union leaders who were hosting their educated counterparts in management in an effort to break a deadlock in some highly volatile negotiations. So, the union leaders decided to decorate their offices with the length of books. Why? To convey the intimidating air of being ideological heavyweights, and to terrify the opposition!
Funny I think. Don't you?
- Ravi Zacharias
A Christian teacher once visited a secondary school in one of England's cities. It was at Christmas time; so he thought it appropriate to remind the young people at the assembly about the most wonderful story ever told, the story of the birth of Christ.
The pupils were remarkably attentive and seemed to enjoy his account of the dramatic virgin birth. Afterwards a boy of about twelve came to say how much he had enjoyed the story.
To the teacher's shock he said that he had never heard it before and had a question about it: "Why did Jesus' parents give him the name of a swear word?"
Getting fired is nature's way of telling you that you had the wrong job in the first place.
- Hal Lancaster, reporter.
I'm anti-racism, anti-sexism and everything else. But I'll always tell the truth without exception. That's my brand.
- Neil French, who said his 'woman are crap' remark was taken out of context.
Demand for Chinese language courses in US soars
WASHINGTON : From well-to-do families hiring Mandarin-speaking nannies for their tots to students in crammed Asian studies programmes, demand for Chinese language instruction is booming like never before in the United States.
In a country that has never prioritised teaching foreign languages, demand is difficult to meet given a serious shortage of qualified instructors, said Michael Levine, who handles education at the New York-based Asia Society, which works to support cultural ties between the United States and Asia.
Clifford Greenhouse, who runs the Pavillion agency specialising in household help, said he gets more and more requests from "very wealthy families" seeking nannies who speak Mandarin, in the hopes their offpring will grow up bilingual. He can't always deliver.
"Mandarin-speaking people in New York tend to look down upon this work; they see it as being a servant," he said.
Leon Furchgott, 17, a freshman at prestigious Princeton University, grew up eating Chinese - from the age of 10 months throughout his childhood in Bethesda, Maryland, an expensive Washington suburb.
"My mother likes to say that my first word was 'bu yao', which means 'I don't want,'" said Furchgott, who now speaks fluent Mandarin thanks to nannies and two hours of Chinese classes per week.
"When I was little, it was not difficult," he said.
Though Chinese has not yet reached the ranks of more traditional foreign languages, it is red hot in Pacific coast cities such as San Francisco and Los Angeles.
But it also has seen a surge in interest in cities such as Chicago, Philadelphia and Houston, and in more rural states such as Kentucky and Kansas, the Asia Society says.
The interest is "coming from the heartland as well as from the big cities," said Levine. He said that behind the focus on Chinese was interest in doing business with China.
"Part of the demand comes from families who want to maintain their heritage, but in Chicago it comes from middle class families who see that as an advantage for their children", said Levine. "That's why demand is growing so rapidly."
Just about 50,000 US students are learning Chinese in public schools, and another 50,000 are studying it elsewhere, according to Asia Today.
"If we wanted to have five percent of all high schoolers in America learning Chinese, we'd need to have 25,000 qualified Chinese teachers" and not the current 1,000, Levine said.
To help deal with the teacher shortage, US philanthropists and corporate foundations are beginning to chip in to support instruction in Chinese, he noted.
At the university level as well, demand for Chinese instruction is on the rise; it is now in seventh place among foreign languages behind Spanish, French, German, Italian, sign language, and Japanese. It places ahead of Russian and Arabic in terms of post-secondary students.
The latest data, from 2002, showed 34,153 university students were learning Chinese, up a sharp 20 percent from 28,456 in 1998.
At Yale, beginner Chinese class enrolment soared by 68 percent at the start of the school year compared to last year.
The Modern Language Association sees Chinese as the "new Russian" referring to the Cold war period when campuses saw higher interest in Russian language coursework. That interest since has waned.
- Channel NewsAsia, 20 Nov 2005.
detritus \dih-TRYE-tus\ noun
1 : loose material (as rock fragments or organic particles) that results directly from disintegration
2 a : a product of disintegration, destruction, or wearing away : debris *b : miscellaneous remnants : odds and ends
The blog originated ... as a catch basin for mental detritus, for the kind of stuff not good enough for print, but too good to waste on casual conversation.
