...and my experience last week taught me that it's our attitude that needs a good scrub
Kimberly Spykerman, Straits Times 11 Sep 08;
I WAS a cleaner in an HDB neighbourhood one morning, and spent another afternoon picking up after diners in a foodcourt.
I popped in and out of a cinema hall five times in a day to see what cinemagoers leave behind when the lights come on. And I rushed from cubicle to cubicle in a mall toilet, yes, for the same reason: to see what toilet users leave behind.
Throughout last week, I was at ground zero in the daily business of keeping Singapore clean, as part of a Straits Times assignment to find out what it was like.
The verdict: We are a nation of people who cannot clean up after ourselves because too many of us have disgusting social habits.
And, we have this grand excuse: Picking up after ourselves when an army of cleaners has been hired for that singular purpose - what for?
'It's their job. They're paid to do it,' was what I was told, time and again, when I asked people to explain their behaviour.
Or this other retort: 'If we did it ourselves, then we'd be putting them out of a job.'
I have pondered hard about what is in our upbringing or education that has resulted in this sorry state of affairs.
Could it be that we are long accustomed to the idea of cleaning as a lowly paid job for the uneducated?
'If you don't study hard, you'll become a roadside sweeper!' - that is the message that has been embedded in many Singaporeans' childhood memories, from when parents reacted badly to a less than stellar report card.
Is this why some of us look down on cleaners, because somehow they deserved it for not being smarter or working harder when they were younger?
During my stint as a foodcourt cleaner, I encountered a middle-aged woman who had been a housewife before becoming a foodcourt cleaner. A recent separation from her husband forced her to get a job to support herself and her son.
I am (almost) certain that most people would think twice about spitting bones on their dining tables and simply walking away, or clogging up their toilets at home with excess toilet paper.
I say 'almost' because growing affluence means that many homes now employ maids who 'do it so that we don't have to'. Imagine if children grew up in households with no conception of keeping the home tidy or cleaning up after themselves because 'the maid is there'. Singapore would need to double the number of cleaners.
This, by the way, is a national problem. Not because the Prime Minister himself raised it in his National Day Rally speech, but because visitors to the country start changing their own habits to suit what they think is a norm in Singapore culture.
Foreigners who said that they would ordinarily have disposed of their own trash back home did not because they realised that it just was not the way things were done here.
In fact, they get ticked off by Singaporeans for 'spoiling the market', so to speak.
Many who were polled seemed to think that Singaporeans react only to threats disguised in the form of fines, incentives, or some degree of law enforcement.
A clip screened on a recent episode of the Straits Times RazorTV's current affairs programme Point Blank featured a woman, who when asked why she had left her messy tray behind at Ikea's cafe, had this excuse: 'But there's no sign that says I have to return my tray!'
Have we become so socially awkward that we need to be told what is the 'right' way to behave?
Not that it has not been tried.
Remember the annual courtesy campaign that has since morphed into the far meeker Singapore Kindness Movement?
Let us face it, nobody likes being told that they are behaving badly, and they are not about to take advice from a bright orange lion - even if he does have a great big smile.
I did another stint that had less to do with cleanliness than with civility. I helped man the VivoCity information counter. What I encountered was not in the least pleasant: People were gruff when making enquiries and all wanted my immediate attention.
It seems that is the only way they know how to ask for help. In return, I was not about to go out of my way to help someone who treated me like, well, trash.
Perhaps, what Singaporeans need is a huge psychological shake-up.
A town council initially pondered a 'down-tools day'. Would residents better appreciate the work cleaners do if for one day no one cleaned the estate for them? The idea was never implemented; no one dared risk the wrath of HDB residents.
One foodcourt manager suggested placing food in disposable bento boxes to encourage people to clean up after themselves. A moviegoer even suggested having rubbish bins placed inside the cinemas.
None of these suggestions will mean much because, ultimately, it's our attitudes that need a good scrub.
Absolutely spot on, Kimberly...
Singapore's Third World, say expats who've lived here seven years
Letter from Marco and Cynthya Preisig, Straits Times Forum 13 Sep 08
WE SHARE Ms Kimberly Spykerman's viewpoint on Singapore as a First World nation still lacking one of the basic attitudes of a modern civilisation. When it comes to litter-free public areas, we are no better than any underdeveloped nation. And this will not change, even if we employ twice as many cleaners. It will not change, even if our universities are ranked among the best in the world. The seeds for change must be planted in everyone's home, in each family.
We are foreigners with three children who have lived in Singapore for seven years. Despite bad examples in our vicinity at East Coast Park (where the beach looks like a rubbish dump after the weekend), we don't adopt these bad habits and walk extra metres to the next litter bin. Despite the privilege of employing a maid, our children clean their table and tidy their rooms since they were toddlers. As the saying goes, 'you can't teach an old dog new tricks'.
Bad Kimberly: So, who's prejudiced against whom?
Letter from Liew Yeng Chee, Straits Times Forum 13 Sep 08
I NEARLY threw up my porridge this morning, when I read Wednesday's article, 'I was a foodcourt cleaner' by Ms Kimberly Spykerman. Why? She was so self-righteous to denounce Singaporeans (obviously she was not included) to be fine and law-attuned, and looking down on cleaners, without realising that, subconsciously, she fit the mould perfectly.
My question is: Why the big fuss over this 'table manners' subject only after the Prime Minister mentioned it categorically in his National Day Rally speech?
If Ms Spykerman is so concerned about people's table manners, she should be expounding her views not after the PM's speech, make it her cause or mission to get people to look into the issue seriously. All this 'working as a cleaner' stuff is only for show, just because the PM mentioned it. Is she not doing what she accuses everyone else of - that Singaporeans (much more so press people) respond only to directions from authority, be they in the form of a law, a fine or just a mention by the PM?
Second, who is looking down on whom? I don't think the public look down on cleaners. The way Ms Spykerman felt could just be her own conclusion based on her own prejudice. In the first place, what is there to crow about 'I was a foodcourt cleaner'? Was it a job she thought so lowly, no one in her right mind would want to try, unless she needs the money badly?
In conclusion, we hope for a press which is more spontaneous, to reflect more what people think and not just follow orders from the top, and stop belittling blue-collar workers subconsciously.
