Newsflash

Yeah probably by now everybody knows that yesterday at 10:30am a student stabbed a prof in the back (with a knife) in NTU and jumped off a building after that. The prof survived but the student died. The building's nearby my office o_O But when the crime happened I was still happily cruising along the highway at Johor.

Why I assume everybody knows, is because when I called my mum yesterday and mentioned it, she said that my aunt from NZ actually called her up and told her about it. Begitulah globalisasi.

But - I bet you didn't know this. At 4:30pm on Sunday, the national icon of Singapore, the Merlion, while happily minding its own business, dutifully spurting water from its mouth because that's what it does, was struck by a bolt of lightning. The poor creature "lost part of its top left mane and is believed to have its right ear chipped".

There it is, the third most read from this list of most popular stories in The Straits Times Online, among all the violence and sex which is what all people care about nowadays anyway. Loving the neon green underwear in Story 2! At least some of the stories are entertaining in the Singaporean news. The Malaysian ones are downright depressing.

1	Student stabs prof, falls
2	Too skimpy for the beach?
3	Merlion hit by lightning
4	Enraged by leaked sex pix
5	Boss faces molest charges
6	Cabbie charged with molest
7	Peeping Tom jailed
8	HSBC to axe 6,100 jobs
9	Investing in S'pore's daughters
10	Billionaire eyes presidency