- Joel Achenbach, The Washington Post, 21 Aug 2005.
S'porean's noodle stall to open in London
Chicken rice, other local favourites to feature in S'pore-style foodcourt
NOODLE stall operator Stella Wong had never thought about going to London, for work or leisure. But when she was invited by British property developer Rosewheel to open a stall in the Singapore-style foodcourt it is building in London's Chinatown, she leapt at the chance.
'Although I have just three stalls, since the opportunity came knocking, I thought I will give it a try,' the 36-year-old said in Mandarin. Her three Singapore stalls are at Suntec City, West Mall and IMM Building.
She plans to be in London in the first three months to oversee the opening of her handmade noodle stall. Once the business is up and running, she plans to return to Singapore and hire staff in London to look after the stall.
'If it is successful, well and good. If not, I shall just take it as a learning experience.'
Miss Wong is one of three Singaporean food vendors who have rented a total of five stalls in the foodcourt. Select Food Management and Lerk Thai, which are under the same management team, will take up one unit each, offering Thai food and Chinese mixed rice. Gourmet Cuisine is taking up two stalls for hot plate dishes and Hainanese chicken rice.
Rosewheel managing director Robert Borne fell in love with Singapore's foodcourts when he visited earlier this year and wanted to import the concept to London. He hired former Kopitiam employee Ellen Chew to advise on the construction of the foodcourt and to woo local operators over.
Select and Lerk Thai executive director Jack Tan said he had never thought of expanding beyond the region because he had few contacts. But Rosewheel provided an opening. He estimates his investment to be $100,000.
The foodcourt is the centrepiece of Rosewheel's £50 million (S$145 million) revamp of the five-storey Newport Sandringham building. It will occupy a third of the 80,000 sq ft shopping mall. It is expected to be open by March next year, with 18 food stalls over three levels, and seating for up to 400, said Rosewheel spokesman Horatio Cheng.
He estimates up to 15 of the stalls will be run by Singaporean operators. 'We want to offer something that is different from the normal London menu.'
Singaporean food and beverage companies' forays overseas have been on the rise in recent years, said Mrs Tan Li Lin, director of the lifestyle and business services division of IE Singapore, the government agency that helps local companies expand overseas.
However, most ventures are into regional markets such as Indonesia, the Philippines, Japan and South Korea. So Mrs Tan was pleased with the Europe move.
'Singapore's reputation as a food paradise is well known,' she said. 'We hope more Singapore-based companies will use this reputation to propel themselves into established markets, including European countries.'
- Straits Times, 18 Nov 2005.
700 gamers to do battle for share of $744,000 pot
STARTING today, 700 gamers from 67 countries will begin the battle of their lives as they attempt to race, kick and shoot their way to glory and a share of the US$435,000 (S$744,285) prize pool at the World Cyber Games grand finals.
The world's largest computer games tournament and digital entertainment festival opened with a bang yesterday at the Suntec Convention Centre.
Considered the olympics of cybergaming, the tournament will see more than 1,000 matches played over the next four days in the eight official games, which include popular strategy games StarCraft: Brood War and Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War, as well as renowned shooting game CounterStrike: Source.
Officially opened amid a blaze of pyrotechnics by Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports Vivian Balakrishnan, the event will also feature cultural performances such as a hip-hop dance competition and trade events like the WCG 2005 Game Conference for games developers.
The games are expected to generate more than $53.5 million in tourism revenue.
Fans of South Korean star gamers have flown here to support their idols. South Korea, known for its top cybergamers, is fielding a team of 26, the largest national team this year.
Other star gamers include the world's number one WarCraft III player, 19-year-old Dutchman Manuel Schenkhuizen, and the United States' most decorated CounterStrike team, Team 3D, which earns so much in sponsorship they can afford to fly business class to international competitions.
Top Chinese CounterStrike team, wNv, are attempting a comeback after their disqualification for cheating in the Cyberathlete Professional League world tour CounterStrike tournament held here last month.
