First, let us consider the case of India, the second most populous country in the world with a population of about 1.2 billion. It has about 1600 regional dialects and numerous languages. The most commonly spoken is Hindi which has an estimated 40% of the population speaking it. However, when two educated Indians of different language streams meet and neither is familiar with the other’s tongue, they will probably need to communicate in English, the country’s subsidiary official language, which is regarded as a prestigious and popular language there for historical reasons. Despite this multiplicity of diverse languages and dialects, it has become a potential world economic powerhouse if it keeps up with its current vibrant economic development.

On the other hand, China, the most populous nation in the world with more than 1.3 billion people, has a less formidable language and dialect problem than India to contend with. Despite having a total of 55 minority ethnic components with their own languages and many Chinese regional dialects of the majority Han Chinese race which constitutes more about 92% of its overall citizenry in this vast landmass, it is fortunate to have a common written Chinese script and spoken Mandarin which all educated Chinese and minority groups are familiar with and they serve as the common medium for effective communication with each other. This is because all schools and other educational institutions and government bodies are required by law to adopt only Mandarin as their sole language of instruction and communication, after the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, with the exception of the significant minority-run autonomous regions where Chinese and the native tongues are taught alongside each other. In private gatherings and at home Chinese dialects have continued to be spoken extensively, especially among the older generation. Then the Chinese and minority group parents began to realise that having a firm foundation and proficiency in Mandarin will bring with it more economic advantages and better employment prospects for their children. Over the decades, the popularity of Mandarin among the younger generation nationwide has increased steadily and this has led to the continuing decline of both the minority languages and regional Chinese dialects . The pace of their decline has begun to accelerate from the 1990s onwards as the Chinese central government intensifies its ongoing effort to strongly encourage the use of Mandarin in Public and in government and other public funded organisations. This policy has worked very successfully with the overwhelming majority of the provinces but has encountered some obstacles in the large and influential Guangdong Province, which has stood out like a sore thumb. Many people there would only adhere to this national policy publicly but, in their day-to-day interaction with one another and in the privacy of their own homes, Mandarin would largely be discarded by the citizenry in favour of their own Cantonese dialect. Other major dialects like Shanghainese and Beijinghua too have resisted the relentless threat to them posed by the ever popular and growing Mandarin usage by their younger kith and kin.

Be that as it may, in recent years there has been a clear and unmistakable sign that the national policy of gradually replacing the dialects with Mandarin aimed at promoting national unity and cohesiveness is bearing fruits even in its three largest cities, namely Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou, where dialects are nowadays less and less used in public places and at home spearheaded by the better educated parents and the younger generation. Language experts have noted this trend in the other large urban centres too. They are therefore optimistic that this development is irreversible. They predict that all Chinese dialects will ultimately be abandoned in favour of Mandarin when the older generation has passed on. In the minority groups, the need to know the Chinese language and Mandarin for a better future has resulted in only a very tiny number of people who are still fluent with both their own written and spoken native tongues. The Chinese central government officially recognises only 80 major regional dialects. Hastening the rapid decline of the regional Chinese dialects and minority languages is the continuing strong parental influence and the manifold tangible advantages for their children to be facile with the lingua franca of China, Mandarin.

