Many people have been asking how my thesis is progressing, and indeed what exactly my thesis is about. So, I'm going to post a few excerpts from what I have written (remember, rough draft!) for those who are interested (don't worry, it is the short and general stuff). So, if you want to read some "academic" stuff, by all means proceed, if you'd rather not, I completely understand!

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The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 propelled the world into a new age where anti-terrorism laws and policies are top priority. The Bali bombing of October 12, 2002 directed attention to Southeast Asia, and emphasized that while the Middle East has been the primary target in the “War on Terror”, terrorist threats are on the rise in other regions of the world as well. The U.S. Government has expressed extreme concern that Southeast Asia, particularly Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and the Philippines, have known ties to the Al Qaeda terrorist network and are a base for current and future operations. The Jemaah Islamiyah, a militant terrorist group associated with Al Qaeda and based in Southeast Asia, allegedly spearheaded terrorist campaigns in Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines. Other notable groups that are active in the region include Abu Sayyaf in the Philippines, and the Laskar Jihad (LJ) and Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) in Indonesia. Many episodes of political violence in Southeast Asia have also been linked to terrorism; Communist activities in Malaysia, Thailand, and Singapore, and state-sponsored anti-separatist movements in the Philippines and East Timor are commonly included in terrorism reports. Another series of Bali bombings in October 2005, and escalating Muslim separatist insurgencies in Thailand and the Philippines, compound the urgent need to develop effective counter-terrorism plans in Southeast Asia....

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Through my own research, I hope to contribute to the debate about how governments and the international community should prepare for and respond to terrorist threats. I use a cross-disciplinary approach to examine current strategies for promoting national security in Southeast Asia. The focus is on the terrorist threat in the region, legal tools used to combat the threat, and impacts on development. The study falls within the broad ambit of security, development, and human rights, and is presented in a comparative legal framework. By juxtaposing Singapore and Indonesia, neighboring countries that experience similar security concerns but wield the law in contrasting ways, I show alternatives for protecting national security while simultaneously promoting development in the region.

There are several reasons this is a meaningful addition to current scholarship. First, I emphasize linkages between fields that have long been considered at odds with one another. My experience has been that those working in the area of national security tend to dismiss development and human rights as secondary concerns that create roadblocks for all-important security objectives. Security is considered “hard” politics, while development and human rights are “soft” politics. There is a prioritizing of security first, development somewhere further down the line, and human rights trailing along at the end of a long list of national objectives. But security actors are not the only ones to consider their objectives paramount. Development policymakers designate economic advancement and free trade as the ultimate goal of all people throughout the world, throw democracy and good governance into the mix, and think this will solve all the world’s ills. Human rights advocates proclaim that recognition of universal human rights is the singular most important global plight, criticizing those in the security field for building weapons instead of peace, and those in the development field for heartlessly exploiting the disadvantaged to increase the profits of the advantaged.

The reality is that security, development, and human rights depend upon each other to realize respecitve goals. Human rights are not meaningful in an environment that is in turmoil, either because of precarious or non-existent security, or under-development. Development cannot be achieved without a basic level of security. Nor is economic economic development an end in itself; political, social,and cultural factors implicit in human rights must accompany economic development in order to achieve sustainable change. Security is also only sustainable when people are secure in their rights and enjoy economic well-being and prospects for advancement.

Second, with terrorism on the rise at a time when borders are blurring through globalization , states are increasingly vulnerable to security threats. Globalization facilitates terrorism by easing the operation of terror plots from remote locations and relaxing barriers to movement across borders. Globalization also creates the possibility of simultaneous attacks in different locations. Undoubtedly, terrorist groups have grown stronger with globalization. According to modern dicta, globalization is an inevitable, and perhaps irreversible, process. Thus, having laid the foundation for this new “era of global terror,” it is now essential that nations develop effective strategies to ward off threats. National and international tools to prevent terrorism need to be fine-tuned to provide maximum effectiveness. I present case studies of Indonesia and Singapore to show both strengths and weaknesses in current approaches to counter-terrorism. These case studies are significant if only for the simple reason that wecan learn from others’ failures and successes.

