The other day, I was passing by King Albert Park—KAP, for those of you Bukit Timah kids—and I saw that in its place now stood a shiny new condo. A place that bore so many memories for so many of us who lived, studied, and grew up near and along this road was demolished, and here in its place stood a soulless residential estate. I tried to remember what it looked like before. I remember the cashier counter, the first floor, the staircase up, the seating layout once you got up there. There were the good seats—the cushy sofa seats that looked into Cold Storage—and there were the normal, not so good seats. We always tried to get the good seats. I remember always going there after school to study with my friends, and doing more talking and distracting each other than actual studying; going downstairs to Cold Storage to buy sushi and snacks to eat while we tried to be productive. I remember learning more about my now-fiance over a Ben & Jerry’s Chubby Hubby. I remember decorating a Sara Lee pound cake with M&Ms, gummy candy, Nutella spread, and all sorts of sweet treats with my friends before we went to another one of our friends’ house to surprise her. So many memories were made in that building. I tried to remember what it looked like on the outside, the building’s façade, the drive-thru, the familiar golden arches, and I realized that I was already beginning to forget it.

Gone are the landmarks of our youth

I can’t remember what the old Heeren or Cineleisure looked like, even though I used to go to these places so frequently. I can’t remember what came before Ion, what the stretch of road looked like before 313. In Singapore, change in the norm. The old must make way for the new, the better, the shiny, and we Singaporeans understand this—that the thriving of our nation depends upon this. We need better malls, more homes, better physical infrastructure, and I appreciate that many of the changes we’ve seen in the Singapore landscape have been for our good; the MRT lines make getting around incredibly convenient, the malls make for a great shopping experience. For the most part, change has been for the best. But when we get rid of the old, we forget what was once there. With each structure we demolish, we rid with it the ghosts of our youth. We forget how we lived, what we used to do. We lose the reminders of our past, and for some of us, our youth. Maybe I’m the only one who’s bothered by this. Maybe I’m the only one who wishes some things could remain the same, and maybe I’m the only one who wants to hold on to the landmarks of my childhood. But maybe I am not, and with each major change to our landscape, maybe we Singaporeans feel a bit of loss and displacement we can’t quite articulate, even as we adapt to the new.

What is home?

Singapore is our home and home should feel warm and familiar—not just be productive and useful. I love Singapore. I think it’s a great place to live and there is not a day that goes by that I don’t feel fortunate for all the things we get to enjoy, living here. But I do wish that in the midst of change, as we continue to forge onward and upward, we still get to hold on to some of our favourite things—even if just for sentimental value. Surely, we don’t have to give up everything in order to be a world-class nation? <a href=" Image Credit

#thisis2016, even if there have been a fair few times this year where it’s felt pretty 20th century. Between Trump, Brexit and Kanye deciding he wasn’t content with being called Yeezy/Yeezus (he also needed to be known as Pablo) it does seem like the only silver lining of 2016 was that we got a brand new Harry Potter movie - thanks, J.K. Rowling. So, do we need to run through the series of unfortunate events that has been this year? I didn’t think so - the past 11 months have been a circus. That is, a circus ending with a pretty alarming wake up call. It was a year slated for shattering the highest and hardest of all glass ceilings, for affirming the female voice and recognising the boundless capacity of women in roles where white-male power has been so ingrained. And yet, in America one man convicted of sexual assault walks free after serving three months of his sentence while another holds the title of president elect. A little closer to home, Teenage Magazine publishes a piece, victim blaming. We hear echoes of the old (troubling) refrain "she was asking for it". The glass ceiling remains intact, and misogyny is alive and well. It’s also been the year of Western countries shutting their borders as refugees pour out of war-torn regions, surging police brutalities, of the Singapore government mandating race-reserved elections to introduce a semblance of equality (read: tokenism). #thisis2016 was developed as a rally cry for Asian-Americans, a way for them to call out and share the day to day racism they experienced. And with the year we’ve had, there are a couple more things we need to stand against.

