Allow me to pen down my experience at a recent ministerial forum in Singapore recently. I watched the legendary Lee Kuan Yew debate with fellow students, firing off with gusto, despite his age. He still remains as sharp as ever.

My friends and I arrived at the University Cultural Centre, hours before he was to speak. Security was tight as we had to pass through metal detectors and a baggage search. We waited patiently, doodling on the free paper given, and cracking silly wise jokes to keep ourselves company.

At 7pm sharp, the master of ceremonies waltzed in and welcomed the first speaker, Vincent Lee Pei Quan, president of the Political Association (which some claim is two thirds PAP) of the National University of Singapore. Then came the legendary Mr Lee.

I don't think many of us were really interested in what he said. Most of the rhetoric was focused on maintaining a balance in society, having a clean, effective government if you only have 600 sq km and no natural resources, and putting the best people in charge.

The fun really started when students starting asking questions. First question was about ownership, the notion that most Singaporeans do not have a sense of belonging to Singapore. To this, he challenged the questioner with a few questions, asking him where he lives, and later replying that ownerships starts when you take claim to something.

With ownership comes responsibility, and if there is no sense of responsibility, there can be no ownership. He then asked the poor student who his friends were and if he could talk to them about a sense of belonging. To this, the poor student replied that he had been talking mostly to taxi drivers; much to the amusement of the audience.

Most of the questions were poorly phrased ones. Some wanted to steal the limelight by making long speeches before asking a question. I wanted to ask the question of a possible future reunification with Malaysia after all Singapore's resources have been extinguished.

Malaysia would then have reached a developed nation status and Singapore would be struggling to compete with its neighbours. But I never had the gall to ask such a loaded question and by the time I did, the queue was already too darn long. But the truth was that I was not fully prepared for such a question.

The night became more interesting when one brave questioner appeared to attack Lee openly. He claimed that Lee did not know what he was talking about by bringing up 'old, ancient stories' of the past to support his arguments. He ended by rudely calling Lee a despot.

That really really fired Lee up. His sarcastic remarks after that were extremely hilarious.

All this reminds me of the time, I met Said Zahari, once incarcerated under Singapore's ISA. Said had a lot of interesting things to say about Lee and I remember him vividly saying that Lee is a very vindictive man.

I can almost see why - a man who prides himself so much on building a nation that he'll do almost anything to stop those who in anyway threaten it.

But to some extent, credit must be given to Lee. At the expense of some civil and personal liberties he has made what Singapore is today - a very materialistically rich nation with a very politically apathetic student population.

Anyway, here are some quotes on Singapore from the old man:

'If you damage Singapore, you're done!'

'It's size means its vulnerability.'

'We have not failed because we are not ordinary.'