My citizenship journey

[malcontent]

Update - 25th September :
I completed a 2 hours long "community sharing session" aka CSS on the 20th. They are held in CCs all over the island - you are eligible to attend the events within your area. They divided us up into 6 groups of approximately 10 people, give or take a few (I didn't count). After registration, there was a buffet style dinner.

They played a few videos which spoke about the experiences of various new citizens and their contributions to various community service initiatives.

There was a talk by a lady, a new citizen from the area who also spoke about her community service.

Then we went off into our break away group activity which basically involved us reflecting on our time in Singapore, who helped us to settle down and what we expected from the future in Singapore. They encouraged all members to share their thoughts - each group had a volunteer facilitator. From what I could tell they were Singaporeans who were born here.

Finally, each group had an interaction with volunteer "INC" members. Don't recall the exact full form - something to do with integrating new citizens.

And that concluded the evening.

Note that they didn't specify dress code, so I turned up in a collarless t shirt, shorts and shoes. This is Singapore after all, right? They stopped me for a few minutes before they registered me - they had to check internally before they decided that there was no rule violation! Turns out that I was the only male dressed like that.

Also an observation on the demographics of the to be new citizens - looked overwhelmingly Malaysian Chinese, a few Malaysian Indians, a handful of PRCs, a sprinkling of Indians from India and maybe 1 or 2 Malays. This was in a group of approximately 60 people, give or take. The majority of people were at least over 35, with a handful in their 20s (those were folks who had studied here).

Thanks for sharing shoulder. I think my sis-in-law and her 3 boys will be in the next round. If you saw her, you might guess she is Malaysian Chinese, despite being Indonesian. Her 3 boys are actually Malaysian Chinese from the father’s side, but all were born here.

Singaporeans with Malaysian Chinese origin seem to dominate the landscape these days. Even people in my office who I thought were true blue Singaporeans often surprise me when they reveal their Malaysian Chinese parentage.

I am very curious, what did everyone expect from the future of Singapore?

[smoulder]

Mal, yep, MCs or former MCs are not easy to distinguish from their Singaporean counterparts. Not only for you and me, but also for some born and raised Singaporeans.

So the question was specifically on the lines of "what's your vision for Singapore 10 years from now and how would you contribute to it". Unfortunately, the room was way too noisy and people had their masks on so all I could pick up was the reply from the 20 something year old girl from China who works in Healthcare. And it was quite interesting too - she hoped that Singapore would not let Chinese dialects die. She had tried to look for people who could converse in dialects but she mentioned that the younger generation that she would normally meet, had already lost the ability to converse in dialects.

[malcontent]

Mal, yep, MCs or former MCs are not easy to distinguish from their Singaporean counterparts. Not only for you and me, but also for some born and raised Singaporeans.

So the question was specifically on the lines of "what's your vision for Singapore 10 years from now and how would you contribute to it". Unfortunately, the room was way too noisy and people had their masks on so all I could pick up was the reply from the 20 something year old girl from China who works in Healthcare. And it was quite interesting too - she hoped that Singapore would not let Chinese dialects die. She had tried to look for people who could converse in dialects but she mentioned that the younger generation that she would normally meet, had already lost the ability to converse in dialects.

That’s interesting, and I tend to agree. I certainly picked up some choice dialect words and phrases when I first arrived, but it’s almost become extinct nowadays.

Even local-only stuff like “lo hei” has become mandarinized, even though “yusheng” doesn’t exist in China (a fact that even locals are sometimes surprised to learn). When I order Yu Char Kway, people nowadays will even “correct me” with the mandarin Youtiao. Ugh!

[MOCHS]

^ Erm, isn’t it “you char kway” in dialect, not “yu” aka fish. I assume some stallholders aren’t local and probably from PRC so they don’t understand dialect either. We have that “Speak Mandarin only on TV” policy to thank for the youngsters not being able to converse in dialect. You can still find dialects spoken in older estates and coffeeshops.

Anyway, the dialects spoken here will also be slightly different than the ones spoken in China too. Like bread has been given the local term “lor ti” but it’s actually called “mi bao” in dialect back in China. Quite a lot of dialect terms here are borrowed from Malay/Indian words.

And due to the cultural revolution, the practice of burning incense sticks/paper is no longer widespread in China. Some “traditional” practices still exist in SEA but don’t happen in China anymore. Even religion isn’t common, my ex-PRC turned SC colleague said their textbooks even states “there is no god”.

[smoulder]

MOCHS, it's true that the dialects spoken here are different from China. I was told that there is even a difference between Penang Hokkien and Singapore Hokkien, even though this was all Malaya not too long ago. Similarly, my wife speaks Cantonese, but tells me that the way they speak it is different from say Hong Kong. However, I suppose, no dialect vs some dialect are 2 very different things.

Speaking about other cultural aspects being different from China, I guess it has partially to do with geography as you alluded to. The other influence, specifically for China (for instance "there is no God") has to do with the communist party in China doctoring culture the way they saw fit.

