Hello Kitty crisis: The cat is not a lie

I’m okay. Really. Thank you for your concern.

No, you don’t need to do the Ice Bucket Challenge to raise money for my benefit.

Unlike the rest of the world it seems, I didn’t have an existential crisis last week when news spread that Hello Kitty is not a cat. (It’s an Avril Lavigne song.)



But I understand why you might have thought I would be in a catatonic state by now.

Yes, I have the complete collection of Hello Kitty Bubbly World toys that McDonald’s released two months ago.

And I didn’t pre-order them online because that would be cheating. I bought them one by one at a McDonald’s restaurant over six weeks like a real man.

Yes, I took selfies with each of the toys and posted them on Instagram.



But I had difficulty taking a group selfie with all six Hello Kitties, so I ordered a selfie stick from Qoo10. Problem solved.

Best invention ever.



Yes, I had quick enough cat-like reflexes to pre-register for the 5km Hello Kitty Run to be held on Nov 1 to mark Hello Kitty’s 40th birthday before all 15,000 slots were lapped up last week.



I save all of five bucks by pre-registering. Now I need to pay only $65 to join the run, instead of $70 like pathetic regular folks.

That makes me feel special. Like I’m riding in my own chartered MRT train to see the upcoming Leo Sayer concert at the Esplanade on Oct 18. He makes me feel like dancing.



I have been a long-time fan of the afro-wearing British singer, something I can’t say for Hello Kitty.

This may come as a shock to some of you, but I’m actually not a Hello Kitty fan.

So what’s with all the Hello Kitty toys and selfies?

Well, like wearing polo shirts when I don’t play polo, I like Hello Kitty ironically.

As radio DJ Chris Ho explained after his “kill the Singaporeans but not my friends” Facebook comment was criticised a few months ago, it’s satire.

What that means is that I find the obsession with Hello Kitty bemusing and amusing. To make fun of this cultural quirk, I’m pretending to be a creepy 48-year-old guy with a Hello Kitty fetish.

I repeat, “pretending”.

As it turned out, I’m not alone in my mockery.

Take, for instance, this mock-serious news headline: “Hello Kitty is not a cat. Everything is a lie.”

Over-dramatic much?

That’s from The Washington Post, the US newspaper that uncovered the truth about the Watergate break-in and brought down an American president over 40 years ago.



Now the paper has uncovered the truth about Hello Kitty that will bring down all of reality.

Can you uncover the sarcasm?

How many of us really believe that the world is ending because Hello Kitty is not a cat? Or are we just playing along like me with my Hello Kitty selfies?

You know who HDB should debark?

Anyone making any more “If Hello Kitty is not a cat, then Scooby Doo (or Goofy or Snoopy or any other canine cartoon) is not a dog” jokes.

As it turned out, it was all just a big misunderstanding.

Someone said that Sanrio, the company behind Hello Kitty, said that Hello Kitty is not a cat.

To quote:

“She’s a cartoon character. She is a little girl. She is a friend. But she is not a cat.”

The Internet went ape. Suddenly, my wife had good reason to be jealous of me sleeping with my Hello Kitties, even ironically.

Someone else then called Sanrio to confirm the species of my McDonald’s toys.

Sanrio replied:

“Hello Kitty was done in the motif of a cat. It’s going too far to say that Hello Kitty is not a cat. Hello Kitty is a personification of a cat.”

Since Sanrio is a Japanese company, I suspect something must have been lost in the translation.

But I get it.

Saying Hello Kitty is a cat is akin to me taking the news headline “Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie arrive in Singapore” literally last week.

I was about to rush out to get the celebrity mega-couple to autograph my Blu-Ray copies of 12 Monkeys and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, but was crushed to learn that the newly-wed Brangelina aren’t really in Singapore.

They are just waxwork figures of the movie stars that are here ahead of the opening of Madame Tussauds Singapore in October.



The headline was a cruel lie.

But then there are lies everywhere.

The Singapore Flyer doesn’t really fly. It just goes round and round. No wonder it went bankrupt and had to be sold.

The Singapore Grand Prix is not really that grand. It’s just cars going round and round. It’s coming back next month.

Singapore the Lion City is a lie because lions aren’t indigenous to this area and Fandi Ahmad’s LionsXII don’t count, especially in the Malaysia Cup tournament.

Oh no, now I’m starting to have an existential crisis.

Where are my Hello Kitties? They always make me feel better.

Ironically, of course.

- Published in The New Paper, 31 August 2014

Murdoch could’ve praised the Great Singapore Sale instead of the High Ministers’ Salaries

Dear Mr Rupert Murdoch,

Uh...is this a good time?

