Asian Wall Street Journal. Singapore. May 1, 2000

PHUA Chu Kang, one of the most popular TV characters here, is a parody of a certain kind of Singaporean. His hair is permed, he has mole on his cheek, and he lets the nail on his little finger grow very long.

When last seen on TV, he spoke almost entirely in Singapore's unique and baffling vernacular, Singlish.

But not any more.

Singapore's government has launched a crusade to banish Singlish - a mishmash of English, Malay, Hindi and various Chinese dialects - to the linguistic dustbin. "Poor English reflects badly on us and makes us seem less intelligent," said Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, speaking at this weekend's launch of the Speak Good English Movement.

Self-Improvement

It's the latest in the self-improvement campaigns for which the spick-and-span city-state is renowned. There's the Courtesy Campaign, run every year since 1979, which encourages such acts as offering subway seats to the elderly. There was the effort to modify the behavior of greedy buffet grazers who pile their plates too high with food and then don't eat it up. There has been lobbying, too, to keep the streets litter-free; to encourage well-educated women to improve the gene pool by having more babies; and to discourage people from discarding broken appliances by throwing them out of skyscraper windows.

Like some of the campaigns that came before it, the Speak Good English Movement has economic and social implications that belie any snickering comparisons to the musical "My Fair Lady." The government here says it was alarmed to find recently that many children have little exposure to English at home, where families in this melting-pot town often speak a native tongue, or else Singlish.

Singapore prides itself on being a world-class business town, and English is the international business language. Yet young people were having trouble distinguishing between good English and Singlish, despite the fact that English is an official language here (alongside Mandarin, Malay and Tamil). Too many kids were copying Mr Phua, the comic TV character, whose catch phrase is the characteristic Singlish expression, "Don't pray pray." (Translation: "Don't kid me.")

Singlish is as pervasive here as it is baffling to the uninitiated, and its origins have become fodder for academics, who are still a bit foggy on some of its roots. A hallmark is the practice of ending a sentence with "lah," much like a Canadian might say "eh." Some Singlish words are more easily deciphered than others: "cannot-lah" means "that's impossible;" "shiok" means heavenly or pleasurable.

Chinese Syntax

It gets more complicated when Chinese syntax comes into play, says Mark Astill, a British language teacher here who runs a Web site on Singlish that aims to help people improve their English. A standard practice is to use a literal translation of a Chinese sentence - for instance, "You see me no up" translates as "You look down on me."

For Singapore's leadership, the popularity of talking like this was a call to action. Last year, Singapore's Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew called Singlish "a handicap we must not wish on Singaporeans." This weekend, Prime Minister Goh warned that foreign investors may avoid Singapore if they find they must "guess what our workers are saying."

Thus, government-controlled or influenced newspapers, TV and radio stations have been asked to run features, programs and quizzes about using better English. And later this month, Mr Phua will return to state-run TV in a new series of his popular sitcom - speaking greatly improved English. Since his last series ended, it seems, he's been back to school to brush up. In one clip shown at this weekend's Speak Good English festivities, he tests a faux-classy British accent reminiscent of Basil Fawlty, the inept hotelier in Fawlty Towers.

As part of the Speak Good English Movement, the government also persuaded two local writer-actors to refashion their 1999 short play, "The Singlish Patient," to complement the campaign. It wasn't a perfect fit, however.

The skit consists of an exchange between two women, one of whom is a gynecologist. The writers, Loke Loo Pin and Jennifer Castilano, at first balked at rewriting it - the government wanted some of the skit's racy jokes eliminated, and Dr Loke (who is a dentist by profession) feared it would turn into "propaganda." A joke about oral sex had to go, but Dr Loke says they fought hard to keep another pun in place, in which the gynecologist quips about being "at your service," or as members of her profession put it, "at your cervix."

`We May Have No Choice'

But most of the dialogue is about the use of Singlish. The Singaporean character, Jek, says: "I'm afraid that ultimately we may have no choice but to adopt standard English, but when that time comes, we also need to realize that we will lose our distinctive local flavor and charm - and that saddens me." The other character, a foreigner named Jane, argues that if Singaporeans don't speak proper English, "you can't compete internationally."

Dr Loke says the original dialogue was more sympathetic to Singlish.

She adds that she isn't about to stop using smatterings of Singlish at home with her family. In fact, she says, the first time she appeared on TV speaking "English" English, her brother called her up and said: "Loo Pin, I never heard you speak like that before."

Privately, some Singaporeans resent what campaigns like the Good English Movement represent. The government "is mercenary" in its treatment of people, gripes one Singaporean, as so many of the campaigns, including this one, have an economic motive.

For instance, a Speak Mandarin campaign, launched several years ago, was meant to both unify Singapore's Chinese community and to further Singapore's business ties with mainland China, in recognition of China's importance in the region. Mandarin, which is China's main dialect, wasn't widely spoken among Singapore's ethnic Chinese, many of whom speak dialects such as Teochew, Hokkien and Hakka. But learning Mandarin proved quite a struggle for many Singaporeans, since it meant they had to study an extra language on top of English.

Whether Singlish has much of a future is unclear. "The challenge that faces the Speak Good English Movement is that many Singaporeans feel really proud of their Singlish," notes Mr Astill, the teacher. It's especially true of some Singaporean artists and writers, who feel Singlish is a badge of Singaporean culture. While Mr Astill says he "totally" supports the Speak Good English Movement, he adds, "I can assure you, though, it is going to meet some resistance."

Indeed, even at the state-controlled phone company Singapore Telecommunications, the message that Singlish is out may take a while to sink in. The SingTel Paging Web site includes instructions on how to send canned messages via its pagers - including 20 in Singlish. Select No. 101, and you can send the message: "Aiyo! Stop pestering me-lah!"