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Table Tennis: Singapore's star paddler Li Jiawei retires
SINGAPORE: Table tennis star Li Jiawei has brought the curtains down to her competitive career.
Li, 31, has represented Singapore since 1996, including at four Olympic Games where she won a silver and bronze medal in the women's team event at the 2008 Beijing and 2012 London Games respectively.
The former world No 3 was also part of the team that pulled off a shock win over China to win the 2010 World Team Championship in Moscow.
"I am very grateful to the STTA and to Singapore for the opportunities they have given me and I hope to contribute back to the country in whatever I do in the future," said Li, who is currently 21st in the world rankings.
Also retiring is team-mate Sun Beibei, who was a reserve at the London Games.
The announcement was made by the Singapore Table Tennis Association at its headquarters in Toa Payoh on Thursday.
- TODAY/jc
By Low Lin Fhoong,
Ref:channelnewsasia
8 Things We Love About Singapore
(and 8 We Could Do Without)
After three years of living in Singapore, we feel pretty safe in our knowledge of how things work here. A lot has changed since we started calling Singapore "Home", changes in Singapore, and changes in ourselves. Many of our visitors come seeking some insight into what it's like to live in Singapore and why we choose to stay here. Thinking about our experiences here, we came up with 8 things that we love about Singapore. But just as easily, we came up with 8 things we could do without. Hopefully, both these perspectives can help shed some light on Singapore for you.
What We Love (in no particular order)
1. The Food. American cities like San Francisco and New York brag about having a melting pot of different cultures, and thus, a huge variety of restaurants. But Singapore, in our opinion, has them all beat. Because while Southeast Asian cuisines remain rare in the US, Singapore has them all and in their authentic greatness. Not only is there a variety of restaurants, but Singapore restaurants remain truer to the taste of the home country than, say, Tokyo, where the food is altered more toward Japanese tastes. On any given night when we want to eat out, it's a struggle to decide which of our favorite restaurants we want to go to, or if we'll try something completely new. Our sole lament is that there aren't enough good Mexican restaurants in Singapore; hopefully, someone will hear our plea and open one.
2. Changi International Airport. Singapore like to talk about becoming "world-class" this or "best in the world" at that. For the most part, it's all a load of crap. But when it comes to the airport, Singapore doesn't have to strive to become the best; they already are. There is nothing like coming home to Singapore from a business trip, passing through the ultra-efficient immigration, picking up your luggage in mere minutes after your plane arrives, and getting a taxi after waiting in a queue for less than five minutes. Hey, you even have time to stop off in the Duty Free shop and pick up something, and you'll still be through the airport in less than 30 minutes. Add that together with the range of shops and services to be found, the absence of machine gun toting security guards, and the candy dish at every immigration officers booth, and you've got the airport the world has to beat.
3. Safe Streets. Yes, it's practically a cliche to talk about Singapore as "clean and safe". While I don't necessarily believe the "clean" part anymore (we'll discuss that later), it's hard to dispute the "safe" factor. School children can still walk home by themselves without their parents fearing they will be kidnapped. Women can walk around after dark. There are no bands of roaming gypsy children to pick your pockets. As the Singaporean slogan says, "Low crime doesn't mean no crime.", but low crime is still a lot more than what most cities can say for themselves.
4. Public Transportation. There is sort of a love/hate relationship people have with mass transit, but to be fair, I have to include it as something we love. Now living near a train system, we find it almost unnecessary to take a taxi anymore. The buses go almost anywhere. And the whole system is cheap, cheap, cheap. Of course, there are reasons to hate the public transportation system as well, but we'll go into that later.
5. Proximity to Prime Vacation Areas. Despite the hordes of Japanese and European tourists who believe otherwise, Singapore itself is not a prime vacation destination. On the other hand, getting to a prime vacation spot from Singapore is a short, boat, plane, or bus ride away. To name a few, Bali, Phuket, Langkawi, Tioman, Bintan, and Koh Samui are all less than two hours away. And local travel packages are inexpensive enough that it's easy to make a long weekend out of any of these destinations.
6. Shopping. Given the fact that there's not much to see in Singapore, it's no wonder there are so many places to shop. You can buy almost anything in Singapore, from designer clothes to fake rolexes. And the best thing to buy in Singapore, in our opinion? Electronic goods, which usually come ready to use in any country of the world, which means dual voltage and multi-system. You won't find that in most other places in the world.
7. The Singapore Zoo. If there is one thing that is a "must see" for your visit to Singapore, it's the Zoo. There is a whole story about the Zoo here if you are interested. But let me just say, there are tons of monkeys at the Zoo. Need I say more?
8. Prenatal Care and Delivery. Okay, this is a strange one to include, but since we are having our first child here, we should share that experience as a positive one. I'm sure I will write a complete story after our son is born, but for now, let's just say that the experience has been very positive. Singapore is much more thorough than the US in terms of prenatal monitoring of a baby, and we have heard that the actually delivery process is as comfortable and pleasant and baby deliveries can be. The doctors and nurses we have worked with are friendly and professional. Overall, there may not be a better place in the world to welcome a newborn.
