6 years on...

The late Ong Teng Chong passed away on 8th February 2002 and 6 years have passed since then. He has always been someone that I look up to, a role-model of sorts, even though I do not know him personally;but by piecing together the articles written about him, I think I might.

I wrote an article on him back in 2006 (Perhaps it was cut & paste from somewhere cos the article really was quite well written, IMHO. link : http://chroniclesbinks.blogspot.com/2006/05/great-man-to-remember.html ) but that was a long time ago. 6 years to be exact.

6 years on, things have changed. The world have moved on. The environment changed. The people changed. So has the motive.

Yet, this man, unknowingly and very strangely remain etched in my memory, occasionally resurfacing when I delve into the narcosis of things related to Singapore. Despite the fact that I have changed over the course of the years.

I am no longer that vocal, no longer that critical and very much mellowed in my expressions. And in the way I express them. Thoughts that once flowed no longer have the luxury of freedom but exists freely only within the confides of my inner self.

The change is not a resignation to fate, but the realisation of a greater truth, the lesser of two evils, that prompted a change of strategy. In layman terms; to adapt and suit the situation.

The passing of Ong Teng Chong represents the end of an era. And the beginning of another. I remember him not for his legacy, but him as a person. To the me of 6 years ago, he was the epitome of everything fair, impartial yet kind; a people's President. You may not agree but at least a common point can be established when I say that his heart is for his people: the people who had elected him President back in 1993.

Ad honorem.

"Love is a choice, not merely a feeling. It is a journey, not merely a collection of promises made in the heat of passion. Indeed, to experience true love, one must learn to let go of that which is fleeting and transient, and embrace the higher infinite."