If I'm not wrong, they have a similar speak Mandarin only policy in China which attempts to eventually replace not only dialects but also entire languages (example, Tibetan) and standardize to Mandarin. However, due to the sheer size of China, dialects still survive in the smaller towns and rural areas. In Singapore, on the other hand, it's so small that I think that eventually dialects will be choked out.

[malcontent]

^ Erm, isn’t it “you char kway” in dialect, not “yu” aka fish. I assume some stallholders aren’t local and probably from PRC so they don’t understand dialect either. We have that “Speak Mandarin only on TV” policy to thank for the youngsters not being able to converse in dialect. You can still find dialects spoken in older estates and coffeeshops.

Anyway, the dialects spoken here will also be slightly different than the ones spoken in China too. Like bread has been given the local term “lor ti” but it’s actually called “mi bao” in dialect back in China. Quite a lot of dialect terms here are borrowed from Malay/Indian words.

And due to the cultural revolution, the practice of burning incense sticks/paper is no longer widespread in China. Some “traditional” practices still exist in SEA but don’t happen in China anymore. Even religion isn’t common, my ex-PRC turned SC colleague said their textbooks even states “there is no god”.

I’ve only ever spoken it, never written it, so you’ll have to excuse my pinyin.

Funny enough, I have a Hokkien Chinoy friend who tells me that his Hokkien (the dialect spoken in the Philippines) is the original one, even more original than the Hokkien spoken in Singapore, Taiwan or Fujian. I can’t help but laugh when he says this… but he sure believes with fervent Filipino passion. I don’t know enough to say whether he is right or wrong.

Many countries have a patois or rojak tongue that has evolved much the same way as in Singapore, but the difference is that is usually accepted and embraced — it is who they are, think of a country like Jamaica that is proudly distinctive. Here it’s seen as almost a lower caste, which is a real shame.

As a practical matter, there are advantages to switching to mandarin, but you definitely lose something too. One of my ex-bosses was married to a Beijing lady and he could speak mandarin well, but with a strong Beijing accent. When he ordered “ta hue” here he would say “tofu-nar” with a really sharp and funny tonality. Again, I probably slaughtered the spelling. But the point is, the mandarin spoken here is often not what is spoken in China anyway.

[MOCHS]

^ No worries about the pinyin. My dialect teacher said that dialects have formal and informal tones too, we are mostly speaking with informal. Formal tone is almost poetic and no one uses it…

[jalanjalan]

Update - 25th September :
I completed a 2 hours long "community sharing session" aka CSS on the 20th. They are held in CCs all over the island - you are eligible to attend the events within your area. They divided us up into 6 groups of approximately 10 people, give or take a few (I didn't count). After registration, there was a buffet style dinner.

thanks for sharing that! I was hoping they'd have this part for my batch but no luck, thanks to omicron. True blue Singaporean question: what did they serve for the buffet?

[smoulder]

Update - 25th September :
I completed a 2 hours long "community sharing session" aka CSS on the 20th. They are held in CCs all over the island - you are eligible to attend the events within your area. They divided us up into 6 groups of approximately 10 people, give or take a few (I didn't count). After registration, there was a buffet style dinner.

thanks for sharing that! I was hoping they'd have this part for my batch but no luck, thanks to omicron. True blue Singaporean question: what did they serve for the buffet?

Hahaha. Good question. There were quite a few things on the list and I didn't try them all. What I did try - biryani rice, curry chicken, otah, brocolli /mushroom /fungus, fish fillet. And dessert was cincau.

[MOCHS]

^ Did they serve the ubiquitous fruit punch for the beverage too? Or coffee/tea?

[smoulder]

^ Did they serve the ubiquitous fruit punch for the beverage too? Or coffee/tea?

LOL. Yes I missed that one. Fruit punch. Don't recall tea /coffee.

[gold.spot]

Ahhh looks like they switched the community sharing sessions back to f2f meetings. Mine was only a few months back but it was an essay writing session online.

[jalanjalan]

Ahhh looks like they switched the community sharing sessions back to f2f meetings. Mine was only a few months back but it was an essay writing session online.

Same. It's a pity as I was curious to meet my fellow new citizens.
I wonder what they will do with all our essays...

[jalanjalan]

Hahaha. Good question. There were quite a few things on the list and I didn't try them all. What I did try - biryani rice, curry chicken, otah, brocolli /mushroom /fungus, fish fillet. And dessert was cincau.

Nice. Sounds like a decent spread, and the best way to welcome new citizens is to feed them.
(I don't mind that mystery fruit punch, though it's basically just liquid sugar)

[smoulder]

Ahhh looks like they switched the community sharing sessions back to f2f meetings. Mine was only a few months back but it was an essay writing session online.

Same. It's a pity as I was curious to meet my fellow new citizens.
I wonder what they will do with all our essays...

I'm sure SMS will have an interesting theory. It would be quite interesting if they actually take in some of the feedback.