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There has been a lot of talk that many career women in Singapore are still single… I am going to talk about the characteristics of some of the single ladies that I have met.

To be fair, not only many career women in Singapore are still single. It is the same with any other modern cities around the world e.g. Hong Kong, New York, Seoul, Tokyo, Shanghai etc. The thing is… more and more singles are delaying marriage. In the past, women marry in their early 20s. If you were to marry in your mid-20s, it is considered old. But now, many women are still not married by the time they are in their 30s. A lot of times, it is because these women are so focused on building their career in the early part of their life. And when they finally decide to settle down, they learn that it is not as easy to find a partner in their 30s as opposed to when they are in their 20s. One of the realities that I have shared in my book ‘Lessons From 15,000 First Dates’ is that ultimately many men are looking to date younger women as they would like to start a family eventually. So they would start to think, if I date a woman who is in her mid-30s, after 2 years of dating, 2 years of honeymoon period after the marriage, would it be too late to start a family?

Single ladies can be generally categorised into 4 groups. Of course these are generalisations and stereotypes and they are not exhaustive.

1. The Dragon Lady: Dragon ladies are women who have done very well for themselves in the workplace. And as the skillset of women such as communication skills, interpersonal skills, multitasking skills are being more sought after in the workplace, more and more women are rising fast in the corporate world, sometimes even faster than their male counterparts. Women often feel that they have to adopt a more domineering and aggressive demeanour to climb up the corporate ladder. And often, they bring these characteristics with them wherever they go even when they are on dates. However, I always say to my single female clients, ‘Men are looking to date and marry women, not men!’ Women need to realise that they are on a date and not a debate. They do not need to challenge every single thing the guy say, or have the last say all the time. My advice to the dragon ladies is to indulge in your femininity and leave the fist-thumping in the boardroom.

2. The Waiter a.k.a. The Fixer: These are ladies who might be seeing someone, but they have been in the same relationship for 3 years, 5 years, or 9 years but the relationship just does not seem to be going anywhere. The reason is, the man keeps telling the woman that he’s not ready to settle down, and the woman is willing to just sit by and wait, hence the name ‘waiter’. And some of them are also fixers meaning they believe they can fix the guy, even though women who preceded them have failed. They believe that they are unique and special. My advice to this group of ladies is to give the guy an ultimatum. Give him a deadline, and if he does not adhere to it, then move on. You have to love yourself more because time is not on the side of the women. Just move on. If he loves you enough, he will ask you back and ask for your hand. If he does not, then he was never worth your time in the first place.

3. The Princess (and her Prince): A lot of single ladies fall into this category. They probably have read too many fairy tales or indulge in too many Hollywood movies or Korean dramas. They would like to meet their prince charming ‘by chance’ because they believe that it is not romantic if they do anything extra to meet him. I believe that dating is a numbers game. Out of every 10 single men you meet, probably there are only 5 whom you are interested to know more about and he too would like to know you better. From the 5, you will probably go on a first date with 3 or 4. And from that 3 or 4, you will probably only go on more dates with 2 or 3. And from there, hopefully, you meet the one. Hence, the question is, if you do not even meet 10 single men in a month or even for some a year, what are the chances you would meet the one? I always ask the princesses, do you wish to be romantically single for the rest of your life, or be more proactive and find your prince charming? My advice is, give yourself more opportunities and find more platform to widen your social circle and meet more new people.

4. The Clueless: Some ladies do not have a lot of relationship experience or have not dated in a long time. Hence, they have no idea of what to expect when it comes to dating or might have unrealistic expectations when it comes to dating. They would tell me things like, “Why should I do anything different? They should like me for who I am. If they don’t, then they are not worth my time!” when I suggest that they put on some light makeup when they go on a date. My question to them is, “There are many guys out there who are very nice and have great personality, however they might not meet your height preference (height is very important for most ladies!), then why don’t you like them for who they are as well?” My advice is that we should challenge our own list of criteria and preferences. Ultimately, we judge others, others judge us as well. When we look at each of our criterion, we should ask ourselves, is this a ‘must have’ or a ‘good to have’. If he is 1.75m, does it mean that he would be a better husband or a better father?

Violet Lim is the CEO & Co-Founder of Lunch Actually, Asia’s first lunch dating company and she blogs at http://www.violetlim.com/

We have housed about 20 underage maids. Of these, two attempted suicide, one was convicted of theft, one will be on trial for child abuse, one was persuaded by her employer to have an abortion, and the others were victims of some form of abuse and exploitation.

Domestic work in Singapore is extremely demanding for a village teenager. We are glad the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) has made it clear it will not condone underage workers and placed the onus on employment agencies to prevent such occurrences.

But raising the entry age from 18 to 23 years has led to a shortage of maids and therefore new ways by agencies to beat the rule.

The authorities in Singapore and the maids’ home countries need to work together with greater tenacity to deter this practice.

We are also concerned over why MOM continues to rely on the official passport as proof of age when it is well known that passports from some countries can be doctored.

