So you guys wanna talk about Limpeh? About me?

I noticed that some of you been talking about me on HWZ, I monitor the traffic coming to my blog. Listen, I blog and as a blogger, I talk about the events that happen in the news. I'd like to think that I am a good blogger because I am able to explain some issues to my readers by offering new and interesting perspectives. This was particularly true during the Charlie Hebdo massacre and the subsequent international reaction to it, when I was able to use my personal experience having lived and worked in France to explain French society to my readers who simply do not understand the context of French society. I don't know whether to be flattered by this attention or slightly disturbed by it.

There is a pretty big difference between someone like myself and someone like Xiaxue for example - for Xiaxue her blogs are pretty much about her wonderful world and her readers go to her blog because they are interested in what Xiaxue gets up to. For me, I may talk about myself once in a while when I do something interesting (for example, when I go on holiday and have an interesting experience) but otherwise, I don't pretend to be as fascinating or fun as Xiaxue - most of my daily routine is pretty boring and I would rather talk about the issues that do matter to my readers and talk about those issue with them. Here's the famous Ms Xiaxue on the warpath, doing what she is best at!

But since you guys wanna talk about me, allow me to respond to the questions that you have raised. Firstly, no I am not working in Singapore and have only worked in Singapore for a brief period of a couple of months way back in 2011. Things didn't work out for that company I had been working for at that time - they had a fund product which they were hoping to distribute in Singapore and the wider Asian market at that time. There was some technical problems with the product in 2012 and so they pulled back from Asia then and focused on the UK market. It was a shame but what can you do - when you work for a company, you are limited by what they need you for. I had a taste of what working in Singapore was like and I had a brilliant time there as an expat. The company provided accommodation downtown and at one stage, I was even within walking distance from Somerset MRT station and Takashimaya. That was when the company had deep pockets and would pay for all my expenses to live the luxury lifestyle of an expat and yeah, been there done that. I had a lot of fun working in Singapore then!

Nonetheless, I was itching to broaden my horizons and try my hand at other things in life and returning to the UK allowed me to do that. I know it sounds like a cliche but when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. When I had the chance to work in Singapore, I had fun there - I made the most of my time in Singapore. Now that I am back in the UK, I have had the chance to work with different people from Google France in Paris to RTL (one of Germany's biggest commercial radio and TV networks) in Cologne. I suppose I have been pretty lucky: as a self-employed person, I have had the uncanny talent of picking up lucrative contracts from different sources and it has been pretty fun the last few years. Do I want to return to Singapore? No, that is not on the card for now. That wasn't on the cards in 2011 - but when the opportunity came along, I gave it a go. The same way working for Google France or RTL was never on the cards, but when the opportunity came along, I always said yes. Such is the unpredictable, crazy nature of my life.

As for why I have called myself Limpeh and why this blog is named Limpeh is Foreign Talent, well firstly, Hokkien is my mother tongue. When I was a young child, my parents worked hard and my grandmother would often be the one who took care of me when my parents were at work. My dear grandmother spoke to me only in Hokkien and so that was the first language I became fluent in before I had begun formal education at primary school (at which point, English took over as my first language). I no longer have anyone in my life to speak Hokkien with and you see, as a polyglot who speaks many languages, I have often been asked what my first language is and what my mother tongue is. I'm one of the few people who can't speak his mother tongue fluently - my Hokkien is extremely rusty but hey, it is my mother tongue after all and I do feel an emotional connection with the Hokkien language.

As for the "Foreign Talent" or FT label, I am an international mongrel who has worked in so many countries as an expat. I am a foreign talent anywhere I go and I love the experience of working in another country, especially when plunged into a working environment where English is not the main language of communication. I love nothing more than being taken out of my comfort zone and challenged to learn new things. And even when I was working in Singapore in 2011, I was a British expat and treated as such despite the fact that I was in the country where I grew up. Go figure. Singaporeans often use the term FT in a rather derogatory way to mock the foreigners in their country, so by referring to myself as an FT, I doing it in the spirit of self-deprecation. Further more, the sentence Limpeh is FT is in Singlish, not standard English. In proper English, I would say, "I am a foreign talent" or "Limpeh is a foreign talent". But I have decided to go for the Singlish version because it is again a nod to my Ah Beng roots from Ang Mo Kio.

Moving on to the next point: someone said that I left for England after completing NS. That is not true. I actually left for France first before moving to England after my ORD. Small little technical detail, but I did enjoy both countries very much. And yes, I can confirm that I was a scholar at UCL - do have a look at their scholarship programmes, they are pretty generous to people who have the right grades. I was lucky enough to have had a teacher at my JC who knew all about these scholarship programmes - I was just a clueless teenager back in VJC and my teacher basically told me exactly what to do, what to apply for, how to apply for it etc. Who knows how things would have turned out for me if not for this very kind teacher who made such an effort to help me.