“She was asking for it”

Ah, the final frontier of victim blaming. An old classic. In a perfect world, a sexual assault victim would be met with empathy instead of doubt, but somehow people take it upon themselves to judge the nature of the victim to see whether their claim to sympathy is valid. Was there drinking involved? How short was her skirt? Did she obey the endless set of rules women have to follow in order to have their humanity respected? This mindset is harmful for so many reasons, not only because it protects the perpetrator but because it reinforces the victim’s feelings of guilt. Society does not need to climb aboard the victim’s guilt-trip train, because chances are, she’s already there. And she shouldn’t be - she did nothing wrong. No one “asks for it”.

“Facebook news = the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth”

We are living in the post-truth era. Remember that meme telling you to apply for that job you want but have no experience for because if Trump did it, so can you? Not only is zero experience required, but in our post-Trump world, it means you can flat out lie in your interview too. Facts no longer matter - it’s erratic, deliberately misinformed tweets and Facebook fake news chaos for us all now! Case in point: that meme that 11,000 Americans voted for Harambe? It’s a lie. Even though we don’t have to navigate bi-partisan social media echo chambers, it’s on us to fact check the things we read online.

“Political correctness has gone too far”

Language matters - it can be used to incite and isolate, as well as to affirm. We’ve seen how words served to sever a country pretty deeply divided to begin with - words that were passed off as locker room talk, words so racially charged (any bad hombres up in here?). It’s not so hard to reimagine them in a different context. Foreign trash. PRC scum. Or, in an accidental slip of the tongue. You don’t even look Indian. You’re so pretty… for a [insert race here]. Words matter. They matter a lot. They draw a line between ourselves and the “other”, oftentimes without us realising. We all have our prejudices, and we need to safeguard against them - starting with our words (and you know, actions too). #thisis2016 and there are only 30 days left to it. If we're to rescue ourselves from the shambles this year has become, we've got some work to do. Top Image Credit: Bowdoin Asian Students Association

Falling in love is easy the first time. There are no qualms, no hesitation. You just dive in headfirst, blind to his flaws or the red flags screaming out at you. You have no insecurities, no fear of heartbreak, none of the mistrust that comes with ever having your heart broken. Love is a drug, and the first time you’ve had a taste of it, you wonder how you lived without it for so long--until the moment it all gets taken away from you. After your first heartbreak, you no longer see love with rose tinted glasses. Your once-broken heart is now forever tainted. The first time I met you, I was still bitter and I saw true love as nothing but a façade. I ignored you, I drank too much and I never laughed at any of your jokes. I closed off my heart, refusing to play the fool and fall a second time—I told myself I knew better this time. Maybe it was your resolute determination, maybe it was the way you reassured me when I had my doubts, but at some undeterminable point I began to trust you. I found it impossible to play it cool, your silly smile disarming me whenever I had a snarky reply to your cheeky pickup lines. Sometimes, I caught myself falling and it was terrifying. My first thought was to distance myself, to protect myself from getting hurt and disappointed again but sleeping next you felt like being in a cocoon of safety and warmth and I never wanted to leave. I wanted to bask in the warmth of your love that felt like the summer sun peeking out behind the clouds. The second time you fall in love, you are not blinded like the first time. I could see your flaws and I knew you were not perfect, but I chose to fall in love anyway. I could see the way your eyes shone when you spotted me from across the room, the way you hugged me protectively and kissed me goodnight on the forehead, the way you remembered everything I say, the way you took care of me when I was sick, the way you said you loved me despite my doubts about us. For the first time in a while, I have faith. A faith so strong it overcomes any fear I once had, because true love is not just passion. It also gives you the fear that the one you love will leave and disappoint you. But true love also gives you faith that your love is true and will overcome all obstacles against it.