Third, I have already noted that the terrorist phenomenon in Southeast Asia is growing and deserves greater scrutiny. The October 1, 2005 Bali bombings are an example of the magnitude of the threat in Southeast Asia. Three years after the previous bombing, tourists began flooding back onto Bali’s beaches, confident in local residents’ claims that there was nothing to fear and that Bali was safe for tourists. The explosions that tore through restaurants in the popular tourist destinations of Kuta and Jimbaran, killing more than 20 and wounding over 100, quickly dispelled the myth of Bali’s safety. Two major attacks in three years show that terrorist groups in Southeast Asia have the capability to plan and carry-out threats. Fear of more attacks is reasonable and will likely lead to set-backs in the region’s development.

Fourth, law is one of the most potent weapons for fighting terrorism. Michael German, a former American FBI undercover agent and counterterrorism instructor, states that his “repeated success using constitutionally sound, proactive law enforcement techniques to infiltrate terrorist groups and prevent acts of terrorism convinces [him] that a criminal law approach to counterterrorism can be effective.” The key is knowing how and when to use the law, including when to refrain from pursuing legal mechanisms. In this paper, I explore how the law is currently used in Singapore and Indonesia, and then hypothesize how the law ought to be used in order to create a more effective counter-terrorism regime. By looking at the impact of the law on greater society, rather than only within the microcosm of legal institutions, I hope to make some pragmatic and achievable suggestions for fighting terrorism.

Interesting Singapore fact of the day:

Apparently one of the newspapers here publishes the pictures of people who neglect to flush public toilets. Actually, I am not sure if they still do this, but at least they used to.... It was (is?) a sort of "column of shame".

The plan was to fly to Mandalay, take the train to Bagan, and then fly back to Yangon. So we booked our tickets on the overnight train from Mandalay to Bagan, caught a taxi to the train station, and... the train was broken. We stood around the office trying to figure out what we were going to do; the train was under repair hours away and the earliest it would make it to Mandalay was the next morning. While we were standing around pondering our options, of course, the power failed and there was a black-out. All we could do was stand in the pitch black of the station until one of the station managers lit a candle. At that time, laughing about the fact that we should have expected a problem like this, we decided to go back to the hotel we had just checked out of and see if we could arrange alternative means to reach Bagan. Luckily, we were able to book on to an early morning flight for only $35.

Like Angkor in Cambodia, Bagan is an ancient medieval city and important religious site. There are over 2000 pagodas that remain here, mostly in ruins but some very well-preserved, and sprawl over a vast plain. When gazing toward the horizon, it appears as if these temples go on forever. Bagan dates back to the 2nd century A.D., and the thousands of temples were built over a short 200 year period. At one time, there were more than 13,000 temples and other religious structures.

To see the temples, we rented bicycles for two days and biked all day (through the scalding heat and over dirt trails that were better suited to mountain bikes). Here are some highlights from Bagan:

We spent the first two days in Mandalay, Burma's second largest city and the last capitol before the British colonized the country. The city is built around a large moat-surrounded fort that at one time housed the National Palace and later housed the British Colonial Headquarters. This is what the moat looks like today:



It is quite picturesque despite large floating bits of scum all over the water. Actually, we learned that in order to "prep" the country for tourism, the government forced the citizens of Mandalay to come out and clean the entire moat, bringing tools from home to do the job, and if they didn't have any tools to help, they just had to use their hands.

