Stepping into my fourth year living in Singapore, I can barely explain how life is going on here. Fortunately, that doesn’t keep me from trying to summarize the three-year impression I’ve gained into the following trivias. These are deduced, observed, and written from daily situation I often encounter. The lists are not exhaustive. I’ll try to add few more thing in the upcoming year.

DISCLAIMER: They might not always be true, as you may not have seen or experience the things I wrote, or you may think that some of them are just simply random; no generalization can be made from them. Well, if that’s what you think, I’ll never intend to limit or interfere with your rights (if any) to express your thought. Everyone entitles to their own opinion (though I’m not quite sure that such phrase even exists here).

Here we go.

1. Polite gestures and manners toward strangers are only observed when the subject is about to do two things: Handing over his/her business card AND returning your credit card after transaction.

PROOF:

If any of the following has happened or been seen or experienced by you, then the above trivia doesn’t apply for you.

• Taxi driver helping you load and unload your big and heavy luggages at your starting and destination point without involving some minor clash while you ask them to.
• Sales representatives letting you go on your own when you want to browse in their shop; no questions, helps, or suspicions are offered.
• Customer service staffs are actually offering you the help you needed, without having to: (1) produce your warranty card, membership card, proof of purchase, or any other silly documents which left you speechless if you forget where you keep it; (2) argue in different ways, which are basically nonsense since you ARE the customer, and they were hired to serve you; (3) pay more than what you expect to afford just to get a service.
• You are being confronted directly by an authorities or someone who feels uncomfortable with your behavior, without giving the reason that if you don’t improve or change your behavior, you are either getting FINED, EXPELLED, or any other severe punishments which include the following terms: LAW, REGULATION or POLICIES. (If you find it difficult to grasp the meaning of this example, let’s just simplify it into something like this: Those who confront you because of your behavior are threatening you with their own capabilities, without mentioning anything related to Government, Officials and other authorities)

2. All lies, hidden facts, small unreadable prints that you’ve heard about the ads are actually true in some ways, and it is SO crystal clear that we couldn’t afford not to think “do they think we’re that dumb enough to believe in those cheesy and lying ads?”

PROOF:

Again, if any of the following has happened or been seen or experienced by you, then the above trivia doesn’t apply for you.

• Taste of the food at the public food court or makan place is actually BETTER or similar to what’s being advertised.
• The panorama of some natural tourism resorts is way more beautiful and looks as interesting as those on the ads.
• All the discounts broadcasted by some shopping centers through TV, radio and magazine are talking about the actual discounts (no terms and conditions applied).
• Your mobile phone provider gives you benefit not to worry whether you should make a call, receive a call, send an SMS, apply for ID caller, etc.

3. We are somehow journalistically close to the Hollywood, or United States in general.

PROOF:

Again, if any of the following has happened or been seen or experienced by you, then the above trivia doesn’t apply for you

• Reading an English entertainment or popular-culture related magazine whose more than half of its pages talk about local or Asian celebrities.
• Listening to English radio station which plays non-English songs played by local or regional artists.
• All the brouhaha resulting from Beckham’s transfer to LA Galaxy, Paris Hilton’s jail sentence, or even the breakups of the Hollywood It couples are not as much significant as the coronation of the new Indonesian Idol, Siti Nurhaliza’s extravagant wedding ceremony, or the launch of the new movie by Shahrukh Khan.