“Are you angry?” <a href=" 12 year old boy approaches his mother with trepidation and hesitance – almost fearful. After all, he did get 229 when he told her he could get a 250. Maybe he should have kept expectations low. 220? 210? 200? But he did get all As. Surely she would be okay with that. Hoping to get some recognition of his effort- “You can forget about your Nintendo DS.” He gets none. This exchange tugs at the heart strings of ex-PSLE students across the island. Having faced the traumas of 10-year series (even 20-year series for the fanatic), panicking when we forgot to bring a 2B pencil for OAS shading, and getting back our excellent / horrendous / ok-lah results on Results Day, we have clearly “been-there-done-that”. We experienced the pressures of every Singaporean child during PSLE season, and wave it off as a coming of age ritual. However, secretly, deep down, we all hoped for change for the next batch of students. For tiny pinholes to penetrate the air-tight Singapore education system, to allow students some relief from suffocation. Earlier this year, the Ministry of Education finally recognized the need to shake the system and its cookie-cutter outputs. Announcing a PSLE revamp in 2021, this gave fresh hope to current students. For us past students, it gave us some hope that our future offspring might have greater freedom in exploring their interests instead of their “interests” in Mathematics- or even worse, Advanced Mathematics. Yet, policy changes must be accompanied by psychological shifts. Unfortunately, much of our societal mindset is still trapped in the past. You are only successful when you are a doctor, lawyer or engineer. What about Singaporean fashion designers with their labels on NYFW? You are only successful when you get straight As. What about breaking regional and world records in sports? You are only successful when you get a scholarship? What about an apprenticeship at the world’s best culinary school? Much of our Singapore identity is tied to grades, which is manifested early in the young Singaporeans’ life--The PSLE T-Score. Our fascination with grades stems from our fundamental roots as a meritocratic society, where people are rewarded based on merit and hard work. Yet, we have restricted the definition of merit to academic success, and failed to acknowledge the presence of other achievements. Consequently, examinations and any means of testing become the only means for us to prove our worth as a “successful Singaporean”, and failure to excel becomes equivalent to failure in society. We need to shake Singaporeans out of this distorted mindset. We need to assure our young ones that there are other routes to success- if you fall through the cracks, take another path and carve your own niche. We need to cultivate a spirit of excellence and not perfectionism amongst Singaporeans. Do the best you can, instead of comparing yourself to a perceived standard of success. We need to stop forcing square pegs into round holes. Embrace our children’s unique talents and nurture them. Yet, there is only so much that the government can do to provide opportunities for diversified education channels and reduce the emphasis on academic scores. It starts with the everyday Singaporean. A conscious effort to quell a “ITE? It’s The End” quip or “if you don’t study hard, next time you wash toilet” warning. A re-think of mercilessly cramming tuition, enrichment, extra-curricular classes into our children’s schedules. A united celebration when success is achieved in sports, arts and many other facets of society. Identity is not based on academic grades, and it is up to us to make this a reality for future generations. <a href=" Image Credit

You were once the world to me. We knew each other like the backs of our hands and spent nearly every waking moment together. There were days when being beside each other wasn’t enough, and there were days we got tired of each other—but the bottom line was always the same; we loved each other. At least, I hope we did.

You used to hold my hand every night and share with me all the ways you thought life was beautiful. You used to talk about how we would build a future together. We would stroll together, discuss the house we would live in, the children we would raise, the lifestyle we would lead, the home we would make. We would travel the world together and immerse ourselves in all the different cultures.

We were the couple everyone thought would stay together, forever.

And then one day it all vanished, leaving behind nothing but words left unsaid and the photos to prove that what we once shared was indeed real.

I was the one who let you go. I chose to give you up instead of work out our differences. You didn't want to walk away, but I made you. I cajoled and I begged and I was the one who pushed you away. I was the one who let you go, even as I doubted if there could ever be someone else who would love me the same.

When I watched you finally walk away, your back turned resolutely on me, I expected liberation; I expected relief to wash over me. At the very least, I expected guilt to come over me, guilt for not giving my all in fighting for us. But there was nothing of that sort. You simply crept away, into the dark of the night, and as quietly as you had entered. That day, you took something of mine with you. You took a part of me I knew only when I was with you.

With each day that passed since we agreed to go our separate ways, the void in me grew deeper. I wondered if it could ever be filled, and I asked myself time and again if I did the right thing. Can you ever truly let go of someone you still love?

Oftentimes, circumstances get the better of people and events play themselves out. We may have been lovers and best friends once who shared some of their best moments in life together, but all good things inevitably come to an end.

We started off as strangers, and we've come full circle—except now, we're strangers who know all of each other’s little secrets. There will come a day when we will look back on the times we shared together and be able to smile genuinely, but that day will not arrive quite so soon. It's a journey that only time can take care of.

In the meantime, it’s okay to dwell in the past every once in a while. It’s okay to reminisce the time you both burned that steak you tried to cook, the time you pieced together that impossibly huge jigsaw puzzle, the time you stayed up all night just revealing all your secrets to each other; the time you fell asleep on each others’ shoulders, how you tried to complete each others’ sentences, your miserable attempt at break dancing together.