Moving on to the discussion of Ivan Heng: you guys are wrong in saying that gays can only get married since early 2014. Same-sex couples in the UK could get civil partnerships already back in 2005 when the Civil Partnership Act was passed in the UK. It was a compromise solution to get it through parliament because they didn't want to anger the religious groups who were going on and on about redefining marriage. So the compromise was the Civil Partnership - it is effectively a civil marriage, it does exactly everything a civil marriage does except it does not contain the word 'marriage' as to not piss off the religious people. However, some gay rights campaigners have felt that this compromise still gave too much ground to the religious groups and they have always campaigned for full gay marriage - which was eventually granted in 2014 March after years of campaigning. But really, it wasn't that significant a step since it was just calling a civil partnership a different name, so please people, let's all just get the facts right, please.

Ivan Heng got to meet the Queen at Buckingham Palace.

So Ivan Heng could have easily gotten himself a UK civil partnership anytime between 2005 and 2014 - he would simply have to refer to his husband as his civil partner instead, but in the eyes of the law, a civil partner has exactly the same rights as a spouse in a gay or straight marriage. As to whether or not he would continue to live in Singapore - who knows? That's up to Heng really, but I think a lot of that would depend primarily on where he thinks he can get most work and which city would best serve his career. He has built up a very impressive career as an actor and theatre director so far, so I would imagine that career development would be his primary concern. He is rich enough to live a comfortable life in both the UK and Singapore, so money wouldn't be a problem either way.

As for Siew Kum Hong's statement in the parliament about me, yeah I did get in touch with him because I felt, "finally, someone who has the balls to stand up in parliament to challenge the PAP." I must however, point out that Siew had summarized my achievements somewhat inaccurately. It wasn't just some crummy chapalang sports award, hell no. It was the National Colours sports award - here's how the system worked back in the 1990s. If you have represented your school and won a medal locally, you were entitled to a Zonal Colours award (it was divided into North, South, East, West zones, depending on where your school was). If you had represented your country nationally and won a medal for Singapore against other countries (or at least came close and achieved something pretty amazing like set a new national record in that competition), then you were entitled to a National Colours award. Now that was pretty much the highest honour you could bestow on a student for sports in those days: it wasn't just any ordinary "sports award".

And as for excellent academic results, I think he's barking up the wrong tree again. Yes I did very well as a student, I don't think that's my greatest strength. I have always talked about soft skills and how much more important they are in the real world compared to paper qualifications. Indeed, as an old man of 38 (going on 39 in 2015), whatever grades I may have had as a student has become totally irrelevant in my life and I rely far more on my soft skills to get my lucrative contracts these days. So perhaps Siew was slightly barking up the wrong tree in going on and on about my academic achievements, but then again, I was just a student when I left Singapore. I was so young then, I still had not had the chance to prove myself in the working world yet - so perhaps he was talking about me at the time I had left rather than talking about what I had achieved in my career as an adult. That's his choice - those were the facts he had chosen to present in parliament, but I stress I had no choice or influence in what Siew had chosen to say at that point. I merely gave him the facts and he picked the ones he liked for his speech.

As for Siew's words, " He had long decided to leave Singapore, as he did not see a viable future for himself in Singapore as a gay man." Well I must stress, those were his words, not mine. I don't deny that I am gay, I have always been very open about my sexuality on my blog and have blogged about matters pertaining to gay issues. Well technically speaking I am bisexual if you wanna split hairs about it and I am no saint either. I never claimed that I was - but this blog is not about my sex life and I don't think my readers are particularly interested in what kind of sex I have and with whom. Actually there are plenty of people who do blog about their sex lives, Alvivi were certainly not the first couple to put their sex lives online - there are plenty of exhibitionists who do that. But I digress, Yes I did not see a viable future for myself in Singapore - but my sexuality was just one part of a very complex equation. Unfortunately, as Siew was doing a speech on section 377A, he chose to focus on my sexuality rather than admit, "well, even if Alex was heterosexual, he would have left Singapore anyway cos he was so fed up with Singapore by then." And there was plenty for me to be pissed off with when it came to Singapore and it wasn't just the PAP whom I didn't like - there were so many other aspects of Singapoream culture and society that I hated and some of those had nothing to do with the PAP actually. 

I left Singapore to seek greener pastures far away.

