Making reference to one of the reading materials for Friday's English Current Affairs Discussion(How Dare He make the MRT look nicer?),I would like to express my opinions about the recent MRT vandalism case by the swiss national.

First of all,I like to thank the awesome blogger who posted this,the title was the best part,how he though up of it,perhaps I would never find out,but if it's one thing I know,it's that the title is extremely humourous and made me laugh till my stomach hurt,allow me a moment to get over the pain....

Ok,I'm ready now,so,for the benefit those of you who do not know read the newspapers/watch the news or are just plain oblivious to the what is happening around you,2 foreigners,Oliver Fricker and Lloyd Dane Alexander,broke into the Changi MRT depot and spray-painted MRT trains with graffiti.The incident was only reported by commuters who noticed the vandalised MRT 2 days later as most commuters just thought it was part of the MRT's decorations and already,there are multiple footage of the vandalised trains posted on the Internet.

So, what's the big deal about it anyway?It's just vandalism.You see it all the time and everywhere in other countries like in the US,and the government doesn't even seem to care,so what exactly is all the fuss over this incident,why would Singaporeans view it so differently?

It would seem that the most controversial part of this case is the unusually heavy sentence meted out to the arrested vandal.

For " voluntarilly decorating" the MRT trains,Oliver Fricker will be rewarded with the top prize of 3-8 strokes of the cane,3 years in jail and a 2000 dollar fine for the "commendable" service he has done for the citizens of Singapore.

Wait,did I hear correctly?3-8 Strokes of the cane?Are you kidding me?That's hardly considered a reward for he probably has to sit on a rubber float or a pillow for a very long time,all just because he had a little artistic flair.It is stated clearly in black and white on the law book of Singapore that any form of vandalism,regardless of severity,warrants caning as a punishment.In my opinion,it is far too harsh a punishment for a crime of this level.Besides,it's not like he placed any four-letter word on the train,and people actually liked his handiwork.All he did was placed his signature on the train,nothing offensive or obscene at all,no "f' word,no one-finger salute,so,why so harsh a punishment?

In my opinion, this is all a result of Singapore's old-fashioned thinking-the punishment was decided based on the Vandalism Act of 1966.1966!Think about it,it's been 44 years already,must we be so square?In the course of 4 and a half decades, human rights have already took a great leap of advancement and physical punishment is not used anymore and maybe even criticised by other democratic nations while here we are sticking to old ways and getting increasingly left behind.I feel Singapore should review its laws accordingly or run the risk of being criticised and ostracised by other nations just because of the caning of a foreigner.Already,angry comments have appeared online,this proves people are against this sentence meted out,this one is my favourite one:

"OKAY KIDS, DADDY'S GONNA CANCEL OUR TRIP TO SINGAPORE, THAT PLACE IS JUST TOO INAPPROPRIATE FOR U KIDS, JUZ LOOK AT THEIR ECCENTRIC ATTITUDE TO FOREIGNERS. BUT NVM, DADDY'S JUZ BOOK TICKETS TO ISRAEL...! MUCH MORE SAFER AND MODERNIZED! "

However,I do not attempt to deny that vandalism and trespassing of protected property are violation of the law,Fricker should however,been given a vastly different punishment than his current one,perhaps a heavier fine but slight reduction of his imprisonment and no caning at all as people feel it violates human rights.He should be commended,by breaking into the depot,he showed us just how easy it was for terrorist to attack it,would we rather have realised this when the depot blew up?

To conclude,I say that Fricker's punishment was too harsh and that I do not support it,however,I do not believe that he should be absolved completely as vandalism is still a violation of the law.

Foreign talent-are they a boon to us or a bane?This is a topic that has been discussed over and over again,even going as far as to become the topic for our CA discussion,and seemingly with no consensus ever reached,simply because everyone view things differently,and now,I'm here to give my own opinion.

Now,pertaining to the workforce,I feel that competition between foreigners and Singaporeans'competitions for jobs is more than justified because in te current working society,success and failure all depends on your potential,your abilities and the contributions you have made to the company.If you get turned down for a job in favour of a foreigner,so be it because the company felt that the foreigner was more capable than you.Bosses are likely to be professional and know how to choose among their candidates wisely so as to maximise work effectiveness and generate the most possible revenue for the company so I think Singaporeans whining about foreigners stealing their job is incomprehensible.They should just get over it and try again.If you do not want to lose out to a foreigner,instead of complaining,you should strive to improve yourself,now like Professor Pautsch said:"Just work harder for complaining will get you nowhere."In fact,Jackie Robinson,the first black Major Leaguer,stated in his contract that he wouldn't complain if anyone spat at him and that was a time when blacks were discriminated against.

