SINGAPORE--We were waiting for an underground train at an MRT station in the Serangoon area. Suddenly, my recurring cough irritated my throat, rattling my chest and I was about to expel phlegm. My son who works in a multinational company here restrained me, pointing to the overhead closed circuit TV camera.
Personnel of Singapore's Manpower services are nearby, ready to pounce on the would-be-phlegm thrower, hail him to court that will impose a fine of no less than $S500. Of course, after a quick legal process.
In this rules-based island state, the 6th wealthiest nation in the planet, the law is the law. Remember the Flor Contemplacion case? Death was her penalty for the killing of fellow Filipina Delia Maga. No amount of representation, nay, intervention from the Philippine government stopped the imposition of Singapore's death penalty.
What I did to my phlegm? Think about it and laugh to your heart's content. Shade of Lal Bahadur, the late former minister of India, who drank his urine on a daily basis. For health purposes, according to some medical journals. I don't see the benefit of phlegm as medicine for an ailment except that it indicates the presence of germs and virus that have invaded the human body.
Friends have asked me whether life in this expensive country is easy for its citizens and permanent residents (that include a big number of Filipinos).
I have seen old men--Chinese, Malays, Tamils, Indians, Indonesians--driving cabs and wiping tables and sweeping floors in restaurants.
I have seen old women--Chinese, Malays, Tamils, Indians, Indonesians--sweeping floors and taking away the plates and serving spoons from the eating tables in food courts. Sometimes, they look at me with their sad, sunken eyes and my heart is broken.
They have to keep with the rent and the high cost of living in Singapore, says one of of my sons, also working
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