JayCee wrote:leona123 wrote:JayCee wrote:Leona - why did you join a forum for foreigners in Singapore if you get so easily offended by people commenting on things that they don't like about Singapore? What did you expect to find here? It's not as though SMS was making vulgar comments such as Singapore sucks and the locals are idiots for speaking Singlish etc... he just commented on his dislike for it and you went off at the deep end, and you say you're a teacher too, let's hope the kids don't make you mad huh?
Jaycee, you are lazy because you have been taught to read but yet, you have not bothered to read the complete thread. I guess I would have to allow for your deficiencies. You are probably from a
developing country, after all. And yeah, I am using the condescending tone here.
How does this go down with you? Perhaps, you would like to look through the entire thread and see if the above comment sounds familiar to you.
And seems like you completely missed MY comment...
leona123 wrote:I have no issues with you disliking Singlish. However, I DO have issues with you coming to our country and demanding((in the guise of being concerned that Singaporeans aren't following the government's initiatives) that we speak English to please you.
. You also seem to have missed the point that I did not take an offense to AngelJoy disliking Singlish and I even agreed with his/her comment on page 2.
As for this board, I don't remember reading anywhere, "Foreigners may call Singaporeans lazy (simply because they don't talk proper English) but Singaporeans must shut-up."
Disclaimer: And Jaycee, no, I don't think you are lazy simply because you missed some issues on this thread.
Nah, I'm from the country that helped build your one, that one over in the English channel that gave you the basis for what you are today rather than ending up like Malaysia or Thailand. You are welcome.
You can try and highlight a couple of points where you lamely protest that you don't have a problem with people criticising the use of Singlish, but your overall posts and the tones you use suggests anything but. It's clear as day you cannot handle anyone else's opinion other than your own, like I said before I hope those kids know how to keep their mouths shut and don't upset you, for their own sakes.
I'm done with you, clearly you just like the sound of your own voice so go ahead, keep digging
Poor Leona123!!!
My! You do have a large field for combat here! I hope you won't feel bad with some of the arrogance and despicablly unacceptable racist upfronts. Worse, there're people poking fun at Singlish too, though they're quite happy to draw SG salary.
Well done to you! It's high time, an SG girl throw down the gauntlet. I agree Singlish's not very nice to listen to, but we've got to get used to it. It's as good as Franglais or AE except that it's influenced by the mother tongues of Southern China and the Malay languages.
You have every right to be in this forum as anyone else so Jaycee can try to build up Malaysia or Thailand - if they even welcome him - instead of boasting about how his country built up SG. He'stalking out of his hat and it's got a hole in it. I don't believe a word of that. We alll know who built up SG and we're not shouting it to deafen others.
Your English is good, better than some who post here too. You're a teacher and you've handled this abominable class quite well. Who would you put the Dunce hat on? Sorry, I understand that's not the SG way, pai si lei tapi nm sai kia soo, lah! Whatever, it is, don't stick to your principles because these guys are winding you up and having a good laf.
Poitervarain SMS. Nan unday chapirakiri , ask your trouble and strive for this translation.
Some main points I drew out you might like to feed back to your classes:-
1. SM LKY ( in gold) is not a lingocrat though there're some who'd like to categorise all Asians as dictators. Funny how they only attack those who are not and fear to go near the real tigers! Grrr! LKY would like S'poreans to speak good English, and I have met many who amazed me with their oral and written fluency; but obviously some of these expats only meet heartlanders whose "Pidgin" is classic and historic while they themselves speak Australian, SA can English, AE or Franglais. The Filipos speak Spanish English with Tagalog anyway.
2. Of course there're no rolling tongue Rs in all Chinese languages . hence the 'lent' for 'rent' . Linguistically, Chinese and Vietnamese are the furthest removed languages in terms of pronunciation, from English. Likewise Chinese is the most difficult language to master in the world. Structurally, it's simple, semantically, it's impossible for foreigners, even some Chinese like me. That's what accounts for the 'laziness' . Singlish is spoken in a non-inflectional grammar, like Chinese. But the French retains their inflection to a large degree so they'll say, 'The name of my father is," while you try to stifle a yawn.
When foreigners speak Mandarin, they get the tones wrong unless they're musical; they order 40 bowls of soup instead of 10 sweets - this is for Mandarin speakers only. LKY knows this as he's proficient in Mandarin or was it his dear wife who's the bilingual one?
3. Language evolve organically and cannot be forced. There's a point about 'laziness' SMS made regarding the learning of another language. One might begin to think Singlish speakers are lazy, but it's more than that. S'poreans need to be assured that speaking the standard RP
( Received Pronunciation of the BBC) is about attaining international standard rather than imitating another language that's not theirs. I guess I can say this as I'm British and have lived in Europe - language is usually defined by the domains one's in.
But SMS is huffin' and puffin' to see if his bait works on you like the big bad wolf in Little Red Dottyhood. What's he bin reading in the ST in the last few days that's wound him up good?
To cut it short, as I'm not going to spend all my lovely evening writing a linguistic dissertation, Don't let any of the rude comments worry you. English is spoken very differently within Britain - there's a huge linguistic repertoire in the country and Singlish is one of the distant ones.
Some local English is " Spokin so good, you 'alf 'eard wot dey sai, ya, so ain't it all 'alf h...h'ot' 'ere aye? I ain't brung dis 'ere yet, yesterdey - ain't it a sarny, all butt'er and wa'er, all opinion an no substance? No nuthin' ain't git nothink bu' pissin'. What's ya wid yer lot?"
As more and more Singaporeans marry inter-racially, the Government is having a hard time remaining profiling racists!
