Be the best, but don't forget the rest

And, over the past week, Singapore theatre group, Action Theatre, has been staging a play called Best Foot Forward.

In a series of sometimes hilarious skits which take a dig at Singaporeans' drive to be the best, it tries to examines the psyche of a people always comparing notes and making sure they are at least one up on others.

It is fairly successful; pressure-filled characters struggle to deal with having to live up to standards of success defined by others.

The audience -- mostly young adults who were probably as stressed- out, fairly successful and anxious themselves -- laughed a lot. Obviously they identified with the characters.

But what about those who get left behind? Those who lead lives totally inconsistent with our image of Singaporeans? Those who start the race with so many disadvantages that they find it difficult even to catch up, let alone run with the rest?

Near my office, there is a social service centre that serves a community many people prefer not to know about. Theirs is not the well-lit, well-ordered, air-conditioned cleanliness of Shenton Way and Orchard Road. Nor is it the world of upgrades, new cars, cappuccino and rieslings.

Theirs is a community where truancy and school drop-outs are common, where some parents rarely leave the area and would be hard pressed to even find their way to the East Coast on public transport.

It is a world where parents do not take their children out on weekends and holidays, because, as my friend Mary, a 28-year-old social worker puts it: "Once you leave the house, you have to spend money."

But even there, competition and measuring up are a large part of their lives. Even there, parents drill their children to be the best. "They're constantly told they have to succeed," said Mary. "And then they start to think, if they can't be really good, what else is left for them?"

In the extreme cases, the children there are hit by a double whammy.

Some have parents who know only how to punish, not to reward.

At school, they are seen as problem children. And because English is not spoken at home or among their friends, they face an even bigger disadvantage when all their lessons are taught in English.

There are 12-year-olds who cannot read simple fairy-tales, five-year-olds who are perfectly gregarious in Mandarin or Malay but will clam up when you try to get them to speak English, or will turn around and say to you, "I no speak English".

Of course, there are young adults who make good there, who do well in exams and become professionals; who become everybody's idea of a success.

But there are also those who go in and out of prisons and drug rehabilitation centres.

There are those who end up working for loansharks, and then struggle to find a legitimate job.

"But it's difficult," said Mary with a sigh. "Most people don't trust them enough to hire them."

Even there, you will see teenagers wearing some of the designer togs youths from higher income homes wear.

Sometimes you will see them in Guess jeans, Versus shirts and Emporio Armani Ts. Only, they did not get the money from Mummy and Daddy, but from Ronald McDonald and Colonel Sanders, from working for months in fast-food restaurants or department stores to buy one designer item. Here, as in other places, being the best means having the best.

Sometimes, it is a lot easier to ignore things like that. Sometimes, it is easier to tell ourselves they are aberrations, the exceptions, that they are not really part of us. It is easier to think that at best, they hover on the periphery of society.

We can tell ourselves that they are being looked after by the Government, by groups of volunteers, that the Community Chest funds programmes for them, that social workers like Mary look after them, and that a good economy has a trickle down effect and that even though these young people face many disadvantages, they too, reap the rewards of a successful country.

I mean, why should we do anything? We have got enough problems of our own, being caught in the treadmill ourselves.

Our lives are complicated enough by our cranky bosses, moody girlfriends, unreasonable boyfriends and demanding parents.

Besides, we have done our bit by writing out that cheque to the Community Chest and we have our tax-exempt receipts to prove it. And it is not as if Singaporeans are unfeeling brutes. When stories of tragedies or poverty make it to the media, donations are usually forthcoming.

But can we sit back and say we have done enough? Social service centres, like the one Mary works for, need people to help with classes, supervise play groups, help keep the children attentive and organise programmes.

In English classes, for instance, the social worker teaching the class twists himself into knots entertaining the children with nursery rhymes, rapping to the alphabet, playing games -- energy-sapping stuff that no university course ever prepared anyone for.

They need not just bodies to make the children pay attention, but people who can be role models, people to show the children they are liked, and that they are worth more than the grades they cannot get.

"I guess, with their jobs and everything, it's difficult for most people to come and spend time here," said Mary.

Then again, most of the people who help out at the centre are in their 20s, and they run the gamut from university students to teachers, engineers and a lawyer or two.

At the break-neck speed the country is progressing, and with competition and the fight for success becoming more of a priority than ever, can we afford to leave children like those behind?

With the success that we have acquired, many of us have also become arrogant. We begin to think that those who cannot pull themselves up deserve to be left behind because if we do not look out for ourselves, who will?

Then again, if we live for only ourselves now, can we live with what we will become in the future?