I met a Malaysian lady who had migrated and lived in UK for several years. She related her experience going through security check at Singapore airport. She had a lipstick which was detected at the screening gate. She had to go through a lot of hassle over this matter.
She said, "I left Heathrow Airport with this lipstick and they did not give me any trouble over it. Heathrow has many times the passengers compared to Singapore and had to deal with bigger security threats. The security officers were able to identify what was important, and what was not. Why did Singapore give so much trouble over a lipstick, which clearly was quite innocent. Couldn't the officer exercise some discretion?"
I agreed with her. There is a tendency in Singapore to follow the books blindly, without exercising any discretion or common sense. This is a part of our culture that needs to be corrected. Someone called it the "kiasu attitude". It is quite a serious weakness.
She said, "I left Heathrow Airport with this lipstick and they did not give me any trouble over it. Heathrow has many times the passengers compared to Singapore and had to deal with bigger security threats. The security officers were able to identify what was important, and what was not. Why did Singapore give so much trouble over a lipstick, which clearly was quite innocent. Couldn't the officer exercise some discretion?"
I agreed with her. There is a tendency in Singapore to follow the books blindly, without exercising any discretion or common sense. This is a part of our culture that needs to be corrected. Someone called it the "kiasu attitude". It is quite a serious weakness.
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