Our first day in Mandalay we paid a driver to take us to the nearby ancient cities of Saigang, Amarapura, and Inwa. At Saigang we climbed to the top of the hill to visit a pagoda that overlooked the river and a vast expanse of ancient pagodas. We then took a boat to Inwa, which is built on an island in middle of the river:



At Inwa a carriage driver took us to see some of the ancient sites, including the wooden monastery and the "leaning tower of Inwa". Here is a view across Inwa and an ox cart on the way to the monastery:




Last, we went to visit U Bein's Bridge at Amarapura. I posted some photos from this place in the last entry, but I will post some more here because it was just such a beautiful place:




That night we went to the Thadingyut festivities. We were expecting a fair-like atmosphere, and that's what we got! Well, we got a little "more" than we hoped for. Night had fallen and virtually the entire city was making its way to festival site. Entire families piled onto a single bicycle or motorcycle, whooping with exileration and throwing firecrackers into the street as they rode past. Honestly, I don't know how tires weren't exploding with all the firecrackers going off under foot. When we arrived at the festival, we quickly realized that there were no other foreigners around, that all the men had lost their inhibitions through drinking, and that we were the target for many lecherous eyes and hands. So needless to say, we didn't stay long. We did stay long enough, however, to be involved in a stampede and almost get trampled, and also to witness a Burmese ferris wheel. So, you know how I mentioned that electricity is not reliable in Burma? Well, generally you would need electricity to run a ferris wheel, but the Burmese had come up with an alternative. They had a group of 10 or so young men who would scramble to the top of the wheel, hanging off the cars or propping themselves on the frame, and would propel the wheel into a spin with their body weight. It was CRAZY. The wheel was spinning soooooo fast, with boys dangling off everywhere and cars packed with families. I had visions of people flying off and smashing into the street below. I have never seen anything like that.

Writing one entry about Burma is an impossible task, so I am going to have to write a couple of separate entries about my recent trip.

I spent the last 5 days in Burma (Myanmar) visiting a friend, Natalya, who is working as a teacher in Yangon at the International School. I coordinated my visit with her fall break from school so that we would be able to travel together and I would have a more meaningful impression of the country in the short time I was able to visit. First, some of you may have guessed that this visit to Burma was a big decision for me to make. When I lived in Chiangmai in 2001 I knew some Burmese exiles who recounted stories of the reign of terror that the government in Burma directs, and as such I was wary to visit the country, not because of any danger to myself, but because I didn't want to "support" the current government by adding to its budding tourist trade. The current government is run by the military and is widely known to massacre its own citizens if they are believed to be politically opposed to the regime, and also has the largest number of child soldiers in the world in their national army. In fact, they regularly pick up street children and force them into military training "camps" where they become addicted to drugs and are forced to do things like run through mine fields and torture their fellow soldiers in the camps. The government is perhaps most well known for its 1988 massacre of around 3000 students, nurses, and other activists who took to the streets in a peaceful demonstration for democracy. Of course, none of this is at all evident to the average tourist today. Burma appears to be a calm, peaceful country with a contented population. At least in the places tourists are allowed to see. There are many areas of the country that are off limits, so it is impossible to know what conditions are like in those regions.

I was most struck by two things about Burma: (1) the lack of infrastructure and poverty is so evident that it is literally like walking into a place where development froze 100 years ago; (2) the people are incredibly warm- I have never had the experience where all I had to do was smile to bring out a huge grin and happy giggling from the people I passed. Both of these elements of Burma have a strong connection to the fact that there is still very little tourism in the country. Outside of Bagan, Natalya and I actually encountered very few travellers, westerners or other Asians. In fact, on the flight from Singapore to Yangon I did not see any other foreigners at all.

And what a first impression of Burma that flight was! We landed on the tarmac and I looked around, trying to figure out where exactly the airport was. There was a golden monstrosity of a building that looked completely empty, and otherwise some run-down old warehouse-like structures with the windows knocked out and plywood sheets nailed haphazardly to the outside. It turned out that one section of that "warehouse" was actually the airport. Not a very auspicious welcome to the nation's capitol!

