Africa's Problems

Listening to: Phantom Planet's California

Am getting increasingly interested in Africa and its affairs. You should be too.

1. Let's get this clear - Africa is a continent, not a country :)

2. It's a continent with a total of 53 countries.

3. The poorest continent in the world - poorer than it was 25 years ago - despite receiving over one trillion dollars worth of aid since the 1960s.

4. South Africa is probably the richest country in the continent

5. Among the many causes of Africa's problems: corruption, poor governance, lousy policies, exploitation, internal conflict, diseases, brain drain, lack of education, lack of water..

6. US has been exporting its old PCs to African nations in an attempt to bridge the digital divide. But read about how this is actually detrimental to the environment. PCs and environmental problems? Find out how here.

7. Yet, I heard today that Ghana may have approached Andy Cole to be its coach as it has qualified for the World Cup 2006. But the Ghana Football Association has now denied this news... Can you imagine if it's really true? With poverty in the continent, they can afford to hire EPL players to be coaches?!

Fast Facts

Listening to: Eve 6's Here's To The Night

announcement: another practice session for paper 2 on 25/10 (Tues) @ 0740 - 1040 @ LT2. The task to be tackled? 2003 A level paper. Download the paper from litespeed if you want to go for the session. same thing, practice, then review session straight after.

this may seem so typical of someone who's in my line, but really, sat and sun's papers entertain and educate (not necessarily in that order) to no end. really. sharing some nuggets here, but go find out more by reading the stuff yourself yah?

fast facts i learnt over the weekend:

1. That we have a Tripartite Committee on Employability of Older Workers.
- Their job is to study ways to keep the older workers in the workforce. Found this out in the article abt ageism in ST on sat (you know what that is?)

2. That females are not just resorting to selling their eggs for money.
- That even young females in our society are selling sex for cash. Read in sun's ST abt how the "consumerism" trend in society is one of the factors blamed for such a phenomenon.

3. That an outright ban on smoking is not going to solve the problem.
- Apparently, they think that smokers listen more to the advice of doctors.

4. That the latest rule on pre-paid handphone cards are a bid against criminals and terrorists.
- Hmm.

5. And finally, liked that article questioning about whether freedom exists for academics here.
- At the end of the article, there wasn't still quite a clear answer....

Not MIA

Listening to: Eminem's Just Lose It

has it been a week since my last entry? have so many reasons...but too little time to list them all, one by one.

how's everyone doing? :)

btw, think i've been promising people answer schemes too indiscriminately, and being ms scatterbrain, i think i'll have problems fulfilling these promises, so could you kindly email me and let me know what you need? that way, i can keep track of what i've done or have not done.

if you haven't had time to read the papers, do read saturday's ST at least. Really.
'cos if you haven't, you wouldn't have realised that an expert has claimed that Singapore and Malaysia are not safe from earthquakes and tsunamis. not exactly comforting :(

also, did you read in last wed's paper abt how "poor" Singapore's poor really are?

thurs' sked: 0830-0930: wanxin* (with special permission), 0930-1000: john, 1000-1030: peiwen, 1030-1100: aarthi, 1100-1200: xiaohui, adelene, yongxiang, kevin

this is for all those people who still haven't gotten sick of Paper 2 Exercises.

Work Sucks, I Know

Listening to: Franz Ferdinand's Do You Want To

so many of you are now equipped with the skills to tackle the papers but lack the knowledge. that's why i've been emphasising these days about the continual need to read, research and question. so check out this informative and cool site: www.globalissues.org

facts of the day:
1. mr bush is currently being dogged by accusations of cronyism. rem what cronyism is?
2. China successfully launched their second manned space mission

Words Of The Day

Listening to: Darkness' I Believe In A Thing Called Love

grad ceremony came and went. so did all of you turn up? :)
thurs' sked for various members of s3a: 0900-1000, 1030-1130, 1130-1230

New question: Has the fuss over blogging in S'pore come to a rest? Me thinks it's only the beginning..