What about the state of the Cantonese dialect in the Special Autonomous Region of Hong Kong where it is the common dialect for all its more than 7-million residents, Cantonese and other chinese groups? It rejoined China only in 1997, after having been under the British colonial administration for the past 150 years. Under China’s One country, two systems doctrine, it is allowed to retain its existing capitalist system for a period of 50 years. Prior to 1997, Cantonese was not only the daily working language among the Chinese there but it was also the common medium of instruction in schools. With such a long-standing tradition, it is hardly surprising that the overwhelming majority of the Cantonese Hong-Kongers are non-Mandarin speakers, but their proficiency in the written Chinese language is on par with their compatriots on the Mainland. By tenaciously sticking to Cantonese as the common dialect there when the rest of China are increasingly switching to Mandarin as their common language, the Hong kong people have paid a very high price for its past neglect and disdain for the many advantages and benefits of being fluent speakers of Mandarin. To remedy the situation for their own future well-being, the Hong-Kongers, who are noted for their shrewdness, adaptability, resourcefulness which had enabled them to overcome many past crises, are now making a determined effort for the younger people to learn to speak Mandarin well. The schools there now use both Mandarin and Cantonese as their mediums of instruction. Besides their very poor command of Mandarin which has hindered their interactions with their Chinese compatriots outside the Guangdong area, the birth place of the Cantonese dialect , the average Hong-Konger’s level of English is also way below that of many other countries with past colonial connections with Britain. This is despite the fact that English has been taught in their schools, both in the past and at the present time, This, again, is attributable to the overpowering influence and convenience of speaking only Cantonese in their everyday life. This tends to make them feel uncomfortable and even diffident when speaking to non Cantonese-speaking English speakers. I believe that, as Cantonese is so much a part of their life in Hong Kong for so long now, it will take at least one more generation for Mandarin to become the common language in Hong Kong. Only time will tell.

I can still vividly recall a somewhat amusing and embarrassing episode in Beijing on my first visit there in 1982. My wife and I were in a tour group comprising wholly of Hong Kong residents, most of them were in the 40s and 50s age group. As none of them spoke Mandarin and as the tour guide could speak only impeccable Beijing Mandarin and no Cantonese at all, I had to come to their rescue by acting as an interpreter for both sides in my less than perfect Cantonese and Mandarin, much to their relief. To show their appreciation, the Hong Kong group bought me a present to thank me for my assistance and I felt impolite to decline.

In China’s offshore province of Taiwan, Mandarin became a political hot potato during the 8-year presidency of Chen Sui Bian from 2000 to 2008. He and his government were determined to declare Taiwan an independent country, and not an integral part of China. To further their aim, Chen was advocating that the Chinese Fujian Minnan dialect, which more than 80% of its citizens speak, be elevated to the status of the official national language of Taiwan. He went so far as to claim that the Taiwanese’s DNA is different from the Chinese on the Mainland and therefore they are not of the Chinese race in order to augment his case to turn Taiwan into a separate independent state. However, before this could come to fruition, Chen’s party was defeated by the opposition Nationalist Party, which was opposed to Taiwan becoming an independent nation. Chen is now serving a long prison sentence for a number of corruption convictions and for misuse of public funds during his terms of office.

What about in the other multiethnic countries in Southeast Asia like Singapore, where its citizens of Chinese descent constitute 74% of the local population? As in China, the Singapore Government too had officially launched a national campaign in 1979 aimed at making Mandarin the ultimate common spoken language of the entire Chinese community in place of the multitude of Chinese dialects brought by their ancestors from China when they settled in Singapore over the past 130 years, mainly from 1819 to around 1949 when it was still a British colony. The government leaders are making sustained efforts to convince the local Chinese population of the manifold advantages and benefits of switching to Mandarin from the then wide use of Chinese dialects as they firmly believe that the Chinese economy will continue to expand resulting in more trade and business dealings between Singapore and the fast emerging China and that the Chinese Singaporeans who are facile with the Chinese language and Mandarin will have an edge over others. Unlike Hong Kong, the Chinese language schools in Singapore had, from their early days, already opted to adopt Mandarin as the only medium of instruction. The sole use of Mandarin was later extended to cover the broadcasting industry and in the movie and the performing arts sectors. The government ministers also set an example by abstaining from making public speeches in the popular Chinese dialects like Hokkien as they had done earlier for political reasons. There was initial disquiet and apprehension over this new language policy, especially among the dialect-speaking older Chinese Singaporeans and some Chinese community and opinion leaders. However, through unwavering perseverance, rational reasoning, public debates and gentle public persuasion over the years, this government language policy has gradually started to bear fruits as parents began to realise that being proficient in both the Chinese language and Mandarin is the way forward to a better future for their children. This has led to a significant decline of dialects and the corresponding rise of Mandarin as the vehicle of communication among the Chinese community. The language experts are optimistic that Mandarin will ultimately replace the Chinese dialects as the common language of the Chinese community in Singapore after the older generation of Chinese there has left the scene. As anticipated by the Singapore Government earlier, the Chinese economy did expand exponentially in the past two decades and by 2011, it had exceeded that of Japan as the world’s number two economy after the US. Economists are confident that Chinese economy will continue to move up in the near future and that it will surpass the US as the number one world economy around 2020. Hopefully, Singapore will benefit much from this in its business and other dealings with China and will also improve further their existing friendly ties.

