Taking Flight (from 2018; revised April24)

 

How many times this bus ride and still the screen of the window tattooing its images on the retina. 200kms. of sheltered walkway by 2018 so we can walk in comfort near Kambungan. That burnt orange notice was first seen on Jalan Besar on the return from down in Oz adjacent a new condo tower dotted with greenery and trailing vines. From the condos to the MRT and then the office tower you could escape the tropics almost entirely in well-planned Singapura. I plan to do more charity when I retire, especially for these guys: late thirties/early forties left her bicycle aside in order to pick up a cat and lift it up to her face in place of the baby she missed out on for some strange reason in the sheltered bower on the Equator. (DBS Bank near Bedok would help her manage the transition.) Two kilometres further the picture-board promising Grandeur Park Residences titillated sleepy-eyed commuters. In-between at all points along the roadway dark men in hard-hats and fluro toiled under the sun. Hard Rock tees were less numerous at 9AM. (One anticipated the absence of brands on the streets of Jogja, both hi & low form.) Days past Malcolm Turnbull had nagged in the brain after the award bestowed on the republic for its accomplishments in urban design. A spot of urban terrorism now: Once low dose nerve gas had done for his security detail, the miscreant Malcolm would be taken by the ear and dragged along a few kilometres of sheltered walkway, up in the elevators and along the passages to the pigeon holes, where he could sit beneath a fan sipping his teh and cast over the iconic sky-line. Dunk the Duffer’s noggin in the little water feature outside Paragon, with its silver and pink baubles curling overhead; rub his nose over the street art on Orchard. Run the bugger through the school playgrounds and across the sun-blasted fields of the richer ones. Have a good look Mal and report back when you’re done! The award for good works in the colonies to Prince Phillip by Mal’s predecessor was bad, but this not far behind.