A word to make you blur like sotong/And a feeling of being flushed with excitement...

One of the two major local stories today (July 25) is this one (ST and TODAY's headlines respectively):

The man, Edwin Yeo Seow Hiong, was charged in court the day before (July 24). ST's story also said: "The CPIB said in a statement yesterday that Yeo's ruse was uncovered on Sept 14 last year. He was suspended from duty and interdicted the next day." [A whistle-blower is believed to have tipped off the CPIB.]

TODAY's report said: Yeo "was interdicted on Sept 15 last year, a day after the CPIB first discovered signs of alleged wrongdoing and had conducted preliminary investigations". [TODAY also said someone was believed to have blown the whistle on Yeo.]

But I wondered if ordinary readers understood what the heck "interdicted" was! So I polled 10 people, all well educated. Some thought it was a synonym for "indicted" (ie charged in court). But, no, I replied, Yeo was formally charged on July 24. One vehemently insisted there was no such word. Another said "imprisoned, sentenced or buried". A few were clueless. One came close: "...suspended from duty and placed under arrest the next day". Nope, not arrested yet.

Nick got it though, in a manner of speaking: "He was told not to come to work and next day kena tangkap (got caught out)."

Only Tom -- a veteran journalist -- gave this spot-on SMS answer: "From old subbing days I understood this to mean first u suspend the guy... not allowed to come to work. Then we officially n explicitly state that u will henceforth not continue in your job duties as (whatever the job) becos blah blah."

Well put, Tom. So, in plain English, "interdicted" means -- in the context of this story (there are other meanings) -- "officially relieved of one's duties". And, clearly, you don't interdict a gardener. You throw that word at a high official.

Now why can't the two newspapers use plain English in such an important story. If my very small sample size was an accurate gauge, four in five readers were clueless about that word.

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 Now for the other story that made the news big time...

 How did it happen? TODAY gave a vivid account:

I think people should not snigger. It is laudable. Just read this infobox from ST's story:

Notice that, untypically, I had not made any wisecracks so far. Well, I'll drink a toast to World Toilet Day come Nov 19 but I'll make sure it's not from this source even if PUB claims that all our water supply is potable...

Still, in China, things could get worse than the toilet water, like soft drinks...