At the other end of the globe, English is the common language of another multicultural nation, the United Kingdom (UK). It is the union of four historically sovereign countries of England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales, each with its separate languages, traditions, customs and culture. For economic and historical reasons, they decided that it would be best for them to come together to form a larger entity of UK, also known as Great Britain, with England as the undisputed dominant leader in view of its military and economic prowess and its emerging influence in world affairs which would significantly benefit the other three components too. The heyday of UK was in the 19th and early 20th centuries when its colonial empire stretched from Europe to many other parts of the world. The unabashed boast then was that “the sun never sets on the British Empire”. After world War II in 1945, there was a great influx of British colonial subjects from different parts of the world settling in the UK in search of a better Life. Thus, over time, this country has gradually become a multiethnic nation that it is today.

Owing to historical developments and the pervasive influence of the English language both at home and abroad, it has become the common language of UK and internationally at the expense of the minority Scottish, Irish and Welsh languages to the extent that nowadays their native tongues, both written and spoken, are almost completely alien to their people except to a small group of diehard nationalists among them. In the case of the new immigrants from the former British colonies, all will have to be proficient in English if they are to survive and do well in their new adopted country. The older generation of these immigrants have managed to keep their native languages and traditions alive at home and when interacting with those of their own community. However, with the younger generation of immigrants, born and bred in the UK, they will, over time, cease to be familiar with their parents’ languages, customs and traditions because of the social and educational environment and the compelling need to completely integrate themselves into the larger British community as an integral part of it and for a brighter future.

Across the Atlantic Ocean. the United States is truly a melting pot of races and cultures whose ancestors, excepting the native Americans, came from virtually all corners of the earth, but predominantly from the West. There is no official national language there but, for historical reasons, English has always been the de facto national language and spoken by almost every citizen, young and old. The native American languages, which had no written scripts, had virtually disappeared under the overwhelming impact of the English language. Be that as it may, the US has an enlightened policy towards all its minority languages and racial groups and freely allows them to preserve their own cultures and languages within their own community. Take the Chinese as a case in point. Following the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and US in 1979, there has been an influx of Chinese students and immigrants coming to that country. Consequently, in some major cities, a sizable Chinese community has sprung up, not counting the American-born Chinese and those who had migrated there from earlier times. To cater to the Chinese community’s needs, there are now Chinese kindergartens, supermarkets, newspapers and even Chinese-speaking churches in these cities which include New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco Bay Area. Among the minority races there, the Spanish-speaking group, mainly immigrants from north, south and central America, forms the largest non-white population in the US. However, all the immigrants’ offsprings, born and bred there, will need to become fully integrated into the mainstream American community with the passage of time. All these minority groups have contributed much to the development and prosperity of their adopted country and have enriched the life and culture of the American society. This is self-evident to discerning visitors to that country.

Lam Pin Foo

Jiu Zhang Suanshu is gradually being given its rightful place of importance. This trend will continue into the next century as knowledge of the book increases.

Our arithmetic is built on the Hindu-Arabic numeral system. We know how useful this arithmetic is to us. It not only provides a foundation to mathematics, it is commonly known to most people throughout the world as its knowledge is necessary in our everyday living. Try to replace the Hindu-Arabic numeral system with another numeral system of a different concept and you will find that our arithmetic and its applications will collapse like a pack of cards.