The taxi that drove us into central Yangon was similarly run-down, lacking door handles and window handles, with it's steering wheel on the right side even though traffic also drove on the right in Burma. Natalya pointed out that most of the vehicles were hand-me-downs from Japan or elsewhere, and few claimed the distinction of being newer than about 50 years. In fact, cars are definitely not the primary mode of transportation in Burma. I would say most Burmese travel by bicycle, though motorbikes, horse carts, and ox carts are also common.

I spent the first night with Natalya at her apartment in Yangon, where I discovered that even though the city looks war and/or poverty-ravaged from the outside, and has extremely unreliable electricity and streets that are covered in pot holes and sewers running along the sides, it has many hidden "surprises" in the form of beauty on the inside. First, Natalya's apartment was actually quite beautiful, freshly painted, wood floors, and teak furniture. Second, we went to a restaurant called "Monsoon" that looked very unremarkable from the outside, but wow, on the inside it was a gorgeous resetaurant that served great food. Natalya said that Yangon has dozens of places like this.

Unknowing, I scheduled my visit to Burma during one of the biggest national holidays- Thadingyet- or the "Festival of Lights". When I got to Yangon many locals were lighting up the streets and pagodas with long lines of candles made with oil in little clay pots. These candles sparkled through out the city. When I continued on to Mandalay with Natalya for the next two days, the candles were joined with paper lanterns hung in front of houses, paper balloons in the air, and showers of firecrackers being set off in every direction.

We were only in Yangon briefly and spent two days each in and around Mandalay and Bagan. I am going to post some pictures from Mandalay below, and will write more about what we did in the next entry:


Typical horse-drawn carriage and driver (this man drove us around one of the old cities near Mandalay called Inwa)



This is an ancient wooden monastery at Inwa



These lions are important Burmese symbols that you see through out the country. These ones are at the base of Mandalay Hill



Monks are literally everywhere, and of all ages



This is the longest teak bridge in the world- about 1.5 km - known as U Bein's Bridge


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Locals commute across the bridge on foot and bike at sunrise and sunset





Picture taken from the bridge



Me in front of the Mandalay moat that surrounds the old fort

Today I did something that I ought to be doing more, since it is one of the great things about living in Singapore. I went to Little India and had a good explore around the area. I've been there a couple of times before, but it seems there are plenty of reasons to go back! I had forgotten that it is leading up to Deepavali right now, so a perfect time to visit Little India. For those of you who aren't versed in indian festivals, Deepavali is the "festival of lights" and one of the biggest celebrations of the year. During Deepavali, people light earthen 'diyas' (lamps), decorate their houses, set off firecrackers, and have huge feasts with friends and family. The lighting of lamps is apparently a way of paying obeisance to god for attainment of health, wealth, knowledge, peace, valor and fame. I think Deepavali is November 1 this year? I better check and make sure. It will be really fun to go back to Little India for the celebrations. Anyway, leading up to the holiday, the streets of Little India are packed with people buying decorations for their homes and beautiful sarees for the celebrations. They have set up a special holiday bazaar on one street to sell holiday treats, jewellery, and decorations. I ended up buying some fabric that was on sale, so now I better come up with some ideas of what I want to make out of it.

Well, I am off to Burma tomorrow. I'll write again in about a week about my Burma adventures, and include some pictures as well. We will be going to Bagan, which I have high expectations will be one of the most fascinating places I will ever visit!

In the interest of health and deliciousness, I have taken to eating yong tau foo pretty much everyday, and sometimes twice a day (like today). Part of the reason for this is that there aren't actually that many other alternatives for things to eat at school that haven't been drowned in vats of oil. Yong tau foo is so great though- it's like a huge banquet of make-your-own soup or noodles. You go through a line where you put all the things you want in your soup (different vegetables, tofu, meat) and then request for it to be made specifically how you like it- type of noodles, with or without broth, etc. I always get some grass-like green veg, tomatoes, seaweed, and tofu. And maybe some eggplant or carrots, but no noodles, and just broth. And then you add this sweet sauce and a little chili, and mmmm, the perfect lunch. The other thing I love to have here at school is fresh-squeezed juice. Watermelon or mango are my current favorites.

