" I would bring my date to a music cafe along Prinsep Street to chill out with some drinks. the cafe would preferably have a warm, cosy ambience's and a centre stage for its patrons to freely sing a song or two if they want to.

I would go up on the stage to dedicate and serenade my significant other with my all-time favourite love ballad - Richard Marx's Now and Forever. she will be seated right in front of the stage, and i will look into her eyes lovingly as i sing."

TWO...
Alison Liew on The Straits Times (Friday, January 30, 2009. pg B9.).
His letter was the winning letter!

"Never has the national anthem Majulah Singapura been heard officially in any Olympic Games, or even in its less glamorous cousin, the Paralympics. but one Singaporean, Yip Pin Xiu, has laid that to history. on Sept 15, 2008, she helped put Singapore on the world sporting map.

Competing in the Beijing Paralympics, Pin Xiu, at the tender age of 16, swam her 50m breaststroke (s3) event in a gold-medal time of 58.75 seconds. this added to the silver she had already obtained in the 50m freestyle.

altogether, it was a haul of unprecedented proportions.

what makes her achievements all the more remarkable is the fact that she suffers from muscular dystrophy - a genetic disease that is marked by progressive weakness and degeneration of the muscles which control movement.

however, her extreme medical difficulties did not deter her from chasing her dreams and, in so doing, giving all Singaporeans something to be proud of.

For a start, Pin Xiu did not choose the easy path of wallowing in self-pity and resigning herself to her circumstances. instead, she took up swimming to inject purpose in her life, and that soon developed into a new direction.

a sporting career is never smooth-sailing and, given her medical conditions, would be doubly punishing. for example, she has to put in that extra effort to complete a stroke as compared to her able-bodied peers.

yet, she never gave up her dreams. she chose to toil away silently, knowing that every stoke she made would being her closer to a podium finish, closer to the day she saw the fruition of her dreams.

for those who have always taken their physical well-being for granted, unintentionally or not, she has compelled them to take a new perspective of their lives: by showing them the way to live."