Recently, I heard a complaint from a Pinoy expat in Singapore that he cannot access my blog there.
Curious, I asked him if he tried using another browser. He said he tried other browsers in different computers but he still could not gain access to my blog.
I asked him what was the error message on the browser, but he forgot what it was, so we just forgot about it. He mentioned that it could not have been the internet connection since Singapore is a highly wired City state and that Wifi hotspots abound in the place.
Well, we forgot about it until some time later at dinner he told us about life as a Pinoy expat in Singapore.
According to him, life in Singapore is kind of lonely. Singapore may be organized and disciplined. The buildings are well maintained and the living there is like living availing of Outer Banks rentals. It is much more of a 1st world country compared to its 3rd world Asian neighbors but life there is dull compared to our colorful life here in the Philippines.
He even mentioned that one time he actually saw a pinoy expat in Singapore shed tears while riding in the train, probably because said person missed home so much.
Our topic then shifted to the disciplined life in Singapore. Crime is almost unheard of. The government is so efficient and the system of doing things there is so organized. People are so busy doing their own work and minding their own business that you rarely find Singaporeans loitering around doing nothing. This discipline behavior has also been adopted by a lot of pinoy expat in Singapore. Censorship by the government helps maintain this discipline.
When he mentioned government censorship; I finally realized that probably the reason why my blog cannot be accessed in Singapore is because of the great Singapore firewall.
Further research has revealed that the Singaporean government has very tough laws on censorship. In fact it is illegal to privately own satellite dish receivers capable of viewing uncensored televised content from abroad. Radio, television and print are almost all under full government control.
When I first started blogging, I was very proud of the fact that I have a global audience and that my blog can be read by more than 6 billion people. Well this Pinoy expat in Sinagpore has made me realize that there are more than 4 million people located in the tiny city state of Singapore that my blog cannot reach.
When the bots of the great Singaporean firewall came across my blog they must have thought that it is a blog dedicated to “subversive” ideals since its title is “Guerilla blogging” and that it has a picture of Che Gueverra on it. My message to the government of Singapore is, HAVE NO FEAR ! The only subversive content of this blog are topics on a “subversive” (but not illegal) way to invest and to make money online !
I hope that someday my friend pinoy expat in Singapore as well as all other Filipino expats and OFWs in Singapore will be able to access my blog.
Hi ! my name is Zigfred Diaz. Thanks for visiting my personal blog ! Never miss a post from this blog. Subscribe to my full feeds for free. Click here to subscribe to zdiaz.com by Email
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Greatings,
Where are you from? Is it a secret? 🙂
Thanks
Nadine
Nadine: It’s no secret. I’m from the Philippines 🙂
hi.. i’m in singapore and i can access your blog just fine. so your friend’s accessibility issue must be unrelated to geography. 🙂
Dee: Hi ! Thanks for commenting, glad to hear this from another person. So you can access my blog in Singapore ? hmmm… must have something to do with his own connectivity.
Perhaps he was accessing it from within office (or ISP) where sites are whitelisted or blacklisted. Not sure.
pinoyism: Probably because one pinoy based in Singapore told me that he could access my site.
im really sad because our kanbabayan in Singapore doesn’t have a change to view this awesome site ..hmmm pero bside of that tlgang mlungkot po tlga pag mlayo k sa pmilya..huhu