With the passing of time, as with a million other inconsequential matters, the memories that were once vivid will gradually fade. The shared experiences will one day be relegated to the deep recesses of your mind, and you will be okay.

People tell you that healing is a long and arduous process, but one thing is for certain—it will happen. With the passage of time, even the most painful of memories fade away. When you’re finally able to sit yourself down and look at all your old photos without feeling that pang of regret or overwhelming sense of nostalgia, you know you’re getting there. I may have been the one who let you walk out of my life, but I think there are some people you love that you never really stop loving. You allow them to graduate from your life as a stranger, but you also remember how they have changed you and made you the person you are today.  So, this is how you let go of someone you love; you take them down from the pedestal and you allow yourself to forget, one shred of feeling at a time.   

I am a perfectionist. I am sad, I am frustrated, I am stressed out, and these days, I find it hard to find any kind of work rewarding. These days, I fight tiring, losing battles with myself in my head. In true perfectionist form, I try to appear like things are under control when inside, I believe I am not good enough in nearly every way. I am not clever enough, not creative enough, not capable enough. I don’t write well enough. I’m not growing fast enough. I suck at my job. You could grab someone off the street to take my place and he’d easily do a better job than me. Literally anyone else is better than me. What the f*ck am I good for. It’s depressing, being in my head. I look at other people and I wonder how it is they can take things so easily. Why can’t I be as happy, as free, as light as everyone else is? Oh my god, why can’t I just chill? Now, I’m well aware that this isn’t good for me. I tell myself I need healthier thoughts. I tell myself I need to get comfortable with the idea of making mistakes, that there is so much to be gained from making mistakes. I tell myself perfection is a lofty, lofty ideal that will only drive me crazy. And still, it is only a matter of time before I fall back into old ways, back into the cold arms of my punishing need for perfect.

The pursuit of perfection

Perfect sounds wonderful. We talk about the perfect life, the perfect home, the perfect family. Perfect sounds perfect. Perfect sounds like the ultimate goal to aspire towards, the gold standard—but it isn’t. What I’ve realized is perfection is a curse in blessing’s clothing. It’s not a reasonable goal. It should not be the gold standard. What it is, instead, is a path towards self-destruction. See, perfectionists are their worst critics. Before you tell them their work could be better, they’ve already told it to themselves, in much harsher ways. Perfectionists are well-acquainted with the words “stupid”, “useless”, “dumb”—they regularly use them on themselves; they feel these things every day. The thing about perfectionism is we set ourselves up to fail at every turn with our excessive standards, and by these standards, we diminish ourselves every day. In my experience, the longer I’ve worked, the harder I’ve strived for perfection, the more incapable it’s left me feeling. Things that started out fun, things that I started with love become ruined once touched by my toxic perfection. At its root, perfectionism is about fear. Perfectionism is what happens when you’re deathly afraid to fail, when you’re terrified of criticism. Perfectionism is when you strive for excellence not because we want to, but because you simply can’t not. We can’t fail because it’ll reflect on who we are, on what we are capable of. We can’t fail because in our minds, we are only as valued or as worthy as we are successful. Beyond the practical things that are at stake, like our job or our reputation with our higher ups, our sense of self-worth hangs in the balance.

F*ck perfect

I’m a perfectionist, and maybe this is who I will be for a very, very long time. But I’m trying to teach myself a couple of things: First, that perfect is good but not necessary. Not everything has to be perfect. The occasional typo in an email is allowed. One slight misstep will not be the end of my career. I am allowed to produce sh*t work, if my best truly is sh*t. Sometimes, trying is enough—it's surely better than not trying at all. Second, trust yourself anyway. When perfectionism makes a home in your head, self-esteem is quickly kicked to the curb. And with an injured self-esteem, you can lose trust in yourself, even if you have good ideas, are a great problem solver, or actually have many valuable qualities to boast of. Many perfectionists are doing just fine in reality, and it only feels like things are going to sh*t in our clouded heads. Third, I’m teaching myself to not be defined by my work. Surely there is more to us than the work we do and how good we are at it? In life, we play so many roles: the child, the partner, the friend, the colleague. There are 101 ways to play those roles well, to be a truly valuable human being. So, I’m going to define a person’s worth my way, and I’m going to find a way to love myself, apart from the work I do and how successful I am at it. I am much more than how good a worker I am.

