Singapore—The internet can be a great place to meet people, with more and more people creating new friendships online.
As it turns out, the internet can also be a place to meet your Member of Parliament, as one woman found out.
Now Mr Baey Yam Keng (PAP-Tampines GRC) has a pretty impressive résumé, having served as an MP since 2006 as well as holding a number of positions in different ministries, including the Ministry of Transport, where he is the senior parliamentary secretary.
But it seems like some people don’t know who he is.
Mr Baey, a regular on social media, held his first live TikTok session on Sunday night (Feb 7) so he could meet and chat with residents.
A young woman named Megan Lynn was also live on TikTok at that time. So she just “randomly clicked on a bunch of people,” she said in her TikTok clip, which Mr Baey shared on his Facebook page on Monday night (Feb 8).
@itsmeggsss NOT ME GOING ON LIVE WITH THE TAMPINES MP AND NOT KNOWING WHO HE IS 🤡🤡 @baeyyamkeng you are v cool #fyp #tiktoksg
She had no idea who the MP was.
“You’re the first person I clicked,” she told him, “I’m sorry.”
“Oh..ok, no worries, ya,” he answered, and then asked her, “Do we know each other?”
Which made her laugh.
The MP then told her that it was the first time he was on live video for this type of exchange, and asked her if she was from Singapore.
And then, viewers can see her begin to realise who he is.
“Are you an MP?” she asks.
Pointing to his shirt, he says, “Can you see the word Tampines?”
She bursts out laughing and says, “Are you for real? Whoa, that’s so cool!
You’re my MP then!”
Mr Baey replies, “Really? And you don’t know me?
“Oh no, that’s my failure.”
But she quickly reassures him, “No, I think it’s my failure that I didn’t even know you were my MP.”
She later chuckles over his name, “Everyone’s saying Our Tampines Bae, that’s so funny,” as the MP smiles a little awkwardly.
They say goodbye after Megan Lynn thanks him for joining in, and he tells her, “I hope to see you around Tampines,” but she ends up cutting him off mid-sentence.
“I’m so rude, I just cancelled him out,” she said.
When the MP shared her clip, which has been viewed over 100,000 times, he captioned it with the comment, “At least I managed to introduce myself to a Tampines resident who didn’t know me.”
In her follow-up to meeting the “Tampines Bae”, Megan Lynn wrote
“I sincerely apologize for my stupidity and political ignorance 😖 but thank you for laughing with me.”
/TISG
Read also: LGBT publication praises PAP MP Baey Yam Keng for open support of community