Sugar-coated city: the real Singapore
July 27, 2008I’m writing this, half thinking I should probably wait to leave the country.
Walking through Singapore, you cannot but wonder who really lives here. Impeccable streets (and I really mean impeccable, not a single piece of rubbish on any lawn or anywhere), very little public space or street benches, ads on the telly about parental planning, and an airconed shopping mall at every corner.
A friend of mine called it “the most american city in Asia” and I think that’s probably true in the 1984 sense of the word America.
The Wikipedia page is strangely absent of any political history section and Google reeks of not so happy reports on what the situation might be like and how people have been taught to feel about it. I met a few people this weekend who went to jail or had been arrested for what seemed like quite foolish reasons.
All slightly unsettling. I leave tomorrow evening.
I love the way almost everything works in Singapore and didn’t find it that neat or ritzy, actually.
I follow Daryl Tay’s blog on social media
http://uniquefrequency.com/. That’s of impressive quality too.