Now, in case you let this piece of news slip under your Trump-filled radar over the past couple of weeks, let me get you up to speed. On November the 8^th (the day of the US Presidential Election, no less), PM Lee announced amendments to the Constitution that would reserve the next Presidential Election in 2017 for Malay candidates. “Wait, what???” Yeah, while you were busy Trumping about, our government slipped underneath the hairpiece of America’s racist President-Elect, and dropped a racist election on us. Can I hear a yay for democracy?

Equality of Opportunity, and Equality of Outcome

What does it mean to be fair? In a meritocratic society like Singapore is supposed to be, equality and fairness mean providing equal opportunity, regardless of the outcome. It doesn’t matter if you’re a man or woman, Malay or Indian, everyone gets an equal chance, as long as those characteristics don’t impact one’s suitability for the position in question. That’s equality. Gaming the system to favour one race over others in an attempt to achieve some superficial semblance of equality through an underlying framework of inequality? That’s racism. That’s equality of outcome. Imagine if the Olympic Committee announced that the 100m Sprint finals at the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympic Games would be reserved for Asian sprinters, because we haven’t had an Asian Gold medallist in that event in the longest time. Imagine the controversy, the PR nightmare. “But that’s different!” Oh yes, of course, that’s the Olympics! We’re only talking about a country’s president here. No need for the same standards of fairness. That was sarcasm.

Social Progress and Race Neutrality

Malays do not need tokenistic hand-outs and special assistance from the government to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with their countrymen. Malays are every bit as capable of being president as any other race, because race shouldn’t factor into political discourse at all. A Chinese president should represent ALL races, not just the Chinese, and so should a Malay president. While the move to ensure a Malay president will help to present an image of racial harmony to the country and to the world, it will also sow the seeds of racial discord among the non-ignorant in Singapore. You can be president, if your skin colour is correct. Message received, loud and clear. If we don’t pursue our country’s race-neutral ideals of equality and meritocracy, how will we ever achieve true social progress? You don’t move forward by moving backwards in the name of “pragmatism”. Sure, expecting absolute racial equality might be idealistic for now, but fair and race-neutral elections shouldn’t be that much to ask for, even in our current political climate. <a href=" Image Credit

I love to travel. I’ve visited five continents and dozens of countries. I lived in the United States for about half a year. I’ve done all manner of crazy s*** in almost every type of place you can imagine. I’m telling you this right now just to give you an idea of where I’m coming from. I’m not a travelphobe who’s here to whinge and whine about why travelling sucks a bag of knobs. I’m a travel-phile who wants to tell you that it’s okay to not like travelling. It’s okay to be different from me, and all your friends trying to convince you that travel is the best thing ever. And I’m about to tell you why.

Superiority Complex

We all have that one friend. Yeah, you know the one. His/her Instagram is flooded with fancy shots of far-flung places no one ever goes to, and we-fies of himself with foreigners because “Singaporeans are boring”. He constantly brags about his endless travels in every way he can, from photo captions to travel blogs, and talks down to his less-travelled peers, constantly seeking to educate them or telling them to “get a life”. And don’t you dare call him a tourist, oh no sir; he’s a traveller! I’ll admit, I have on occasion had to remind myself not to be that guy. Because seriously, what an insufferable little twonk he is. Travelling is great. Against that I will offer no argument. But here’s the thing some “travellers” don’t get – it’s just a hobby. Sure, you can pursue a hobby as far as you’d like, making it almost a way of life, but at its core, it’s still just a hobby. I wholly reject the superiority complex that comes with travel, because being a traveller doesn’t make you any more superior to your peers than, say, being a stamp collector. You do what makes you happy, and let others do the same.

Bloated Rhetoric

Much of the hype and romanticizing of travel among young people comes from a culture of bloated rhetoric regarding the subject. “Travel broadens the mind.” “Travel makes you a better person.” “A ship is safe in its harbour, but that’s not what it was built for.” Calm down, Columbus. People aren’t ships. Travel broadens the mind? So does reading a good book. Once again, the acceptance and enforcement of this rhetoric in our culture about the wonders of travel boils down to the superiority complex held by its proponents. Travel is great, but it’s not the be all and end all of existence. Stop knocking everyone over the head with your self-important hyperbole.

