Who Moved My Singapore Cheese

A friend asked this question early this morning, "Is the racism still bad in syd?".
Being highly concerned with this question myself, I have done a bit of snooping prior and found that there has been a recent increase in racism across various countries which primarily stems from the unemployment and a sudden spike in Asian immigrants, most of which are from China and India due to their rise in spending power. Indians, in particular, have been having a really bad time in Australia in the past months, culminating in public protests and undue tension.

Not unlike what we have in Singapore, there is a growing disgruntle to Kevin Rudd's continued policy of leveraging skilled immigration to bolster the economy, one that was really the works of John Howard. Australia is more multicultural than Singapore, and has been so for a long period of time. Kevin Rudd made headlines with his 2008 public apology made to the aboriginals. There is no denying that racism exists in Australia just like anywhere else but how much it affects you in your quality of life as a migrant is going to be for yours truly to find out. One interesting statistic I found though, is that 60% of Sydneysiders are not born in Australia.

On a personal note, I feel that as long as Australia's immigration laws do not veer to the extremes of that like we have in Singapore, balance and harmony will be achieved, without incurring too much wrath on the ground. Why? If you have ever tried your hand at figuring out your migration eligibility to Australia, you will find that the biggest impediment at the end of the day is in securing a job there, which is no easy feat if you do not first secure a permanent residency. Now try reading this article to compare the difference with our system here in Singapore.