Since the numeral system is so important, let us examine it in detail. The system uses a place value notation with ten as base so that anyone who uses the numeral system will only have to remember the nine signs for numbers one to nine. Depending on the number, the nine signs or digits are picked and arranged in a horizontal line from left to right in descending order of rank. For instance, the number fifty six thousand nine hundred and thirty four is notated as: 56934, and the ranks of the digits from left to right are: ten thousands, thousands, hundreds, tens and units. In the very early Hindu-Arabic numerals, if a number had no digit of a certain rank, the space of that rank was left vacant so that fifty six thousand nine hundred and four would look like this 569  4. It was later that this empty space was filled with the zero symbol as we know it today.

From 1200 to 1600, the peoples of Europe discarded their own numeral systems or, like the Romans, displaced them to secondary importance, and laboriously started to learn the Hindu-Arabic numeral system. They had before this found even simple multiplication and division extremely difficult to perform, and knew that the new numeral system would open for them an exciting world of computation leading to the new arithmetic, which would be very useful in many areas and especially in commerce. They probably had the same feeling as we have now about computers opening a new vista of high technology for us.

The numeral system produced a method of division which resulted in a notation for the common fraction, for example, five sevenths was expressed as below, without the horizontal line which we use today.

5
7

Based on the knowledge of the numeral system and the notation to express a fraction, a new world of computations began to unfold. Literature on arithmetic grew phenomenally and some of the common topics and methods included fractions, exchange of goods, partnership and sharing, proportion, Rule of Three, areas, volumes, the extraction of square and cube roots, and Rule of False Position.

In their attempts to compute, the ancient Chinese used a bundle of bamboo sticks or rods. Through this usage they invented a numeral system, which had the same concept as the Hindu-Arabic numeral system. The nine signs that represented the first nine numbers were:

Like the Hindu-Arabic numerals, the digits were arranged in a horizontal line from left to right in decreasing order of rank. As the digits were formed from rods, the ancient Chinese had an ingenious device in displaying digits which occupied alternate positions. They turned a vertical rod horizontal and a horizontal rod vertical. For example, fifty six thousand nine hundred and thirty four would look like this:

If a number had no digit of a certain rank, the space representing that rank was left vacant, so that fifty six thousand nine hundred and four would appear like this:

This was a very natural process for a system which handled with rods. The Chinese also invented the division method which left a remainder, and used the remainder in rod numerals to denote the complex concept of a fraction. For example, five sevenths was expressed as:

Over two thousand years ago, the Chinese were aware of two very useful notations – the numeral system that used a place value notation with ten as base and the notation to express a common fraction. Through the use of these two notations they were able to compute and develop numerous mathematical methods. Around the first century, such problems and methods were compiled into a book called Jiu Zhang Suanshu 九章算术 (Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art).

Jiu Zhang Suanshu has nine chapters and two hundred and forty six problems. It begins with the topics on fractions and although the methods involve the manipulation of rods, they are surprisingly very similar to the methods that we use. This is followed by problems on areas of different shapes such as an isosceles triangle, a trapezium, a circle and an annulus. Jiu Zhang Suanshu has probably the earliest general description of the Rule of Three. This rule is first applied to problems involving exchanges of food stuff and then to other cases. Problems on partnership and sharing dominate Chapter Three, while Chapter Four is concerned mainly with the methods of finding the square root and the cube root of a number.

The next chapter involves the calculation of volumes of solids such as a circular cone, the frustum of a cone, different types of wedges and a prism whose cross-section is a trapezium. Chapter Six is concerned with the application of proportion and inverse proportion, and gives a wealth of information on the socioeconomic aspects of life in ancient China. The first problem is stated below:

Now there is a fair [way of] transporting millet. County A has 10,000 households and [requires] 8 days’ journey to reach the destination; County B has 9,500 households and [requires] 10 days’ journey; County C has 12,350 households and [requires] 13 days’ journey; County D has 12,200 households and [requires] 20 days’ journey. The four counties transport a total of 250,000 hu of millet as tax and use 10,000 carts. It is desired that the contributions be based on the distances and the number of households. Find the amount of millet and the number of carts from each [county]. Answer says: County A 83,100 hu of millet, 3,324 carts. County B 63,175 hu of millet, 2,527 carts. County C 63,175 hu of millet, 2,527 carts. County D 40,550 hu of millet,1622 carts.