Self-improvement

Speaking of being a better person, let’s do a little thought exercise. Who is the better person in this scenario?

• The rich college kid who spends his parents’ money on long backpacking trips abroad.
• The middle-class kid who spends his summer holidays holding down two part-time jobs to help provide for his family.

Trick question. The answer is neither. The goodness of a person’s being is an entirely subjective concept. Good for whom, exactly? We all see the world and its people through different, unique lenses. A good person to one may be a bad person to another. There is no definitive good, only subjective acceptance. The only person whose opinion of your goodness truly matters, is yourself. I know that sounds selfish, but let’s face it, you’re kind of stuck with you; if you don’t like yourself, you’re pretty f-ed. Ergo, the quest for betterment of one’s being is truly and above all a personal one. In other words, only you can decide what makes you a better person.

Privilege

But let’s get back to the rich kid. Why do people keep pushing the traveller’s agenda? Earlier, I said travel’s bloated rhetoric boils down to a superiority complex. Distil that a little further, and I’d argue that the superiority complex comes from privilege. Historically, travel has always been for the elite. From Marco Polo to Magellan, Columbus to Drake, exploration of the world was inhibitively expensive, and reserved for the upper echelon of society. You can say that international travel is now much cheaper, but most of the world’s population still cannot afford it, making it still an activity of the wealthy. Therefore, travel is essentially a status symbol. It’s a way of saying, “I can go here, why can’t you?” I’m not saying travellers intentionally look down on their less-privileged peers, I’m saying that the privilege is so baked into the superiority complex of travel that it makes them do it by default. Don’t feel bad that you can’t afford to ride the Trans-Siberian railway or hike the mountains of the Norwegian fjords. Maybe you will someday. Maybe you don’t even want to.

Comfort

One very good reason people prefer staying home to travelling around the world is a very simple one – comfort. “Why should I squeeze into economy seats and dirty budget hostels when I can just stay home for a fraction of the price?” If you reject travel on the grounds of comfort, you’re not wrong! Comfort is the brain’s way of telling the body that it’s doing the right thing. While I can personally attest to the validity of propositions for the case of leaving one’s comfort zone, I think it’s necessary to recognize that there is no law of the land for whether comfort should be pursued or avoided. Again, only you can decide, regardless of what others tell you. So, go, see the world and experience its wonders. Or don’t. It’s your decision, and yours alone.

