Last week I went to the SPC petrol station at Sembawang to top up my car's petrol tank. I was shocked when the new pump attendant didn't understand a word I said in English.

I have been going to this station for 10 years and this is the first time this has happened.

In the end, I served myself and later found out that the pump attendant was from China.

Another shock awaited me on the same day when my family and I went to the Thai Express restaurant in Marina for dinner and another Chinese national served us. Once again, I was faced with a language problem but this time my wife, who is a Chinese Singaporean, spoke to her, with some difficulty.

I also faced an embarrassing moment in the famous Russian restaurant in Far East Shopping Centre last month when I took my in-laws there for a treat. The waiter was from China and could speak only Shanghainese. My father-in-law, a Shanghainese Singaporean, had to do the ordering of food.

On Tuesday, I went to Sun Plaza to have my usual haircut but the Malaysian barber couldn't speak English and spoke very bad Malay. I couldn't converse with him and ended up with my hair cut too short. I look like a recruit now.

Isn't there any governing body keeping a watch on the language spoken in the service industry?

Shouldn't there be a language proficiency test before foreigners are allowed to work in the service industry, like in Australia?

What happens to minorities like me, an Indian Singaporean, who can't converse in the languages of China and Malaysia? Do I spend the rest of my life eating only at places where the staff can speak English?

Ironically, for the Beijing Olympics the Chinese are being trained to speak English.

As Mr Philip Chan ('Raise awareness of 'minority' languages'; ST, Jan 28) said, 'Language is a very sensitive issue in Singapore society.'

Rajavarman Mathichandran