"We believe the evidence to be
extremely compelling," concluded Bishop Chuay. "And we are
asking the authorities to hand Gurmit Singh over to us immediately so
that we may slay him."
"We suspected that Phua Chu Kang to
be a pernicious influence over our society," said a source at the
Prime Minister's Office. "But we never expected this. It
makes so much sense, though. In the interests of equality,
however, we are asking all religious leaders in Singapore to make
independent determinations that Gurmit Singh's fictitious character is
indeed the great beast of prophecy."
TCS had no immediate comment, though a
source who wishes to remain unnamed has revealed that plans are afoot to
rename their magazine '8 Days' to 'Last Days'.
Gurmit himself has not made any public
appearance since the SAC's announcement and there is no official
statement from his office.
Attempts to reach him have also proved
unsuccessful. His secretary would only say that "Mr. Singh will
return your calls once he comes back from riding with the Four Horsemen
of the Apocalypse."
Ministry
of Environment Tackles Sick Building Syndrome - Bans Farting
by K. K. Cheow
As Sick Building Syndrome begins to afflict more
and more Singaporeans, the Ministry of Environment has moved decisively.
"Sick Building Syndrome is caused by poor
air quality and inadequate ventilation," said Mr. Chin Chia Chow,
spokesperson for the Ministry of Environment. "However, to overhaul all
buildings built before a certain time will be horribly expensive. We feel
it is more economical to tackle the problem at its source - the bad air
itself."
"Beginning this week, farting will be banned
in all office buildings, and farters will be subject to a maximum fine of $500
and a jail term of 2 weeks," said Mr. Chin.
When asked whether this might be perceived as too
harsh, Mr. Chin snorted derisively, "If un-civic minded behaviour impairs
the ability of our business community to function, then we must send a strong
message to these deviants."
"However," said Mr. Chin with a smile.
"As the policy is only just being phased in, we will approach this
humanely. First time offenders will be warned, and repeat offenders will
attract intermediate sanctions such as having to wear a luminous green jacket
saying, 'Smelly Asshole'. Jail will only be meted to recalcitrants."
Mr. Chin then added that ENV had initially
considered adding caning as a sentencing option, but decided against it when the
guards who administer the rotan protested, saying they did not wish to
inadvertently cause the prisoner to fart when the cane hit the buttocks.
"Ultimately," said Mr. Chin, "What
is needed is not criminal sanctions but a real change in social behaviour.
People must learn to restrain their farts, and expel them only in designated
farting areas."
According to ENV guidelines, people are
prohibited from farting even in office toilets and stairwells, as they are
spaces contiguous to office spaces.
ENV is also currently trying to extend the ban to
other public spaces such as bus stops, MRT stations and restaurants. Clubs and
discotheques, however, may permit farting at their discretion. Singapore
Airlines is also reportedly planning to make their long-haul flights fart-free.
"Basically," explained Mr. Chin,
"Expel your noxious fumes only in the privacy of your home, away from
people who may inadvertently breathe it in."
Mr. Chin also said that the criminalization of
farting in offices is only one aspect of a multi-pronged strategy. "For
instance, we are also working with hawkers and restaurants to cut down on the
use of onions in their cooking. We have already gotten commitments from
Burger King to stop selling onion rings, and from Delifrance to cease the sale
of their french onion soup. We are also adding a tax on all onions to cut
down on their purchase."
Some people we interviewed thought the new
initiative by the ENV to be rather heavyhanded.
Said Mohd. Bawang bin Busok, a satay seller at
Bukit Gorblok Hawker Centre, "It's always been a tradition to serve onions
with satay. This move will really erode our customs. Now people will be unable
to get an authentic satay meal in Singapore. I foresee hundreds of thousands of
people thronging Johor to eat onions. What next? Banning eggs? Durian?"
Dissent has also been fomenting at the new No
Farting policy. A new independent political organization, Stink Centre, issued a
statement saying that this campaign was yet another slide down the slippery
slope to the erosion of Singaporeans' civil liberties.
Said Stink Centre Media Liaison Phang Chao Pooi,
"Today, your right to fart, tomorrow, what else will the gah'men take
away? As it is, we're already seen as an anal retentive society! Stink
Centre intends to advocate a campaign of civil disobedience. We want to
urge everyone with a conscience to come to Hong Lim Speakers Corner for a mass
fart-in."
Parliament Agrees To Extend Question Time
by Coq Au Vin
Parliament has agreed to extend the
time Members of Parliament have before they answer during Question Time.
Many
MPs had asked for this extension because the current time limit of 30 seconds is
not enough for them to come to a considered position for the critical Final
Jeopardy question of the day.
Said MP for Potong Pasir Mr Chiam See Tong,
"Everyone knows that the last is the toughest round and yet the most vital.
Everything can hinge on that one single question and that one single bet. It's
just not fair that we should have only 30 seconds to answer it."
This
proposal was met with bipartisan support.
Mr Ho Peng Kee, Minister for Home
Affairs, said "For once Mr Chiam has said something I agree with. The
pressure that Question Time places on us Members of Parliament is enormous. You
never know what's going to be behind that lighted up box when after you make
your bet. I mean, the last time I thought ISA was a good category, but then they
came up with this really cheem question about 'He was the judge of first instance
in the 1988 case of Teo Soh Lung'. So long ago, how can remember?"
Minister
for Law Professor S Jayakumar, agreed. "I think that sometimes the
categories can get a bit esoteric for MPs who aren't completely versed in them,
so perhaps they should have time to think about whether they really want to bet
all that much or just leave the prizes to those more knowledgeable in those
subjects."