In his opening address, Dr Balakrishnan said the cyberathletes would 'display the many winning qualities of sportsmen, such as dexterity, determination, exceptional sensory coordination, decisiveness and team-spiritedness'.
Said the minister: 'The number of professional gamers in Singapore is growing. Some of them will compete alongside the world's best in this competition and that will go some way in helping us achieve our vision of developing Singapore as a hub for the games industry.
'We are already home to major digital entertainment studios like Koei, Genki and Lucasfilm where Singapore creations will be made for global consumption.
'We hope in the next few years, you will be playing some of our very own games in international gaming tournaments.'
- Straits Times, 17 Nov 2005.
Singapore's childless couples come to India
Singapore, Nov 15 -- A ban on surrogate motherhood in Singapore is driving childless couples overseas to rent wombs - in India, the US and Russia, doctors said in a published report Tuesday.
Cheng Li Chang, medical director of the Thomson Fertility Centre, told The Straits Times that he has seen several patients going abroad.
He cited an Indonesian couple in their early 30s. The wife was not able to conceive, but they found a surrogate mother in the US and are now the proud parents of a child.
Ministry of Health guidelines forbid assisted reproduction clinics in Singapore from carrying out surrogacy procedures.
In another case, a childless couple in Singapore searched the Internet for a surrogate mother. They found a fertility physician at the Dr. L.H. Hiranandani Centre for Human Reproduction in Mumbai.
The surrogate mother is now more than nine weeks' pregnant with a foetus conceived from the man's sperm and his wife's egg. The woman carrying the child will be paid 5,850 Singapore dollars (US $3,461) for carrying the pregnancy to full term, with all her medical expenses covered.
The couple, in their mid-30s, had tried in-vitro fertilisation five times in Singapore without success.
Halimah Yacob, who chairs the Government Parliamentary Committee for Health, warned of several complications with surrogacy.
"It may sound easy just to get a surrogate mum and then implant fertilised eggs in her," she was quoted as saying. "But any woman who has carried a baby to full term will form strong emotional bonds with it."
A gynaecologist told the newspaper about a woman who wanted a child and had no medical problems, but refused to become pregnant.
The woman, a professional in her 30s, was seeking to rent a womb because she "wanted to enjoy life", he said.
- Hindustan Times, 15 Oct 2005.
Singapore known as Asia's hangman
SINGAPORE, Nov 4 AAP - When the Changi Prison executioner loops a noose around the neck of Australian Nguyen Tuong Van, Singapore will be living up to its reputation as the hangman of Asia.
The tightly controlled city-state - governed uninterrupted by the People's Action Party since 1959 - is ranked by human rights group Amnesty International as having the world's highest per capita execution rate.
Between 1991 and 2000, 340 people were hanged in Singapore, according to official figures.
Some years are busier than others. For example, 50 people were hanged in 1996, meaning the gallows were used almost once a week.
Death sentences in Singapore are mostly imposed for drug trafficking, such as in Nguyen's case.
But it's also handed down for murder, kidnapping and some firearms offences.
Tradition dictates that hangings are always set for the early hours of a Friday.
Although criticised abroad, Singapore's tough capital punishment policy is broadly supported at home.
Opinion polls periodically show hanging is backed by around seven out of ten Singaporeans.
But there are a handful of people who disagree.
"Drug addiction cannot be solved by hanging a few people, and these are normally the small-timers ... not the masterminds," said human rights activist Sinapan Samydorai.
Sinapan, a spokesman for the group, Think Centre, is one of a few dozen people set to protest against Nguyen's impending death at a rare vigil planned for Monday.
Melbourne salesman Nguyen, 25, was arrested at Changi Airport in 2002 as he was about to board a flight to Australia.
He was carrying 396 grams of heroin; enough, Singapore authorities say, for 26,000 individual doses.
The final avenue for appeal appeared to have been exhausted.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer has received a letter from his Singapore counterpart, George Yeo, rejecting any last-minute bid for clemency.
The city-state has a responsibility to prevent Singapore from becoming a conduit for the trafficking of illicit drugs, Yeo's letter to Downer said.
