[SG Talk] You know you're an 80s kid (in SG) if... [Archive]

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aDrena

11-12-2003, 10:40 PM

Was inspired by Karen's post in the US and Canada forum, and decided to post the local version here. Some of these really tugged at my heartstrings..Oh, if only I could go back to being a kid :oops:

[center:b033bb933e]You Know Your an 80s Kid if...[/center:b033bb933e]
[list=1:b033bb933e]
[*:b033bb933e]You grew up watching He-man, Transformers, Silver hawk and Mickey Mouse. Not to forget, Ninja turtles and Smurfs too.

[*:b033bb933e]You grew up brushing your teeth with a mug in Primary school during recess time. You will squat by a drain with all your classmates beside you, and brush your teeth with a coloured mug.
The teachers said you must brush each side 10 times too.

[*:b033bb933e]You know what's Bin(1) Fen(1) Ba (1) San(1) (缤纷八三) is all about.

[*:b033bb933e]You know what SBC stands for

[*:b033bb933e]You were there when the first chinese serial, the Awakening was shown on TV.

[*:b033bb933e]You brought every single book to school, even though there was one thing called the timetable.

[*:b033bb933e]You find your friends with pagers and handphones cool in Secondary school.

[*:b033bb933e]SBS buses used to be non-airconditioned.
The bus seats are made of wood and the cushion is red. The big red bell gives a loud BEEEP! when pressed.
There are colourful tickets for TIBS buses. The conductor will check for tickets by using a machine which punches a hole on the ticket.

[*:b033bb933e]Your favourite actor and actress is Huang Wenyong and Xiangyun.
Next is Lee Nanxing and Zoe Tay and the Aiyoyo woman.

[*:b033bb933e]You've probably read Young Generation magazine.
You know who's Vinny the little vampire and Acai the constable.

[*:b033bb933e]You were there when they first introduced MRT here.
You went for the first ride with your parents and you would kneel on the seat to see the scenery.

[*:b033bb933e]Movie tickets used to cost only $3.50.

[*:b033bb933e]Autograph books were loaded with "Best Wishes", "Forget Me Not", and small poems like "Bird fly high, hard to catch.
Friends like you, hard to forget".

[*:b033bb933e]You learn to laugh like The Count in Sesame Street

[*:b033bb933e]You longed to buy tibits called Kaka(20 cents per pack) and Ding Dang(50 cents per box), that had a toy in it and it changes every week. Not forgetting the 15 cents animal crackers and the ring pop, where the lollipop is the diamond on the ring.

[*:b033bb933e]You watched TV2(also known as Channel 10) cartoons because Channel 5 never had enough cartoons for you.

[*:b033bb933e]All that you know about Cantonese is from the Hong Kong serials you watched on TV2.

[*:b033bb933e]Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, The Three Investigators, Famous Five and Secret Seven are probably the thickest storybooks you ever thought you have read.
Even SweetValley High and Malory Towers.

[*:b033bb933e]Civics and Moral Education was "Hao3 Gong1 Min2".(好公民)

[*:b033bb933e]KFC used to be a high class restaurant that serves food in plates and let you use metal forks and knives.

[*:b033bb933e]The most vulgar thing you said was asshole and idiot and THE MOST EXTREME WAS 'super white'...you just couldn't bring yourself to say the hokkien relative.

[*:b033bb933e]Catching was the IN thing and twist the magic word.

[*:b033bb933e]Your English workbooks was made of some damn poor quality paper that was smooth and yellow.

[*:b033bb933e]CDIS was your best friend.

[*:b033bb933e]The only computer lessons in school involved funny pixellised characters in 16 colours walking about trying to teach you maths.

[*:b033bb933e]Waterbottles were slung around your neck and a must everywhere you go.

[*:b033bb933e]Boys loved to play soccer with small tennis balls in the basketball court or play something that uses tennis ball

to hit other players known as "HUM TAM BOLA" during recess /after school.

[*:b033bb933e]Hopskotch, five stones,chateh and zero point were all the rage with the girls and boys too...

[*:b033bb933e]Science was fun with the balsam and the angsana being the most important plants of our lives.

