…and here’s what the Singapore Development Unit (yes, there’s an official matchmaking agency for Singapore) is promoting for the night after National Day, which is today, August 9.

“We gotta go all the way for Singapore, you know what I’m saying.”

Singapore has one of the lowest birth rates in the world at around 115, according to the World Bank’s 2010 list.  By contrast, the demographically challenged Italy is at 1.4 and Russia at 1.54.

So: ‎”It’s National Night, let’s make Singapore’s birthrate spike.”

H/T to James Fallows at The Atlantic, one of the most consistently thoughtful voices in Western media on Asia (and if anyone’s looking for a good August book recommendation, his new book, China Airborne, is out):

About the only thing that needs explaining is when, around time 2:18, the video talks about “putting a bao in the oven,” a bao is like a little bundle or dumpling or bun. And before that, in the line: “I know you want it / so does the SDU,” here is what they’re talking about. But even if you didn’t know that you’d get the idea. There’s a little more explanation to the right, which says a lot about Singapore in just a few lines.

The Singapore government has often been criticized for being too Gradgrind-like and strait-laced. So, no joke, congrats to whoever broke the stereotype by doing this. And … ummm, Happy National Day / Night!