'A' division badminton finals: RJC vs JJC

Posted: June 4, 2009 by fievel in Labels: ,
7

As a former badminton player in the inter-school circuit, I found it rather surprising when I saw the contenders for the title this year, RJC vs Jurong JC. What? JJC? What happened to VJC? Or ACJC? Or even TJC? Well the twist of story came to light when I managed to track down my former doubles partner at the badminton hall amidst the good old deafening RJC cheering. He is one of the teachers-in-charge now and the inside scoop is this...

Me: How come JJ is so strong now?
Him: They are all Chinese import students/players.
Me: Where do they find so many Chinese players?
Him: They have agents for that nowadays apparently...
Me: Then how can they cope with 'A' levels just coming into Singapore like dat?
Him: They don't. Their school don't care. They return to their country or find other things to do after the 2yrs in JC.

For a more informative read, below is a better documented article taken from the Kent Ridge Common.
Some really 'funny' comments also ensued the article...of which I extracted one...see below!

Warning signs of unhappy sentiments against foreigners
By
Kelvin Teo ⋅ June 2, 2009

SINGAPORE - Last week, the National Inter-school ‘A’ division badminton finals featured a showdown between Jurong Junior College (JJC) and Raffles Institution (RJC). What was supposed to be a simple final duel between 2 schools ended up being polarized into a Singapore versus China showdown. How did that happen? The boys’ and girls’ teams from RJC consisted of Singaporeans, while the girls’ team line-up from JJC wholly consisted of Chinese nationals. Of the 7 members in the JJC boys’ team, 4 were from China, 1 from South Korea and 2 were Singaporeans.

JJC made history with its first appearance in a badminton final. However, the line-up of its teams came under heavy criticism, and there were hints of unhappy sentiments. Vice-captain of the Anglo-Chinese Junior College (ACJC) badminton team, John Low, echoed the sentiments of his team:”‘It’s unfair and we do feel a little resentful.” RJC coach Hamid Khan agreed with Low’s unfair assessment, adding that there should have been a cap in the number of foreign players allowed to participate. Others felt that a cap in number of foreign players would have the advantage of improving sporting standards without adversely affecting the participation of local players. The polarized contest between Singapore and China was summed up by Lim Boon Tiong, an RJC reserve player:”A lot of us feel like we’re playing for Singapore, not just Raffles”.

The resentment went to the level that even supporters from ACJC cheered on RJC. This is a thought that any ACSian in his right frame of mind would never ever entertain given the rivalry between ACS and Raffles. The fact that the former cheered for the latter just showed how polarized the contest is, which transcended inter-school rivalries.

Such unhappy sentiments were reminiscent of those expressed in the wake of the open door policy, which opened the floodgates for waves of foreign employees into our work force. These sentiments were expressed occasionally in our very own Straits Times forums, and online in blogs and other popular Internet forums. Like those who were concerned over the badminton showdown between JJC and RJC, there were repeated calls to exercise a strict cap or quota on the number of foreign employees a company can hire. Like local badminton players losing out on the opportunity to represent their school, local employees fear losing their rice bowls to foreign employees. If the calls remained unheeded, such unhappy sentiments against foreigners will rear its ugly head. The events at the badminton final provided a stark reminder to all.



Comment
nsnsns ·
9 hours ago
Wake up, the Singapore male will eventually lose in the game of life when you finish your A-levels and are forced to enter NS slavery. The "JJC China loser" will move on to your varsity place and fuck your girls. I hope something ugly breaks up at a larger scale. It will be a much better show than this childish badminton.


7 comments:

  1. ec says:

    what a funny comment haha

  1. fievel says:

    Funny and probably untrue...our gals are more SPGs than PRCPGs ;)

  1. Anonymous says:

    y cant jjc play against rjc??!!!ya..ure right in terms of academic but we are talking about sports here...u shld be asking y jjc use foreign talents??!!because all local talents went to TOP jc!!!!also, how u knw that they cant cope wif alevel!!!!i can oni say that ure DAMN narrow-minded!!!!!!!

  1. Anonymous says:

    JJC FT policy is our National Policy...

    National Policy is ironed out by our most expensive and theoretically infallible and smart elite leaders


    to question JJC FT policy is to cast doubts on the direction that our great leaders has pave out for us


    if there are any doubts then you should not be a sinkaporean

  1. Fievel says:

    Anonymous (12 June 2009, 930pm),

    I apologize if I misrepresented my views for the lack of further elaborations.
    When I said "why JJC, and not VJC or TJC or ACJC..." I meant that traditionally JJC was simply not strong in badminton. For every game played at the school levels, there has always been traditional favorites. For example, Jurong Secondary would always be expectedly strong in basketball. It was a surprise that cannot be argued to be uncalled for, that's all I was saying. If fact, I'd like to point out that local sporting talents do not gravitate to academically top jcs naturally. That's a woeful assumption by many at best.

    Next, my question on how the imported players from China could cope with A levels was more due to the fact that these students were obviously imported on the merits of their sporting talents and in such a hasty fashion. Ronald Susilo was brought to Singapore by ACS at a much younger age to play (Secondary 1 if I recall correct) and that would have given him sufficient time to assimilate to the education formats here - and that was rationale.
    However, on looking back at the number of PRC students comfortably occupying the upper tiers in our tertiary school systems when I was in school, I must admit I might have been too presumptious. Thanks for pointing that out.

    I hope somebody from Kent Ridge Common would follow up on the fates of these players from JJC after their 2 years is up...

  1. Anonymous says:

    A jjcian is not determined by its' nationality. and mind you. there was only 1 china play in the game and 1 korean. rest are all singaporeans. Please stop being so closed minded with all these. JJCians fought a great match. The students cheered to their best. and the players gave their best. not as a singaporean, but as a JJCIAN alrights?

  1. Anonymous says:

    look at your own system. MERITOCRACY. Those who earn get the reward. JJC did not import the players, they entered the school just like any other student, they earned the right to be in the school team and they did well. You people get sore over foreign talent and u want to be a International Hub? Dont make me Laugh.