Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Learning the Tongue



Briefest of briefs. A trifle for linguists and those historically minded. Other readers would be advised to look away now.... These little oddities have been rattling away in the brain for a good long while now. Saturday's edition of The Hindu struck a much harsher note in the recollection of Empire on the sub-continent; specifically in the north-east in this instance post-war when the Indian National Army (essentially formed here in Singapore among the expatriate community of Tamils) was attempting armed rebellion against the British. A good time to engineer a famine, teach the rascals a lesson. About three million people were estimated to have perished across West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha and Bangladesh. A much later piece of Colonial devilry than that detailed by Mike Davis in his eye-opener book Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World. Many of the heinous crimes of the recent past never acknowledged by many of the perpetrators on "our" side. Buried, selective history.... These Chinese in Singapore never had too much cause to complain. Circumstances here in the strategic transport hub were for the most part moderating and less than demonic. The earlier generation of Coolies perhaps suffered greatly; perhaps the first two generations. Brutal times. Slavery in many parts of the world was far from eradicated in the relevant period. In Singapore the English left much to their inheritors for which they could be grateful. And not merely the upper crust to whom the torch of freedom was passed.
         But brevity.
         Three unusual common expressions on the streets here every tick of the clock in every quarter of the island no let-up. Sketch in rubber plantations, the English superintendent from northern parts (Manchester, Birmingham, Leicester, Lancaster), pith helmet, twin-pocketed safari shirt, long walk-socks, a kelpie at his side brought over on the boat; stepped out under the rubber trees, gone down into the tin mines, the house-boy needing instruction, lads laying down the rails:
Carry on
Never mind
Correct
These three words and phrases in particular penetrated deeply right down to the present generation. Utterly ubiquitous, impossible to avoid one or two dozen times per diem in the strangest contexts. The author's illiterate former boxer landlord possessing no more than 100 - 120 English words maintains in his kit the last two. Unremarked previously and needing to be dislodged; worthy of some mention for the strong echo and the indication.
         .... Get Help To Arrest Your Mistakes mug at the Blue Diamond for lunch today from the Speak Good English campaign of a decade or two ago. Still very much active and widely promoted by the foreign-educated technocrats and mandarins.

NB. And a fourth afterthought arrives, used by the same groups, common island-wide and taught to current day youngsters too, even in Bukit Timah. In primary English speaking countries we say, Will you/Can you accompany me? ….go/come with me? On the rubber plantations and in the tin mines it was something else; something instrumental. No time there for mincing words.... You FOLLOW ME.... The exclamation mark half-retained in the tone two generations later here. More than a little irksome when directed at oneself: pretty girl extending an invitation to a picnic under the trees ruins the venture with such unseemly grossness. Horrid. Damn well ghastly. Ooooh those superintendents and administrators getting out the product!

