Will you cry for her? Or her?

Aber das ist wohl so, weil ein einzelner immer der Tod ist — und zwei Millionen immer nur eine Statistik...

That is German for "When one dies, it is a statistic - when a million die, it is a statistic."

Contrary to popular culture, the above quote has never been officially attributed to Josef Stalin. Instead, it is found in a novel by German author Erich Maria Remarque.

Last night, local time, Singaporean lawyer Lo Hwei Yan was found dead at The Oberoi Trident Hotel. The 28-year-old was killed by terrorists who were holding hundreds of foreigners and hotel staff hostage in Mumbai's hotels. She is the first Singaporean who has fallen victim to terrorism.

The local media has been quick to run stories on her death. In today's The New Paper, one writer has sensationalised the event, devoting huge chunky paragraphs into describing how she has suffered injustice in the hands of these terrorists and how this was never meant to be for her. The writer labeled the terrorists as "cowards". And from the look of the cover of today's TNP, I presume that they must have jumped at this story once it surfaced.

At noontime, while having my hair cut, I heard the DJ of a local chinese radio station offering her sympathy and sorrow on this tragedy. I typed Lo Hwei Yen's name on google and managed to find seven webpages dedicated in memory to her. One even mentioned her as someone who 'gave her life to terrorism'...

I felt a tinge of sadness upon reading the papers after I woke up this morning. A promising 28-year-old lawyer who had only been married for a year has lost her life in a senseless act of terror in Mumbai. My thoughts were on her family, and I pray for the comfort of God to be upon them.

Yet as the day went on, I can't help but think, "Is this going end up as Huang Na 2?" Remember the little girl from China who was brutally murdered by a Malaysian a few years back, on Singapore soil? Hordes of people turned up at her funeral. They sympathised her mother, and donated huge sums of money to her mother, who's from China. Then, this mother, who is a Chinese national, went back to China, and used to money that was donated by Singaporeans to build a bungalow, on non-Singaporean soil...

Ok I admit I'm getting pretty much too carried away. But my point is, if Singaporeans regard the significance and value of human life so highly, why then are we not doing as much for people who are suffering in other parts of the world? They are innocent too, they don't deserve it too, and most importantly, they are not of any less important because they aren't lawyers, or they aren't happily married. Are their lives of less worth to us, the citizens of the air-conditioned nation?

The picture you see up there, that woman, she is 53 years old and was raped by armed militants in Congo. Everyday, ten new victims of sexual assault appear in one single hospital in Kivu, which is only a province of Congo. To make it slightly more appalling, these women are assaulted so brutally and sadistically that their reproductive and digestive organs are damaged beyond repair. Their stories may be less worthy for news, but their lives are not.

Everyday, many lives are lost in regions of conflict. Many of would most probably have died without ever being loving someone or being loved.