What We Could Do Without (in no particular order)
1. The Proliferation of Portable Phones. The fact that Singapore has the largest percentage of cellular phone users in the world may be wonderful news for the telecom service providers, but it sucks for the rest of us. It probably wouldn't be so bad except that a large percentage of Singaporeans don't know when to use their phones appropriately. It horrifies me how many educated, otherwise well-bred people will talk on their phones in movie theatres, at business seminars, and in fine restaurants without a second thought. And never mind the even greater number of people who refuse to turn off their phones or pagers in these events or at least use a silent alert mode. In Tokyo, I have seen more than once a person who received a call on the train and deferred the call because he was actually embarrassed to disturb the people around him. While that's a little overboard, Singaporeans could take a lesson in appropriate places and times to use their phones.
2. Public Transportation. Did this appear in the list of things we love? Well, as much as we love public transportation, there are plenty of things to dislike about it too. Crowded buses with pushy passengers, some bus drivers who shouldn't even be allowed to ride a bicycle, let alone drive a bus, and most recently, people on trains who don't give up their seat to an 8 month pregnant woman (it happens more often than you think).
3. TCS (Singapore Television). Okay, maybe this is not completely fair. TCS does produce some pretty good quality Chinese language shows. But what TCS has done with English television is practically a crime. Since we've lived here, I can say that I have watched only one locally produced show that I enjoyed ("The Donny Lee Show", a comedy sketch show reminiscent of "The Muppet Show"). The quality of the American shows they import has improved, but in most time slots, is still a joke. The quality of Cable television is not much better either. In Singapore, there is a cable television station devoted completely to Infomercials. No joke, I'm afraid.
4. "Short Man Syndrome". In the US, there is a condition called "Short Man Syndrome" where a man of small stature talks and acts like someone much bigger to compensate for his lack of height (see Ross Perot). I am liberally applying this syndrome to the country (particularly the government) of Singapore. Everyday in the media, we are bombarded with how Singapore will be the "best in this" and "world class that". It's fine for a country to have lofty goals, but when you have to hear about it everyday, it begins to lose it's effect. Any educated person stops buying that crap after a week or two of hearing about it. Singapore, show a little humility. Maybe then the world can take your potential more seriously.
5. Censorship. One of the ways we are reminded that Singapore is not a democracy is in the way things are censored. After two years, I have yet to figure out how a country can call itself enlightened and keep up a policy of censorship that makes no sense. As the world evolves more and more into a "Global Village", it becomes more and more ridiculous to keep this up. Consider this: violence and language in movies can go nearly uncensored, even on television, but a hint of sex or homosexuality is cut in a second.
6. Taxi Service. When we first came to Singapore, I thought the taxi service in Singapore was excellent. As time went by, either the service deteriorated, or my eyes were opened to the truth. The truth is that getting a taxi in Singapore when you need one can be one of the most frustrating experiences of your life. The policies that govern taxis don't help the situation; currently taxis are not considered public transportation and are therefore not exempt from the fees incurred from entering some of the prime traffic districts. Therefore taxi drivers have devised their own ways to avoid paying these fees, at the cost of the convenience of the riders. I'm not blaming the drivers for this; they have to earn a living. But the solution is pretty simple, in my humble opinion: define taxis as public transportation.
7. Customer Service (or lack thereof). Entrepreneurs, take note! Want to make tons of money in Singapore? Offer a service to businesses to train their employees on good customer service. The market is huge, since 90% of the places you go, customer service is either lacking or downright non-existent. It is common to go to an upscale department store, purchase an item, and have not a single employee in the store say a word to you. I have been followed around stores by employees who don't greet or speak to me. I have dealt with Customer Service departments that are so inflexible about their policies, they give the appearance of not even caring about the customer. Singapore needs some help in this area, and from the looks of things, it's not going to come from inside the country.
8. Courtesy Campaign. It's true that Singaporeans need to be more courteous to one another. Many of our dislikes about Singapore stem from the fact that Singaporeans in general have a lack of courtesy. We believe this is fostered by the "Kiasu" (Me first) attitude that is not just tolerated here, but often encouraged. However, the belief that the government can teach people courtesy is outrageous. Courtesy comes when people believe that the rights of others are equal to or greater than their own. What is actually being taught, though indirectly, is to survive in this competitive world, you must be number one, and your rights to be number one are greater than the rights of others. Again, a little humility goes a long way here, and if the government wants to teach courtesy, it should start with some humility itself.
I should point out that the US isn't doing much better in this regard. Since the 80's, this spirit of "Me First" and individual rights has run rampant in the States, and we can see it taking it's toll on American society today. There is no reason for Singapore to follow in it's footsteps however.
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