"And I'm not saying this just because I got that Teo Soh
Lung question right by answering, 'Who is Justice Lai Kew Chai?'" he added
with a grin, before taking possession of his brand new, fully-equipped
kitchenette and dining table set and cash prizes amounting to nearly $8,000.
The
motion passed unanimously, with Finance Minister Dr Richard Hu vowing to charge
ahead and overtake Professor Jayakumar's lead. "He better watch out. I got
my Internet account to do research already. I'm prepared to answer anything from
questions on next year's Defence Budget allocation to the year when the Dada
school of surrealist art was founded in Zurich."
The extended time period
of a full minute will be implemented during the remaining run of October 9 to
28, and will be permanently in place by the next season.
Prizes still yet to be
won by some lucky MP include an all-expenses paid trip to Caesar's Palace in Las
Vegas and packaged tour in the Southern Philippines organized by Abu Sayyaf
Adventure Holidays.
Scientists at NUS Crack Secret of Declining
Fertility:
Singaporean sperm and ova shown to be kiasu and kiasi
by Lau Cheow
Scientists at the
NUS's Institute of Genetics have put together a series of astounding discoveries
that go a long way to explaining why Singapore has been experiencing a decline
in fertility.
"All this talk of sociological change, economically displaced
demographics and so on affecting fertility is very unscientific and has no
absolute empirical basis. Sociology is a well-known soft science and as such,
all its pronouncements can be considered to be an abundance of gallinaceous
efflux," emphasised Prof. Seymour Koch, a researcher at the Institute.
In
other words, the professor maintains that all previous theories of declining
fertility have been a load of chickenshit.
In a paper recently published in the
prestigious journal 'Nature', Institute scientists led by Dr. Koch described a
series of experiments to demonstrate that Singaporean spermatozoa and ova had
built-in biases against in vitro fertilisation.
It was discovered that
spermatozoa from Singaporean males had a marked tendency to shy away and avoid a
female ovum of any racial origin. Singaporean male sperm would approach the
ovum, initiate pre-ingress motility, but when it came to actual consummation,
they would avoid the ovum when it showed it was ready for ingress.
In a
complementary experiment, the scientists showed that Singaporean female ova were
equally reluctant to entertain spermatozoa of all types. When a female ovum was
approached by a spermatozoa, it would shrink a little and pretend it did not
exist, despite multiple overtures of interest. It was noticed that in several
ova, hardening of the cell membrane would begin even before penetration.
In some
cases when penetration was initiated, another spermatozoa might even come along
and dislodge the original successful entity. The ovum, thus rescued, would move
away in the ensuing confusion.
"We factored in the other parameters and
discovered that Singaporean sperm scored low in the standard curve when it came
to penetration of ovum," explained Professor Koch. "The healthiest
sperm were those from white chao ang-mohs, like myself, whose sperm could be
seen greedily attacking a Singaporean female ovum even though it tried to fend
off their advances to no avail. In fact, the ratio was often 100 male sperm to
one outnumbered ovum. On the other hand, we had introduced 100 Singaporean sperm
to 100 Singaporean ova and found that only in 2 instances did any fertilisation
occur. The rest of the time they were off to one side, all by themselves."
Another experiment showed that when Singaporean sperm were introduced to ova
from Thai women, the penetration rate went up.
However, if certain contraceptive
drugs were introduced to the medium, the rate of penetration was significantly
higher, although of course, successful fertilisation could not occur.
When the
same sperm were later reintroduced to Singaporean ova, there was total rejection
and the ova hardened up and refused to have anything more to do with
procreation.
"Our work is really hard-core science, and we have established
beyond all doubt why our fertility rate has been declining. The reason is even
more extreme than suspected. It seems that the basic Singaporean's reproductive
cells have been too kiasu and kiasi to initiate fertilisation," concluded
Professor Koch.
Lim
Swee Say To Lead Young PAP Team to KL
by Coq Au Vin
Mr Lim Swee Say, the Acting Environment Minister and Secretary of State for Communications and IT, will
lead the Young PAP Executive Committee on a two-day goodwill visit to Kuala Lumpur.
"I'm confident we can find our way there," said Mr Lim, putting his field pack together, "We've been
studying the terrain extensively and we know sort of in what direction we'll be heading. East, right?"
He directed the last question to the other members of
the Young PAP contingent, who looked resplendent in
their jackboots and armbands. They shrugged helplessly, until one reedy little voice piped up, "I
think it's North, mein fuhrer... I mean, sir."
A committee meeting was immediately convened. After several votes and reports about North, West and South,
the agreement was to split the difference and head Northwest.
One member of the group, who wished to remain
anonymous, wondered why they didn't ask just ask for directions, and said that North was probably the right
direction anyway.
"The committee has spoken," said Mr Lim, "So they must
be right."
The dissenting member was then mocked mercilessly, arrested for tax evasion and sent into exile.
The expedition was about to leave when someone
realized they had left the compass behind. With a collective cry of
"Alamak!", they turned around and started to argue about where to buy one.
Eventually, however, the deadlock was broken when Mr
Lim decided to pull rank and call the Senior Minister, who recommended a cheap place in Beach Road Market,
upstairs where you buy all your stuff before going for Reservist.
"Oh, you mean like pencils?" said CPL(NS) Clerk Class
I See Buay Keng, who has astigmatism and a bad case of equine albinism (denoted by the "White Horse" stamp on
his medical docket).
The group will be meeting several people, including
the Secretary-General of Barisan Nasional, Mohamed
Rahmat, and Chairman of BN Youth Hishammuddin Tun Hussein, the latter of whom got lost on his last
goodwill tour to Brunei but was subsequently rescued when his whereabouts were ascertained by CNN.
The delegation leaves on Saturday. Memorial services
are scheduled for the week after.