It added that the final decision to take Nguyen's life was debated by cabinet and had not been taken lightly.
Singapore argues that the noose has helped keep it safe from serious crime, especially drug trafficking.
"The Singapore government makes no apology for its tough law and order system," the Ministry of Home Affairs said in a written defence last year of capital punishment.
"The death penalty is a just punishment for those who knowingly and intentionally commit serious crimes, which threaten the lives of others," the document said.
"The death penalty, because of its finality, is more feared than imprisonment as a punishment."
Most of those hanged are Singapore citizens, and the majority are condemned for drug-related crimes.
But official figures also show that the system is more likely to be used against the jobless or low-skilled.
According to the 2004 document, Singapore executed 138 people in the five years to 2003.
Of those 37, or one-quarter, were foreigners.
This figure tallies almost exactly with the proportion of non-Singapore nationals who are resident in the city-state.
Of the same group of 138, one hundred and ten were executed for drug-related offences.
And over the ten years to 2003, fifty one per cent of those hanged were either unemployed or working as unskilled workers, labourers or cleaners.
In the same period, 64 per cent of those hanged were either educated only to primary school level or had no schooling.
Opponents of the death penalty fire back that executions do not make Singapore safer, and violate what they regard as a sacrosanct right to life.
On it website this week, Singapore's Think Centre asked: "If this inhumane practice is really a deterrent, how come we after 40 years of executions still have the highest per capita execution rate in the world with the greatest known proportion of these executions small-time drug mules?"
As Nguyen is a foreigner, the authorities will inform his next of kin and the Australian High Commission of the chosen date between seven and 14 days in advance compared with the four days notice usually allowed for locals.
Nguyen will then be allowed visits from relatives of up to four hours during his final few days.
His execution will be witnessed by a doctor and his body will be handed back to his family.
- Australian Associated Press General News, 4 Nov 2005.
Is it worth it?
Despite all denials of truth as a category, people still hunger for it and the real question that haunts us is not whether truth exists, but whether it is worth it at all.
On August 7, 1961, a twenty-six year old Soviet cosmonaut named Gherman Titov became the second Soviet to orbit the earth and return safely. Some time later he recounted his experience while speaking at the World's Fair. In triumphalistic tones Titov declared that on his excursion into space, he looked for God but didn't find him. Someone humorously quipped, "Had he stepped out of his spacecraft, he certainly would have." Titov, of course, had moved beyond the discipline of technological gain to draw theological blood. One great step for science became an immensely greater leap in philosophy.
Years later on Christmas day, 1968, three American astronauts were the first human beings to go around the "dark" side of the moon. They saw earth rise over the horizon of the moon draped in a beauteous mixture of blue and white, garlanded by the glistening light of the sun against the black void of space. Captured by the awe of the moment, they echoed the only words that seemed fitting. Those words were from the first line of the bible: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth…"
Two similar experiences of awe and splendor, yielding two diametrically opposed conclusions. These two incidents carried off into space the most debated question on earth: Does God exist? The answer to that question has a greater bearing on your life than anything else. Personal and national destinies are inextricably bound to this issue. Our entire human frame of moral reference is determined by whether or not God exists. Our purpose in life is determined by that, whether we are here by design or whether we are the accidental collocation of atoms. Who we are and why we exist logically flows from the question of God’s existence.
The question, therefore, is not whether the pursuit of truth is worth it or not, for it is the only thing that is ultimately worth it. Winston Churchill said the most valuable thing in the world is the truth; so valuable that it has often been barricaded by a bodyguard of lies. But we might ask, "What's wrong with a lie?" For one, we would think it is morally wrong, would we not? But how can we be morally wrong unless this is a moral universe? And how can this be a moral universe unless it is created by God? The intelligibility in this universe and the immense capacity of the moral law point us to God.
What is more, we don't have to go into outer space to find Him. He comes to you in your inner space, the inner space of your life. Jesus said, "If any man comes to me, I will in no wise cast him out." In knowing Him, you find truth and life. That is worth it.
- Ravi Zacharias, 1 Nov 2005.