But read what the judge said when he decided to jail those fellas. I found some useful vocab words! :) read till the end to see these words.

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Section 4 of the Sedition Act makes it an offence to, among other things, promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of population here. The Act was last used in 1966 against two Socialist MPs, who accused the People's Action Party government of plotting to murder a political detainee. In his landmark ruling, Senior District Judge Richard Magnus explained why the Act was used, for the first time in nearly 40 years, in the case against Benjamin Koh Song Huat and Nicholas Lim Yew. Here are the key points of his ruling.

'WHILE an offence under section 4(1a) of the Sedition Act is rare, it is necessary for this court to make it clear that such an offence will be met, upon conviction, with a sentence of general deterrence.

Racial and religious hostility feeds on itself. This sentencing approach of general deterrence is because of three main reasons:

The section 4(1a) offence is mala per se (heinous in or of itself);

The especial sensitivity of racial and religious issues in our multicultural society, particularly given our history of the Maria Hertogh incident in the 1950s and the July and September 1964 race riots;

The current domestic and international security climate. The court will therefore be generally inclined towards a custodial sentence for such an offence.

Young Singaporeans, like the accused persons before this court, may have short memories that race and religion are sensitive issues. They must realise that callous and reckless remarks on racial or religious subjects have the potential to cause social disorder, in whatever medium or forum they are expressed. In this case, it is the medium of the Internet and with it, its ubiquitous reach.

The virtual reality of cyberspace is generally unrefereed. But one cannot hide behind the anonymity of cyberspace, as each of the accused has done, to pen diatribes against another race or religion.

The right to propagate an opinion on the Internet is not, and cannot be, an unfettered right. The right of one person's freedom of expression must always be balanced by the right of another's freedom from offence, and tampered by wider public interest considerations.

It is only appropriate social behaviour, independent of any legal duty, of every Singapore citizen and resident to respect the other races in view of our multiracial society.

Each individual living here, irrespective of his racial origin, owes it to himself and to the country to see that nothing is said or done which might incite the people and plunge the country into racial strife and violence. These are basic ground rules...the Sedition Act delineates this red line on the ground.

The two accused persons have crossed the red line by wantonly breaching these ground rules.

Having said that, the court notes that the offending acts by the accused persons were nipped early and contained. The accused took action to reduce the offensiveness of their acts.

On June 19, Benjamin Koh decided to issue an apology and removed the offending material from public access. Nicholas Lim tendered his written apology on Sept 25 and reiterated this apology this afternoon. These are mitigating factors.

Bloggers who still have similar offending remarks are well advised to remove them immediately.

The court however notes that the remarks posted by Benjamin Koh on his blog were particularly vile, to use the words of the learned Deputy Public Prosecutors. Paragraph 10 of the learned DPPs' submission on sentence said: 'He...spewed vulgarities at the Muslim Malay community, derided and mocked their customs and beliefs and profaned their religion. He even compared their religion to Satanism.'

His remarks provoked a widespread and virulent response. They sparked off more than 200 comments, some of which involved the slinging of racial slurs at Chinese and Malays. This is an aggravating factor.

In the case of Nicholas Lim, the learned DPPs say that his comments are less serious than those by Benjamin Koh. This is borne out by a comparison of the offending materials.

The quantum of sentence on each of the accused persons, therefore, varies according to their level of blameworthiness.

The court will not hesitate to impose appropriate salutary and stiffer sentences in future cases.'

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Words of the Day:

1. sedition: Conduct or language inciting rebellion against the authority of a state

2. callous: unfeeling

3. diatribes: bitter, abusive criticism

4. unfettered: not bound by restrictions

5. delineates: draws, traces, marks out

6. wantonly: unrestrained

7. vile: loathsome, disgusting

8. derided: insulted

9. profaned: violated

10. virulent: bitterly hostile or antagonistic

11. quantum: quantity, amount

12. salutary: remedial, designed to have an improvement

Another Paper 2 Exercise

Listening to: --- (sigh)

as announced today during the science gp lecture, there's a change to the dates and times of the practice sessions:

1. 18/10 (Tues) @ 1010-1310 @ LT1
2. 25/10 (Tues) @ 0740 - 1040 @ LT2

Here's another prelim 2005 paper 2 insert and answerbooklet.

tues' sked: 0830: wanxin, 0900: joanne, 0930: shumin, 1030: kaiwei

shout-out to the s3a guys who signed up for consultation on thurs. can you guys please let me know what are we going to go through? IF there are similar agendas, then let us combine some of the slots k?

