Never understimate the impact of Local Television

Its been a year since i watched Chinese drama serials on the telly and I did just that on Thursday, it felt strange but oddly familiar and comforting at the same time, made me realise an important and interesting fact: Its probably only in Singapore television channels, that you get English subtitles for Chinese serials ( even though they are imported from HK..hmmm do you get them in Msia too? tink they are in malay?)

So non chinese speakers can also watch the chinese channels too, aint that cool. I think watching local tv productions will give you an insight on the culture and lifestyle of the locals and what is important to them, what is the trend etc, excellent way of knowing more about the cty you live in, sure its no big Hollywood production with A class actors and actresses, still its very amusing and entertaining for me to watch local serials now and then, like Phua Chu Kang, the "Ah Beng" construction company owner, " The Best in Singapore, some even say to JB" :). But do take things with a pinch of salt eh.:)

Never appreciate this till I went to sweden, and everything is in swedish.....even the cartoons in cinemas, like Shrek 2, we have to go to the late night spots of 9pm to get the English version of the movie ( coz its after children watching hrs, mainly this time slot is for adults).

Made me realise too that what a strong influence are television programmes in shaping the value and belief system of a person. When i was watching the ancient chinese drama serial on Thur, its set in the Tang dynasty, several msgs keep popping up during the show, " You have to put your family's interest before yours", " The family's pride is more important that anything else" " You should listen to your elders" " Girls are to remain passive in terms of courting, and aware of what other pple might say, for it hurts their reputation more so than for the guys" True, this is set in the olden times, and times have changed, but i think growing up in an environment surrounded by subtle messages as such, you are more or less influenced in your value and belief system as well.

Imagine if you were growing up in US, Europe etc, what msgs do the TV programmes constantly bombard you with as you grow up, would you have a different set of value system then?

No wonder some parents actually ban their kids from watching TV programmes at an early age.