this was something I wanted to highlight on the eve of the event and even the evening after coming home from. The fact is, the organisers of Singapore Day or even the governing body who orchestrated this farcical event should really shoot themselves in the face. At the risk of sounding anti-Singaporean (friends of mine will laugh at the remark for adrock2xander and Singapore can’t co-exist), the Singaporen Government has not one iota of how tourism and Singapore ought to be marketed.

Friday night and good mates of mine told me in dismay when their application was rejected because ‘they weren’t Singaporeans.’

Saturday morning enroute to the event two other non-Singaporean friends rang me up and told me excitedly that they have some how managed to secure entry.

A flurry of exchange later, turns out the jingoistic government only allowed applicants who registered themselves as ‘Singaporeans’ entry into the event.

I called up my disappointed Australian friends (who were resigned to a day at home in front of the telly) and within a couple of hours we had a motley crew of pseudo-Singaporeans trying their darn best to drop the ‘lahs’ and the ‘lohs’ into every sentence they speak. Failing which, they could always pretend to be Singaporeans because fair-dinkum dinky-di red-blooded Aussies are second class people in the eyes of a chinese-chauvinist government.

Best afternoon they had. Good food and it’s all free.

The reputation of the Singapore Government has always preceded itself and they always outdid themselves in the Embarrassment Meter, but to ostracise non-Singaporeans and treat foreigners with such disdain and to think they’re such simpletons simply smacks of utter contempt for foreigners. Online-savvy foreigners who’re determined to be part of the day’s event would only have to re-register as Singaporeans to be allowed entry. Why the organisers/governing body allowed this racial-profiling is beyond me, but it doesn’t bode very well for a country whose latest claim to fame is an evening F1 Grand Prix.

Singapore = Looking good from the inside but an empty shell from the outside. Hypocrisy anyone?