Labour Day

1 May was a day of charity. The government gave out money and Nestle gave out 1.5kg tins of Milo. My mother was more enthusiastic about the Milo rather than the Progress Package. She had already prepared the newspaper cuttings by the time i woke up. She also drilled me on the slogan which i have to recite to the Milo men in order to get the Milo tin. And she reminded me to wear the green Nike cap which i never knew i had. I was well prepared to get the tin of Milo.

After lunch, I and my dad (who wore a green shirt) walked to Suntec to accomplish our Milo mission. Along the way, we also met many green-shirted people carrying their tins of Milo back home. They looked so happy. When we got down to the Milo collection venue, i finally realised why they were so happy. The Milo tins were their rewards for enduring through the long queues that had formed up. The number of people were quite appalling. We wanted to begin queueing up straight away and went to the back of the queue. However, we were stopped by a policeman who told us to proceed to another queue to collect a white coupon first. Even the police got involved in this Milo promotion. It just shows how important this thing is. We then headed to the other queue. The queue moved slowly and I had to go for Norman's funfair. So midway through the queue, I gave up the fight to get that 1.5kg tin of Milo. I took the MRT and met up with Tim. The funfair was supposedly nearby so we walked. As we were walking, we invariably began to talk about politics. I thus learnt that Tim is also a supporter of opposition rallies. We agreed to go to the rally held at East Coast Park. As we walked and talked, we lost our way. We were shocked. How could this happen to us? We were the topo boys. The conquerors of MacRitchie Resevoir. And we were lost in civilisation. Pathetically, we had to call Norman for help and we got to the funfair 15 mins later. We met up with Hongkie and Calow later on. The funfair wasn't very fun. The only thing good was the 50 cents can drinks. I can't believe that they can sell can drinks for 50 cents. Especially in a fun fair. I was expecting $1 or $1.50.

Maybe they bought them directly from JB. Timmy and I recruited Hongkie and Calow to join us for the rally by telling them how cool the rallies were. We went to Hongkie's house after the funfair because he needed to change his specs. They were damaged during the jostling match at the funfair. We were excited about going to his house because Kim Wakerman is his neighbor. Unfortunately, we didn't see her. After dinner, we headed to East Coast Park for the rally. It had begun to drizzle by that time. But as Mr Low Thia Khiang had said, the heavens have eyes. The rain stopped shortly after the rally began. It was the first rally for Calow and it would have been a disappointment if it rained heavily. The speeches made during the rally were mostly in English. This is to accomodate the mainly English-speaking people in East Coast. The atmosphere then wasn't as high as the Hougang rally. But there were a few vocal supporters who made the crowd laugh with their comments. Mr Gomez was talking about how Singaporeans were being forced to become taxi drivers, cleaners etc. Then someone from the crowd shouted that he was a Ah Long runner. The whole audience erupted with laughter. To which Mr Gomez replied that he was the lucky one. There were people out there who were unemployed. The Ah Long runner was the most vocal person around. He shouted at the cameraman to remove his umbrella because it was blocking his view. "Oei, yellow umbrella, you are the only one! Yes, You, Yellow Umbrella!" The cameraman was so scared that he immediately raised his umbrella higher. The Ah Long runner also shouted at the policemen to switch off their lights. "No light, No light!" The Ah Long runner was an angry man and he kept shouting comments throughout the rally. "Bullshit!" "Pay and Pay" "No need to apologise" The only highlight of the rally other than the Ah Long runner is a Hokkien speech by a speaker whom i don't remember. He said the cashcard device in our cars are like bloodsucking devices. First thing in the morning, rushing to work, suck one time. End of day, tired, want to go home, suck another time. The rally ended at 10. We were all shocked to find a huge crowd behind us. When we came, there weren't so many people. Maybe those people came after collecting their Milos. Like the rallies before, there were chants of "Workers Party Workers Party" as we left the ground. Labour Day was truly for the workers.