As for the problems with school vacancy,the government has already given Singaporeans an edge by granting them two balloting slots as compared to the foreigners who only had one,they possess twice the chances of the foreigners so it all comes down to the luck of the draw.This should be a fair system as no one can rig the results,furthermore,you can't blame others for something that totally depends on luck,it's just not right,it's like when you lose money at a casino,you claim that it was someone's else fault rather than your own bad luck.

Now for part of my blog post that likely concerns us,students,competition in schools,firstly,I like to make it clear that I have absolutely nothing against foreigners,I believe they should be treated equally and if they are better than me,so be it for it is no one's fault but my own.The second point is about scholars. Firstly,scholars are studious,smart,intelligent.I can understand that they are treated very well back in their country(and they deserved to be treated so,if I may add)due to their scholar status.They tend to be more selfish,eg. refusing to help classmates in need,not bonding with the class,being antisocial and only wishing to get/receive from others without sacrificing something themselves,at least,this is the stereotype that people hold of scholars which I say is totally bull.They are most definitely not selfish and they definitely do help their peers,whenever I have a maths question,I can always approach my scholar classmates and they would explain it to me step by step,and the part about them being anti-social?I have alot of friends who are scholars,I'm sure you have sharpened inference skills,so you should understand what I'm trying to say.

With that,I believe I can say that scholars are a boon to our nation in my eyes.They bring with them unique cultures an d a myriad of unique talent.Through interaction with them,we can learn more about their culture,this also fits in with Singapore's plans to become a global hub.As for the part about competition,well,it's also all good,like they say,with competition comes improvement,with the presence of foreign competition,we will strive to do better in order to not lose out and int he long run,this will greatly benefit Singapore.

After listening to the principal dialogue's section yesterday, I felt an sudden urge to write about the topic of plagiarism as it left a lasting impression on me.
So what exactly is plagiarism,how do we define it?When I checked it up online,I found out that the word itself comes from a Latin word which means "to-kidnap". As it's derivative suggests,plagiarism is "The action or practice of plagiarizing; the wrongful appropriation or purloining, and publication as one's own, of the ideas, or the expression of the ideas(literary, artistic, musical, mechanical, etc.) of another." according to the Oxford English Dictionary Online.Basically, stealing the fruits of labour from others IE Copy and pasting your assignemnt.

So,if stealing is considered immoral,why do so many people still plagiarise?I'm sure alot of students do actually,as mentioned yesterday at the Dialogue session,limited time available for our projects is one of the many reasons why they do it,also,they sometimes feel that their own work is not adequate or good enough,so they copy and paste information on the internet which is generally more "better" and more "professional.Why bother to think up your own ideas when you could just google some of the readily available ideas on the internet,isn't that what they are published on the net for?That,my friend,is the thinking that students have when they plagiarise and also the thinking that prevents them from feeling guilt over plagiarising.The dawn of the Information Age and the general affordability of computers and various electronic gadgets have also encouraged plagiarism.Computers even come with functions that allow for quick and easy plagiarism,such as the student favourite,copy and paste and the huge variety of easily attainable content on the Internet,it is difficult to resist the urge to plagiarism,especially when it gives you a better chance to attain better grades,which I believe all students want,me included.

But if we are not supposed to copy information from the Internet,then what is the bibliography section at the end of every research assignment for,decorative purposes?Yes,it's for you to cite sources which you harvested information from,however,it is not meant for sources which you simply copy and paste to your Microsoft Word document and then save,but for sources that you have read thoroughly and comprehend completely,along with what you have derived from painstakingly studying these sources.Yes,it is challenging and extremely time-consuming and all of us have been tempted to or even plagiarise many times but I personally believe it is more worth it to spend 6 boring hours studying all the articles than spending alot more time behind bars when you are caught plagiarising from others.

So,what are some measures we can adopt to avoid plagiarism?Firstly,we could refer to hard-copy sources such as books and magazines for research materials as an alternative instead of information on the Internet.This would put us off from plagiarising material as it would be alot more time-consuming to plagiarise from a ahrd copy source as compared to the plagiarising from the internet.Furthermore,hard copy sources are usually more reliable than those on the Internet as the latter might be written by people who might not have even read about the subject beforehand and the information could have only been up on the web for such a short period of time that it might not even have been reviewed by others for accuracy,whereas hard copy sources would usually have gone through multiple vettings to ensure that the information published is accurate.Secondly,we could train our critical thinking skills more so we would rely minimally on external sources,we would also be able to come up with better or equal ideas ourselves,after all,something original and new is always better.

