I am not a local. S was born in Singapore and due to this fact; BB & GG also are locals. I am the only non-local. Sometimes it’s quite tiring straddling two countries, but the fact is that over the last decade plus, I consider Singapore to be home. I feel a huge relief when I land at Changi airport after a trip and understanding local lingo is a piece of cake for me. Contrast this to the first time I landed here, I desperately wanted to go back home to Mumbai!

I love Mumbai, but each time I go back, it’s changed a little bit more and a time will come, in the not too distant future, when I will be unable to recognize it at all.

So in recognition of the fact that I am half Singaporean, I came across this old entry from Talking Cock. Below are my favourites, so please click the link above to see the whole list. I also have taken some more from this list and some are my own!

You know you are a Singaporean when:

1. When speaking to foreigners, you somehow feel a need to adopt an accent. (If you’re a DJ, this happens even when you’re not speaking to foreigners.)
2. You won’t raise your voice to protest policies, but you’ll raise your fists to whack someone over Hello Kitty.
3. You’re forever talking about businesses you want to set up but will probably never get around to starting.
4. You’re never completely sure how many times you’ve sung the second verse of the National Anthem.
5. You’ve sung the Majulah Singapura every single day since the day you’ve been in Primary 1, but you still don’t know the meanings of the lyrics.
6. You move to where you want your child to go to school.
7. You feel you can’t walk around naked in your own flat.
8. You force your children to take Speech & Drama classes, but pray they won’t wind up in Arts later on.
9. If you’re a guy, whenever you get together with your guy friends, you invariably trade army stories.
10. If you’re a girl, whenever you get together with your girl friends, you invariably trade stories about how your stupid guy friends are forever trading army stories.
11. You think the most important sporting event in Singapore this year was David Beckham switching from Manchester United to Real Madrid.
12. It actually makes a difference to you being called an ‘NSMan’ rather than a ‘Reservist’.
13. You’ve eaten more times at the Esplanade than you’ve actually seen shows there.
14. You need campaigns to tell you how to be courteous, to flush toilets, have sex, etc.
15. You feel the urge to add the suffix ‘-polis’ to everything, viz. Biopolis, Airtropolis, Fusionopolis, Entrepolis, etc.
16. You’ll gladly spend $50,000 on a car, but will go to great lengths to save a few bucks on ERP charges or even a few cents on a parking coupon.
17. If you’re pregnant, you have the strange ability to make people on the MRT fall asleep instantly.
18. You copy down licence plate numbers of cars involved in accidents.
19. No matter how old you are, you keep associating people with their secondary schools. (alternative: No matter how old you are, you secretly need to know what other people got for their PSLE, O levels and A levels.)
20. You ‘chope’ a seat by placing a packet of tissues on the chair.
21. You’re very forthright with your criticisms of the Gahmen, unless there’s a chance they might actually hear you.
22. You think we’re living in a modern, sophisticated country even when our leaders still insist on wearing their school uniforms.
23. You can never quite remember what “the core values” of Singaporeans are.
24. You know all these acronyms and have no issues using them altogether in a sentence –NUS; NTU; ERP; SDU; PAP; MRT; LKY; GCT; PRC; TIBS; SBS; SMS; JB; JBJ; AMK; AYE; PIE; ECP; ISD; ISA; 5 C’s; CPF; CHIJMES; SPG; CWO.
25. You think there’s nothing wrong with putting chili sauce on everything you eat.
26. “Crossing the country” means taking the MRT tothe end of the line.
27. You join queues without knowing or caring what the queue is for.
28. You see nothing unusual about an organization of trade unions spending more time owning and operating supermarkets, parks, drugstores, amusement nightclubs, and financial services than planning the next strike.
29. You get irritated if you don’t see a sign telling you how long your wait’s going to be for a bus, a train, or the expressway to take you where you want to go
30. When you cross the border into Malaysia, you automatically and deeply fear for your life and your wallet. Especially your wallet!!
31. You buy loads of chewing gum when you go overseas and try to smuggle it in.