So, believe me when I tell you that I was pretty clueless as a young person - I really didn't know what I wanted to do for a living, or had a clue what kind of career would have suited me - there wasn't really any element of career guidance for me back then. All I was taught was that if I studied hard, things would somehow turn out fine if I had good results. That was a very Singaporean mindset I'm afraid. I was clueless, I didn't have a clue what I was doing. Yes I knew I wanted to leave Singapore but I wasn't clear in my mind how I was going to do that or when I would finally be able to pull that off. There was an element of trial and error - I was figuring out what I wanted to do, what I didn't want to do by process of elimination over many years. I am still somewhat amazed that things kinda turned out okay thus far.

So perhaps Siew did go some way to portray me as a worthy talent and my departure from Singapore was somehow a huge loss (hence the justification to repeal section 377A), but I think the reality isn't quite that clear. I didn't go on to win the nobel prize or did I become super famous during my adult life - I am comfortably rich, I have a lot of fun, I have a good life in London but Singapore is not going to miss me just because I am gone. The fact that I left as a student meant I didn't leave a gaping hole in Singaporean society when I got on that plane at Changi Airport. My departure was no big deal at the end of the day if you were to look at my case - but perhaps if a whole generation of well-educated Singaporeans got so pissed off with life in Singapore that they all left, then collectively, as a cohort, that would have a far greater impact as it would constitute as a "brain drain": that's the bigger picture, a far bigger problem.

There has been a brain drain from Singapore.

If you were to look back at the videos of Siew's speech, you could see that he was rushing against the clock to finish his speech. Perhaps he was reading very quickly from his script, perhaps he was doing some impromptu editing on the spot, skipping paragraphs to try to rush to the end of his speech before his time was up. Either way, he should have made the connection that my departure was no big deal, but I represented a group of Singaporeans (gay and straight alike) who have decided that they were better off seeking greener pastures abroad and that they didn't like the kind of future that Singapore had to offer. By focusing too much on me, he missed the opportunity to make the more important point about the brain drain situation I'm afraid. Nobody was going to miss me when I left, not even my own parents for that matter. I'm hardly the ideal poster boy for your repeal section 377A campaign I'm afraid.

Looking back, I was a blur-as-sotong kid who didn't know what I was doing and I didn't plan ahead. When my JC teacher told me which university to go to and which scholarships to apply for. I just took the first scholarship that I was offered and it turned out to be UCL (one of the best universities in the UK). I then applied for many jobs in my last year at university and again, I took the first offer that came along (to be fair, it was a pretty good company) - I didn't even think about holding out for a better offer as I thought it was good enough. In that period of 1993 to 2000, I stumbled from one thing to another, often just saying yes to the first option that came along. That wasn't wise. I would recommend that you plan your futures with a lot more forethought please. The fact that I ended up in the UK was less of a well planned exit from Singapore and more of a happy coincidence of a sequence of events that I had somehow stumbled and fumbled through. Don't get me wrong, I would have left Singapore one way or another as an adult even if things didn't quite turn out the way they did today. I just wanted to be honest about the way I ended up in the UK!

I was a totally clueless teenager who didn't plan for his future.

Furthermore, I wanted to get away from my parents. I am going to be totally blunt here: I never ever got along with my parents, even as a child. My mother had so many medical and psychological problems that were undiagnosed and left untreated for many years - as a result, she was extremely abusive and used to beat the crap out of me when she felt frustrated. I have vivid memories of my mother doing things like smashing glassware over my head when I was about 6 and grabbing my sister my the head and smashing her head against the wall. In more enlightened times, my mother would have been diagnosed and given the help she needed, but no that was the 1970s and 1980s. I spent most of my childhood living in total fear of her unpredictable mood swings.

So what happened? Whenever she blew up, we cowered and suffered the ruthless, senseless beatings and my father would look the other way. We were then told that we deserved the beatings because we were naughty and bad children who made our parents angry. How's that for happy childhood memories, eh? If you have had a happy childhood, then I say, good for you. But I had a very miserable childhood and there was a part of me that just wanted to find work in somewhere far away like Europe, Africa or South America just so I could be as far away from my parents as possible as an adult because I wouldn't be able to just pretend that none of that abuse had ever happened as a child. We don't talk about it today, but I cannot pretend that everything is okay either - and that is why I use distance as a buffer, as an excuse not to have a relationship with my parents. Sorry if that sounds very harsh, but the damage is so beyond repair, there is no basis for any kind of relationship between me and my parents today.

I don't really have any kind of relationship with my parents anymore.

