THE MERLION IS A JOKE! A BLOODY JOKE!
That's the gist of a letter published in the forum of today's copy of TODAY. The author had friends come to Singapore, and they toured Sentosa. Now, as everybody knows, Sentosa has the Merlion Tower which has the ability to shoot laser beams. Well, the author states that her friends began laughing when they watched the Merlion shoot to death some evil "creatures" as if a Star Wars episode was taking flight. But it was darn embarrassing for her.
I can tell you, I'll laugh in the same scenario. For God's sake are we trying to sell the Merlion to George Lucas' company or what!?
Anyway why on earth are we harping the Merlion as some cultural symbol? It's just a shitty little cartoon character created for the then Singapore Tourist Promotion Board. You know, so that they can put it somewhere with the other world icons, such as the Eiffel Tower, Big Ben, Mount Fuji (with the bullet train running in its foreground) and the Statue of Liberty. Something to call our own. The Raffles statue would have been too pro-British . . . anyway the British downplayed him and he died in poverty, so I have no idea why they even bothered to give him a knighthood in the first place . . . we can't possibly have a lion because we all know that lions only live in the grasslands, and not dense forest as in Singapore. Which means Sang Nila Utama could have seen a TIGER instead. But the Tiger is represented by Malaysia . . .
Therefore the best possible choice is to piece the tail of a fish and the upper body of a lion together - the fish representing the fact that Singapore was once a fishing village.
And there you have it: something that Disney should have taken and dipped into "The Little Mermaid".
Hmm . . . it would make an interesting story: the Merlion trades its water-spitting capabilities for legs to roam the grasslands of Africa . . . and what does Ursula do with the tail? Sell it to some seafood restaurant. Fame and fortune, you know. The shop could proudly proclaim: "The one and only Merlion's tail . . . sold here!"
Oh, and not forgetting Austin Powers: the Pizza Boy rocket runs into trouble, so Dr Evil takes the chance to upgrade to the Merlion. After all, it is air-conditioned, has a lift, has laser-shooting capabilities and has a look-out tower which he can cover with a glass-dome.
Perfect.
And perhaps the genius in Dr Evil could modify the tail such that it can move mechanically, and whack any enemy spacecraft hovering about near it into smithereens.
Or, it could be the focal point of a movie called "Liontopia", where the lions can talk and co-exist with humans.
Therefore, on the other hand, the Merlion really does wonders for our tourism industry - not to mention the film industry too. See how much we can CAPITALISE on it! Look up, Singaporeans, we're going to get rich!