[*:b033bb933e]Who can forget Ahmad, Bala, Sumei and John, immortalized in our minds from the textbooks.

Even Mr Willy.

[*:b033bb933e]You did stupid exercises like seal crawl and frog jumps.

[*:b033bb933e]Every children's day and national day you either get pins or pens with 'Happy Children's Day 1993' or dumb files with 'Happy National Day 1994'.

[*:b033bb933e]You went to school in slippers and a raincoat when it rained, and you find a dry spot in the school to sit down, dry your feet, and wear your dry and warm socks and shoes.

[*:b033bb933e]You freak out when the teacher tells you to line up according to height and hold hands with the corresponding boy or girl.

[/list:o:b033bb933e]

charis

11-13-2003, 01:51 AM

lol! that just brought on a flood of memories man.. i could totally recall the hao gong min thingy.. heh heh.

oh, and every weekend we'd wash our school shoes and then paint them with the white paint... lol.

cherily

11-13-2003, 01:48 PM

hey thanks alot aDrena for sharing all this with us..though i m a late 80s kid this really brought back alot of memories..so much that i sometimes wish that i could
just go back to my primary school days which are so much more relaxed compared to now :dry:

still remembered my teacher forcing us to brush our teeth after recess at the large metal sink with everything else although i would just messily brush my teeth a few times and rinse my mouth before sneaking off.and we often played zeropoint when i was younger and it was so much fun..not to mention us gals getting crazy over sweet valley high books.. i know thats abit lame now but hey that was the 'in' thing then k.. :happy:
and oh yah the boys in my class were all crazy bout soccer..so much till they
got into trouble with the principal once for some reasons.. :)

dazzlette

11-13-2003, 01:51 PM

orhh.. man that was a really sweet and funny read.. makes me feel so old now.. can't believe i'm almost all grown up already... sigh.. i loved the part about science with angsana.. growing up with ninja turtles and growing up with ahmad sumei and mr willy...!!

lattae

11-13-2003, 05:23 PM

macdawn

11-13-2003, 05:46 PM

I am old :cry: I do like 95% of those stuff... and the best part... no 23... the textbook with super thin paper... which was yellow and had this weird texture... cannot liquid paper cos it'd turn out patchy and your teacher will know(erm, my time liquid paper was banned in sch), cannot erase cos the paper disintegrates at the touch of erasers boy... the kids really do have better stuff to write on these days...

Please.... Lattae you are only 20 and dazzlette is only 18, so please dun use the O** word here...... some of us here are pretty sensitive once we stepped over the quarter of century thershold....

-MacDawn

lattae

11-13-2003, 06:06 PM

macdawn

11-13-2003, 06:50 PM

that's classified, i can tell you, but I must kill you.......
*evil glint in eye*

*laugh like the Count*
AHaa haa haa

-MacDawn

Jay_ayumi_4eVeR

11-14-2003, 06:42 AM

:excited: that was cute... it definately brings back lots of memory... the bus was really non aircon and there still an odd smell sometimes... and we would always use the bus ticket and fold into heart shape.... but i din noe that movie was $3.50 at that time..well my parent pays them... and the autograph book... those poems...hahaa...

wish u gd luck wish u bad luck wish u born a baby duck... and 1 more..
pepsi cola went to town, coca cola shoot them down. mr fatty mixed them up and they become 7-up!...lol... :) :) :)

hisashi

11-14-2003, 09:06 AM

You freak out when the teacher tells you to line up according to height and hold hands with the corresponding boy or girl. That's the most I hated coz no one wanted to hold each other's hands. :dry: Thanks for bringing back the memories... :cry: really wish to go back in time..not in school but where I were carefree...

kecokele

11-14-2003, 09:38 AM

haha. wah, i saw this in an email long ago. but reading all these again juz brings back those memories. damn.. i'm old... :wacko:

dazzlette

11-14-2003, 09:53 AM

haha macdawn.. i'm sorry if you feel 'offended' when i used the O** word to describe myself.. but well that's how i truly feel.. maybe cos i'm still in denial a little cos well i enjoy being a kid.. hmm perhaps i should say i feel say i'm almost grown up?

petheads

11-14-2003, 01:21 PM

I'm so 80s! I know/have done like 90% of the stuff mentioned!
Such fond memories...squatting at the drain along the pathway with my toothbrush and plastic mug, carrying ALL my textbooks, workbooks, exercise books to school, reading my favourite magazine Young Generation and the adventures of Wallie and Yakki, paying $0.50 more to sit in the more "high class" Circle seats at Orchard cinema and so much more! Whoever heard of Internet and handphones.