Lazy Sunday

Listening to: Kimberley Locke's Eighth World Wonder

1. gp lectures this week - review on that practice paper u did last week. am almost done with marking and i must say, this is not a good paper. not going to give full blown opinions online, but hmm, i think exam papers can be better set. So don't fret abt the results, i blame this on the way some questions were set. yucky.

2. will put up more practice papers when i get back to my laptop in sch.

3. mon's sked: amanda (1030), 1200 -1310 (zhengyu, ho kong, leslie and zhen cong)

4. k, back to more sharing: have said before that Singapore is one interesting country. Definitely a melting pot - we are greedy at times, wanting all the world's finest ingredients in our pot and at the same time, wanting to retain that special flavour of ours.

read this description of Asian democracy and values in the papers that day and felt it was quite apt, so am sharing it here: strong and effective governance and soft-authoritarianism.

anyone knows what kind of figurative expression the term " soft-authoritarianism" belongs to? :)

A Graduation Without Graduates?

Listening to: Jann Arden's Insensitive

friday beckons. Cool.

fri's sked should read: melinda, xiaohui+adelene, yongxiang and peiwen (off the top of my head, forgot to take a good look at the schedule before i left today).

anyway, wanted to talk about the grad ceremony next wed. Today, it struck me that you guys might not be turning up at all. Hmm. Might? Who am I kidding, right? I mean, what's the draw of taking that prelim results slip, right? After all, to most of you, that piece of paper is rather non-consequential.

So i asked myeslf why in the world would you people turn up then?
Then i thought: "why does the school even bother to have a grad ceremony?"
Flashback to my college days: hmm..can't even rem whether i had a grad ceremony.

But walking around the staff room these days, and talking to fellow colleagues, i know for a fact that there are teachers out there putting in efforts to make the grad ceremony a memorable one.

i know some teachers who have prepared lil' presents, cards for their students.
Me: "What if these students don't turn up? Then what happens to these presents and cards?"

i know what's going through your mind: " ms chiew's just trying to make us feel guilty and *gasp* she's actually dishing out politically correct information!"

my response: you should know me better.

but i think it'd be a rather sad affair if the turn-out for the grad ceremony is a miserable one. sure, it isn't a bash, but at least, it's a symbol, a gesture from the college, from your tutors, and perhaps, the last chance for you to gather with your class and tutors, in a single space.

your call.
and i repeat, this is NOT propaganda.

Practice Sessions

Listening to: Keane's Bedshaped

Tomorrow's agenda: Mock Exam for the Science group tmrw during GP lecture.

Thurs' consultation sked: zhiwei and alyssa

One more thing: Some of you would be receiving sms-es (by tmrw) telling you that you'd have to attend two COMPULSORY Paper 2 Practice Sessions. These two-and-a-half hour sessions will include doing the paper and an hour review after.

Now, if you've not been informed by me via sms, and would like to attend these sessions, do download the practice papers via litespeed as the date approaches and just come along.

any questions, please clarify with me.

