The Devil In The Details

The bit about the Night Safari Halloween event not being "family-centric" is pure bull, of course. That plus quoting President Tan out of context - linking his call for family bonding activities to her single-handed divisive decision - for which she had to apologize under no uncertain terms. Ah Meng the Sumatran Orangtan (circa 18 June 1960 – 8 February 2008) must be rolling in her grave.

Ms Loh also claimed that "zebra heads were chopped off" as part of Halloween Horrors, another outright lie. She cited negative feedback from the public, of which 1,000 have already snapped up tickets that are priced from $40 to $56. For a tourist attraction dating from 2006, and won an award for most Innovative Marketing Initiative in 2009, she seems to know zilch about the prematurely aborted $1 million undertaking, which is also part of the final year project requirements for Singapore Polytechnic students. Anyway, what did she know about the job, before displacing Fanny Lai as CEO of Wildlife Reserves Singapore?

In a previous incarnation, Isabella Loh was a Sembawang executive known as Loh Wai Kiew. Urban legend has it that whenever Philip Yeo of A*STAR notoriety threw one of his (regular) foul tantrums, with toilet language to match, Ms Loh was the one deputed to soothe his frayed temper. When her patron's star appeared to wane, she jumped ship to Shell. Pundits wagered she will not survive in a real world where professionalism has no place for office politics. This is one female who goes to extremes to further her personal ambitions. She featured herself in the SembCorp calendar (Straits Times carried the story in January 2005 - CEO "Loh Wai Kiew donned a red halter-neck bikini as Miss December."), not that she posed any challenge to the chio bu's at Singapore Daily. The only clue to why she pulled the plug just 2 weeks before the September 30 launch is the smoking gun missive, "I explained in an email that it is a lot of money to spend on an infrastructure (Haunted House) of devil worship." She debunked conspiracy theories of conflict with her Catholic roots by declaring that she's a Buddhist. Now ghost like whispers attribute her stubborn attitude to her fengshui master's advice that the "devil worship" happening would be deleterious to her career aspirations. Maybe a self fulfilling prophecy is already set in motion.

Halloween is celebrated on October 31, with common activities such as trick-or-treating, attending costume parties, carving jack-o'-lanterns, bonfires, apple bobbing, telling scary stories, or watching horror movies. Kids trek from house to house in costume, asking for treats such as candy or sometimes money, with the question, "Trick or treat?" It all sounds so fun until some spoilsport adult comes along with a warped sense of "family calendar activities". Yeah, like the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Calendar is the perfect thing for wholesome family bonding.

Wholesome family entertainment NOT