Where I Belong

Where I Belong

Out of the periphery of my room I hear familiar tunes sung in chorus, blasting from a television. My mind registers and recognizes each song that the crowd at the Padang is happily humming, screaming or more likely whispering along to. Occasionally the obligatory variation and mash-up invades on my half-complete memory of these songs, interrupting the record that I dust off every year in my head to remind myself of where I'm from. No, not my mother's womb, but the little red dot, the rojak of Southeast Asia, the socialist nation in disguise; Blink, and Singapore is already 45.

My nationalistic spirit lays dormant, deep down in my mind most of the year. Sure, the times when our table-tennis teams usurp China's comfortable recline on the worldwide throne or we are once again hailed as the most effecient economy of the world, that spirit gives a slight murmur, maybe a half-conscious smile, before rolling over and returning to its slumber.

While the TV continues a rhapsody of dramatic music to cue the entrance of our nation's finest in security and defence I am doing my patriotic part, making my way to the National Service portal which require the awkward utilisation of Internet Explorer. I deal with my inner geek and delve into the uncomfortably slow mode of exploring long enough to find my NSPortal password. It takes even longer following the outdated instructions to finally register my deferment for another year. All this while, my mind is focused on the arguable bleak future laid out for me in my blood - the male Singaporean I am is only a year away from the one of the world's few mandatory conscription programs. Despite the festive pride that should be raising our PSI to dangerously high levels rivlling what Indonesia can manage, my feelings are anything but. I restrain a sigh, reminding myself that a year and a half is peanuts to pay for the peace that our forefathers had cultivated for us. Peanuts, and not the Goh Chok Tong kind.

In my defence, I do feel certain feelings for dear Singapore. The Green City has been my safe abode for 17 years and counting. I have no complaints for the fact that our government has been dominated by the same party since its inception, neither do I mind the fact that chewing gum is frowned upon by the appropriate authorities. I find it hard to understand how people give in to the unnecessary urge to whine and exaggerate the teeniest bit of discontentment about how we now run the risk of being fined for $300 everytime rubbish ends up in the wrong place.

My version of common sense often steps in and reminds me what makes this nation great - I have been in the same room as a fellow Singaporean of another race, poking, stabbing and impaling fun at each others ethnicities with reckless abandon, each of us laughing at our own rumoured inadequacies. I am able to go to school each day without the fear that the next car passing the road might contain a hitman with a horrendous aim. It beauty of increasing ERP and COE prices never seem to occure to most, but I marvel at how our government is bringing us towards a greener community where we don't indulge selfishly in what limited amounts of energy our planet can provide in the short term.

So yes, I do, in my own warped and twisted way, have my own form of Singaporean pride somewhere. It lays dormant, deep down in my mind most of the year. But it makes its appearances when necessary, kindly acting as the aperture for my perception that points me to what matters. It reminds me that Singapore is where I belong.

After signing my allegiance to my country once again, I log off and move on to yet another Singaporean expectation. Focus, I told myself - You still have General Paper 2 to complete.