Please.... Lattae you are only 20 and dazzlette is only 18, so please dun use the O** word here...... some of us here are pretty sensitive once we stepped over the quarter of century thershold....

That is so true. :laughing:

And yes. My favourite SBC actresses are Xiang Yun and Zoe Tay. :angel:

Melvin

11-14-2003, 02:02 PM

Haha that's cool although in the 80s i wasn't born yet... But some of these things also did happen in the 90s...

You brought every single book to school, even though there was one thing called the timetable.

Hey that's so true when I was in primary school I just chucked all my books into my bag and dragged the bag to school! :laughing:

Waterbottles were slung around your neck and a must everywhere you go.

Haha I did the same when I was in Primary 1 and 2.

SBS buses used to be non-airconditioned.
The bus seats are made of wood and the cushion is red. The big red bell gives a loud BEEEP! when pressed.

SBS buses were mostly non-airconditioned until about 2 years ago. Nowadays all SBS buses are airconditioned though.

You grew up brushing your teeth with a mug in Primary school during recess time. You will squat by a drain with all your classmates beside you, and brush your teeth with a coloured mug.
The teachers said you must brush each side 10 times too.

Hey I remember doing that in Primary 1 and 2 and we would all squat by the drain and brush for 5 minutes... It was really fun!!

Boys loved to play soccer with small tennis balls in the basketball court or play something that uses tennis ball to hit other players known as "HUM TAM BOLA" during recess /after school.

Yea I really did that every day... And If we couldn't find a tennis ball we would use coconuts (There were many coconut trees in my school) to play soccer... That was really fun! :excited:

*SkyLark*

11-14-2003, 03:59 PM

fungi

11-14-2003, 06:07 PM

i'm a 1985 baby.. but somehow, all these sound like what we did in pri school!!!! lol.. hey its so true and so funny reading about it!! i remember there was this health education thingy too, and i remember mugging for my health education test!!! hahaha. and we had to say the pledge in chinese during hao gong ming!! and there were those music lessons, where we'd have to play the recorder, and those weird songs we had to sing with hand actions? anyone remember burang kaka dua.. that weird community song when u roll over the ocean roll over the sea, its i who builds community... lol. and there were those rubber band rope games like "zero point", "triangle" and "circle circle".. oh man!!! oh yea!! those sbs buses, there were those bus stopping bells for us to press at the sides of our seats which would light up purple when we pressed?

oh remember those hao gong ming model scenarios? give up ur seats to elderly, pregnant women, help elderly carry their heavy stuff, help blind man cross the road, bring wallets to the police station when u pick up one (its called lu bu shi yi remember? haha) and all the must have gong1 de2 xin1 crap.. and oh!! the funniest!! we even had this log book for CME hao gong ming, where u get ur parents to tick under funny check boxes like, greeted parents in the morning, did homework etc.. and the teachers would check through them and sign? lol... those were the days!!!

smilepiggy

11-15-2003, 01:58 AM

ahhas. wateva you said was like so typically the past when i was in primary school. lol

lattae

11-15-2003, 01:10 PM

yeah fungi.. you said it... that hao gong ming thing we have to get parents to fill up?? I nearly forgotten...

but I'd recall that my mum always just tick and sign for me just so I can give it to my teacher... none of us treated it seriously...

macdawn

11-16-2003, 03:58 PM

Moi was born in the 80s, but I don't remember much. I grew up in the 90s, but hey, some of these stuff I did you know.

Melvin, brushing teeth during recess, fun? Wait till you see the blood spewing from your classmates mouths from over-brushing. Hahaha :oops: :laughing:

Hmm.....when I was in primary school they tried to do the tooth brushing exercise, we ended up with water and toothpaste everywhere, cos a few of my classmates decided to have a water war instead....

kinda funny.... :happy:

I love those days....