Furthermore, MOM has penalised only four of the 14 agencies that brought in underage maids last year.

This is not in line with encouraging agencies to guard against recruiting underage workers.

The difficulty for agencies in authenticating the age of inbound workers suggests the need for a checklist of measures that agencies should be held accountable for implementing.

Some agencies and employers compel workers to continue even if they are mentally or emotionally incompetent, or have decided to admit their real age. They do this to discharge the worker’s debt to the agency and avoid disruption to the employer.

Often, agencies threaten workers with imprisonment if they are found to be underage.

Workers who report an agency or employer who has compelled them not to reveal their real age should be offered witness protection and immunity from prosecution.

Where underage women are traded, the agencies in both the home and destination countries should face consequences. For example, the Singapore agency could be blacklisted.

Bridget Tan is the Founder President of HOME (Humanitarian Organisation for Migration Economics) which provide humanitarian assistance for the effects of ‘crisis’ migration.

Have we Singaporeans lost our cultural and historical identity? Are the youth of our nation really that ignorant about our past? It seems to be the view of many from the older generations that we youth simply ‘don’t know, and don’t care.’

I disagree. Although we may not be able to remember and identify every single political and historical figure or landmark on our little island state, it is unfair to make the sweeping generalisation that all of us are completely uneducated and uninterested in our country’s history.

There has been an argument put forth that a reason for the lack of interest in history is that our education system focuses on and nurtures the sciences, not the arts. This is little more than a poor excuse. Why should schools be solely responsible for the education of our country’s children? History is an interactive subject and parents can – and should – play and important role in their children’s education; instead of taking your kids to the mall, take them to visit Little India or Kampung Glam. Or to Chinatown or the Peranakan museum. Teach them about the ways of their grandparents, let them learn how meaningful their culture is.

Have your child spend an afternoon with his grandparents and let them listen to the stories of their elders. Encourage them to ask questions. Challenge yourself to answer them. Bring them to the library and encourage them to read. Don’t leave everything to their teachers.

There is no need for renaming of streets and landmarks to commemorate our political and historical figures. Our forefathers don’t need to be remembered as ostentatious statues of marble; they just need their stories to be told.

My parents and grandparents had many stories to tell me about the history of Singapore. When they ran out, they supplemented by education by giving me books and taking me to museums. Many of my peers learnt the same way. School trips and lessons educate us of the facts, but cultivating the interest and enthusiasm for our history is something only the community can do. If all parents could do the same, we wouldn’t have to debate the loss of our sense of history.

Sarah Ooi is an often angry Wilde childe at http://sarahooi.tumblr.com/, but a disgustingly happy person in real life.

Many Singaporeans, especially the younger generation, do not have a sense of our history. From my conversations with them, I found that they do not know the people who are responsible for building our nation during its earlier years.

I attribute this situation to the low emphasis given to history as a subject in our schools. There is a strong focus on mathematics, science and economics and insufficient attention to history, culture and arts. Our top scholars are likely to come from the science stream.

Another reason is the heavy study load. We expect too much from our children. I recall that topics that I learned in secondary school 40 years ago are now covered in the lower primary school.

Our younger generation is losing more than a sense of history. They do not understand the values that help to build the character of a person – values of honesty, fairness, a positive attitude, courage and a sense of public service.

Too many people look after their own interest and are not aware of their responsibility to the other people that make up a community.

We can lay the blame on the over-emphasis on self reliance and the drumming that “nothing is for free”. This encourages each person to be self centered. If they are taught about the sense of community, the attitude and mindset will be different.

Our schools have been teaching National Education for a few decades. It does not seem to have a positive impact in building up the Singaporean as a person of strong values and character, a sense of right and wrong, good and bad and an understanding of the lessons of history. Perhaps, the emphasis should be on character and values, rather than national education, or the two objectives should be merged into one.

Unfortunately, we do have a culture of political worship. For too long, we have a single party and a few personalities dominating the landscape. Singaporeans do not have choice in understanding different leaders with different values and priorities. They tend to think that there is only one right choice and approach. There is lack of diversity in thinking and approach.

We do not need statues to commemorate our founding fathers. We can give better credit to their contributions by telling stories about their contribution and giving time for our young people to learn about them.

When our young people have an understanding of history and of the past leaders who have left their mark in history, they will learn that these leaders are people with a character and personality that are shaped by their personal values and are ordinary people who can make mistakes and face setbacks and adversities. Through the lessons of history, they will earn about the importance of democracy, freedom, respect for people and their cultures and diversities.

This will build a people who are more confident of their place in society, about their personal values and beliefs.

Mr. Tan Kin Lian was the former chief executive of NTUC Income. He is now the founder and director of Tan Kin Lian & Associates Pte Ltd, which recently launched a game called Family Life (click on the Guide to find out how you can win one of 120 prizes to be won everyday!). He is the current President of the Financial Services Consumer Association and teaches a course at Singapore Management University.