Wk 4 Blog Prompt

The recent news show a S4 student writing a letter to our MoE here. You can read her letter through here (YES SHE IS A GIRL!!!).

To a certain extent, I find some points raised are in fact true about education systems in Singapore. For example, she raised an issue about students not often taught to ask ‘Why?’ What she means is that why aren't children answered with questions of reasoning like "Why is the grass green?" or "Why is the sky blue?" In fact "Children are curious and inquisitive, asking their parents questions many parents themselves are not able to answer."

I realised in Singapore (since I'm Malaysian) competition is frequent among students. Parents always ask their children to do well in their studies without even learning the true stuff!!! It seems like the aim of learning for us students is only to get good grades rather than learning stuff we are suppose to learn. Or in general, our learning is a dead learning, meaning we only memorise stuff from textbooks and pour it all out during tests. In this modern world where creativeness is one of the most important factors of success, the education here seem to go off the right track.

Notice the language she uses. How does it reflect the girl's attitude? From what I see, she seems to have been unsatisfied by the education system for a long time. Although she is complaining in the letter, she minds her language and remains her manners while writing to the minister. Still from the tone I think she is still quite concerned about it and I can see how she wants this matter to be solved as soon as possible. Quite well-crafted, and the tone is appropriate too.

If I really were to write such letter I would just explain the current system and the desired system. Frankly speaking I have no opinions too. However, some important issues I would raise may include something like teachers blame students straight away without finding the truth, or like what the girl has raised about educating moral values, or maybe uncreative education. I would also give suggestions after raising these issues.

Week 3 Blog Prompt

Third random post...

In my opinion, I feel that money is important in a relationship to a certain extent. Money is of course needed to survive but it is not a factor that I look for in a relationship. I do not be with someone just because she is rich. I believe in true love. Being in a relationship with someone because of money is not love. It is love for the person’s money instead. I feel that this kind of relationship will not be a romantic one, and the love is a fake one. Loving someone is to be willing to go through hard times for that someone and you have a special affection for that someone. True couples should be working towards a blissful life and this is when they work hard to earn enough money to support a family. Money should not be a criteria for a relationship but something that couples work for. Sometimes there are cases whereby people use money to make someone they like but does not like him/her to go in a relationship with him/her. Will this kind of relationship last? I seriously think we should not play with other people’s feelings. If we do not like that person for who that person is, we should not start a relationship with that person just for money. I do think there is an upward trend of relationships and marriages valuing money over other qualities. Other than liking someone for money, there are also cases where couples lose interest in each other and continued to be together for the sake of money. People are getting more materialistic nowadays. They do not care about love anymore. All they want is to live well and love does not matter to them anymore. I really feel disappointed that love is being cast off and money is now the most important in life. Love is actually something very wonderful. It can change a person’s character. It can spark off a person to work even harder. Life without love is really boring and meaningless.

Week 2 Blog Prompt

A random post again...

"A country cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war."

- Albert Einstein

Indeed. In fact, even though war had ceased in most places, or seemed like that, war is always ongoing even for this second. Just matters that it now differs in purpose and its way compared from the past to now. It's obvious from Einstein's quote that war is still ongoing but because of present conditions we usually do not prepare for a war that many.

War has evolved, in general, a traditional war to a modern war. War has a very long history of up to thousands of years, yet many people are still fighting it. From traditionally using only simple tools and weapons to compete for food, to using troops of thousands to conquer land using basic weapons, eventually to guns and cannons and ships and aircrafts for war, and even nuclear weapons which could turn a huge area of metropolis to a pile of scrap heaps in just a short time!

From how in ancient China the famous Chinese generals like Yue Fei and Sun Tzu leading several troops consisting of tens of thousands of armies, winning battles and conquering lands, to the Civil Wars in America, to World War I and World War II, where the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki which raided thousands of people dying either directly from the bomb or the radiation aftereffect, to the recent death of the leader of Al-Qaeda, Osama Bin Laden, we know that war is always ongoing non-stop.

Although the ways of fighting a war is not the same throughout the years and that their purpose is not the same, war to me is just a fight, mostly an unnecessary fight between a huge number of people, that usually leads into bloodshed, and can be avoided at all costs. As what Albert Einstein had said, a country cannot possibly take too many wars at once, so why fight the unnecessary fight?

"As far as I'm concerned, war always means failure."

- Jacques Chirac

Book review - Merchant of Venice

I've read this book before school holidays, and it is a wonderful book. It features Antonio, the merchant of Venice, along with Bassanio, Gratiano, Salerio, Solanio, Lorenzo and more. There is also Shylock, a Jew who drives himself into hatred, and Portia, an heiress of Belmont who is also a wise maiden.

Ironically the main character is not Antonio, the merchant of Venice. Rather, it is Shylock, the Jewish money lender. While I think there is no way one would consider Shylock a nice fellow. I came away believing that he was more wronged than anyone in the play whom he harmed. He is presented as a nasty and greedy money lender. No doubt that portrait played well in a time of rampant anti-Semitism, but I came away with great sympathy for him. Even Antonio, the merchant, is just horrible in his judgment of Shylock, much more based on his race and religion than his money-lending practices.

The play is a mixture of romance, tragedy, mostly comedy, and has a happy ending. It also tells us, from Shylock and Antonio, that Christians then hold much prejudice towards the Jews. We also see romance between Lorenzo and Jessica, and Bassanio and Portia. The way of how Portia finds a suitable husband is seemingly interesting, and of which Portia already predicts her future husband, which is Bassanio.

The twist comes in when Shylock, having arrested Antonio, demanded a pound of flesh from Antonio's body rather than three thousand ducats. This trial, judged by the Duke, becomes very interesting when Portia, disguised as a lawyer defending Antonio, though pretending to agree with Shylock to cut off a pound of flesh near Antonio's bosom, suddenly says that no blood should be dripped while cutting the flesh, or Shylock will lose his fortune. In the end Shylock chose to pay instead.

The Merchant of Venice is a wonderful read. Touching, challenging, insightful and fascinating; just a delightful read.