The school cafeteria is quite interesting here. I kind of like the set-up, though if only there was less oil.... Basically, they rent out space for food stalls run by locals. So all over campus there are little food venues set up just like the hawker stalls that you can find throughout Singapore. Because of the multiple ethnicities here, they always have different stalls for Chinese, Indian, Muslim, and Western food, with a lot of other variations.

After that frustrating week I desperately needed a break and to get away from Singapore for a bit. Luckily, I was able to make plans to meet up with my friend Miah on Tioman Island for a couple of days. Tioman is a Malaysian island that is off the Southeast Coast, and relatively near Singapore. In fact, there are flights directly to Tioman from Singapore and there used to be ferry, though unfortunately they shut down that service last year. So instead I hopped on a bus at 6:40 am for the 4 hour drive to Tanjong Gemok in Malaysia to catch the ferry for the 1.5 hour boat ride. Arriving at 2:00pm, I found that the people fromthe hotel were not there to meet me at the jetty as they promised, so after waiting around for a bit I caught a water taxi out to the Panuba Inn and immediately found Miah loitering on the beach waiting for me. Tioman is the only island in Southeast Asia that I have visited outside of Thailand, and it was quite different. Less developed and a bit more ramshackle, but with lots of charm that only secluded beaches can give...

Here are some pictures from my balcony:




I love waking up to those kinds of views!! Made me wish I had more time to spend out there letting the stress just melt away... All we did was hang out on the beach, swim a bit, and take a short walk through the jungle to the neighboring beach. We were accompanied in our walks and lounging times by lots of monkeys and giant monitor lizards (I would guess around 4 feet long- these are the biggest lizards I have ever seen!)




The monkey pics are kind of fuzzy for some reason... oh well.

Here's an example of the kind of "roughing it" lifestyle I lead. No posh resorts for me!



Just kidding actually. I don't stoop quite so low these days. Not saying I wouldn't have in the past, but I am somehow feeling too old for all that now. I really do think those toilets may still be used by the odd person though, which is a rather scary thought! Probably at night in the company of giant lizards and cockroaches...

Well, all in all it was a lovely mini break. Of course, can't beat hanging out on beautiful beaches in the company of good friends!

I should probably clarify that even while I am complaining about some of the annoyances of life here in Singapore, it has not escalated to the level that I am unhappy that I made the decision to come here. No, at least for now, I am still happy to be in Singapore for the year. Singapore is still a good place, just frustrating of late! In fact, what I have decided about Singapore is that it would be a great place to live if you had money- because that's when you can afford all the wonderful things that Singapore has to offer- shopping, restaurants, shows, etc. It is definitely a center of culture in Southeast Asia, and a great mix of East and West, thus presenting access to "whatever" a foreigner should want here, right??? Well, such is the case if you are in the class of people who can afford it. Student life, on the other hand, is far below what it should be for a developed country like this. The facilities are totally run-down and inconvenient (I recently found out that there are no fire alarms and the building has electrical problems). In fact, I was reflecting back on all the places I've lived overseas, including in much less developed countries like Morocco, Uganda, and Kyrgyzstan, and the truth is that where I am right now is the worst accommodations I have had. Hence the reason I am fed up with it. So, maybe I will see some progress as I went to see the Dean of the Law School and he said he will see what he can do to help me. In this country you definitely have to go up up up to the very top person if you want to see anything accomplished. So I'm keeping my fingers crossed that change will come soon, though it is far from a sure thing, and who knows how long it will take?

I went to the embassy of Myanmar to get my visa yesterday (I am going to visit Natalya there in a couple of weeks). Even though I am generally appalled by the actions of the government of that country, I do have to admit that their embassy was one of the most efficient and best I have visited. I submitted my application for a visa at 10:30 in the morning, and they had it ready for me by 3:00 in the afternoon. Wow, that never happens.