-MacDawn

Polalion

11-21-2003, 03:40 PM

I remember holding a girl's hand during Primary 1 throughout the entire recess once. :oops: Sounds a little dumb thinking about now.

I used a Horlicks mug for the brushing, those that I got for free from buying bottles of it. I had choices of red and blue, and I was insistant on the blue one(you know: boys = blue, girls = red).

And I remember there were plenty of verbal tricks like when you ask someone(preferably a Chinese, or someone who knows how to speak the language) to say 400 in Chinese, then 500, then 600, and then 700. And then you go "OR HOR!! YOU SCOLD BAD WORD!" 700 in Chinese is... Well, can't say it here.

Another one is when you ask what the opposite of a Queen was. It's King. Then you ask for the opposite of Near. That is Far. Then you ask what the opposite of Near Queen is, and that's... Erm, go figure.

Sorry, but I have mention that I'm old, psychologically-wise and looks-wise. Once I was coming home and at the lift lobby this ice-cream salesman asked me, "Uncle, want to buy ice-cream?"

lattae

11-21-2003, 04:33 PM

oh the verbal tricks... I have one too...
da zhu shui da jiao (big pig take big sleep)
xiao zhu shui xiao jiao (small pig take small sleep)
lan zhu shui she me jiao? (what sleep does lazy pig take??)

that one was hilarious... go figure...

Polalion

11-21-2003, 06:44 PM

Well, those days were full of those stuff.

And tennis balls... Did that happen for the 1984 and back people? I had it though... It was lame. But not lamer than using something that isn't round at all, but stills rolls, that is a bottle. The lamest thing is something that is round, but doesn't roll. That is the bottle cap. Try kicking something the size of your toe around. And try saving it from goal. :glug:

I didn't have the checklists you mentioned... Did they realise the truth about its lameless and finally cut it off the curriculum? :laughing:

aDrena

11-22-2003, 06:33 PM

LOL, the verbal trick that lattae mentioned, it's always stayed at the back of my mind because I remember answering the question very loudly in primary three, amidst much rancous laughter on the school bus. There and then, I decided not to ever shy away from such silly situations (I still am like that), and I bugged the guy who asked me the question for the real meaning. I must have traumatised that poor guy some, following him up and down the bus asking "what is a lan jiao, what is a lan jiao?" No wonder i turned out this way :dry:

Polalion

11-22-2003, 06:42 PM

To be honest, I feel sorry for that guy. He ended up being the one who was humiliated instead of you. :laughing:

Those eluded me too, except 'jiao' is 'pa', and there was a Pokemon called Lapras, and this friend of mine called it that. I ended up repeating it a few times in front of my parent, uncle and grandmother! Man, that's embarassing.

Now I know what it is, and I know I have it. :)

lattae

11-23-2003, 11:17 AM

aDrena>> man, I had the same experience as you... my friends laughed at the 'lan jiao' and I really couldn't figure out... and I went around asking everyone I see what lan jiao means... :oops: until... of cos... the person was like my dad and he was like 'where did you learn that kind of rubbish'... he was really angry...

Quiet Boy

11-23-2003, 11:23 AM

erm so, what does lan jiao mean? :blush:

I dont really get the joke... its lan3 jiao4 right? :?

yiwen

11-23-2003, 11:46 AM

I'm a 90s kid on the dot! same as melvin! hahahah...but I do some of those! Sigh!! I couldn't stand hao gong min at all! my teacher was such a bore, but it was definitely much nicer in primary school than in secondary school. I don't know about now, but last time my school banned using blue pens before we were primary 3. We had to use pencils. So I was full of envy when my sister could use pens! It was such an honour to be able to! hahaha..I couldn't use liquid paper either. We had to use a pencil and a ruler to cancel the word. wondered how I survived. ahhh...lurve those primary school memories!!!!