Monday, July 28, 2014

Hari Raya—Idul Fitri—Eid—Lebaran in the Malay Quarter of Sin'pore



A cast of thousands for a modern-day historical epic of empire, travel and adventure. How many thousand could it have been from Onan Road up to the Post Office? Five or six at a pinch in the visual field. All granted a day free of labour it needed to be acknowledged, when in the case of domestic service there was no stipulation in the law. (Moreover the day before had been a Sunday when many had an ordinary free day.) These were all Indonesian young women from across the archipelago; the lads entrain and courting Bangladeshi and Indian. Hand-holding on every side, sisterly arms over shoulders, bright, colourful new bajus every so often in highest style Cleopatra from First Lady and the like. These latter girls were either well remunerated or had generous boyfriends. (In his crusade against immorality Zainuddin had long complained the Bangla lads were big spenders on the girls, at the expense of their needy families back home.) The picnics were concentrated beneath the trees before the Post Office and around Tanjong Katong Complex; others were spread among the refuse of the stalls that had been promptly evacuated overnight. Magnificent hearty embraces on the finding of friends from the annals of ages past. One lass alongside the spluttering fountain outside Coffee Bean had a dear friend who sat on the parapet clasped around the knees. In front the girl was kneeling on the paving half-burying her head in the other’s lap and holding tight. A loved mother reunited after a long absence might have been embraced in such fashion; here an older sister, precious friend or kampung neighbor. A tall Bangla lad in a resplendent lime green frock-coat from the eighteenth century stepped past erect and stately with a dowdy Indon girl like a hand-maiden bringing up the rear. Still in their teens a good number of the young women. Only a small minority risk the chairs at the Bean, where the $5.70 regular lattes are the cheapest option. Two hundred and fifty congregated in the immediate vicinity—thirty or forty empty cafe chairs. And the racial divide of course: indoors under the aircon Chinese girls of the same age sit with their lap-tops and smart phones over their drinks. The lucky ones here have been gifted the traditional New Year bonus (as have the illegal foreign worker compatriots at the stalls). Ten-twenty-fifty dollars mostly; generous employers present one or two hundred and the best bestow an entire month’s salary—$500-600. Two friends met along the way, mid-thirties and with children at home left in the care of mothers, in both cases received nada. — You give me Pavle? cheekily in either case. Selfies of course in all the hot music-video poses wherever one turned, forgivable here where they were destined for distant family. 
         Late afternoon after a bakso lunch with friends old and new at the Botanical Gardens Rina called round. At the Bukit Timah bungalow Rina and the second maid have been left alone at home while the family holidayed in the Philippines for a week, where visas for Indonesians presented a difficulty. A week of lounging and relaxing! Excellent.... Ah, in fact not quite. Ma'me has left a list of tasks to be completed in their absence, the major item being cleaning the fish pond. The water needs to be drained, weeds and litter removed, filter and stones cleaned. Last time it was a four person job that took a full six hours. Still, sleep-ins, cooking only for themselves and their own tastes, no car-washing, none of the usual Hari Raya parties. No need rush home either, the pair agreeing eight o'clock would be seemly enough for the neighbours. (Little doubt Ma'me would make her enquiries on her return.)

Thursday, July 24, 2014

Venice on the Equator



Do Some Good Today
Small Deeds

Big Differences


A do-good initiative by Fair Price Foundation

No jest involved. Traditional poster art this is not; but certainly a close modern counterpart. A large delivery truck stuck in the Changi Road traffic outside Har Yasin in this rundown to Hari Raya on Monday; Fair Price is a supermarket. The large steel banner seems to flutter in the breeze: white background; soft primary colours; and the contemporary version of the pictogram in the universal language of children's books. Fair Price is one of the largest chains; NTUC is anotherNational Trade Union Congressboth with a stated mission to keep prices rock-bottom for the lower-end wage earners. (Fifteen, or even twenty percent it might be from memory, survive here on S$600 per month.) Given single political party domination these almost fifty years since independence, government owned and controlled media in its entirety, religious bodies and trade unions both strictly controlled, if not in fact co-opted by government, the position of the supermarkets does not need to be enquired too closely. This is the fascinating nub here in Singapore, a shining example to many in the region and well beyond: a demented breakneck leap to modernity foisted upon it by the forces of globalization and Western corporate interests; and at the same time the last flickering remnants of community and co-operation, Confucian/Buddhist values (Muslim and Hindu in the minority case) and a moral code from the ages. It has after all only been a famously thirty year leap from Third World to First. The pluto/techno-crats know only one waywreckage tidied up behind them. Can-dostraight-aheadchop-chopbrook no challenge. A little democratic opinion beginning to flare in recent time and growing slowly; some outright defiance and challenge. Opposition members of parliament finally—the days of “Cold Storage” (another supermarket incidentally) of dissident voices no longer sustainable. The earnest rousing and rallying of the populace meanwhile; an unending cycle of colourful community events and festivities. Sport and Arts the next arm of this social pacification project, with a good deal of money channelled in that direction. Meanwhile onward with the main growth game, shopping malls and housing towers, tourism, logistics, pharmaceutical and military production, extended Special Economic Zones within the neighbourhood in order to take advantage of the huge cheap labour pool. Venice on the Equator some of the commentariat are fantasizing, stroking themselves under their desks.


