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Tag: tamil

Put Tamil back on public signboards

T3 Signages DSC_3718sa

Where there are other languages apart from English on them, to be precise.

Does anyone know if they’ve put back Tamil on the directional signage at Changi Airport? Or are they still in three of our national languages plus Japanese, as they have been so since 2007?

And how true is it that the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore, which runs the airport, replaced Tamil with Japanese on advice from the Tourism Board, whose rationale for doing so was “English is the 2nd language of India”?

Apparently, the Tamil directional signage at the Botanic Gardens have also suffered a Japanisation, according to a message left by a member of the Facebook Group “I Want Tamil Back in Changi Airports Signboards”.

If that is true, then the people working at some of our statutory boards have very, very little respect for our national customs and languages. If you’re Singaporean, you should feel affronted. So, I urge you all to join that Facebook group, and sign a petition when they do set one up.

I want to see all four of my nation’s official languages back on signboards.

The Singapore formula for ethnic harmony

National Parks Singapore - Weblinks
Uploaded with plasq‘s Skitch!

It is diabolically simple – just don’t talk about it. When you don’t raise race issues, they won’t surface, and everyone is none the wiser, and Confucius did say something to the effect of doing away with knowledge and grief consequentially not being known.

It makes me really upset to hear about the Police disallowing a Speakers’ Corner application to speak about the CAAS not having Tamil language signboards at Changi Airport (they have English, Chinese, Malay and Japanese ones).

I thought there was some liberalisation or something, and that the National Parks were in charge now, but apparently, it now seems if the Parks receive applications with keywords like “race”, “language” and “religion”, they refer them to the police to be disallowed.

When pressed, the CAAS, who, bless their hearts, are doing a fine job of running airports, but who need PR people desperately, apparently responded like this:

The CAAS replied last week that directional signboards were previously only in English. From April 2005, they were also in Chinese, Malay and Japanese, to cater to the large number of visitors speaking those languages.

As English was India’s second language, it was advised by the Singapore Tourism Board that English signs were sufficient.

Bravo, Singapore Tourism Board too. So English comes second, between Hindi and Tamil, issit?

I hear they’re changing the lines of the National Pledge:

...pledge ourselves as one united people who will not talk about race, language or religion… to achieve happiness, prosperity and progress for our nation.



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