Many of us consider Singapore to be a relatively safe place. We don’t hear many stories about people getting sexually harassed, and rarely do we hear them told from the victims themselves. Yesterday, a question posted to Reddit Singapore asking “Women of /r/singapore, have you ever experienced sexual harassment?” sparked a flurry of responses from women detailing their experiences with sexual harassment, revealing that this may be more common in Singapore than we realize. 1. Many times. The one incident that happened on public transport when I was 16. Gotten on the MRT and noticed this guy who kept staring at me. I walked to the other side of the train and he followed. When the seat beside me cleared up, he sat down. He wasn't local, probably around late 20s - early 30s. After a few stops, he turns to me and asked in mandarin, "You want to come to my house and watch porn?". I noticed he was holding his phone and it was a naked girl on his display. Replied him loud enough for everyone to hear that if he asks me to watch porn with him again, I will report him for sexual harassment. He noped out of the MRT pretty quick. - saltides 2. Yes, plenty of times, but one particular incident stands out to me. A few years ago I was riding on a bus and some old hamsup ticko sat next to me. He struck up a conversation by asking me for the time and we continued making small talk about general things. The longer we talked, the more personal his questions got. He eventually started asking me where I lived, what school I went to, why I was going home this late at night (it was only 10pm, wtf). I deflected most of his questions by giving fake or really vague answers. I was getting super SKETCHED OUT and was planning to switch seats until he dropped this bomb on me: [Appraises me up and down] "For a small girl like you, you have really big boobs" I noped the fuck out of there at the next stop. - wandxrlust 3. (1) Not me, but my friends. Sec 1, they were just walking around those neighborhood shops when they notice a man following them around. They run into a toilet and hide in cubicle hoping to evade him. Several minutes pass and they don't hear anything so they go out. As they stood in front of the mirror and do as all 13 year old girls do (i.e selfies with Motorola razr), a cubicle door opens. Lo and behold, it's the creep. He approaches them while they stare into the reflection in the mirror. They were too scared to scream or run. He holds out his hand asking for some soap. One of myblonde friends (not making fun of blonde angmoh girls but my friend was like the stereotypical blonde air headed bimbo type) told him "You can press the soap machine and take yourself." He smiles at her and asks her to pass him some. Her, being dumb af, pumped some soap into her palm and pours it into his hands. That's when she notices that he has his dick in his other hand and was wanking off. They all notices it at the same time, scream and takes off running into a nearby LAN shop where a few ah bengs decide to help them out and hunt for the guy. Never found him. (2) I worked in a kitchen as part of my internship and had some ungodly hours to clock. One night, I took the last 857 bus home. If you know 857, you'd know the passengers. They're mostly Bangladeshi construction workers. It was a Sunday night and the entire bus was packed with construction workers. Not to be mean or anything, I am pretty tight with some construction workers around my housing area and regularly talk to them. Most of them are hardworking and nice, but then there's the 5% that just ruins everything. Pretty sure all 5% of the bad apples were in that bus that night. I had no seat and was squashed up in a corner. I felt a hand grazing my butt every time the bus jerked. Decided to give the guy the benefit of the doubt; maybe it was an accident. But when the bus hit a stop light and I found a hand on my ass... Oh boy. That ain't no accident. I turned around and glared into his eyes. Pretty sure I shot lasers that night. He got the message and left me alone. But I had another thing to survive - getting out of the bus. My stop was coming up next after a hellish hour on that bus. I was really far from the exit and had to squeeze through everyone. I was like… the only girl on that bus. And I could not count how many hands were on my body as I tried to exit. It was the scariest and most disgusting thing I’ve ever felt in my life. I went home to scrub myself after that. None of them were accidents. I looked into their faces as I exited and as I said "excuse me" and they were LAUGHING and smiling at me as they groped me. #FYOU - lunaelly 4. When I was in Sec 4, this senior of mine asked me to come down to his house so that I could collect some guidebooks from him. Slightly sketchy but his dog was super cute and I trusted him to not be a dick. Never was I so wrong. He threatened to rape me. I put on a false bravado and basically told him that I would fuck him over if he tried. Scarred for life afterwards, and still have a slight fear of all men to this day. - kat-xuan 5. (1) Man on the train kept brushing against my butt in a rocking motion while we were standing, it was morning rush but it wasn't that bad. Other people could stand behind each other with a good amount of space. I walked off whenever I could, but this has happened more than once. Men also like to use the crowded train as an excuse to brush against my boobs. (2) I was resting my arms on the armrests in a hair salon and the guy hairdresser who was meant to be a family friend kept pressing/moving his crotch against my arm and would stand necessarily close to cut my hair. I was about 16 or 17 at the time. I moved my arms, didn't say anything and waited for the nightmare to be over. Never let him cut my hair ever again. (3) I worked as a beer promoter when I was about 15-16? Can't name the brand, but it's a fairly popular brand here. Old men would constantly ask 'Little girl, come serve us ah' when I was only meant to promote it at a store. Constant wolf whistling. I was scared and soft spoken back then, so I didn't say anything. (4) Surrounded by guys who think it's okay to make rape jokes. One dude said to me, when we were alone, "I wish the purge would happen in Singapore. Then rape can be legal." I was horrified and I told him off but I'm pretty sure he still wants it to happen. (5) I was walking and this old man was walking in my direction. As he got nearer, he (looked to be about 60-70+ years old by the way) and and said "WOW!" really loud while ogling my tits while I speed walked. I was already about five steps before my brain processed what he had done. I was wearing a normal, fitted star wars shirt and this happened yesterday outside a MRT station. - moleskines 6. Friend says he needs to pee after drinking at Clarke quay. On his way home on the cab. Calls and asks if I can let him go up and pee cuz it's urgent and the cab ride is far away. I say ok. Comes up. Pees. Leaves bathroom. Starts getting touchy. Drag me to my bedroom. Mouth covered. Dunno why parents don't wake up. Starts forcibly kissing. I say no. But he was so drunk like, I think he wasn't responding. Drunk people are actually really strong. Vagina bleeds for the next few days. Dropped all the friends from that circle immediately. - hieveemonster 7. Working in F&B for a while now. My male colleagues kinda see me as a bro and they joke about sexual stuff. But sometimes they get a little too… Eh… Idk the exact words for what I am describing but these are what my male coworkers have said to me: "How big are your boobs?" "Do you like big dicks?" "You must be damn tight." "Wanna go out to drink? Let's get drunk and have a one night stand. I promise to make you scream." I usually shut them up with some sarcastic reply but it only works for a while. - lunaelly 8. Dude stalked me on the way home. When I got into the lift, he stopped the doors from closing and started to jerk off. I vividly remember that he has a very small member... I was 19 then, and a late bloomer, I panicked and screamed. He booked it. Then I threw my bag at him but missed. Some people came around because of the commotion and told me to go to the police. They weren't really kind, they made some sarcastic remarks too. Then I went to the police station nearby and waited for my mum and sis to come pick me up. - PrimAndProper69 9. My best friend once had a guy sit next to her on the bus, and just started to jerk off right next to her. Fuck, just last week some guy pretended to be a buyer on Carousell and kept sending her dick pics. - samleecx 10. Yes a couple of times. The scariest would have to be when I was 12. I was on the way home from school in my PE uniform (tee and shorts) and had fallen asleep on the bus. I was sitting on the inner seat closest to the window. I woke up to an old uncle stroking my thighs. I was too scared to make a big fuss, so after I tried getting him to stop once, I just got off a stop earlier. - strangerrocks 11. Fell asleep once on the bus, woke up to find the guy behind me had slid his hand between the seat and the bus wall and was stroking my waist. Another time on the MRT, this guy started easing his hand under the schoolbag on my lap and started stroking my thigh. - halfbakery 12. (1) A guy once stuck a piece of paper with his phone number in my bra when I bent over to pick something up. (2) When making a police report, the IO asked about the color of my bra/asked if I want to see ‘his gun’/told me to feel free to send him ‘photos’. - elmachosierra 13. When I was working, I had a particularly cheeko co-worker framing his lewd requests as jokes and asking me to let him "touch (my) boobs, just once" (should I mention, while pointing a knife at me, we work in a kitchen) or openly checking me out and intentionally making it known to me. - saydoubleokay <a href=" Image Credit

