bangkok dangerous.

A few years ago, I used to look forward to going to Bangkok. The place had cheap food, cheap clothes, cheap accommodation, and cheap massages, performed by cheap women who were really men.

The people were really friendly too, as long as you threw out a few hundred baht every time you made a bad joke in Thai. "Sawadeeka, my Thai very bad ka, here's a few hundred baht ka. You won't understand my Thai but my money very nice ka."

Now though, the place is just dangerous. Every day, you read reports trying to convince you that Thailand is a huge mess. A few months back, it was yellow shirted people marching everywhere. Now its the red shirts. Apparently now they're killing each other too, and random cameramen working for Reuters who just enjoy strolling into warzones and getting their asses handed back to them.

What happened to you Thailand? Ate too much tom yum? The diet is fiery, but in the past the people used to be pansies. Even when they were scolding you for being stingy with your baht it sounded like good service.

Now, all the fury has come out from the tom yam into the streets. I bet someone has been tweaking with the recipe, or maybe they started importing inferior grade tom yam paste from China so all the Thais are becoming messed up. Or maybe they are just fed up of having tom yam for every meal.

Well, protest all you want. Keep off my shopping centres and flea markets.

Singapore is no longer my home.

These days, I think it's becoming pretty evident that foreigners are making up a sizeable amount of the local population. Yesterday, when I was in Dhoby Gauht on assignment, I realised that the people in front of me were from China, and the ones behind were from India. I looked around, and I realised that the next nearest Singaporean was three escalator steps down.

And when I was in the MRT, all the people in my immediate vicinity were not locals. I think it is a sure sign that you are in a foreign country when you can be pretty sure that the people around you in the public metro are not of the same nationality. I felt that way all throughout Europe, and now that I'm back, I am very surprised that I am reliving that feeling, only that this is supposedly my home.

I made a passing comment about this to my photographer, who I was on an assignment with. He laughed and said: "Actually, I thought you'd be the last person to say something about it."

Actually, I am. Because honestly, most of the time I don't give a shit until I realise that I'm already in deep shit. So the fact that I'm actually saying something means the situation is really bad. This is what's going to happen. We are importing lots of foreign produce, and we are not producing enough local produce. In a few years, Singapore is going to be taken over by Indian, Bangladeshi and Chinese nationals.

I think it is already very bad that Singaporeans have to fight with all these foreigners for jobs. Granted that the PAP says that these foreigners fill a void of jobs that Singaporeans do not want to do. I would like to ask then, so why give these people PRs and citizenships? So they can breed future generations of road sweepers, toilet cleaners and streetwalkers? Because that is precisely the void that needs to be filled.

I look around at all these "foreign talent", and I am really wondering, I'm sorry but where is the talent? I see bangla workers and chinese farmers imported from the farms of India and China. You might call me elitist, but I believe the foreign talent policy was supposed to introduce high level talent to raise the overall commercial competitiveness of Singapore. High level talent like scientists, professors, and financial experts.

Don't get me started on the ridiculous policy of buying second grade sporting talent and slapping the Singaporean label on them. We are fooling nobody, not even our local population. Or have you stopped caring about us already?

So, why the hell are we importing so many farmers? We have no land for farms!

Vote for Amos!

A friend of mine, Amos, is in a competition now organised by Sony make.believe. The winner of the competition will get to travel the world and document the whole journey, and I really believe that it'll be a great experience for him. According to him, the only beach resort he has visited is Pulau Tekong. Help send him to the beaches in Greece because at least those have babes. Oops, sorry Pamy!

He hopes to visit every continent in the world with the help of Sony's sponsorship. All you need to do is to click on Amos (and another photography entry of your choice).

The link is here
http://makedotbelieve.sony.com.sg/

Amos is on the right side of the page in the bottom right corner.

Now, you might be wondering, what's in it for me?

Well, you stand a chance to watch the FIFA World Cup 2010 in South Africa, be a flag bearer or win $5000 worth of Sony Products. The chance is probably as good as that of you winning Toto, but it's better than nothing.

Amos looks like this, according to his Facebook profile picture.

Okay, that's not very helpful. Actually, he looks like this. Look out for his epic entrance at 0:48. The girl at the start is called Pamy, and she is 21 this year. No, really. She will also be very happy if Amos wins. Okay, more happy than usual if that is possible.



Vote for Amos, because he has never won anything in his life! Not even 4D! Or L4D. Really, everyone loves an underdog! And because really, you don't want to see him look like this.

Thanks Christine for the picture. I have no idea where you dug it up from but this is epic.

Vote for Amos, because he really deserves it.