www.Go To The Mountain - Musings of a Potential Guru

Ministerial Pay Everybody's talking about ministerial pay. Of course you must pay your ministers well so they must have enough and not worried about these things like us as they have bigger things to do and not get caught in a vicious cycle of mundane stuffs.  We should not begrudge them. We want our leaders to stand tall and hold their own against the world's best.  But I suspect that many like me feel strongly that while you do not want people to get into politics for power and other forms of  money, you do not  want people to go into politics asking what's in it for me.  If you feel smaller because your salary is less than those you are working with or talking to, then there is no business for you to be there or anywhere. President Obama should then be ashamed to be talking to Bill Gates, Warren Buffet or even Michael Bloomberg. A policeman ought to be ashamed to issue a summon to the owner of a Jaguar. Meanwhile, corruption is of the mind and soul o...

Soccer is all about the fans without which there is little meaning but it is the players that make things happen. Star players were household names. Of course there must be rivalry. Strangely enough, when a team wins, they often mention about some great players or the team but much less praises or awards are given to coaches, yet the coach is the main fall guy when it comes to the sacking when things do not turn out right. Uncle Choo was not the Singapore coach because he was extremely outspoken and fiery just like Brian Clough was. He recalled certain players against certain opinions. You see Uncle Choo was diabetic and in giving his all to Singapore he might have neglected his health. Soon after the glorious win and thereafter, he had an amputation of his right leg due to gangrene to save his life. At 66, the enforced idleness was too much to bear as the FAS turned down his offer to be adviser to the Pre-Olympics team. "I may have lost my leg but not my head" Uncle was d...

Back in the good old days, we have four other national teams. Besides the National Team (The Lions), we also have a B team (The Cubs). Then we also competed in the Sultan's Gold Cup fielding a team called Singapore Malays. We have the Singapore Indians playing in the Bardhan Cup and the other being the Singapore Chinese team also competing aga inst Malaysian state teams in the same format and also the Ho Ho Cup triangular among Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong. In 1976, Englishman Trevor Hartley became responsible for the Singapore team at age 28. I can't remember which year Singapore beat Malacca 6-2 and Lee Bee Seng was sent off for punching an opponent who must have trampled on him. Here is Bee Seng with Brian Rozario. In the same match Quah Kim Song was sent off too for fighting. And I said wow! Malaysia Cup is like that? I like! (Pix - Lee Bee Seng with Brian Rozario). And can you believe this? Before all these we have Mike Walker who played Kim Song a...

It was a soccer-crazy school circa 1974 at Tyrwhitt Road. Boys would form 2 teams and play with a plastic ball before or after school at the basketball court and suddenly when you could hear a pin drop that was when the discipline master just stood there watching. When there was a friendly match at the school field, the old school doors left wide opened was ideal, only the teacher conducting lessons was a distraction. When ordered to shut the doors, half of our spirit just died. Fresh from a Malaysia Cup game over the weekend, some teachers would begin by talking about the game - how good Kim Song was, etc. Our school teams were always in the Schools Final be it C, B or A Division. We packed Farrer Park soccer pitches on many Saturdays for social or inter-class games. It was a dream come true when the National Team would sometimes train at our school pitch when Jalan Besar was occupied and I watched first hand how the legendary Uncle Choo Seng Quee trained his charges. That was in...