Hai Sing Catholic School student Winnie Hiew, 15, kept her love for sport stacking under wraps when she first started two years ago.

“I didn’t want to tell my friends, in case they thought I was weird,” she said. “Everyone’s outside playing badminton and basketball, and I’m here stacking cups.”

Her passion and hard work eventually earned her three overall national sport stacking records for the female division.

Sport stacking, also known as cup stacking or speed stacking, requires participants to stack and unstack cups in various specific formations as fast as possible.

The idea came from a Mr Wayne Godinet from California in the early 1980s, and it was popularised in the 1990s. The World Sport Stacking Association (WSSA), based in Colorado in the US, was formed in 2001 to promote and govern sport stacking around the world.

The Singapore branch of the association was founded in 2008 and is now headed by Mr Allan Ong, 41.

There are about 3,000 stackers in Singapore, but only 250 who stack competitively under the banner of Team Singapore, estimates Mr Ong, who runs the Singapore branch full-time. Stackers come from all age groups, from as young as five to as old as mid-60s.

Over the years, Team Singapore has accomplished several notable feats. It holds five divisional world records, one by nine-year-old Shaina Nero Ruiz. Special stackers – those with physical or intellectual disabilities – have set four world records. Twelve-year-old Ikhsan Irwan is one of them. He holds world records for all individual competitive sequences in the Level One Special Stackers Age 11-14 division.

Stacking is gaining traction in Singapore, according to Mr Ong.

More than five schools have contacted WSSA Singapore for information about stacking so far this year, more than double the number in the same period last year.

St Stephen’s School has been holding cup stacking sessions regularly during recess since August last year, when some play areas were hoarded up for upgrading.

The principal of the primary school, Mr Thomas Koh, told The Straits Times it became so popular that the school held a competition early this year, in which over half the pupil population participated.

“Cup stacking was chosen because it can be played by all ages and within the school canteen,” said Mr Koh.

WSSA Singapore’s Mr Ong said about 10 community centres run regular sessions on cup stacking.

In 2011, Singapore held a major competition, the Asian Open, that was attended by seven countries.

The Singapore Open will be held on June 4 and 5 at the Orchid Country Club. So far, about 100 Singaporeans are participating, as well as about 80 competitors from countries and territories including Malaysia, the Philippines and Taiwan.

More children in Singapore are taking up stacking, compared to two years ago, when most of the stackers were senior citizens, said Mr Ong.

Parents whose children are into stacking find it a good way to bond with them. Winnie’s mother, Ms Serene Ong, 39, volunteers at some of the stacking competitions her daughter took part in. She even participates in the Parents’ Doubles, where a parent and child each uses one hand to stack together.

“We talk and interact more now,” said Ms Ong, a secretary in the semiconductor industry.

Ms Jane Sim, 35, whose son Edison Chew, 11, is a competitive stacker, said: “We discuss strategies to improve our timings. We have a common goal.”

Ms Sim, a naval engineer, noticed a change in her son, who goes to Jing Shan Primary School. “He used to be able to focus for 10 minutes (when he studies)… Now, he can focus for over 30 minutes,” she said.

According to recent studies by Texas Tech University and Mesa State College in the US, sport stacking improves concentration and hand-eye coordination, and utilises both the right brain and left brain. It also improves bilateral coordination, the ability to use both sides of the body at the same time in an organised manner.

Edison and Winnie stack with their friends regularly now, and hope that more schools will offer it as a co-curricular activity.

Said Winnie: “Some people don’t see it as a sport… (but) I hope stacking can become as popular as other more common sports.”

This article was first published on May 19, 2016.
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SINGAPORE – Singapore is expected to hang a Malaysian murder convict on Friday despite last-minute clemency pleas, his family and human rights groups said.

Kho Jabing, 31, was sentenced to death in 2010 for killing a Chinese construction worker in a robbery gone wrong and spent the next six years on a legal roller-coaster trying to avoid the gallows.

In a news conference late Tuesday, his sister Kho Jumai, 27, said the family was told in a letter from the Singapore Prisons Service that her brother would be executed on May 20.

Executions are normally carried out at Changi Prison before dawn on Fridays in Singapore.

The prison did not immediately respond to AFP’s requests for confirmation of the execution date.

Only the Singapore president, on the advice of the cabinet, can grant clemency.

The president said last week that he will not grant clemency although the family is pleading for a last minute reprieve.

“I’ve done everything I can, I’ve sent letters all over the government, to anyone who would listen. Whether the letters were really received, I don’t know because I don’t have much education,” said Kho’s mother Lenduk Baling, speaking through an interpreter.

Malaysia also has capital punishment, executing murderers and drug traffickers by hanging, a system like in Singapore that dates back to British colonial rule.

Amnesty International Malaysia and Human Rights Watch have both released statements calling on Singapore to halt the execution and review the case.

After Kho was sentenced to death in 2010, Singapore amended its mandatory death penalty for murder, giving judges the discretion to impose life imprisonment under certain circumstances.

His case was reviewed and Kho was re-sentenced to a life term in 2013.

But after an appeal by prosecutors, Kho’s death sentence was reinstated in January 2015.

An appeal was thrown out by a five-judge court last month, setting the stage for Friday’s hanging.

Singapore executed four people in 2015, one for murder and three for drug offences, according to Singapore prison officials.

Rights groups have called on Singapore to abolish capital punishment but the government has rejected such calls, arguing death sentences are a deterrent to crime.

Certificate of entitlement (COE) premiums for cars dipped at the latest tender yesterday. But they would have fallen more dramatically if not for strong bidding from Uber.

The COE price for cars up to 1,600cc and 130bhp finished 1.8 per cent lower at $47,020, and that for cars above 1,600cc or 130bhp closed 3.6 per cent lower at $49,156.

The premium for Open COE, which can be used for any vehicle type but ends up mostly for bigger cars, bucked the trend to end 1.4 per cent higher at $49,700.

Motor traders pointed out that the Uber-owned Lion City Rental submitted 870 bids in all three COE categories, and was successful for all but 30 of them.

In the previous tender two weeks ago, Lion City Rental was successful in all its 90 bids in the Open category.

Together with the bids it submitted in two previous tenders, Lion City has secured about 1,700 car COEs – all within just two months of bidding.

Echoing the frustration of car dealers, Mr Ron Lim, general manager of Nissan agent Tan Chong Motor, said: “Retail demand has slowed down quite drastically. But COE prices continue to be supported by all these bids from private- hire companies. When will their appetite be satisfied?”

The Land Transport Authority (LTA) had earlier barred taxi companies from bidding for COEs so as not to overheat premiums.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore had also introduced car loan curbs to do the same thing.

But Uber and other private-hire firms are not bound by these restrictions.

The LTA said last month that private-hire vehicles can lower the demand for privately owned cars, but added that it would continue to “monitor the situation”.

Mr Neo Nam Heng, chairman of diversified motor group Prime, said Uber and other private-hire firms cannot keep up the demand.

“There just aren’t enough drivers,” Mr Neo said. “And the turnover for such drivers is very high. So I believe this cannot be sustained. They will stop bidding, and premiums will fall.”

Meanwhile, the commercial vehicle COE premium rose by 1.7 per cent to end at $43,002 yesterday. Motorcycle premium was flat, ending just $1 higher at $6,303.

This article was first published on May 19, 2016.
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