A red herring: my sex life

You know, I recently blogged about T-ara's new single 'Number 9' which is their comeback single after a difficult year - many of their fans have been deserting them because of the departure of two members Hwayoung and Areum amidst rumours of bullying going on within the group. Look, I am a huge T-ara fan, they are my favourite K-pop act of all time, but when I go onto some of the K-pop forums to try to find more information on T-ara, my heart just sinks with despair man. There are so many people talking about T-ara as if they know the group, like they were there and actually witnessed these incidents of bullying first hand.

Okay, there's no smoke without fire but in the world of manufactured K-pop where you put a group of singers together and subject them to a rigorous schedule of endless rehearsals, dance lessons, performances and live shows - the tension is bound to get to them at some stage and they are going to argue and fight amongst themselves. I'll be very surprised if that didn't happen - but all these things would happened in private, behind closed doors, in the dressing room rather than on stage in front of the audience or TV cameras.

Still, it doesn't stop some of the fans speculating about what could've happened in private and talking about it as if they were there and making up bullshit about T-ara. Well, T-ara is one of the biggest names in K-pop with huge hits like Roly Poly, Bo Peep Bo Peep and Sexy Love - but imagine my surprise when I found myself subjected to that same kind of speculation by people I don't even know. Good grief - as to why people in Singapore wanna talk about me, I'll never know. Compared to T-ara, I'm boring. Here's my Sunday for you. I woke up late, did a bit of vlogging, had lunch. Then I went to diving practice at Putney and then I bought sushi on the way home. My boss emailed me to look into something, so I decided to get it out of the way as soon as possible as I have a meeting on Monday morning. I have just finished doing what my bossed asked me to do and am blogging before having dinner. Whoopee. How bloody exciting, not.

A lot of people are asserting that I left Singapore because I am gay - now I think that's a complete red herring! Whether you are straight, bisexual or gay, all male Singaporeans will have to serve NS (declaring 302 doesn't get you out of NS). Whether you are straight, bi or gay, all male Singaporeans will still be subject to reservist obligations (I don't think declaring 302 gets you out of reservist obligations - correct me if I am wrong on that one). Whether you are straight, bi or gay, you still have to put up with the fact that the system in Singapore favours foreign talents who have no CPF or reservist obligations. Whether you are straight, bi or gay, you still have to fight your way onto the MRT in the morning as the population grows and grows towards that magic figure of 6.9 million.

Need I go on? Alvin Lim (who writes the blog Alvinology) is straight and heterosexual - he is married to his lovely wife Rachel. Yet he is the one who is complaining about the system on his blog, calling NS a form of modern day slavery (boy did he ruffle a few feathers last week). The fact is straight, heterosexual men in Singapore like Alvin Lim are subjected to the same crap that all male Singaporeans (straight, bisexual or gay) have to put up with. Plenty of straight Singaporeans men have responded to Alvin Lim's post and they are equally pissed off about the system - so it's not just gay men in Singapore who get a bad deal, straight male Singaporeans are frustrated as well. How's that for equality - both gay and straight male Singaporeans are pissed off about the system.

Let me move on to a ridiculous allegation that I had read on one of the forums (as ridiculous as some of the stories I have read about T-ara), it was alleged that I got into trouble with military law for section 377A related crimes - and that I am being "retributive". Allow me to first put on my English teacher hat and say that you have used the wrong word - "retributive" is not used like that. The word you're looking for is vengeful or spiteful.

In any case, what a ridiculous story. Nothing like that ever happened. How on earth would anyone do anything that stupid? Certainly my gay friends would never ever do anything like that! Really, this is the kind of bullshit that homophobic straight people would come up with. If I wanted to cook up a story like that, I would make it far more believable by claiming that he was caught having sex during guard duty in the guard house with another 302 or that he was caught sucking off some married officer (ooh or you could say that I got spit roasted in the officers' mess), you know something a lot more juicy and exciting rather than defaulting to the most cliche gay stereotype, duh. You wanna make up gay stories, at least do your gay research first you lazy idiots.

You wanna make up stories - at least make them believable. Duh.

