And a confusion with he/she too.I notice when writing a good many Chinese use the past tense of a word when they should be using the present and vice-a-versa.
There is no tense in Chinese as in English other than a referral to now, then, the future. As with gender, it is simply "they".
Waay waay back when, before my time, the Singaporean school system was divided into Chinese education or English education where it was totally a two standard system (were there Malay schools and Indian schools too?? I don't know?). This may explain why some older people 60s onwards may struggle with English.
Those in their mid 50s and younger were all educated in a system similar to today's. I think quite a bit of the poor English/Singlish spoken is simply due to people speaking a mixture of languages as their everyday speech.