The “REAL” story of Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus founded America, didn’t he?

Yeah he did. He stepped foot on the New Land. He saw natives on that land and called them ‘Indians’.

Nothing wrong, right (oxymoron unintended)? They ARE called ‘Red Indians’ anyway. But how – or why on (that part of the) earth – were they called ‘Indians’?

The truth is, Christopher Columbus set out in search of India, but he went THE OTHER WAY ROUND to the Americas instead. “Land-ho!” and he thought “My, we’re in India! Hooray!” So naturally when he sees those people he thinks, “Wow, Indians!”

And that’s how they became known as ‘Red Indians’.

In any case Vasco de Gama too left Portugal for India much after dear Chris did, but went the correct way and touched down on India proper.

But guess what? He got there because he picked up a Gujerati pilot (one who controls the direction the ship travels, planes were not invented then!) who provided the directions. Thanks to him, didn’t end up in Holland (for non-Singlish speakers, Holland actually stands for ‘Hor-lan’, which means ‘to get lost’)

So you can see what travellers Asians used to be at that time; they already know the sea passages!

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*For interest only, nothing against our Eurasian and Caucasian friends!*

How did the term ‘ang moh’ come about?

Historically the Chinese have used this towards the Europeans. It actually means ‘red-haired barbarians’ – the Chinese then were very arrogant and looked down on the Europeans, belittling and undermining their power. Little did they know that the Europeans would soon rise and (literally) overtake them.

Now, for ‘chao’ (smelly) in front of that term, I have no idea where it comes from, but apparently Singaporeans like to have ‘chao’ in front of almost everything they don’t put in their eyes, such as ‘chao recruit’ and ‘chao ah kua’, just to name a few (they’re probably more out there, consult the Coxford Singlish Dictionary, the authority on Singlish!