Before we embark on our travels, many of us will do our research, including watching video guides on our destination countries.
Oftentimes, we trust the information provided in these videos to be accurate, but this might not always be true.
On 1 Feb, Yellow Productions Travel Guides shared a video titled ‘What You Need To Know Before Visiting Singapore!’ on Facebook.
However, the video contained quite a few inaccuracies. For example, it described Singlish as a mix of English and Chinese and referred to Tamil as an ‘Indian language’.
Singaporeans soon flocked to the video’s comment section to point out these mistakes.
On 1 Feb, Yellow Productions Travel Guides posted a Facebook video about things to know before visiting Singapore.
In the first section, American YouTuber Chris Raney, who runs the channel, talks about the exchange rate and the importance of having cash on hand.
He then says that Singapore is still very much cash-based. According to him, cash is needed at hawker centres and sometimes taxis.
Raney then talks about the laws in Singapore, stressing that chewing gum is illegal. Hence, he asked travellers not to bring it into the country.
After a brief description of our tropical weather, Raney moves on to the languages of Singapore.
He shares that Singapore has 4 official languages. While elaborating, he makes the mistake of saying the languages are “English, Mandarin, Malay, and an Indian language”.
Raney says that “the official, official language is English”.
He then describes Singlish as adding Chinese words into English as well as adding extra words for emphasis.
At the time of writing, the video has garnered over 1,400 shares. Many Singaporeans took to the comment section to point out the inaccuracies in Raney’s video.
Many criticised how he referred to Tamil as an ‘Indian language’.
Netizens also noted that our national language – or in Raney’s words ‘official, official language’ – is actually Malay, not English.
Some also took issue that the video says Singlish is only a mix of English and Chinese. This netizen noted that it actually includes all 4 official languages.
Besides the language section, one netizen also corrected that one can chew gum in Singapore. Only the sale of chewing gum is illegal.
While some of the misinformation in the travel guide comes down to a lack of research, another possible reason for the inaccuracies could be that it is outdated, as pointed out by some netizens.
A quick search through Yellow Productions Travel Guides’ YouTube channel shows that Raney has uploaded 18 videos in Singapore.
Some were shot from as far as 8 years back. The most recent videos of Singapore were filmed 5 years ago in 2017.
The videos filmed in 2017 show Raney donning the same orange shirt he was wearing in the travel guide.
One particular video, titled ‘Singapore Travel Tips: 6 Things to Know Before You Go’, also echoes a lot of the same information included in the Facebook video.
Such misinformation could give his global audience the wrong impression of Singapore.
With a strong following of over 99,000 users on Facebook and 239,000 subscribers on YouTube, many perhaps expected Yellow Productions Travel Guides to do better.
Hopefully, Raney will be receptive to the feedback he is getting and do his due diligence in future.
Have news you must share? Get in touch with us via email at news@mustsharenews.com.
Featured image adapted from Yellow Productions Travel Guides on Facebook.
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