Chinese
Workers from Mainland China face pressure, loneliness and homesickness when they come to work overseas in a foreign land such as Singapore. However, they do not have a choice as they have to support their families back in China. Due to their low educational qualifications, they are unable to find well paid jobs and hence, have to become blue collared workers. Many chinese foreign workers have decided to band together and work in Singapore’s construction industry in order to survive together. These chinese foreign workers are unhappy in Singapore owing to a reasons such as those listed above( pressure, loneliness and homesickness), long working hours, overtime work, and also a lack of understanding, empathy and appreciation from local Singaporeans.
A lot of Singaporeans seem to think that China nationals are rude and impolite, with videos such as the one where 2 Chinese nationals were seen shouting expletives and spitting not helping to remedy this image. However, majority of Chinese nationals are not like that and we cannot be stereotype and judge an entire community through actions by these few uncouth individuals.
Chinese students who come here to Singapore on scholarships are often looked upon as 'stealing' a Singaporean's job or place at a prestigious school, but they often benefit our community a lot. We can learn from them and having different sets of opinions or perspectives will often help us shed new light on certain topics. They also often choose to settle down in Singapore and have to serve in the National Service just like any other Singaporean male.
Chinese nationals are also easily identified through the way they speak and their accents are quite distinct, especially when speaking mandarin. In school, a majority of them are also very intelligent and hard working so they have no problem keeping pace with Singapore's stressful education system, which makes a lot of Singaporeans jealous, and sometimes results in feelings of bitterness towards these China nationals when they get such good grades and others struggle to stay afloat. However, we have to bear in mind that they were sent overseas, away from their parents and out of their safety zone to learn from us, together with us, and teach us. They may feel out of place and we should do our best to make them feel as welcome as possible, as there are also a lot of things that we can learn from them. They also have to get good grades to ensure that their parents and family at home will not think that they have wasted time, money and effort to send their kids to Singapore, only to see it wasted.
For example, Daryl Lim Jun Liang and his friends who prowled around Yishun looking for smaller man they could beat up as sort of a 'practice session', however, the Chinese national that they beat up did not go and seek help or even miss a day of work as he did not want to 'lose any income'. He was punched several times in the face during the senseless attack and was left bleeding in his mouth.