Today, I was treated to a running commentary on a microcosm of Singapore's education system. It all began during English tutorial.

It all started during attendance taking for English tutorial rather. The tutor skipped my name, and being the easily purturbed type, I immediately attempted to inform him that he missed me out. (No, it's not that I have a constant craving for attention, and will therefore wilt if I am not noticed. Rather, this tutorial, held in the Arts campus, requires me to execute a mad dash across NUS. Since I risk life and limb to run pell mell down the stairs of SOC1 to catch the shuttle bus, I'll be damned if I let any one mark me absent.) The tutor immediately looked up and informed me that he already knows my name and face. With a half smile/smirk (smilrk), he further remarked that some of our test scripts were already graded. *smilrk smilrk* Now if you know about the debacle about the karaokers from hell, you'd know that I wasn't exactly brimming with confidence for the test. His remark therefore sent me into a tizzy. Does he know me because I am such a hansem boy? Or does he know me because my name is common? Or does he know me because he had an enjoyable few minutes grading my sorry script, while laughing his head off? Or does he know me because he realizes that I am a linguistic and historic genius, and thoroughly personified the axiom "the pen is mightier than the sword"? You get the picture. Combined with the fact that NUS loves to play with our brains, and make the common test week The Week for declaring satisfactory/ unsatisfactory option, these 30 words from the tutor caused about 300 scenarios ranging from doomsday to worldwide renown to flash through my brain. Declaring the option for this English module is definitely the safer thing to do- I am afterall a computing student in artsie's clothing.

How so? For example, when the topic of discussion (monologue is more appropriate perhaps) veered towards Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis and linguistic determinism, I immediately thought of how true that was in the coding world. In my opinion, one's coding language largely determines how one analyzes algorithms and large systems on the whole. C aficionados will think procedural and garbage collection, Java enthusiasts will think classes and objects, while VBScriptors will think drag and drop because they are lazy lazy lazy. In general, programmers will tend to think about problems and possible ways to tackle them in their preferred coding or "native" language. Those über gods will be able to switch effortlessly between many languages, and thus, gain a perspective that lesser humans like me will never possess. So who says Whorfism only pertains to English? Unfortunately, I can imagine the uproar this will cause had I volunteered this nugget of information in class. I will be labeled as G-E-E-K and forever relegated to The Uncool Graveyard, even if I don my most l33t t-shirt that proudly states that my 127.0.0.1 is the sweetest place on earth. Oh well, that's the way the code polymorphs I'm afraid. No one cares about computing people until some system crashes, or something apocalyptic happens. We're invisible until tragedy stikes.

So, back to being a computing student in artsie's clothing. I was considering whether or not to take a risk and continute reading this module as a graded one. Being a typical Singaporean afterall, I am kiasu, kiasee and kia-everything-including-CAP-drops. To take up modules from a different faculty and do well in them means you're well-rounded, well-read and blardy smart and intimidating. To take up modules from a totally different faculty and do badly in them means you are stupid, foolish and begging for academic suicide. Your CAP will plummet, friends will laugh, pat your back and think "One less contender for first class" and you will forever think back on how glorious your CAP would've been had you played it safe. Well, what about learning for learning's sake you ask? Grades are transcient afterall, while knowledge is eternal (until you get Alzeheimer's anyway). That is a very nice theory I say. It is best uttered by people who have been there and done that. It is something better savored in retrospect. Therefore, you'll excuse me while I be kiasu, kiasee and kia-everything-including-CAP-drops now and say that grades don't matter when I'm working in future.

On the train back, while mugging for tomorrow's biology test (which incidentally, sucks harder than a malnourished baby who's just tasted milk for the first time), I eavesdropped on the conversation of the lady next to me. Eavesdropped, that is, if you ignore the fact that she was loud enough for commuters on the next MRT to hear. She made 4 calls in total. 3 of them started with "Have you heard my daughter's disaster news?". You'd think that with such a drama-mama-papa-grandmama opening, her daughter has gotten herself knocked-up, expelled from school, mugged, swept away in a tsunami or kidnapped by terrorists. Nah... Rather, teachers from the primary school her daughter attends had recently finished grading English test scripts. The performance was dismal, and the teacher for her class announced the names of the two boys who failed, but withheld the identity of the girl who failed (talk about gender discrimination). Therefore, the young primary 5 girl is currently "scared to death" and "shivering at home". What's more, the lady almost gleefully retorted, "Class B had 2 failures, Class C had 3 failures, Class D had 16 failures, Class E had 17 failures and - it gets better- Class F had only 5 passes!". Why was she gleeful? Because she was going to "knock some sense into the teacher". She "cannot see the point of failing everyone across the grade", and told her daughter "that it's okay as long as she has tried her best". (Some murmurs ensue here about who the odious teacher is, but I missed it as the MRT lady announced Simei in her sepulchral tone.) That alone would have been amusing, and capable of striking a chord in me. The 4th call however, was to her daughter. Her conversation here was hilarious. Apparently, Mrs. Irately Kiasu has forgotten all about her best effort advice, and reverted back to the mother hen speech that went "Aiyo... like that how? I will talk to your teacher. They cannot do this to you all. It's very unfair to you. How can set such a difficult paper?" What a gem. Forget about best effort, daughter. Mother will hum dum your teacher for you. Show her my muscles. She'll move away to Peru to hide from my fury and wrath.

Honestly, are parents nowadays so concerned about grades that they lose sight of the fact that a primary 5 student will hardly become the Loser of the Singapore by failing one English test? (I told you this is easier said in retrospect, so get off my case and don't say "You also mah!?".) Are they naive enough to think that it's okay to fail because almost everybody else is failing? Many firms have no compunctions about weeding out weaker employees. If you are not one of those who make the cut, then it's goodbye for you. Rather than blaming the system or the teacher, they should challenge their children to rise up to the occasion. Don't expect the whole world to sympathise because you belong to a majority of losers. Nobody will. They will rejoice, and work harder to avoid being lumped together with losers. Get that, Ms. Irately Kiasu? This hansem boy must now go back to studying lest he faces the same prospect of failing his super sucky biology test.