The one who cares more, who loves more, loses--or so they say. In love and life, there are many unspoken rules and preconceived notions. Many of them lead us to think that we would be at the losing end of a relationship should we let slip and show that we truly care. It is better to pretend to have a devil-may-care attitude than to be known as the one who loves more. The one who loves more would be in an extremely vulnerable position just waiting to get taken advantage of. He or she would be someone who gets walked all over, the one with no semblance of self-respect or dignity--or so they make it out to be. Often times though, the one who cares more, who loves more, are the real brave souls. They are the ones willing to put themselves out there, in the face of hurt and rejection, simply to express their truest emotions from the bottom of their hearts. They are unafraid to show that they love you, that they genuinely care for you, and this goes far beyond any pride or uncertainty that comes with being the one who loves more. Be the one who loves more, so there will be no games, no room for overthinking. You will begin to see the beauty of a relationship sans the games and hidden connotations. If you love someone, just show it. Wear your heart on your sleeve and flaunt it proudly. Why bother masking this beautiful phenomenon reminiscent of a life well-lived? When you are finally able to look past the stigma that accompanies being the one who loves more, you will see for yourself that it is a truly liberating revelation. You can accord your loved ones the attention they deserve, the care and concern you think they should have and nothing else would matter. Nothing else should matter. When pride takes a backseat, love takes the front seat. Put aside societal expectations, go ahead and be the one who laughs louder, cries harder and yells longer. Go ahead and be the one who says "good morning" first, the one who says "good night" last. Go ahead and be the one who eats the lesser share of the pie, the one who gives up the jacket under cold conditions. There is no shame in that. In fact, being the one who loves more speaks volumes about one's self-esteem. Embrace rejection. It is okay to experience rejection, to feel the pain of heartache if it comes along. They are part and parcel of life. These are what make you strong. They are the precise events that shape you into who you are and who you will eventually be. Take a step back, feel the full force of your emotions and show it bravely to the world. Be the one who loves more, that's okay too.