Besides the ever increasing prices of foodstuff nowadays, the next hottest topic in town is of course that dress. Which dress you may ask? That dress.

That dress refers to the merlion dress to be worn by this year’s Miss Singapore Universe Shenise Wong in the national costume segment of the annual Miss Universe pageant.

The white and silver gown has textured ’scales’ made of PVC leather and dangling plastic crystals. And to complete the merlion look, an organza fishtail train and a matching shimmery collar piece that is supposed to spread out behind Shenise’s head like a large fin. Several scallop shells also adorn her mohawk-styled hair.

Designed by 18-year-old designer Muhammed Hafiz Tahir who is studying at fashion design at Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts, it is indeed a breath of fresh air after seeing traditional-looking sarong kebayas, cheongsums and orchid inspired themes from previous years’ creations.

Well, the merlion dress has been drawing more brickbats than praises. Critics label it a national disgrace. After all, the merlion itself is a myth. The Merlion doesn’t even exist.

I know the Merlion is supposed to be our national symbol, something like what the Statue of Liberty means to USA, Great Wall is to China, Eiffel Tower is to Paris. Featuring the head of a lion and the body of a fish, it represents both strength and Singapore’s relationship with the sea. After all, we started off as a sea port.

Most of us regard the Merlion as a joke. It is at best a marketing ploy used by the Singapore Tourist Promotion Board to create a beautiful legend to draw in more visitors. While I cringe at its forcefulness, I’m equally surprised ‘coz it seems to work with non Singaporeans. During my recent Bangkok trip, a Taiwanese who was also waiting to board the plane started a small chat. Knowing I was from Singapore, he immediately asked me where he should go to see the Merlion. The Merlion? Yes, the Merlion. He didn’t ask me about Orchard Road, the Esplanade, Chinatown or the Singapore Flyer. He asked me about the Merlion!

So now we have the Merlion icon and we have the merlion dress. This is what I feel about the dress.

Actually, if you remove the fishtail train of the dress, it looks really tacky…like some recycled 7th month shimmering getai dress. And why PVC leather and plastic crystals? I thought the standard would at least be real leather and Swarovski crystals. Come on, Singapore is a developed first-world nation and this IS the national costume! Look at the earrings…so 80’s. Cannot make it. And the hair, didn’t they get Singapore’s hair gurus David Gan or Addy Lee to do it?

43 years of nation building and Singapore is still having a national identity crisis as far as the national costume is concerned. What is our national costume? Is it the cheongsum, sari, kebaya or a rojak of all our cultures? Not to forget we still have other items to consider like the orchids and that half lion half fish icon. We started off as Temasek, then became Singapura, and now Singapore. Remote settlement to fishing village to immigrant society to British colony to Japanese Occupation to being part of Malaysia to the separation to world class port to developed nation. Singapore has seen them all. But as far as our national costume is concerned, we have yet to sort things out. The Merlion? Never in the next 43 years.

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