After everything said,it all comes down to one thing,one's moral integrity,there is always a choice for a person to plagiarise or not to,the question is,what would you do?Ask yourself that....

Task 2
*Teachers,read this,friends,ignore this*

Poem analysed:Children in the drakness

Point of View
The speaker is speaking in the point of view of a person who wishes to free the child soldiers.The poem continuously state "could we",this shows that the speaker is trying to offer suggestions and think up ways to free the child soldiers,"could we" is also repeated to enhance the impact on the reader.

Situation and Setting
The poem is set in a social and psychological setting,with the presence of a internal conflict over the morality of using children as soldiers.The poem states "There are children in the darkness,who have not seen the light",this shows that the children are not liberated as darkness is usually associated with negative things while light is usually associated with positive things,in this case,the darkness is them being forced to fight as soldiers and the light is them being liberated from this fate.The poem also states "Or will a war consume them,their body and their soul,will their life and blood be poured down some endless thirsty hole",this shows the effects war has on the children."their body and their soul" shows that the war not only hurts the children physically,but mentally scars them as well,"life and blood be poured down some endless thirsty hole" refers to how the war is taking the lives of the children,here the "hole" is the blood lust of humans,because of this blood lust,the children are dying.

Language and Diction
The poem is written in a very sad and pessimistic tone.It makes constant reference about how the child soldiers lives will never be the same again,shown through the line "To this door there is no key" as well as "From this life they can not flee" and as a result,they are not free.It also makes reference to how hard it is to change the child soldier's lives,shown through the third stanza,where the speaker gives suggestions about how they could end the suffering which they children go through,nonetheless,it is all futile and useless.The poem also shows how the children will always just descend back into the darkness,with no chance of liberation whatsoever.

Personal response
After reading through this poem and going through research,I have witnessed how hard life is for these children and have come to pity them.Compared to us,who live in comfort and who take love for granted,these children know what it's like to feel no love,to be forcefully taken away from those they called family,those lucky to survive the war,their families would not accept them.They carry gruesome memories of their past and the nightmares continue to haunt them.

Task 1
*Teachers,read this,friends,ignore this*

Poem analysed:Children in the darkness

The poem seems to deal with using children as soldiers and how the war has shackled them,they would never be free from this life.The use of children as soldiers have long been condemned as abhorrent and inhumane,yet,over the years,tens and thousands of children have been used as soldiers by people.In June 2007, the Special Court for Sierra Leone found three accused men from the rebel Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC) guilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other serious violations of international humanitarian law, including the recruitment of children under the age of 15 years into the armed forces. With this, the Special Court became the first-ever UN backed tribunal to deliver a guilty verdict for the military conscription of children

I shall now provide some facts on child soldiers.
1)The recruitment of children under age 15 for military purposes is a war crime under international law.
2)Due to the proliferation of lightweight but deadly small arms of sophisticated modern design - a child of 10 can be trained to strip down a Kalashnikov - this enables a cheap,acquiescent and expendable army to be conscripted by warlords.
3)Despite the ending of various civil wars and release of tens of thousands of child soldiers in the period since 2004,there remain 14 countries in which recruitment takes place.
4)An estimated total of 250,000 children are in military service, including a significant proportion of girls.
5)There may be as many as 70,000 child soldiers engaged by government and rebel armies in Burma, the country named as the worst offender.
6)In 2007, governments approved a set of practical guidelines, known as the Paris Commitments and Principles, designed to assist the process of “disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration” which is particularly sensitive for children, often psychologically disturbed by violence.
7)A crucial step towards ending the use of child soldiers was registered in 2007 with the conviction of 3 warlords by the war crimes court for Sierra Leone.

Now that we have established a basic understanding,I shall cite a few examples of wars which child soldiers have been used.
1)World War 1(1914-1918)Child soldiers were in every army,every day,boys on the battlefield were dying
2)The Civil war of Sierra Leone
3)The Indochina wars
4)World War 2

Now,to move on,I shall cite a few of the most ridiculous justification I have found out about
1)There are not enough soldiers,we need every man we can get our hands on
2)These children should be prepared to fight to the death for their country
3)These boys are human too,they can hold a gun and shoot it,just like the others,so why should they be treated differently?
4)Most of them are orphans,we have taken them in,provided them with food and shelter,is that wrong too?