Besides problems on proportional parts, the chapter also has problems involving relative distance and speed. The Rule of False Position was one of the methods devised by ancient man to solve a problem at a time when his mind was unable to formulate or to think abstractly in terms of mathematical notations. The Chinese called the method ying bu zu and Chapter Seven is devoted to this topic. Chapter Eight involves the solutions of simultaneous linear equations up to six unknowns. The data are set in columns like our matrix notation; the subtraction of two columns gives rise to the concept and definition of a negative number. The final chapter deals with problems on the right-angled triangle.

Jiu Zhang Suanshu is the most important of all the very early Chinese mathematical texts that have survived. It provided a firm foundation and had a strong influence on the subsequent development of mathematics in China which reached its zenith in the thirteenth century.

Jiu Zhang Suanshu also stands out in the world history of mathematics. It is the earliest most outstanding book on arithmetic that was built on two mathematical notations still indispensable today: one to express a number and the other to denote a fraction. It is now been given its rightful place of importance in the history of mathematics.

When you read new books on the history of mathematics, you will notice a significant change from the old ones: Jiu Zhang Suanshu is gradually being given its rightful place of importance. This trend will continue into the next century as knowledge of the book increases.

About the Writer

Oon Lay Yong is a retired professor of mathematics, formerly from the National University of Singapore.

“Are you Chinese?” “Are you Japanese? Korean?” “What are you?” My black-haired, almond-shaped eyed, and olive complexioned six-year old son, Lleyton, was asked by his fair-skinned, blond-haired soccer teammate, Sergio Massarucci (Italian-American).

Ah… the issue of national and, more importantly self, identity has once again crept into my life, this time through the lens of my children.

My parents immigrated to the United States from Taiwan in the early-1960’s as graduate students. At the time, the United States was just beginning to loosen its immigration policy and, thus, the mere opportunity to immigrate to this “dream” land was intoxicating. Yet as the obvious minority in their new country and living in California’s Central Valley, their goal for their children was to “not call attention” to our differences and to fully assimilate, or in other words, “become American.”

So that’s what we did. Despite the obvious physical differences and their unshakeable Chinese-accented English, my parents became “American” in dress, in the community (PTA, politics, Girl Scouts, soccer), in cooking (my mom made a mean tuna and pasta casserole and matzo ball soup) and I tried thoroughly to shed any remaining Chinese identity. Being American meant dissolving and showing disinterest towards Chinese traditions (aside from hong bao), dying our hair lighter with Sun-In hair lightener, learning to apply makeup to make our eyes more “round”, refusing to speak, or even understand Chinese, and proclaiming our desire to only marry “American.” Looking back, I can only imagine the conflicting heartbreak felt by my parents.

It wasn’t until college and in the midst of greater diversity, openness and inquiry that I became to terms with being an Asian-American, Chinese-American, or simply American. It also helped that as China’s, Hong Kong’s and Taiwan’s economic and political standing in the world grew, so did the appreciation and respect for Chinese culture, food, and people.

So 40 years later, what has changed between my Asian-American experience and that of my children’s? Unlike my parents who felt more like an added condiment to America’s melting pot, my children and I, as American-born citizens, are the main ingredients – heck, my children and I can become the President should we choose . Even more so, my children as second generation Americans, have very little affiliation or roots to China, Taiwan or Hong Kong, except through their grandparents and increasingly less so through their American-born parents.

However, though we speak impeccable, accent-less English, regularly score in the 700’s on the English portion of the SATs, are student body presidents and homecoming queens, we still fail to be viewed as 100% American. Despite the tremendous progress, some things still stay the same.

Consider the basketball phenomenon Jeremy Lin who, as born, raised and educated in Northern California is arguably as American as anyone else. And yet, even the usually culturally aware The Daily Show with Jon Stewart “associated “sweat shops” and “low-cost workers” to Jeremy Lin in a humorous bit on how “Asians were now stealing away basketball from blacks”. Not having worked or lived in Asia, Jeremy Lin has about as much to do with sweat shops and low-cost workers in China as a random farmer in Iowa. It would be equivalent of saying that Larry Wilmore, the African-American Daily Show correspondent should go back to his day job of being a ruthless dictator in Africa.

