I learnt from a visa contractor that his first and last case of visa refusal was of a Singaporean whose govt did not give him the required No Objection Certificate to be able to work in USA as software consultant ---and that is after USA has a Free Trade Agreement with SIngapore and Chile (and 7,000 out of 65,000 H-1B visas are kept for these two nations -and routinely few apply from these nations).
Seems Singapore is afraid that if they all take H-1B visas then who will work in the city-state. I think SIngapore is run by some Chinese guy whose father was the chief before him.
Umesh
Rajib Das <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Rajib Das <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
I could not describe Singapore better!!!! Even if
someone spends a few days and tires of the shopping
malls, one realizes how close the boundaries are. My
biggest fear is throwing cigarette butts inadvertently
on the street and getting caught.
I hear the Speaker's Corner in Singapore is now really
called Sneakers Corner because more often soccer is
played than someone giving a speech.
--- Rajiv Baruah <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>wrote:
---------------------------------
Rajib,
There is this corner of the world - disneyland with
death penalty I call it, which was my abode for about
2 years. If there was one place where the might of the
"danda" successfully turned a tropical vice pit into
first world orderliness - it is Singapore. And so
successful was the power of the "danda" that well nigh
the entire populace turned into duty bound salarymen,
always keeping to the straight and narrow. But
globalisation came, China became the factory of the
world and the old certainities of Singapore, that
elbow grease and a 60 hour week will continue to put
dinner on Singapore's table vanished. The guv-ment
wanted "knowledge industries". But how do you get the
creative spark to kick start these knowledge
industries. Aha - some bright spark in the Guv-ment
said, we must now permit table top dancing and
encourage free debate (S'pore style).
And so the Speakers Corner was born. It is behind a
police station where you have to take a permit in
advance before you talk. In my two years there, I did
not see a soul talk here. And I cross this place every
day, sometimes twice a day, on my way home or to a
coffee from office.
Let me give credit where credit is due - Singapore is
a wonderful place to raise kids, play golf and, and
let me think a bit more. But it is so mind numbinly
boring.
best
Rajiv
------ Original Message ------
Received: Wed, 21 Jun 2006 10:51:53 AM SGT
From: Rajib Das <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: assam@assamnet.org
Subject: [Assam] An evening in Hyde Park
In the middle of a tiring business trip around the
world I found myself in London - trying to be a
tourist on a very hot Sunday a couple of weeks back.
The very unimaginative stories around some really
great monuments added to the ennui.
I landed up around the Speaker's Corner in Hyde Park
and was planning to take the train from around there
to my hotel. Which is when I saw the crowds milling
around folks doing their speeches.
It was a most enthralling experience. I found myself
in the middle of a debate between a full bearded
mullah (perhaps of Arab descent) with a cockney accent
and a white punk with spiked hair about creationism
and evolution. Into that mix came a wide variety of
people across the length of 2 hours I was there. There
were many African Muslims and Pakistanis (perhaps a
few Bangladeshis too) looking on with admiration at
the mullah who was speaking perfect English and
holding his ground. There was a black Brit - perhaps
an African - that shouted profanities at the mullah.
There was this very quiet white liberal woman who was
politically very correct and tried reasoning with the
Mullah that perhaps evolution can be a part of God's
design.
And while the mullah (as also the punk) quoted
philosophers and scientists about intricacies of the
debate, I figured the Mullah's logic was simple - that
before there was any living thing, there must have
been something that must independently and absolutely
exist. Ipso facto there has to be a God and but one
absolute God and therefore there has to be just one
word (or book) from
this one God. Pretty simplistic argument. The guy was
aggressive, didn't listen to any other point of view
and used a condescending tone when replying to someone
else. My observation - no wonder the human bombers on
the West are coming from the West itself.
Taking courage from this Mullah, a Pakistani middle
aged man started talking about many Hindus having
converted to Islam till I reminded him how Spain
converted back from Islam to Christianity.
When I broke away from this group, I found quite a few
people accosting a Jewish American and telling him how
bad George Bush is and why he is an Israeli and not an
American. All along this somewhat crazy Indian (not me
:-)) was trying to tell him how he knew more about
America than the American - never mind the fact that
he had never lived in America for a long period. There
were other speeches about crazy topics and using
language that cannot be mentioned here.
As I wound my way back around 10 when the sun was
setting, I was exihilarated and energized by the
experience.
Is there any other physical place in the world that
this kind of thing happens?
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Umesh Sharma
5121 Lackawanna ST
College Park, MD 20740
1-202-215-4328 [Cell Phone]
Ed.M. - International Education Policy
Harvard Graduate School of Education,
Harvard University,
Class of 2005
weblog: http://jaipurschool.bihu.in/
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