Did I get into trouble as a result of my mistakes during my time in NS? Sure, but I would never ever become spiteful or vengeful (or "retributive", duh) as a result of that. Let me share with you an incident that did happened and how I blame myself rather than the system for that. This was way back in 1995 and this was just after I had finished BMT. I was chatting about food with a friend of mine in camp and we were talking about cooking salmon. Now this Hokkien peng who doesn't really speak English properly sat down with us and attempted to join the conversation. He pronounced the word salmon as "sell-mong" and I corrected him in a rather condescending manner. I can't remember exactly what I said but I think I smirked when I corrected him. Big mistake. He took offence, picked up this really thick book by the side of the table and then hit me on the face with that book pretty darn hard. Then he hit me again.

I then looked at him and said, "What's your problem?" And he tried hit me a third time but my friend intervened and stopped him. He then walked off in a huff and I was sitting there, holding my bleeding nose feeling rather sorry for myself. My friend then said to me, "He shouldn't have hit you but really, you deserved it. You brought it upon yourself - what were you thinking putting him down like that? So what if he said sell-mong fish? Couldn't you just let it go? You dumbass. Don't expect me to feel sorry for you."

Sell-mong fish

In hindsight, I would be the first to blame myself when I do stupid shit like that. I put my hands up - my bad, my fault, mea culpa - hindsight is 2020. I deserved to be hit in the face by that Hokkien peng, I provoked him, I asked for it My readers will know that I always advocate accepting responsibility when things go wrong - trying to blame others when you have clearly made a mistake is just such a wrong thing to do because it just turns you into a bitter, twisted, angry person desperately trying to be the victim. That's not me. When I fuck up, I accept that it is my fault and I learn from my mistakes - that way, you have the opportunity to analyze where you went wrong and become wiser as a result of the experience, hence never repeating the mistake again. The next time another soldier mangled an English word, I pretended not to hear it and never attempted to correct the mistake. Such is the nature of the SAF - you keep your head down and your mouth shut, that's how you stay out of trouble. Having been awarded a scholarship, all I wanted to do was to get through NS as peacefully as possible and avoid any kind of trouble. I had plenty at stake and I became very careful after that sell-mong fish incident.

So as for that allegation - no, that never ever happened. Like, anyone can anonymously claim that they served NS with me and come up with all kinds of bullshit stories, but the person who made that claim didn't even use his real name? Duh. You what that reminds me of? That crazy fat guy at the Yishun library who started shouting at the librarian claiming he was some kinda counter terrorist commando - oh yeah you know the guy I am talking about. Just because you say something over and over again and shout about it from the rooftops doesn't make it true. And as for the stupid shit (like that sell-mong ish incident), yeah I have accepted responsibility for what happened and have learnt my lesson. I am not spiteful, vengeful and am certainly not 'retributive'.

As for my sex life, let me share with you something else that happened not so long ago with my blog. When I found out that I am Eurasian after an analysis of my DNA last year, I attributed two things to my European DNA: my rather large nose and my (ahem) rather above average manhood size. I made a reference to the fact that I am pretty well hung on my blog sometime last year and boy oh boy, I had to quickly pull that post because I had angry people writing to me saying, "my teenage daughter reads your blog, how dare you blog about such filthy details about your big cock!" Geez, sorry okay let's just stick to talking about my big nose then and I won't mention what else is big...

So that was when I thought, okay let's keep personal details like that out of my blog - you don't wanna know what kind of porn I look at (even though I have talked about porn on my blog) or whom I have sex with or with how many people etc. I don't think my readers are really that interested in that - that's not what you came to my blog for! I enjoy blogging about issues that are interesting, such as travel, education, politics and learning foreign languages. My readers enjoy the way I share my knowledge and insight on these issues - they are not that interested in me per se as a subject and I'm happy to have a discussion about education or travel without making the conversation all about me. That has always been my formula for my blog and I am uncomfortable with the way it has become about me... Xiaxue is happy with her blog being about her, I am not.

My readers come to my blog for my insight, rather than for me.

In any case, I did write a piece about the level of acceptance for gays in Singapore vs other countries last year. The fact is I don't think things are so bad for gays in Singapore that they are all desperate to get out of Singapore! As I've said in the piece, gays need the same things as straight people in their everyday lives: they need a job, they need a place to live, they need to be able make enough money etc - and by that token, life isn't that bad for them in Singapore since section 377A isn't actively enforced (ie. there is no witch hunt for gay teachers, for example). Sure, there are many things that can be improved, but all you have to do is to compare the situation for gays across the border in Malaysia and you'll realize that Singaporean gays are actually much better off than their Malaysian counterparts.