Or on a more serious note, consider the recent deaths of Danny Chen and Harry Lew, American soldiers of Chinese ethnicity, who both committed suicide in Afghanistan after countless months of being taunted for months for being Asian by fellow “American” soldiers. It would seem that sacrificing and voluntarily fighting for your country would be enough proof of your American-ness, not so, if you are black-haired, yellow-skinned and with almond-shaped eyes.

The challenge of nationality is not isolated to the United States, but also in Asia. Whenever in Asia, not a day goes by without someone asking me, 你是中國人嗎? The question literally translates into “Are you Chinese?” Simple enough as a question, but loaded with nuances that are difficult to answer. Without denying my ethnic heritage, my usual answer is 我是美國人 (“I am an American.”) Their reply that follows is almost always 但是你還是中國人. (“But you are still Chinese”) Yes, I am Chinese.

Though I am proudly culturally Chinese, I have no other national affiliation than to that of the United States. Yet, I feel that because of my outward appearance, I am embraced far more by my Asian brothers and sisters as the “long-lost” wayward daughter than by my own country, the U.S. where I occasionally (usually when straying away from the coastal areas) still feel like a long-staying guest who occasionally is asked “Where are you from?” and even told to “go home…” To where, I ask?

So what is it going to take for American-Asians to be accepted and embraced as Americans?

• I dream of a day when white and black American boys (not just the Asian American ones) pin-up Jeremy Lin posters on their walls.
• I dream of a day when Americans regularly see American-Asian politicians representing them in Congress and the Senate.
• I dream of a day when our Executive branch positions are held by American-Asians.
• I dream of a day when the winners of Grammys, Tony’s and Oscars include American-Asians.

Despite the continual challenges that face Chinese Americans in how others perceive our national identity, it is far better for my children. Unlike my generation, where we often sought to deny our ethnic heritage, this generation seems to have the best of both worlds. My kids proudly speak and read Chinese, love sharing their Chinese foods and customs with other American friends and seem to have little or no angst with their Chinese-ness.

When asked by Sergio if he is Chinese, my son Lleyton confidently replied “No, I am an American.”

About the Writer

Sophia Chiang is a first-generation, American of Chinese descent. She lives in the San Francisco Bay area with her Taiwanese-American husband and two children. She is the CEO of Causera – a web-based social fundraising company. Like most first-generation Chinese-Americans, she was good at math and earned a B.S. in electrical engineering from Carnegie Mellon University and an M.B.A from MIT.

My Kids

My Husband

My Daughter and I

Over the years, I’ve gained priceless experience by being a golfer and I pray all the time that I can stay competitive and injury free because I believe I have one of the best jobs in the world!

I wish I had a dollar every time someone asks me “How do you make a living playing golf?” I get that so often when I tell people I am a professional golfer. I suppose I get so many questions because it is such an uncommon profession here in Singapore.

Let me just explain how a golfer makes a living out of knocking little white balls into holes. There are 6 major golf tours in the World – The US PGA Tour, European Tour, Japan Golf Tour, Asian Tour, Australasian Tour and the Sunshine Tour (South Africa). First and foremost, a player has to qualify to play on one of these tours. This is usually done by taking part in the qualifying tournament before the start of the season to earn eligibility to play on the tour. The better you play in the qualifying tournament the more events you get to play on that particular tour. This is by no means an easy task as the US PGA Tour (the most lucrative tour) typically gets about 1500 entries in the qualifying tournament and only the top-25 players out of all these players will earn a full card to play on the tour. The tour that I play on, the Asian Tour had 550 players this year vying for 40 spots to play on the tour. Once you earn your playing privileges onto the tour through this qualifying tournament, you will have to try to play as well as you can to retain your playing rights for the following year. On the US tour, the top-125 players on the Order of Merit gets to retain his playing rights the following year whereas the Asian tour, only the top-60 gets this privilege. Any lower in the ranking earns you another trip back to the qualifying tournament. The biggest incentive is to win an event on the tour and you will be guaranteed full playing privileges for the next 2 years.

