on National Day

on National Day

Today, I was watching the parade on tv. I thought I had enough of these. But as the first strains of the national anthem rang out, as if on cue, there was a lump in my throat.

Maybe it was the two and a half years in green uniform, running up hills, cleaning carbon from rifles. The mud caked on my boots is soil, our nation's soil. I was training for a contingency that I hope will never come.

This must be clear. The nation is one thing, the executive that runs it is another. Though I may have differences of opinion with the latter, I do grudgingly believe that they are trying their best. I do hope they will keep to their promise of a more open society.

I have lived through a period when this nation's very own existence was an uncertainty. Today, as F-16s roared past overhead my block to the parade grounds, I hope, for my daughter's sake, that she will not see the times I had been through as a child.