Monday, July 21, 2014

Internal Tourism in Singapore - Hari Raya (Eid) 2013


An unexpected visit from Rina put the trip to Woodlands back until early afternoon. Usually Rina and her friends headed out to the Indonesian Embassy for Hari Raya. At the last minute this year the decision was made for City Plaza, a picnic on the grass beside the river, or if that was crowded, by the Paya Lebar MRT, where there was tenting. 

We had little time either side; just enough for Rina's racy story of her pretty sister Rani's first weeks in Singapore. A delay in her work visa and crowding at the maid hostel meant Rani was in for a fortnight's sleeping rough. Instead, rescued by a white guy met at a midnight bus-stop where she had planned to bed-down, the gal finds herself a place at the Marriott Hotel—five star luxury, food, gifts and money laid on. Just like Sis, landing on her feet, Rina laughed.

Zainuddin had provided precise details for the trip: up/down escalators at the two MRTs, left/right, the particular roads and drives. Before the first bus-stop, however, a halt was made in the progress. 

The matching azure-blue outfits of the approaching pair had somehow passed without notice. Another chance meeting with young Raden and his recent bride. Early in Ramadan Raden and his wife were met at the Arab Community iftar—break-of-fast, put on for the poor and needy. On that occasion Raden and his bank colleagues had hosted two large tables of young male orphans. As well as the feast and the enveloped hangpao from the Arab Community, the bank employees’ union provided gifts for each of the lads. 

Some years before Raden and his group had been out to Sri Lanka aiding the relief effort after the tsunami. 

For the festive occasion the young pair was found in fine new tailored cloth, truly radiant. In this case the peacock outshining the hen with a cummerbund in glittering earth tones that hung like an apron below the knees. 

Such operatic costuming for the streets was not uncommon in Geylang, even for lesser occasions. What was remarkable here was the outsider being drawn closely into the procession, something like stepping into an exotic historical epic of the screen. 

Warm greetings, best wishes and promises to catchup. Raden's mother lived in one of the Haig towers, where the celebratory feast awaited the pair. On entry the son and daughter-in-law would go down on their knees before the old woman to ask for forgiveness for any sin or error they may have committed over the previous year. (According to Zainuddin, the elder ought respond in the same kind, as he himself did with his two boys on the day.)

Woodlands was on the opposite side of the island from Geylang Serai, in the north-west corner by the Causeway to Malaysia. The train on the Circle Line had not been taken previously; the prospect of some sight-seeing from the window was in store. A trip a few months before to Jurong in the mid-west had shown a slightly shabby Singapore—housing towers in need of a lick of paint, schools that would have stood low in the rankings and passengers on the bus likewise in the meritocratic stakes. The badlands of Jurong, where large industrial estates were found, including, whispers suggested, military production that made up a proportion of SG’s manufacturing. 

The Circle Line, then the other train from Bishan, showed the commonly lampooned picture-postcard Singapore of order and cleanliness. Not a blade of grass out of place, award winning pavement beautification, air-brushed litterlessness. A command urban planning order executed that had descended like a Papal bull. You could only sit and stare through the glass. 

Cream and pastel-blue blocks stretching into the clouds in Zainuddin's particular quarter; tree and bush plantings under the regime of meticulous gardening supervision; kerbside plantings again like toyland. Up over the Causeway the Malaysians had built a Legoland tourist feature that would draw the people from Woodlands and wider Singapore. 

The newspapers often carried photographs of housing estate launches in model form, politicians and construction heads gathered round. Here at Woodlands stood the realisation—a Swiss dream on the Equator, minus cow-dotted hills.

Wherever one looked the same voids appeared, pasted over by design flourishes. A couple of parcels of forested land had been passed prior to the Admiralty stop, one cut by a bicycle track; a reservoir holding a large body of water; even the more or less natural features seemed concocted. 

Included in Zainuddin's careful directions was what he called a handsome foyer for his particular block. Number such-and-such. Each block carried their numbers that would be visible from jetliners, let alone rescue helicopters.

