Gloom

Around the half-way point of the excursion in the becak yesterday a little “forest” Paijo called the treed area around a large road network that included a stone roundabout. Almost immediately, as if an air-curtain had been entered, a transformation of the atmosphere. Cool, lightly fragrant and seductive; birds appeared overhead passing along the top of the canopy. One large bird had to be an eagle, Paijo hazarded unconvincingly. In the variegated stands on the different sides and elevations the green provided refreshment for unaccustomed eyes. (Cheeky old Malays have their own expression for eye-candy: Cuci Moto are roadside motorbike cleaners; cuci mata cleansing of the other kind for the eyes.) The incline had been steep and Paijo had needed to be relieved of his burden. It was a ten minute slowing in all; two minute stop by the roundabout. Subtle intangible impressions weighing negligibly in the larger scheme; in the Tropics a common experience even in the radical, break-neck case of the Singaporean urbanization: one simple reason why we are surely doomed.