Now,I think we all agree that the use of child soldiers is morally unacceptable,I'm sure even the military leaders know that,so why press on in the use of child soldiers?Well,for once,most of the children are still too young to know what's going on around them,as such,they can be easily influenced into believing something.Secondly,as mentioned before,as lightweight modern arms become increasingly popular,a child aged 10 can be taught how to strip down a gun and reassemble it,the gun being lightweight also enables children to carry them.As such,this makes children an cheap and easily accessible source of manpower.Children also usually outnumber adults in the third-world countries that child soldiers are often used in.They can also be used as human shields or for propaganda,should an enemy soldier come across some children soldiers,they are less likely to open fire on them compared to adult soldiers,also,propaganda is made more effective as people are more likely to listen to children as they believe that they are innocent and whatever they speak would be the absolute truth,another incentive for the use of child soldiers.

So what becomes of these chidl soldiers after the war?
Well,those who joined for the money are usually not paid,those who have families find it hard for their family members to re-accept them,some have lost limbs and other body parts but one thing is for certain,all of them have been permanently scarred mentally by the horrifying war and the gruesome deaths they witnessed.

Sources:
1)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_use_of_children
2)http://uk.oneworld.net/guides/childlabour?gclid=CLWmyZGR7KECFcdS6wodrF2gLA#Child_Soldiers
3)http://www.anti-slaverysociety.addr.com/csoldiers1.htm
4)http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/life-after-death-for-africas-child-soldiers-446360.html

Linguistic B
Shooting of a mad dog

Children were told to stay at home,when the the threat of an old dog who had gone mad and with a call from a local Maycomb citizen,Miss Calpurnia,two men rushed to the scene.One of them was the local sheriff,Mr Heck Tate and the other,Mr Atticus Finch,a famous defense attorney who has caused much cotroversy when he decided to defend a black man who had been accused of raping a white.With this being a one-shot job,the sheriff handed a gun to the deadest shot in all of Maycomb.Reluctantly,Mr Finch walked into the lone street and took aim,his glasses plaguing him with much difficulty when it kept falling back whenever he pushed it up to aim,eventually,he decided to take them off.Raising the gun once more,Mr Finch took aim and fired,sure enough,he had lived up to his reputation,the mad dog was no more.

Interpersonal A
Me:Hey dad,what do you think of discrimination?
Dad:What is discrimination?
Me:You know,it's like when you say things like "all Indians smell like garbage",this kinda thing
Dad:I see,I think we should not discriminate the black people,alot of them provide us with manpower,to discriminate against them would be racist
Me:Oh,look who's talking.Dad,you do know your a very racist person right?I "vaguely" remeber you telling me stories about how Bangalas would come kidnap me when I was young in order to scare me
Dad:But that was just to scare you so you would be obedient
Me:But why the Bangalas?Why not just the kidnappers?
Dad:Go do your homework
Me:I am
Dad:Well,go do your other homework
Me:No can do,this is my last piece of homework,say dad,do you have anything else to add about discrimination,racism and stereotyping?
Dad:No,except that I'm not racist
Me:Ok,ok,whatever you say

HAHAHAHAHA,tests are finally over!!!!!I feel so relieved,so alive,so happy,but i did screw most of them though,at least that's what i think.There were however a few which was easier than I thought,like chemistry or history,sigh,my msg cannot go below 2 for this term,on the bright side,at least I can get the good progress award if i perform better next term :) Cross-country was a bit cheat,even though i rushed with terence for the first 2 kilometres or so,he got into top 50 and i didn't,wonder why,maybe it has something to do with the entire right side of me hurting and difficulty breathing,i did get a cup of milo though,speaking of milo,someone in our class was just ermmmm "despicable",I'm not going to point out any names but I'll tell you what he did.So ok,this guy,he used his cough MC as an excuse not to run,he didn't even bother to walk the whole way,then he took 4,yes,4 cups of milo when some of us who ran didn't even get 1(not referring to me),how is that justifiable.Then when we ask him why he could drink cold milo when he's coughing,then he said he's not coughing anymore,if he's not coughing,why can't he run?That's like what the...............We have elearning next week too,yay,another 2 days to slack at home and sleep more,I just hope the homework is not as heavy as last year

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Simple and Clean - Utada Hikaru

Flowersletter(Iljimae OST Main Theme song) - Park Hyo Shin