Entering at Zainuddin's the immediate sense was of hospital order and spareness. Floors and walls gleaming; reflective steel in the lifts showing skin-pores and blemishes. 

Inserting  Zainuddin and his food-spotted shirts, his sockless shoe-wear, concentrated seer's visage, into the surrounds was far from easy.

Zainuddin had told the story of his recourse a few years ago when he needed to dispose of some books from his shelves. The lift. Stacked in the corner. Ground button. 

We had laughed at the table.

            One recalled the old dyed sharp lads in their cowboy shirts and buckles, their out-sized rings and flat-caps; gold-dripping made-up ladies that congregated in Geylang Serai; the scrounging Batam gals, the homeless, the shiftless, the beggars and cripples. How vital they all were to a healthy, sane community. 

Small wonder Zainuddin and the other suits and starched shirts needed to take flight from their pigeon-holes for Geylang, even the tame, lower end of the quarter. 

A surprise inside the flat was the perfect order there too. Zaiton—Olive, Zainuddin's wife—had been underestimated.

Every writer deserved a help-mate of the calibre. With Zaiton’s accomplished secretarial services, perfect heaven! 

An independent-minded, rebel author who had spoken truth-to-power in Singapore on numerous occasions—whose autobiography was titled The Singaporean Fundamentalist—found here in feather-bed luxury such as the early Sultans would have envied. 

Where were the books? Zainuddin was never without a book in his voluminous lady's handbag, either to promote to a friend, or else for the long train journeys. The matter could not be pursued.

An impressive gathering. One old Hokkien neighbour who had recently foisted a broken-winged bird on Zainuddin. The chap too was an independent-minded Free-thinker, more than half-inclined to Mao and very much anti-PAP. (The following day would mark both National Day and forty-eight years of unbroken, single party rule in the Republic.) 

Don't mention Lee Kwan Yue, Zainuddin mock-warned during the course. 

Another jack-in-the-box was a Trinidadian lawyer settled almost twenty years, who on free days liked to ride the buses to far-flung corners of the island with her camera. The woman's home island was five, or eight times larger than her adopted, she revealed; but with a third of the population. Even after so many years, the lady seemed to be searching in her new home for something she could not find. With her husband the pair worshipped at the locally famous church in Novena.

At table for the feast were other Chinese neighbours of Zainuddin and Zaiton. Each Chinese New Year the pair came down to the sixth floor to cook the celebratory meal for their neighbours. (Thus perhaps overcoming any possible suspicion of pork.) 

Woodlands held better and richer prospects than one would guess from the exterior.

The large table for eight meant shifts for lunch, perhaps more than a dozen over the course of the day. Once Zaiton's extended family left the non-Muslims were clearly in the majority—a testament to Zainuddin's ecumenicalism.

A highlight on the return journey bookended the day. 

The holiday had the trains crowded. It was a real holiday—even the construction sites had closed. Many of the sites ran 24/7 under lighting, with no more than three or four shut-downs a year. (Even on Hari Raya, not all had in fact taken the holiday. An outfit on Orchard Road beside Dhoby Ghaut MRT laboured in the tea-brown mud behind high screens.)

In middle Geylang later on the return the China boys were prominent; on the trains the Bangla and Indian. During the first brief visit to Singapore five years before, Nancy Ong had suggested Little India on a Sunday, in order to observe the recreation of the Indian construction workers. 

For the spectacle on display among these foreigners Singaporeans were known to come out on a Sunday as tourists on their own patch. Nance and her friends had been out to Little India Sundays a number of times to take in the sights on the streets, in the gutters and across the grassy patches that awaited development. Many Singaporeans made the same trip for the same reason, Nance assured.

On the train from Admiralty—the nearest station to Zainuddin's digs at Woodlands—not all the passengers could reach a handle or rail, let alone find a seat. Quite a number clung to friends and family in order to keep their feet. What the young Indian spivs in their bright, clean and colourful attire arranged was something beyond the common recourse. 

