To be a Singaporean

There are always incidents/events in one's life, where things happen and that it reshapes the course of someone's life.

2002) I had suicidal thoughts.
2006) Met Samantha
2007) 3 months of BMT
2008) As a CBRD pioneer in 39th
2009) Customer service role in IRAS
2011) Ah Gong Passing
2013) Broke up with Adeline / Got together with Cat
2015) Lee Kuan Yew Passing

The above are the events that had shaped my life greatly. Of course there were smaller stuff along the way.

Unlike my esteemed friend, Samantha, I never got the chance to meet Mr Lee in person. Or maybe I was too young to be bothered even if I did. I always remembered my mum was a huge fan of him. She would snap up his books except the recent "hard truths" and that she always sings his praises.

So I read the book(hard truths) and came out impressed by the man. However, I do not feel anything except a "hey sir, u are cool". As time goes by, LKY became more of a character in history books to me. Maybe because he is no longer that active in politics and Goh Chok Tong was my era's PM.

Everywhere I hear adulations and praises about Singapore and LKY, wherever I travelled. Again, to me, I am like.. Oh it's nothing.. Your country is a lot better.

I still do respect the man, nonetheless. I always thought and felt that as long as Singapore politics remain stable and the party don't screw up the place, I am fine. Worse come to worse, I will migrate lo.

Now, yesterday, I got the news from cat about LKY passing. I felt the same despair and uncertainty of the future. It's the same feeling when Ah Gong passed away. We are on our own now. Once my parents generation, too faded into the night, we will be the stalwarts.

Now the nation last heckles have been unchained. The old guard are no more, nothing and no one will come from the past and say do this do that. Though it will be incredibly cool, if in some form LKY spring from the dead if Singapore is screwed up. I am just joking.

I felt an immense loss and uncertainty in me. More impactful then my Ah Gong Passing on me. Maybe because my Ah Gong represent a childhood and the fact that we do not communicate a lot. Like a heart to heart kind. So I can't truly say I know my Ah Gong. I remember I cried a few nights as I thought that now it has happened. Time is moving.

So, like any human, I try to salvage what ever information of the dead. To try to remember, to keep memories of him. I read countless articles of LKY, I read the tributes, I read the pasts, I watched videos of him giving speeches and I cried.
It's not really so much about loyalty to this country or not, like cat puts it. It's more of a realisation, a sense of gratitude for this man. This very man for his tenacity, his determination, his intellect that brought us to this day. I suddenly felt that I am extremely lucky, I am lucky I can read, I can have a lighted house at night, I can be wired to the internet and etc. All these is attributed to the Old Guard.

Never have I reacted so strongly to my country's history. Never have I ever fully emphasise with the racial riots and all like now. In the past, to me, they were the forgotten past. Yesterday, I could feel the emotions of the events. The energy of the people stem from one man.

For the first time in my life, and in the deepest pits of my soul.

"I am not a Chinese, I am a Singaporean"

There is a pride in me that swells up. In the end, in my case, no amount of propaganda and media could make me fully feel like a Singaporean. The national identity that LKY had so strongly fought for us to have. A country whose people with no common attributes to each other. In the end, his passing makes me feel special that as Singaporeans. My friends and I, we all have the same traits. All cut from the same cloth of that man. An unyielding tenacity, the will to survive, the ability to adapt and most importantly, to be a pragmatic idealist.