On the Asian Tour where I ply my trade, we have around 25 tournaments a year around the region as well as sanctioned events as far as Switzerland, Scotland and the US. All these events are 4 day tournaments and the typical starting field for all these events are between 120-156 players depending on the daylight available. The first 2 days, all the 120-156 players will play 2 rounds and after the 2nd round, there is a cut-off where only the top 65 players get to play the remaining 2 rounds. Once you make this 2 day cut, you are guaranteed a paycheck and those who didn’t make the 2 day cut earns an early flight home and no income for the week. The prize money on the Asian Tour varies from US$300,000 to US$7,500,000. The winner of the tournament will get 16% of the prize fund, the 25th position gets about 1% of the prize fund and the player bringing up the rear will make 0.28%. On the US Tour where each tournament varies between US$5,000,000 to US$9,000,000, a player will get the chance to be instant millionaire by winning one of those events.

Life on Tour

After being on tour so many years, things have become pretty routine. Tournaments usually runs from Thursdays to Sundays. Mondays are traveling days, Tuesdays for practice and we would have pro-ams on Wednesdays.

I am really lucky to have a very close group of friends that I hang out with most weeks. Its is a pretty diverse group with of players from Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, Myanmar, Australia and the US. We practically do everything together including our practice, work out, dinner etc. During our peak period during the season, I would see this group of friends more than I would see my family.

Naturally over the years, we have had our share of wonderful memories. Somehow most of the things that stick with you are the practical jokes and the dumb dare bets that we so often play on one another. Some of these dumb dare bets include swallowing a live earth worm, wearing a Nemo hat to play golf in a big tournament with live television, skinny dipping in the freezing sea in broad daylight, swallowing a big spoonful of chilli padi and not drinking for 10 minutes, jumping into a fish pond in the lobby of the hotel just to name a few. The best practical joke that we played on a friend was digging up the eyeballs from a suckling pig and burying it inside a blackforest cake during a pro-am dinner. After our friend ate it (and he’s one of those who refuses to eat anything exotic), we told him what he just swallowed and he caused such a big commotion at the dinner that it was hilarious!

I know for a fact that the top golfers in the world playing on the US and European tours play all these pranks on one another as well. It seems like every week you will hear of new stories. Life on tour is certainly not just golf, golf and more golf!

Characters on Tour

The Asian Tour has in recent years grown to an extent that we have players from all corners of the globe plying their trade here. Of course with such diversified background, we have all sorts of characters on tour. You would hear stories of players working as pizza delivery boy or on the construction sites just to save enough money to try their luck on the tour. Here are a few of the more interesting characters that I’ve played with:

Security Guard from China
One of the most unlikely of golfers I’ve encountered. I played with this professional golfer from China about 4 years ago with a very home-made golf swing. He told me he used to work as a security guard at a golf course in his late teens which is the first time he’s ever set foot inside a golf club. He got really intrigue by the game and he started sneaking out and hitting balls at the range at night and got hooked onto the game. He got a break when the golf course let staff start playing on the course every Monday during maintenance. He then worked really hard during that one day and became pretty good at the game and decided to give professional golf a go. He’s done pretty well on the China Tour and is making many times of what he would have made as a security guard.

The Angry Golfer
Being such a stressful game, it is very common for golfers to lose their temper on the golf course. But I think all these years on tour, after hearing countless stories of players breaking clubs, tossing clubs into water hazards and once, a player even got his club stuck on a tree at 10m tall, I’ve got one that surpasses it all. We were playing a tournament in Macau and it is a really tricky course with water hazards all over the place. A player (I won’t mention names) started hitting some bad shots and very soon loses it. He starts breaking a club or tossing it into hazards every time he hits a bad one. By the end of 18 holes, he was left with only 7 clubs (after starting the round with 14). He then gave the remaining clubs to his caddy and decided to “quit” golf for a few months.