Now would it have suited Siew to have talked about my childhood? No, he wanted to present a very convincing story to parliament about why section 377A can drive talented young gay people away from Singapore. And in any case, to be fair, I didn't really talk about my childhood in detail with him - I may have mentioned in passing that I didn't have a happy childhood in Singapore, but I don't really talk about it much as I am not looking for sympathy (and I often doubt if people will really understand just what I went through). Besides, many people just assumed that because I was good at my studies and sports that somehow that meant automatically that I had a great childhood - that wasn't the case, quite the contrary. It was nothing short of a miracle that I didn't turn out to be a total teenage delinquent or emotional wreck given the home environment I had, really. I just want to move on with my life today and leave that all behind me. Heck, even if I turned out to be completely heterosexual, I would have still left Singapore after that kind of childhood. Section 377A wasn't the only factor that drove me from Singapore - it was a desperate desire to get away from my parents. There are usually a whole range of reasons why a person moves from one country to another - it is necessary to understand the complexity of this decision making process.

Don't get me wrong, I do applaud Siew for having the audacity to take on the PAP and debate section 377A in parliament and I am glad at least somebody had the guts to do so all those years ago. So many years have passed since and no one else has done what Siew did, so I am glad I was able to support him in what little way I could. Siew is a good man and I respect him. Am I, however, the perfect poster boy for the repeal section 377A campaign? No. I may have been a good student, a scholar and great at sports, but I am riddled with flaws in my life. I had a terribly messed up childhood and I am still so clueless about my career that I have in fact established myself in two very different industries (finance and media) because I still can't bloody decide what I want to do with my life. He may have oversold me somewhat to the parliament in his speech (and missed the point about the brain drain). That was years before I started blogging, but I am nonetheless very glad that I have this opportunity to use my blog to directly talk to you.

I chose to leave rather than take on the system.

As for the issue of gay sex, oh yeah you were waiting for me to talk about gay sex weren't you? Well, guess what? Anyone can have gay sex in Singapore, let's get real. Regardless of what section 377A says, what goes on behind closed doors in the privacy of your bedroom is nobody's business but your own. So yeah, the gays in Singapore are happily fucking away in the privacy of their own bedrooms and this piece of legislation isn't stopping them. However, having lived in Europe, I have seen how some societies are a lot more progressive than others - we're not just talking gay rights and laws concerning sex and sexuality here. We're talking about societies which are progressive - for example, whether they embrace the freedom of speech, whether they hold their politicians to account and whether women enjoy equal rights (or are repressed) and how other minorities from immigrants to the disabled are treated.

I prefer to talk about gay rights rather than gay sex: I don't want to spend my adult life living in a country where people think that the government is justified in criminalizing consensual adult gay couples having sex. I find that kind of bigotry unbearable, idiotic and disgusting. I didn't leave just so I could have a great sex life - it is not about the physical act of sex, it is about the values of the society I live in. I am disgusted with the way many Singaporeans are so homophobic and bigoted. Okay, not all Singaporeans are homophobic, I get that - the same way not all Europeans are gay friendly: but at least in the UK, we have so many gay rights law enshrined in our legislation to protect the rights of gays whilst in Singapore, gays get absolutely nothing but disdain from the government and society. By that token, that makes Singapore a backward, primitive and uncivilized country and no amount of wealth can compensate for the lack of freedom and equality in that country - thus I want no part of it. I could leave and I am glad I did. I feel sorry for those who hate the system in Singapore but are still stuck there, unable to leave but also unable to change anything.

Not all countries are equal - some are more civilized than others.

Perhaps it's the path of least resistance, but I don't want to pick a fight with Singaporeans who hate gays, who want to keep Singapore the way it is in the name of being a 'conservative' society. No, I have seen people from Demoncratic to Roy Ngerng take on the system and they have all failed one after another. I pick my battles, yes I think the PAP sucks and I totally hate them and yes I think many Singaporeans suck as well and I hate their guts but do I want to wage a war with them the way Roy Ngerng has? No thank you. I am just going to take my leave and find my place in a more enlightened, liberal, progressive society like the UK where the social values reflect my personal ethos. I may have been born in Singapore but I don't identify with Singapore, I don't like way things are in Singapore and thus it was far easier to make a new life for myself in the UK than to try to change Singapore. You can call it defeatist or realistic - I think I am just being pragmatic: life is too short to pick battles you can't win.

So that's it from me on this issue. Enough about me for now. So please, instead of talking about me on the forums, why not just come directly to Limpeh's blog and talk directly to me by leaving a comment below and I'll respond? So don't talk being my back, some and chat directly with Limpeh here, okay? Thank you very much for reading.