Details of the two sessions:

Date: 19 Oct (Wed)
Time: 1010 - 1240
Venue: LT2


Date: 26 Oct (Wed)
Time: 0740-1010
Venue: LT2

Writing's On The Wall

Listening to: ----

Was asked for samples of good essays from the prelims. take a look at these and once again, take these essays in a positive light. not meant to scare.

wed's schedule:
1000: Jinjie, 1030: Kelvin Low, 1100: deshun (guys, any luck you wanna combine? have a feeling i'd be repeating the same stuff to you three)

1200: jacqueline, 1230: gen and jiaying, 1430: wanxin

Listening to: Simple Plan's God Must Hate Me

The weather's kinda horrid these days.. i call it "flu-inducing" weather.. threatening to rain one minute and then scorching sunshine the next. Only way to beat this weather is water. Not that i'm now dishing out health advice (this is not a one-stop service) but do drink loads of that water. we all need it.

anyway, remember i spoke about how some clinics would pay for women to donate their eggs. Apparently, it's big business in India too. Check this out:

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Oct 3, 2005
Sale of human eggs is big business in India

MUMBAI - WHEN a 25-year-old professional woman in India was looking for a way to earn some money so she could travel, a friend came up with what sounded like a simple solution.

Ms Mumbai Harsha Singh, the name The Economic Times gave the woman, was told in-vitro fertilisation banks would pay good money for eggs from her ovaries.

'I was told about the risks involved, but the money was tempting,' she told the newspaper. 'So, I took a chance.'

Ms Singh is one of a growing number of young women in India willing to gamble on the risky business to make extra cash, even though it is still considered morally and socially wrong here, the newspaper says. Women also run a risk of some medical complications, such as infection or ovarian hyper-stimulation syndrome.

The reason is simple - there is a growing market for it.

Women from more than 70 countries have visited India in the past two years, paying up to 40,000 rupees (S$1,600) to receive an egg donation - far less than it would cost in their own countries. The price for such treatments ranges from 60,000 rupees to 80,000 rupees in India compared to about £40,000 (S$119,680) in Britain.

Mumbai's Jaslok Hospital alone registers around 1,000 new patients a year - up to 100 of them foreigners - for infertility treatment.

Doctors there say: 'Many patients have to depend on egg donors as part of their treatment.'

It is an industry that experts expect to grow by leaps and bounds now that the Indian Council of Medical Research has recommended standard practices for commercial egg donation.

These allow any woman in the country between the age of 21 and 33 to sell her eggs to a third party.

While the practice is outlawed in Western countries such as France and Britain, it is legal in the United States - but the cost is steep.

A human egg in the US costs US$5,000 (S$8,495) to US$6,000 compared to between 20,000 rupees and 40,000 rupees in India.

Also fuelling the growth of the business is the fact that demand far exceeds supply.

So far, it is mostly females from poor families - many of them barely out of their teens - who donate their eggs for money.

Dr Firuza Parikh, an infertility specialist based at Jaslok Hospital and a member of the panel that has been drawing up guidelines, noted that 'there is an opportunity for commercial exploitation'.

She said the group's guidelines will take aim on this: 'This will prevent exploitation of the egg donor and the egg recipient.'

But even the reasons for the growth in the number of women willing to donate their eggs are changing with the times.

Gynaecologist Duru Shah said: 'I can understand when a lady does it to feed her family, but the number of women doing it just to support their lifestyles is a disturbing trend.'

Listening to: Santana and Michelle Branch's I'm Feeling You

oct 4, tues' consultation slots:

0830: kairong, 0900: gwen, 0930: johnny, 1000: sok fong

Miss Fix-It

Listening to: Coldplay's Fix You

inspiring song. go check out the lyrics.

read sat's special? on the youths in singapore. thought it was a great place to get examples. interesting to see where youths are gaining ground in areas like the Arts (dance, photography, music)

got some feedback abt the essay outlines..here's what i want to say: These outlines did not come overnight. Some of them are products which only formed its shape in two days. So what i'm saying is this, it's virtually impossible to come up with these points in a space of one-and-a-half hours (yes, even for teachers, it IS difficult)

so while reading the outlines, you shouldn't be saying: "How in the world am I going to come up with all these in so short a time?! I'm DEAD!" (and then collapse by banging your head against the wall, or in defeat on your table)

Instead, you should be reading and saying: "Oh, I didn't know I could say that. Hmm...this is a good point, must remember it... "

the outlines are meant to help you increase your scope. not to scare you.
how useful a thing is depends on how you use it.
get it?