I know you’re kind of busy nowadays, but I just want to drop a note to thank you for...uh...(air quotes) praising Singapore during your testimony to a UK parliamentary panel last week on the phone-hacking scandal.

But really, you shouldn’t have.

It was just so...unexpected. And random. And...how did we get dragged into this?

You called Singapore “the most open and clear society in the world”, where “every minister gets at least a million dollars a year and the Prime Minister a lot more” and “there’s no temptation”.



Not that we don’t appreciate the shout-out, but...uh...actually, those high ministerial salaries are currently being reviewed by a committee appointed by our Prime Minister himself.

So...well...you know...“awkward”!

Maybe you could’ve said something about the Singapore Flyer. Or the Great Singapore Sale!

No, wait, that’s ending today.

But there’s always the Post-Great Singapore Sale Sale, where you may actually get better deals than during the Great Singapore Sale itself.

Even a multi-billionaire like you wouldn’t mind saving a couple of bucks, am I right? That’s how you become a multi-billionaire – and stay a multi-billionaire.

And hey, the Hungry Ghost Festival is coming. Have you ever seen a getai show? You’d love it!



Do you know Hokkien? Doesn't matter. Just sit back and enjoy the music, colourful costumes and atmosphere.

There will be a getai show in front of Ngee Ann City shopping centre next Sunday. So you can catch a free show and take advantage of the Post-Great Singapore Sale Sale at the same place. How thoughtfully convenient!

So if you really want to endorse something about Singapore, shopping and getai – yes.

But “the cleanest society you can find anywhere”? Uh...actually, littering seems to be making a comeback in Singapore lately.

Well, at least you tried to say something nice about our country – not like that schlubby Hollywood stoner Seth Rogen, who called Singapore “frightening” and “barbaric” a few months ago.



Maybe you should have his phone hacked.

Kidding!

No more hacking of anyone’s phone. You didn’t know anything about it. You were betrayed by people you trusted.

I’m on your side. Look, I have no pies on me.

So...are we good?

Please don’t have me killed.

Or worse, sic your wife on me.

Best regards,
S M Ong

PS: Loved your cameos on The Simpsons!

- Published in The New Paper, 24 July 2011

Singapore flyer's bad fengshui: Going wee-wee in the wheel of misfortune

In April, The Straits Times published a letter from a reader who asked:

“Each rotation of the Singapore Flyer takes up to 30 minutes. What happens if someone requires emergency medical help while he is stuck at the top?”

Well, now we know.

Never mind medical emergencies. What if you just need to go to the bathroom?

If you're lucky, you have some spare diapers with you. But if you're really lucky, you wouldn't be stuck in the Singapore Flyer in the first place.

One of the 173 passengers stuck in the $240 million Flyer for seven hours on Tuesday evening had to resort to going wee-wee in her 4-year-old son's extra diapers.



“I couldn't take it, so I went to one corner and slipped one into my underwear,” the woman told The New Paper. "I felt very uncomfortable."

She felt uncomfortable? There were two visitors from London in the capsule with her.

How do you think they felt, being trapped 40 storeys above ground in a confined space no more than 7m long and 4m wide with a 32-year-old pregnant mother peeing into her child's diaper?

“Uncomfortable” would be a gross understatement. Even “gross” would be a gross understatement.

From now on, whenever the two London visitors see anything resembling a Ferris wheel anywhere in the world, all they can think of is this Singapore woman wetting herself.

What if those two visitors also happened to be among the 400 people stranded mid-air on the London Eye back in March? Now that's real bad luck.

Or maybe it's just bad fengshui.

Which was why five months after its official opening on 1 March, the Flyer was reconfigured to go in reverse at the reported cost of five figures.

According to the Flyer's chairman Florian Bollen, a number of feng shui masters said that the Flyer was turning in the wrong direction as it “was going against the sun and taking fortune away from Singapore”.

That was in August. Since then, the country has slipped into recession and Singaporeans have lost millions in investments.

But thanks to those fengshui masters, at least we know the giant wheel isn't to blame for this massive loss of fortune.

Too bad they couldn't prevent the Flyer's own misfortune.Now that it's shut down because of Tuesday's incident, the Singapore Flyer won't be turning in any direction for a while. Perhaps that's the best fengshui of all.

But when it does re-open and you decide to take a chance and go for a spin, just remember:

Pack extra diapers.

- Published in The New Paper, 28 December 2008











UPDATE: Flyer re-opened the Singapore way - cautiously