Young Indian dad at the Diggersite kiddie play corner pink UNREAL tee on his phone while his child played in the pale sand. Opposite a Chinese husband and wife in front of their children, quietly sitting, patiently, the chap casting a furtive look at his counterpart on the other side as if at a worrisome reflection. In the passage by the escalators at Level 3 another dad mounted on a bent blue polar bear or elephant it may have been with little girl in front and a musical happy, happy track for good measure playing on their ride. Between the ears of the beast flashing red and green console, the steering wheel somehow hidden. In the narrow space the pair could not be rounded and needed to be followed slowly in procession. Unaccompanied older kids are given the entire back half of the third floor for their circuit in the yellow truck—out round the elevators, up and down the passage either side and swing back behind. There was no stage event on Ground today, no concert or talent quest. Occasionally closely supervised rock climbing walls are erected in that space; once or twice a month smooth and costumed US or UK Emcees compering special events. Even in the condos the heat posed the problem what possibly to do with the kids? The safest urban environment on the planet availed not a jot at 96% humidity. The common resort of parents from another time and certainly place, Go play outside, impossible here. If you tell Singaporeans that ecologically speaking their city-state was never meant to be; that it had been madness to sink all this concrete, steel and glass slap bang on the equator; that all the technology, automation and innovation would not alter hard truths that had been well and truly beyond the ken of the celebrated local helmsman who back in the day thought aircon was the pinnacle of human invention—try a respectful whisper and watch out for your neck. No one was really to blame. And Sing was not on its Pat Malone in the matter. But really. At such a locale. Of course Dubai and the others who had followed the lead. Was there any stopping the juggernaut before the wheels came off entirely? And by golly the psychic consequences, all that follows from the malls, the enforced grid, the chokehold regimen. Catastrophe in action, the critics surveying the contemporary urban scene elsewhere have termed it.
Tuesday, July 10, 2018
The Pit
Young Indian dad at the Diggersite kiddie play corner pink UNREAL tee on his phone while his child played in the pale sand. Opposite a Chinese husband and wife in front of their children, quietly sitting, patiently, the chap casting a furtive look at his counterpart on the other side as if at a worrisome reflection. In the passage by the escalators at Level 3 another dad mounted on a bent blue polar bear or elephant it may have been with little girl in front and a musical happy, happy track for good measure playing on their ride. Between the ears of the beast flashing red and green console, the steering wheel somehow hidden. In the narrow space the pair could not be rounded and needed to be followed slowly in procession. Unaccompanied older kids are given the entire back half of the third floor for their circuit in the yellow truck—out round the elevators, up and down the passage either side and swing back behind. There was no stage event on Ground today, no concert or talent quest. Occasionally closely supervised rock climbing walls are erected in that space; once or twice a month smooth and costumed US or UK Emcees compering special events. Even in the condos the heat posed the problem what possibly to do with the kids? The safest urban environment on the planet availed not a jot at 96% humidity. The common resort of parents from another time and certainly place, Go play outside, impossible here. If you tell Singaporeans that ecologically speaking their city-state was never meant to be; that it had been madness to sink all this concrete, steel and glass slap bang on the equator; that all the technology, automation and innovation would not alter hard truths that had been well and truly beyond the ken of the celebrated local helmsman who back in the day thought aircon was the pinnacle of human invention—try a respectful whisper and watch out for your neck. No one was really to blame. And Sing was not on its Pat Malone in the matter. But really. At such a locale. Of course Dubai and the others who had followed the lead. Was there any stopping the juggernaut before the wheels came off entirely? And by golly the psychic consequences, all that follows from the malls, the enforced grid, the chokehold regimen. Catastrophe in action, the critics surveying the contemporary urban scene elsewhere have termed it.
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