Singaporeans are just jealous. Very very jealous.

@cobaltpaladin: Although I’d agree that the SSC is a small step forward, but the most important thing is that the society (not necessarily the individual talents) is not ready to accept sports (or any other non-academic based) as a full-time career. To be really good at sports, you need to be seriously trained from a young age, and even if the kid is really interested in the game, most parents tend to treat it like an ECA, something extra for the kids to keep occupied and themselves to brag to other parents. As a career? Not very likely. Paper credentials will still take a precedence.

I don’t think it’s IMPOSSIBLE, just not in this generation. Maybe 2/3 generations down the road we might see otherwise. But of course, we might not be around to see that in person.

@imp: IMO, ‘water, organic tomatoes, wine’ isn’t really a great example of how we import everything. We can’t produce these things ourselves, with geographical & physical limitations. If we could, and we don’t, then those are valid examples. But we can’t. And that kinda changes things a bit don’t you think?

unfortunately, it’s going to be a tough longer road to getting a medal if we don’t import.

so we import foreign talent lor. just like the way we import everything else. water, organic tomatoes, wine…blah blah blah.

so we have a silver. paper credentials. good lor. do i feel pride and glory? no. this is the same logic as how Singapore Inc runs the country. not surprising.

imps last blog post..You Remember This Ramen Shop?

I wonder if you had read some of the earlier comments. Some local talents with world-class potential had been spotted before but their parents wanted them to pursue academic path and paper qualifications. This is because parents feel that there is no “future” in sports. As such, foreign talents had been brought in to kick-start the sports scene and now we have Singapore Sports School which I believe is moving in the right direction for the local sports scene. I don’t think our local talents are not good enough. It is just that they are not willing to devote their future to sports. We just need to change their mindset and our paperchase culture.

Building the Singapore Sports School is one of the steps to building a sporting culture here and nurturing our talents for the future.

cobaltpaladins last blog post..Win Oledy Lor

Yes, our local may not be good enough. And they will never be good enough if we never give them a chance. They will never be good enough if we keep sending FT oversea for major competition.

FT can bring us medal. But we have to keep buying more and more in order to keep getting medals for us. Is this what we want?

Wouldn’t it be better if we shake off this FT mentality and start building a sporting culture in the locals?

I guess, like most of us, you would feel extreme pride when our fellow local-born Singapore sports person win a medal.

It is a long and tedious process to build up the sports scene here. The government import foreign talents, hope to kick-start the sports scene when they win and encourage more local talents to take up sports and realise their potential. When our local born talents finally win in future, it’ll instill national pride, sense of camaraderie and belonging in all of us.

Think 霍元甲 and the humiliating term 东亚病夫. It took a hero to restore the pride of the people. You can read the story here: http://baike.baidu.com/view/4436.htm

Did you also see the Chinese audience in the Olympic sports stadium cheering their fellow sports person? Did you see their passion, their enthusiasm?

Remember the kallang-roar when Singapore soccer team plays against Malaysian teams? Didn’t the roar excite you and race your pulse? It is the pride that we feel as Singaporean that we felt when we did the kallang-roar and wave.

Sports in some ways would unite a nation.

Sports are important in many levels. Through sports, it’ll instill discipline and mental strength. If more people are interested and take up sports, our health will also be better and less people need to worry about the escalating medical costs.

I guess I feel that I just don’t want them to take up the place if there are willing Singaporeans who want to try.

We should also stop saying that Singaporeans are not too into sports. This does not justify the need to be so caught up in the quest for medals and implement the foreign talent scheme.

In my humble opinion, foreign talents are those who come here because they want to come here, and they have something to contribute to us. They will be welcome by all of us because they are sincere in living here with us. I am not too sure how to react to the silver medal. I don’t feel any pride.