Non-Seizable Offence

I just realised in Singapore; if you scratched a car, you could be arrested for vandalism on the spot; but if you punched someone, you can actually walk away. Seemingly insane but the distinction lies in seizable and non-seizable offences. Punching someone is a non-seizable offence i.e. the police cannot investigate and arrest unless the Magistrate directs the police to do so. There have been lots of articles written on it apparently where public members like me are baffled as to why the police don't do anything when they turn up but just give you a form to fill in. The underlying fear is that people will complain for the smallest and most trivial of things i.e. drunk fighting or getting his foot stamped on. In other words, if you are hit by someone and you want the police to take action, you should "hope" to lose a limb, get a fracture or well, be castrated. Really, castration is actually a criteria.

Now, I understand why Frank Castle becomes the Punisher or Bruce Wayne becomes the Dark Knight. Sometimes, the law just does not protect. Let's see whether the law could run its course. Somehow, I doubt it. Unless Batman runs the Singapore Police Force, it is probably a lost cause.

- - - - -

Maid in Manhattan

If you watched Maid in Manhattan, Jennifer Lopez was working in the "Beresford" which is actually the Waldorf Astoria where I stayed when I was in New York.

So when I watched the silly romantic movie on HBO today, I recalled my stay. In the movie, J-lo was surrounded by a clique of wise-cracking women who went about their duties cleaning the rooms.

Let me just say that the service staff at all these hotels are without doubt, either blacks who can't speak proper English because they are from Jaimaca or they are Mexicans. Everybody looked disgruntled. You can tell that they are waiting for an opportunity to run you over with their cleaning trolley and strangle you with a spare towel. Just as the dirty service industry in Singapore is supported by mainland Chinee, Filippinos or Thais, the US' economy runs on the sweat of immigrants like the Mexicans. There is no joy cleaning someone's mess, no matter what the school tells you.