nuofu

11-27-2003, 09:50 AM

no no no.. u pple r not that old u know.. i know i am the youngest to comment(13), but, u noe those hao gong ming checkbooks, well i had them in Pri 1 and 2! not joking!
and those
and those verbal tricks.. aha.. i hv lots.. there was one i rmb very vividly.. i was accused of scolding someone a bastard. (it was not my fault k?) he was like, "hey, i ask u a question, u sure dunno one! Xiao ming was waiting at the busstop, first came bus first, then bus second.. which bus came third?" so i said "bus third" quite LOUD u know and then the pple around were like, OR HOR! U SCOLD HIM BASTARD!" and then this prefect came up to me and said "xiao mei mei, u know it is bad to scold others like that? if u do that again i will tell teacher!" ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! think still angry!
and there was one in chinese that i cleverly did not answer altho i didnt know what was the meaning then, (in chinese)
xin jia po ren chang xin ge, (singaporean sing 'xing (?) song),
ri ben ren chang ri ge, (japanese sing 'ri' ge),
mei guo ren chang mei ge,
fa guo ren chang shen me ge?
ans: fa-ge
n a few more i cant rmb..

cackt

11-27-2003, 12:44 PM

macdawn

11-27-2003, 01:47 PM

Hee hee.... I just thought of more:

You know you are 'mature' when you

1. know who Knight Rider and Kidd is, and wanted a car just like that!
2. know the names of the Carebears and Carebear cousins
3. watched lots of Smurf and wondered wny they don't have pants and dresses of other colours, other than white.
4. You know all the members of the Bookworm Family, and probably had joined the bookworm club.
5. Library books (including the national library ones) had a little sleeve on the inside of the cover, and they had these small sleeves as your borrowing records. When you borrow the book, the librarian takes a card from the book and put it in your library sleeve cards.

Darn it, I know too many of these! I am too 'mature' around here....

nuofu

11-29-2003, 03:58 AM

alot have changed,now primary school kids carry handphones and digimons,listen to Jay zhou and worship GTO....haha,but something will nv change,they can categorize friends into so many types,good friends,ok friends,best friends,hate friends,normal friends.

yes! the catogorizing of friends. it is still so common now! but now they (or cant i say we?) dont really do good friends, ok friends and all that. it is more of a 'prize-giving' session, and like Gold award, silver and blahblah. and also like 100%, 90%, 0% friends. but once i did something really silly. i 'catogorized' my friends such that they looked like 4D numbers. :crazy:

bluedolphin

03-09-2004, 05:01 PM

hahaha...i like the part about the old buses, so totally true...and there really lots of 'forget me not', 'birds fly high...blah blah'...poems in my autograph book! haha....oh we also love to write 'hope u pass ur exams with flying colors!' hahaha....now that these are mentioned, the memories just came back to me....heez..... :wink2:

macdawn

03-10-2004, 03:31 AM

but once i did something really silly. i 'catogorized' my friends such that they looked like 4D numbers. :crazy:

Hmm.... I think you are too advance for my age..... how do you catagorised your friends till they look like 4D numbers?

-MacDawn

fairiedd-angel

06-28-2005, 03:07 PM

i think i was more creative during my childhood - i catergorized into diamond , sapphire , ruby ... etc, but i dunno what's the diff in sapphires and rubies =X but my point was still the same as urs. hahas.

oh, does anyone remembers that the first international name that we had to learn in chinese is "xiao ming"?? lols. and, i remember this stuff from math: "Jane,John,Jenny has 10 sweets.But after 3 is given to Ahmad,they have xx left..." =D john,jenny,jane,susan.ahmad,tom etc...

gCjs84

06-28-2005, 03:28 PM

Ha. Really bring back those memories of when I was a kid. Hao Gong Ming, Young Generation etc etc. Too bad, it also reminds you how times have changed since then and most of those things in the 80s have changed. Nevertheless, times passes and one has to live with it. I am just glad that we all remember those times. :wink2:

liwei_jay

06-28-2005, 04:47 PM

hahaz...
am an 84-er...
some of the above in the lists are really what i watch or had in school...
but others... :sweat: memories kinda bad..
didn't remember..
some... since i'm not s'porean.. so i dun chase them or reads those..
i'm much more of the HK singer craze...
u knw the four heavenly kings??
they were my idol... and so were danny chan... and so..
that old huh... :P hehe...