Within the entryway of the carriage two or three found themselves some kind of fixture. The remaining seven or eight in the group created a chain in three separate clusters around the central post. Lads took their fellows over the shoulder, others stood with fingers entwined, waists girdled, affectionate head-locks that included whispers and almost lovers' nibbles of ears. 

Commuters averted their eyes, pretending not to notice. The locals were easy to differentiate by posture alone. None looked in the direction of the show. A drunk peeing in a corner might have attracted this pointed disregard in a Western city. 

The lads rocked lightly against one another, comfortably riding the turns and jolts. 

Boy and girl pairings would have felt shame by comparison. Despite the pretence, all within the carriage understood the matter. Unavoidably. 

The homo-erotic element was undeniable; if there was some it was not the core. 

In corners of the globe, far flung dirty patches without sewerage or running water, humanity lived otherwise. Clean, modern, orderly Singapore presented the other side.

At Bras Basah—wet rice in Bahasa, once upon a time—the No. 7 bus happened along. An early supper was needed after the light lunch. From Guillemard aboard the 7 one could cut through to middle Geylang Road and Tasvee for the, from where an Aljunied vegetarian supper. The Eateries at G. Serai had closed for the holiday; the favourites would not re-open for more than a week. The fortunate Muslim foreign workers had returned to their families for the celebration—Sumatra, Java, Johor Bahru, Chennai and Dhakka.

 

                                                                                                       Singapore 2011-2020


Thursday, July 17, 2014

Ramadan Passage


I'M POSSIBLE another positive reinforcement school tee sported by a young toothy innocent on the cusp of puberty. (A great deal of teacher-student sex in the newspaper recently.) Shortly after 9 the tables well-cleared of diners. Extra tables are assembled each night at Sri Geylang Cafe; off the corner along Onan Road for a hundred metres youth line the gutters with their take-out beside them awaiting the call from the radio. Gabby the other night explained he needed to shield himself from the spectacle, taking dinner a short stroll up Changi Road at Chai Chee instead. Why Gabby? Gone off your Malays?... Because there is no-one up there, quoth the former divine. Well, that may be the case Gab. Could well be. But what about the pageantry, the community spirit and unity? Quiet abiding, peaceful contemplation, solidarity. With the ultimate absence Gabby wouldn't have it. Finally empty and dispiriting. 
         MISTER HAPPY tees are not uncommon, presumably bought by mothers and girlfriends. The former in the gawky lad's case trooping past. Young adulthood without any discernible rebellion also common here. Malay lad opposite, likely Indonesian, on the sweetened, high-colour/calorie drinks counter mouthing the lyrics of the song on the sound system as he awaits the woman's slow choice at the five for eight promotion price. Next table a Chin-Malay of some kind sucking his teeth more loudly than the hubbub and the music both. OKOKOKOK on the phone shortly before in the common machine-gun refrain they have here that one slips into oneself.
         A number of GAP, Nike, bap and adidas cachet of the U. S. of A. 
         Many of the illegal foreign workers spend the night on the floors behind the counters, plastic sheeting pulled down. 12-14-16 hours on your feet, tiredness does the rest. In the Straits to the north three boats so far this Ramadan sinking under the weight of overloaded Indonesians. There was another yesterday, coming unstuck attempting to evade the patrol boat, in that case ferrying workers back to Batam, from where most of the current illegals in Singapore hail. Ramadan's festivities could not possibly operate without this cheap foreign labour, both here and in Malaysia. In Malaysia more usually Sumatrans involved directly across the peninsular.
         Woman in niqab needing to raise a corner of the cloth over her mouth in order to take a bite from her Ramly burger. At the frying stands cloths around necks for the workers. The operator bosses insist on full-throated spruiking, none more so than the Mr. T. T. SAAB former loan-shark (whisper has it) for his Tamil contingent.
         Briyani Briyani Dum Briyani
         The smokers run out of puff quickly; it is the clean-skin Christian Tamil pair in fine voice the live-long day and then through the night.
         NO WORRIES AUSTRALIA from a recent visit; unsighted previously in three years of closely monitoring the billboard tees. (Not strictly related: an Indian young woman yesterday on North Bridge Road outside Peninsular Plaza was warmly congratulated on the choice of book—The Brothers Karamazov no less, good quarter way through and finger holding the place as she strode to her appointment. Missed opportunity to encourage persistence through the longueurs: there was a wonderful segment upcoming of the interview with the monk at the monastery. Case of not being quick enough on the feet.) 
         Shortly after the Oz only more GAP and AIG
         Finally, eventually, at long last, a kind of refreshment: SO MUCH stretched across tight cerulean blue on a middle-aged woman testing her remaining allure. (A generation ago unkind lads back home would sneer, Mutton dressed as lamb.) 
         From another direction it recalled the nice line of William Bronk: “Too much / And not enough...” Restlessness and dissatisfaction all the way.
         Young man on the last corner stand on the Haig Road crossing could have been assessing a carpet hanging before him, the tassels down at the base. Was there a loose thread just then noticed? Or else scrutinising the shorter article at his feet. Arab or Persian, a familiar face there from the two years previous. Thin, closely cropped beard. Shirt, watch. (Not foreign labour.) In the newscasts a member of the younger generation seeking a better life from the regime of mullahs, as portrayed by the American agencies. 
         On the opposite side of the road at the entry to Tanjong Katong Complex the regular carpet man — SEE TO BELIEVE — uses a large silver mike to entice custom, pretending a bargain-sale to his biz-partner a few minutes before. 
         Crowd still even as ten PM approached. 
         The young man at the corner had stood head bent, eyes fixed four-five-six and seven seconds, before going down on his knees suddenly and then bringing his forehead onto the carpet. 
         The short articles a metre in length are prayer mats in fact, easily transported atop their packs by itinerants.