So because I was already downtown far away from school, I ended up having a non-study day on Orchard Road. My friend Heather met up with me in the evening and we went to see a movie. Oh, remember how I wrote earlier about those government signs to discourage things like jay-walking??? Well, at the beginning of the movie when they have all those commercials now, there was a government-sponsored commercial that used the same THINK AGAIN slogan campaign. it was so graphic though! It showed a boy running across the street where there wasn't a crosswalk and then getting SLAMMED into by a car. His family comes out and stands around his crushed and bloody body (which they showed in great detail) on the street crying. Can you believe they showed that at the movie theatre and that this ad was sponsored by the government?!

I have a Singaporean stalker boy. He is this 19 yr old law school pip-squeak who I met in the hallway at school for like 5 min, and now he calls me and text messages me ALL THE TIME. He has no social sense whatsoever, and I have tried to put him off multiple times, though it doesn't seem to register with him. Maybe today, though, finally, I might have gotten through to him. He called me and I actually answered the phone (don't usually answer, just ignore), and I was like "why are you calling me?" and he said, "don't you like to hear from your friends?" I replied, "Are we friends? We talked for 5 minutes in the hallway once, 2 months ago. I'm really busy, so I'm sorry, but I can't meet with you. Goodbye." So hopefully he got the message this time. When I met him, he came up to me and said, "Hi, my name is Dylan like the guy in 90210." Uh, ok.... So I was friendly and answered his barrage of questions about me, but never expected him to go into stalker mode. One of my other girlfriends here told me that you have to be careful cuz the guys here do that. It's bizarre.

The day has degenerated in a way that I am feeling kind of disgruntled and frustrated with my life out here at the moment. I think I'm going to visit Residence Life to find out if I can move on campus, because that would at least solve some of the basic frustration that has to do with the inconvenience of my living situation. I spend approximately 12 hours a day in the library because I feel that I can't get any work done at my apartment due to the discomfort of being there and lack of internet access. I could come to school for just part of the day, but once I am here I feel that I have to stay at least until it gets dark so that I can go for a jog on the track on my way home. Otherwise I wouldn't get any exercise because it is too hot to exercise outside during the day, and the gym here is really quite disgusting so I can't go there (it smells horrible, nothing is clean, everything is really old, and there is not enough equipment for everyone to use). If I have other errands to run during the day that do not involve school, the day is basically shot for getting anything done because it takes too much time taking buses and the metro around to go downtown AND to school. As it is, I spend about 1.5 hours a day waiting for the bus and commuting to and from my apartment to school.... ok, so you can see I am frustrated at the moment! The other thing is that I don't even really know if they will consider letting me move on campus because they are sooooo inflexible about rules here. They might just say, "Sorry, graduate students can only live at Gillman Heights, and not the on-campus residences" and not even consider my pleas for an exception. Well, I will try. Don't know if I can come to school tomorrow though because I need to go get my visa for Burma. Another day wasted with useless activities....

I'm sure by now you have all heard about the bombing in Bali on Saturday- 26 people killed, including locals and tourists from Australia, the US, Japan, and South Korea. They are attributing the bombings to the regional terrorist group the Jemaah Islamiyah, who were responsible for the last attack. This bombing occured in much the same area as the last one, near the resort town of Kuta. It is so sad that this had to happen, especially at a time when tourists were starting to go back to Bali and feel "safe" once again. This has to be a hard blow for the locals, who earn their livings from tourism. Most of the local people in that region are Hindu, not Muslim, which is apparently another reason the Muslim extremists find it an easy target. I wonder how the Indonesian government is going to respond this time? They have to do something substantial to crack down on terrorism in the region....

So, as you know, this is the very topic I am writing my thesis on. The recent attacks highlight how important this issue is.