The youth of today seems to have a preconception that a Third World country must be one that its people live in abject poverty, has no sanitary and drinking water, and have no access to the materialistic things of the world and this cannot be further from the truth. There would always be rich and poor people even in the Third World and just because a person could afford to change camera gears every year does not mean that the rest of the country could.
I m sure everybody would agree that Singapore in the 1950s, before even the Party came into power would be classified as a Third World country. But life in 1950s Singapore was not much different from today, just less technologically advanced but noisier, more colourful and the people were nicer to each other, not as judgemental and quick to call each other names. Just take a look at this video clip of 1950s Singapore.
[video=youtube;nw7toyYrqjs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nw7toyYrqjs[/video]
By virtue of its geographical position, Singapore has always been an important trading centre since the days of Sir Stamford Raffles and always had access to all the luxuries of the world. In the 1950s, Singapore is already a major world city, tourist attraction and shopping paradise for the World. We were no sleepy fishing village as some people would have us believe waiting to be saved through political awakening. We already had clean drinking water and proper sewage treatment facilities even back then unlike most other countries in Asia. We were amongst the first country in Asia to have B&W televisions (1963) and colour televisions (1974) when we were still considered a Third World country. Why I know this? Because I had lived through it all. My father always wanted the best things in life and we were amongst the first families in Singapore to own a B&W and later colour TV set. But I was keenly aware that there were many, many other people who could not afford these luxuries in life. In today's so-called First World Singapore, while we play in our ivory towers with our expensive cameras, there still are many, many people out there scratching out a living barely making $1,000 a month while our leaders collect million dollar salaries promising us all a Swiss living standard. They are not totally wrong though for some people do have the means for a Swiss standard of living but what about the majority. Is it their fault that they were not born rich and were short-changed by their leaders. Perhaps we just choose not to see or feel empathy for them.
So don't compare Singapore to more deprived countries of the Third World when people say we are regressing from the First World back to the Third. We were never like that even back in the 40s and 50s. For those who are too young to know, go ask your parents... or better yet, just Google and Youtube.
