i knew a storeman during my NS days, recent immigrant from
PRC, poor bugger barely knew his ABCs, got bullied left right
centre of course .... but fact remains ... how did he got his PR in
the first place ? ....
what some in preceeding replies said is correct .... lots of
immigrants treat Singapore as a stepping stone, a case of "didn't
get a fish, will settle for a shrimp" kind of thinking .... anyone
remember the case in the papers sometime ago when some PRC fellows
conned their fellow countrymen with a bogus agency promising
australian PR status ? ... what one woman said still stays with me
... "I would never have given up my Singaporean PR status if i had
know that this was a scam " (paraphrased) ...... but the underlying
fact is that these people, migrants from first world or third, are
economic migrants .... people who have placed their economic
well-being above any tugs of the heart-strings they might have felt
about their motherland, so what do you expect ? .... that they'll
fight and die for singapore ? ..... if a better opportunity
presents itself to them, or the grass stops "growing" in singapore
... of course they'll scram from the place .....
having said that ... there will be a few who have decided to sink
their roots into singapore .... we musn't discount these people ...
our forefathers were immigrants themselves too, remember .... which
i why i felt a certain empathy towards that storeman .... and tried
to help him when i could .... serving NS shows he's willing to take
up a stake in the security of our country ...
and for those singaporeans thinking of quitting .... surprise ! ...
you realise that you too, would become economic migrants once you
run off to australia, US or whatever ..... believe me .... I'm
currently studying in Canada .... and my canadian friends here too,
have conversations similar to this thread here ... lots of them are
weary of the waves of economic refugees and immigrants that hit
Canada's shores every year ... taxing the society's infrastructure
and clustering among themselves .... creating ethnic ghettos .....
and feel more affinity towards their home countries than canada ?
... (during the tsunami crisis, the canadian indian community was
very vociferous in criticizing the canadian goverment's response to
the crisis ... how would we feel if say, recent malaysian
immigrants badger the goverment to help out with the haze situation
in malaysia right now ? ..... ) Canadians are generally nice and
politically correct ... so no one will publicly voice such things
out for fear of being labelled a racist ... (a common weapon of
certain groups of minorities over here .... i shall not mention
which ones .... scream racism everytime something doesn't go their
way ...) but when the beer flows in a pub and the tongues loosen up
.... this is how they feel about immigrants .....
bottomline ... no one, in any society, wants people who just
leaches off it .... be they native born or migrants ...(would be
quitters take note ! ... ) that is my stand too, with regards to
immigrants ..... come ! stay ! ... sink your roots here .... take
up a stake in our society ... make this your country ...... you're
more than welcome .....
but if you just treat Singapore as a transitory place ... then
kindly bugger off asap ........
