Speak Good English Movement.


I was invited to the launch of the Speak Good English Movement today at the National Library. One of my senior colleagues and I met up at the MRT station to go there early in the morning. We had to attend the minister dialogue that was off limits to the press and public with RAdm Lui Teck Yew. The audience consisted mainly of principals, heads of departments of English, teachers and some people from the media and the private sector. It was held in a room on the 16th storey of the library with restricted access. I could see the beautiful view of the Esplanade from there. At the viewing gallery, there was even a map indicating the location of buildings and their names.


I met Dr L and Dr M, my English professors there. Dr L was one of the panel members together with the minister, a lady from the Education ministry and one of my former teachers from the primary school, Mrs B. It was an enriching experience sitting there and listening to the views of the educators and the roles they play to encourage their pupils to speak proper English. An English that is of “international intelligibility” and not one with an accent.


Their slogan is quite catchy, “Be understood. Not only in Singapore, JB and Batam.” Heehee! At the launch which was later on in the morning, it was held at the ground floor of the library. I enjoyed the show thoroughly as it was hilarious, especially when Hossan Leong performed the part of “Bobby”, a student trying to speak good English depending on the context. I liked Robin Goh’s rendition of “It had to be you” when he opened the show. Highly entertaining!

~ ~ ~ Skye's telling at 10:48 PM ~ ~ ~
Hey! Are you in on the secret yet?

Racial Harmony Day.


I had to attend some racial harmony thing today for about an hour or so in the morning. Some people were presenting on the importance of maintaining racial harmony not only among friends, but also among colleagues. So my supervisor asked me to help out with the presentation in front of the company. My job was to ensure that the PowerPoint presentation slides were running in order and to be beside the computer to fix any problems should they occur.


I had been running about prior to the start of the presentation to make sure that everything was settled, so by the time I reached the presentation place I was pretty heated up. All of us were in the room and since I couldn’t cool down fast enough, I resorted to fanning myself using a few pieces of paper while the presentation was going on.


There were a few presenters and by the time the whole thing ended, I had finally cooled down and my face was no longer that pink anymore. When I walked past DD’s (Donald Duck) table on my way to one of my colleagues’ table, DD asked me why I was fanning myself so furiously during the whole stretch of the presentation.


I: “What has my fanning myself got to do with you?”


DD: “It’s very distracting and irritating you know.”


I: “Why were you staring at me during the whole presentation then??”


DD: “No what. Because there there’s not much choice to choose from between you and the presenter.”


I: “Then can’t you pay attention to the presenter (some higher management guy) instead of me? I mean, he’s so much more interesting than I right?”


DD: “Because you were distracting me with your fanning what.”


I: “You are very weird you know. I don’t have other people asking me why I was fanning myself at all. Obviously it must have been because I was very warm right? That’s the only logical explanation for my fanning anyway.”


And with that, I walked away to my colleague’s table. Sheesh! I’m just wasting my breath and time arguing with him over such a trivial matter. The guy is nuts anyway.

~ ~ ~ Skye's telling at 6:02 PM ~ ~ ~
Hey! Are you in on the secret yet?