My gay friends in Singapore are actually not that desperate to leave Singapore actually - their concerns are far more basic: they need financial stability, they want to make sure they make enough money to retire on, they want to be able to get on the property ladder - you get the idea. The bulk of their concerns are related to money, rather than gay rights or trying to change the system. The bottom line is this: money can solve the bulk of their problems in Singapore. Gay people in Singapore face the same problems that straight people do - these are bread and butter issues associated with money: should this be any surprise? Gay Singaporean men are far more likely to want to leave Singapore for practical reasons like avoid years and years of reservist obligations or getting on the property ladder rather than because of the lack of gay rights in Singapore. In any case, there are plenty of reasons for my gay Singaporean friends to want to stay there: friends, family, relationships, their jobs - many things do tie them to Singapore, so it is a fallacy to imagine that all gay Singaporeans actually want to migrate.

Besides, all of you have focused on just one half of the equation and totally ignored the other half! I actually really liked London - that is why I chose to make London my home. It is a beautiful and exciting city. Upon graduation, I managed to get a job in London which led to another job in London. Yes I have been very lucky in my career so far and I do not take that for granted. Put yourself in my shoes for a moment, "I have a good job in London, if I return to Singapore, I will be jobless and face an uncertain future. Should I stay in London where I have a good job or leave to return to Singapore where I may be unemployed or not find a job that is as good?" It's not easy to find an ideal job, once you have one you're happy with, you hold on to it!  That is why I am in London and not elsewhere, I have a good job here.

Heck, I have gay friends who are working in Dubai (where they have the death penalty for gays) - they are there for the money, not for the gay scene. They do keep a very low profile in Dubai and none of the locals know they are gay. Yes gay people do exist in even the most homophobic places in the world - after all, even gays have bills to pay and they're usually more interested in making money than going to the nearest gay club for a party. Even when a gay person moves from Singapore to a more gay-friendly country like Australia or Holland, guess what? He still has to get a job, pay the mortgage, pay the bills and do all those other everyday things that straight people do. The fact that he is in a more gay-friendly country is just icing on the cake really.

Gay or straight, we all need to pay the bills at the end of the day...

It's also ridiculous the way people are splitting hairs to say that "oh when he left Singapore we didn't have that many foreigners in Singapore, so he must have left because he's gay." Bullshit. I left because I found somewhere else better than Singapore and the fact that I hated the PAP all the way through the 80s and 90s made it easy for me to leave Singapore. Did you think that everyone in Singapore was completely happy with the PAP in the 1980s and 1990s? Dissatisfaction with the PAP is nothing new - heck, the PAP have always had their critics since the day they were formed. In the 1997 general elections in Singapore (held the year I left Singapore), the PAP won 65% of the popular vote - that's not much more than the 60.14% they won in the most recent elections. And like I said, I did realize that I was in the minority in my dislike for the PAP even back then, so I chose to leave rather than fight the system. So really, not that much has changed on that front since the 1990s

So there you go. As for the boh-liao people who are talking about me on those forums, Limpeh would like to invite you to come directly to my blog and come and talk to me here. Stop making up bullshit lies about me out there - if you have proof to back out any of those ridiculous stories you're posting, then bring it on. You idiots have no balls - all you can do it make up bullshit and post them anonymously, as if you have any credibility that way. Gosh, I am beginning to understand how Amit Patel felt earlier this year when Singaporeans were making up all kinds of bullshit about him online and he threatened them with legal action.

Blogging is not a popularity contest...

But no, Amit got angry and I am not allowing myself to get angry - I am choosing to use humour instead because the whole situation is ridiculous. The whole story this idiot cooked up is so dumb because it just defaults to the most cliche gay stereotypes, I give my readers far more credit than that. I know I attract a much more intelligent readership than most of those who inhabit the forums. You wanna have a serious debate about gay rights in Singapore, let's talk about it. But if you're going to resort to personal insults and slander, then me and my rather large COCK nose are just going to rise above all this childish crap.

Any comments etc - don't be shy, my large nose and I look forward to hearing from you.