The Spitter
I once played with an Indian golfer who was obviously from a very humble background. He showed up on the first tee with a patched up golf bag, some very old clubs and shoes that look like they’ve been worn for years. I remember him so much because he was wearing a glove so old that to have any traction on it, he had to spit on it before every shot. Luckily it’s not one of those big gooey spits but more like 5-10 little ones, just to give the glove a bit of moisture to keep it slightly sticky. He also cannot stop calling me “sir”. I remember telling him to stop calling me “sir” sometime during the back nine to which he replied “Yes sir, sorry sir”!

My Most Memorable and Embarrassing Moments on Tour

Over these past 12 years as a pro, I have been lucky enough to win 13 tournaments (12 on the regional tours and 1 on the Asian tour). While each win is a special and memorable occasion, I would have to say the most special memory for me is during the 2008 British Open Golf Championship at Royal Birkdale. I had just become the 1st Singaporean to make the cut in a major championship and walking down the 18th hole on the final round that Sunday, with massive bleachers surrounding the fairway and green on both sides, a scene I have watched on television since I was a 10-year-old learning how to play this game, right there and then, I said all the sacrifices I have made growing up to become a golfer was worth it.

On the flip side, I have so many “oops” moments on the golf course, more than I care to remember. There are a few instances where I wish I were an ostrich and can bury my head into the ground. Once I shanked a bunker shot almost taking out the head of a spectator (we had a pretty sizable gallery as I was playing with Anthony Kim in Korea). Another time, I was playing with Rory McIlroy in the world cup and the last hole with pretty big galleries as well and a bunch of television cameras around the green, I chili-dipped a chip so bad you could hear the groaning and moaning as well as sniggering and laughter from the marquees. Of course, after that happened, I went up to my partner Mardan and said I hope that wasn’t captured on live television. Of course as luck would have it, the moment I went up to my locker to check my phone, I have received at least 15 snide comments on my phone “congratulating” me about wonderful chip!

Another year in Myanmar, I had the runs with my tummy after eating some dodgy Burmese food and about 5 mins before I was about to tee off, I let out what I thought was going to be a fart … and out came more than just air! So for the rest of the round, I had to wear my rain pants to play. So, if you ever go to a golf tournament and see a player wearing a rain pants to play in broad daylight, you know the reason! At least I had my rain pants, a good friend of mine, told me about the time when he was playing with Martin Kaymer (currently the 4th ranked player in the world) at the Singapore Open, he actually played golf with a big brown stain on his white pants! Guess he forgot his rain pants that day!

Best Job in the World

I remember 12 years ago right before I made the decision to turn professional. I had 2 job offers and was seriously thinking if I should just play it safe and get a regular job. However, I decided that I am only young once and I should at least give it a go and see how good a golfer I can become. Initially, I thought I would at least give myself 3 years to taste the life of a professional golfer but 12 years on, I am still doing it. Time seems to just fly by so quickly. I suppose it’s the fact that I have so much fun doing what I am doing. Playing golf is something that I love and I know so many friends always comment how lucky I am to be doing something I love for a living. I think my wife can attest to the fact that if I take a few days off “work”, I will actually start to miss it and cannot wait to go back to playing golf.

Over the years I have had the opportunity to play with some of the best golfers in the world. I also have the chance to play with royalties, ministers and former heads of states. I get a kick when some of these “big shots” actually say they wish they could change jobs with me! I think a big part of the reason is that for a lot of amateur golfers that I play with, a lot of them cannot wait to retire so they can play more golf and travel the world, something that I get to do as part of my job.

A part of me always wonder how different life would be if I took a different path and started working in the corporate world. But over the years, I’ve gained priceless experience by being a golfer and I pray all the time that I can stay competitive and injury free because I believe I have one of the best jobs in the world!

About the Writer

Lam Chih Bing is one of the leading professional golfers in Singapore. He has a BA degree from the University of Arizona and an MBA from the University of Leicester.