Sunday, July 13, 2014

Changi Road Beggar Once More



Zainuddin learned his homeopathy and Ayurveda chiefly from his mother. After suffering early stage diabetes Zainuddin studied further and soon improved his health. In recent months he has shared the dialogue of one of his on-line groups which during Ramadan has turned to matters of health and well-being. The modern Malay diet is heavy in sugars and fats: Zainuddin has addressed the problem on many occasions. Smoking itself is haram in Zainuddin's book, on the basis that whatever is bad for a person comes under proscription. Recently various exercises were listed by Zainuddin as beneficial. As the years passed suppleness and elasticity were important; there were various simple exercises available to even the busiest person, among a number of others the practice of standing and balancing on one foot, suggested Zainuddin. When this was trialled inevitably it brought back the Changi Road Beggar. 
         The last few weeks of this third Ramadan here a remove in the mornings to the less public Har Yassin on Changi Road has bought the beggar close again. In the mornings the man no longer stakes out the entry to the SevenEleven beside the bus-stop; the driveway to the Pasar across the road is now preferred, in front of the fish stalls. Morning greetings regularly exchanged there after picking up the newspaper and fruit. Around noon the man comes over to Har Yassin for late breakfast, or early lunch perhaps. The Changi Road Beggar’s loud voice makes the waiters hop and the prata-maker look lively. At Yar Yassin he is clearly a fixture. Often after his brief meal he hails a taxi out front; occasionally he will bound back to his place again. 
         Returning across the road one morning recently the Beggar's stride struck afresh. How many times had he been observed bounding one way or the other across that busy section of road? So many times without seeing clearly. The Changi Road Beggar has had his left leg amputated high, well above the knee; there would be little of his femur remaining. Months ago the thought had arrived that a longer stump would only cause nuisance; this must have been the logic of the surgeon. What was apparent now was the closely tucked left arm of the man in stride. While this was crooked and held close like that the other arm was extended straight at his side soldier-wise, as if at attention. No doubt the most efficient posture in motion. In so many previous sightings the flapping of the empty cut-offs had never been apparent; and then once collapsed in his usual way at his spot the exertion, chest heaving. Oddly, this was one beggar never to be given alms all this while.