Have you ever wondered why Hougang is commonly pronounced “Au Kang”, quite different from how it is spelt? Au Kang actually means “at the back of the river” in both Teochew and Hokkien, and is a reference to Sungei Serangoon at the end of Upper Serangoon Road, around which many Teochew-speaking inhabitants settled. In fact,…

Rape, it seems, is normal. Unfortunately. Anthropological studies on human behaviour say a man can have many children, with little inconvenience to himself, while a woman can have only a few, and with great pain. That makes females more selective about partners. So, males have to resort to a strategy for achieving reproductive success. Rape,…

Undoubtedly the Corona warriors are in the following order : medical workers consisting of Doctors, paramedical staff and the safai karmacharis (sanitation workers) and then police personnel and administrators and supporting staff. A very large number of Corona warriors have suffered the infection as a professional hazard and out of these 400 doctors alone have…

Fringe political parties with almost nothing to do with farmers’ issues have been creating havoc over the Farm Bills – the Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill. These include the urbanised, Delhi bound Kejriwal’s AAP whose Rajya Sabha member Sanjay Singh created an unholy rukus while opposing the bill in the Rajya…

Two weeks after his bestselling novel Land Where I Flee made the long list of the Emile Guimet Prize, Nepali-Indian author Prajwal Parajuly is back in the news again. Fuir et Revenir, the French translation of his book by Benoîte Dauvergne is now nominated for France’s First Novel Prize. Also on the list is Man…