I know I'm on a blogging hiatus, but two things today irritated me so much I had to say something.  The first one is something I particularly wanted to raise because a) it actualizes an observation of mine that I've made privately for a long while now, and b) it doesn't seem as though anyone else is interested as a quick scan of my usual blogs and a Google search don't return anything related.  It has to do with this: "Foreign construction workers now can't rent HDB flats", screamed today's headlines - unless of course they are Malaysian.

Suddenly foreign workers (except Malaysians!) are not fit to live in the same space or breathe the same public air as us.  You know why?

"The board made the decision - believed to be in response to complaints about foreign workers living in HDB estates - known in a circular sent out to real estate agents on Tuesday. 

Mr Chris Koh, director of Dennis Wee Properties, said the decision to disallow foreign construction workers from living in public estates may have come about because of the disturbance that some of them create .

MP Ho Geok Choo, who looks after the Boon Lay ward where many foreign workers live, disclosed in a recent interview that she gets frequent complaints of the noise foreign workers make when they congregate , and the litter they leave behind in parks and gardens."

Ohh, because they cause 'disturbance'! 

Now, I sure wonder if we are talking about the same foreign workers I know about.  You know, the ones who build the roads we walk on, the buildings we live in, and the MRT tracks we travel? 'Cos I have never, ever witnessed a 'disturbance' by foreign workers.  I have never seen a quarrel, or a fist-fight, or heard them play loud music, or gamble in void decks.  You know, I wonder if these people who complained to MP Ho Geok Choo were mistaken.  Maybe when they heard a 'disturbance', they were really hearing the noise of a Malay wedding celebration or a Chinese funeral, or something.  Stuff that makes a lot of noise but we gladly put up with because we must be gracious to our fellow residents (only if they are worthy, and do not work in construction sites, of course).  Mahjong players, karaoke blasters, maybe those are the mysterious 'disturbances' people talk about but I have never seen.  As for the litter...maybe they mean the uncles who spit on sidewalks, and on the grass, and even in shopping malls? Or hmm...I know! The ashes from the burning of incense during the Hungry Ghost Festival!

Let's be honest lah.  This is nothing but a cheap excuse to excise foreign "low-class" workers from our easily-offended sensibilities.  The real reason why they are being prevented from living in public housing is because they are an affront to our Singaporean decencies.

Meanwhile, Indonesians can stay in our bungalows, talented expats can live in their executive condominums, and Malaysians, as we learn from today's groundbreaking news, can stay wherever the heck they want.

You know what we are turning into? A plural society.  Kinda like the ones that were formed all over Southeast Asia under the colonial masters of the past two centuries.  Immigrants coming in all over the place, but different communities living in the same country but never coming into interaction except for in the marketplace (as in, not pasar malam or wet market, but when we do business).  It used to be:

Colonialists

Foreign Talent (clerks, lawyers, bankers. etc.)

Locals

General Immigrants (Chinese coolies, Telugu labourers, etc.)

And now it's:

Foreign Talent

Locals

Construction workers

Aren't we supposed to be building a welcoming, cohesive society? Why exactly are we shunning the air breathed by construction workers? It is a bitter irony indeed to not be able to live in the very house you helped to build.  It reminds me in fact of the instance where maids were not allowed to swim in the swimming pools of private condominums.

It might possibly be a reasonable policy if there were some kind of severe housing shortage and citizens needed preferential treatment, but given the reasons behind it? Lame and discriminatory.  If you must, then have a preferential system, where if a citizen and a foreign worker applies to rent/buy a HDB flat, then we choose the citizen, much like how our HDB racial quota laws operate.  That makes sense, because public housing is built for the Singaporean populace after all.  But to ban them from living in our midst because they supposedly make mysterious noise I've never heard, is flimsy and disappointing.  I don't care how squeaky clean or fabulous their "dormitories" are either, in principle it is wrong.  Already they have travelled far from their own countries to work for us and earn a better living -- reasonable and human things to do.  So why are we treating them in such a high-handed manner?

Once again -- irritated! If we could look beyond the length of our own infuriating noses for a moment we would see how easy it is to, corny but true, live harmoniously with different races.  When I offer a simple smile to the domestic helper who hangs clothes out to dry one floor beneath me, or a 'thank you' to the construction worker currently renovating my HDB block who lays a path of boards for me to walk on instead of making me trudge through swamps of half-wet concrete, the gesture is returned and understanding passes between two human beings: an understanding of basic respect and gratitude between two people of different nationalities.  There is no inherent problem in letting foreign construction workers live in public housing that cannot be solved by a) an application system which prefers citizens, b) standard eviction/public nuisance laws, and c) a little neighbourliness.

The second thing which raised warning signals for me when I was surfing blogs to find out if anyone had raised comment on the housing policy was this: Singapore to tighten curbs on free speech.  For anyone who wondered what the voodoo 'light touch' Dr. Lee Boon Yang meant when he spoke about the Internet, I guess this helps. 

"Internet users could face punishment for defamation and making "statements that cause public mischief" or for "the wounding of racial feelings". Documents, including film or sound recordings, sent over the internet could be subject to criminal prosecution."

You know what this means? Well basically it means anything, as all sorts of naughty things can cause 'public mischief'.  Some things that come to mind - people who question ministerial salaries (uh oh...), Mr. Brown podcasts, and even this very entry, because I - gasp! - talked about different nationalities being treated differently in Singapore, and the various cultural practices of different races such as incense-burning, funerals and weddings, which potentially 'create disturbance'.

You know this by now -- I'm irritated.

Signing out from Pacific Coffee, Changi Airport, who has been my bulwark this past week in my A'Level preparation (thank you for letting me sprawl over your wonderful armchairs and mug away),