YOU KNOW NATIONAL DAY IS REALLY NEAR WHEN YOU GO DEAF

Control, this is Blue Leader, we are approaching the Padang for flypa... oops overshot, let's go arou.... oops, we're over Batam, going arou... oops, we're over Woodlands, turning agai.... shit, we're past Tuas... coming round to the Padang agai... shit! Changi liao!

Above all, noisier than all, thems fighter jets and choppers have been making circles all over the island practicing and practicing so that they can get it just right. I've missed half a dozen calls on my mobile because of the racket they've been making, and I've been shouting more than I usually do. At the coffee shop downstairs of my office, a taxi-driver on a coffee break looked up at the be-circling jets and said, WAH LAO SINGAPORE! ROAD JAM NOT ENOUGH MUST SKY JAM! Economy Rice to the rescue. (Tsunami relief efforts, Jan 05) On a more serious note while my ears are still ringing, Serene Luo of the Straits Times called today to tell me of a 99 year old Samsui woman who wants to attend the National Day Parade, but who can't get a ticket. She says that she's tried calling everyone, but her pleas have fallen on deaf ears (see lah, fly aeroplane so often some more!) Serene writes:

She's Madam How Cheon Mui, a Cantonese woman from the Samsui province in Guangdong, China, came to Singapore in the 1930s, leaving her husband and children back home while she worked here. Distinguished by their navy blue outfits and bright red headgear, Mdm How was one of those women who helped build the DBS building in Shenton Way, and Changi Airport in the 1970s.

Her husband is long gone; the last time she went back to China was some 18 years ago. She now lives in Grace Lodge in the Sengkang area, after she took a nasty fall a few years ago.

A member of the public, Anthony, called up a colleague after she'd written an article last week about two samsui women in their 70s who will be taking part in the parade. Anthony is a distant relative of Mdm How's. He's appealing to us to help find an extra ticket to this year's parade for her. Because she's wheelchair-bound after the fall, he was hoping to get two or three tickets so his parents can take her to the parade, and explain it to her (she speaks Cantonese only). But if that's impossible, just one ticket will do, and Anthony will even pick her up from the home, take her to any meeting point and pick her up after.

If the ticket simply is an extra goodie bag for you, or if you really aren't a flag-waving, whistle-tooting, patriotic song-singing person, or if for whatever reason, you suddenly can't make the parade, please do try and make it a little different for someone else.

Dear Singaporeans, dear bloggers, I know you all don't like journalists very much. I also know it's a far shot, seeing that NDP tickets are highly sought after. But I'm hoping that perhaps from somewhere in your heart, if you might be able to help, please do!

Samsui city: These are the women that built Singapore I'd give up my NDP ticket to Madam How, wouldn't you? It would seem a little absurd that there are Samsui Women featured at the parade, but this one poor Samsui woman can't get a seat to watch it. How can? It's a blooming shame! What da heow? Who da blooming copy writer? iTunes Party Shuffle is playing a copy of 沉睡的珊瑚礁 from the album "Pbylmount Jazz Of Shanghai (Disc 1)" by Shanghai Old Pbylmount Jazz Band

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