Chasing Horizons #17: Singapore – End of Act 1 – Singapore

Singapore – End of Act 1

The joys of arriving into a city where you have visited on a previous occasion cannot be praised too much. The overnight train from Kuala Lumpur arrived into Singapore Station very early in the morning. I quickly detrained, changed the last of my Malaysian Ringgit into Singapore Dollars, caught a cab across town to Waterloo Street and booked straight into an old haunt of mine, the Waterloo Hostel.

The ride through the wide clean streets of the city reminded me of how much I liked Singapore. I think the often reported impression travelers have of it being sterile and characterless is a bit harsh. Sure the authorities have been heavy handed in legislating against the disgusting habits of littering, spitting and chewing gum. I only have a problem with jay-walking, why can’t you cross the road if there are clearly no cars approaching? Everywhere in the city is clean, the roadside vegetation is well cared for and lawns cut to look like carpets. Traffic, whilst at times busy is never gridlocked. The public MRT (Metro or Underground trains) is pristine and efficient and buses are plentiful and even have onboard television screens to watch. Everywhere you look are the signs of prosperity, here the capitalist system has been efficiently used to the max. I don’t know what Singapore has done in comparison to its South-East Asian neighbors but it has worked. I like Singapore a lot.

Although Singapore’s history dates from the 11^th century, the island was little known to the West until the 19^th century, when in 1819, Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles arrived as an agent of the British East India Company. In 1824, the British purchased Singapore Island, and by 1825, the city of Singapore had become a major port, with trade exceeding that of Malaya’s Malacca and Penang combined. In 1826, Singapore, Penang, and Malacca were combined as the Straits Settlements to form an outlying residency of the British East India Company. In 1867, the Straits Settlements were made a British Crown Colony, an arrangement that continued until 1946. The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 and the advent of steamships launched an era of prosperity for Singapore as transit trade expanded throughout Southeast Asia. In the 20^th century, the automobile industry’s demand for rubber from Southeast Asia and the packaging industry’s need for tin helped make Singapore one of the world’s major ports.

During the Second World War the Japanese captured the island in February 1942, which now contained British naval and air bases. It remained under their control until September 1945, when it was recaptured by the British. After the war the Straits Settlements was dissolved; Penang and Malacca became part of the Malayan Union and Singapore became a separate British Crown Colony. In 1959, Singapore became self-governing, and, in 1963, it joined the newly independent Federation of Malaya, Sabah, and Sarawak (the latter two former British Borneo territories) to form Malaysia. Singapore’s merger with Malaysia was, however, short lived. Indonesia adopted a policy of “confrontation” against the new federation, charging that it was a “British colonial creation,” and severed trade with Malaysia. The move particularly affected Singapore, since Indonesia had been the island’s second-largest trading partner. The political dispute was resolved in 1966, and Indonesia resumed trade with Singapore. After a period of friction between Singapore and the central government in Kuala Lumpur, Singapore separated from Malaysia on August 9, 1965, and became an independent republic.

I have rattled off this brief history of Singapore’s path to independence so I can recite this old primary Twenty-two points, plus triple-word-score, plus fifty points for using all my letters. Game’s over. I’m outta here school joke. When a student was asked by a teacher to write an essay about how Singapore was founded. The student replied “I didn’t know Singapore was lost.”

Bencoolen Street was once the place to head to find cheap accommodation in Singapore. But this has all changed now. Many of the budget hotels have been closed, and pulled, down. The entire street is undergoing massive redevelopment. To the north at the top end of Bencoolen St. near the Rocher Canal a couple of dreary looking establishments still survive (for my own reference, as well as others, the YMCA on Fort Canning Road and Inn Crowd, a new hostel in Little India are worth a look. Stay clear of the Hawaii Hostel on Bencoolen Street, it’s a dive). Waterloo Street is right next to Bencoolen Street so it’s still very centrally located. The Waterloo Hostel was introduced to me by a helpful local in 1999, it is run by the Catholic Church and is very clean and comfortable, although prices have risen somewhat in three years, a room for night here costs S$55.

Now if you have been paying attention over my last few travel updates you may have got the impression that all was not well with me since my recovery from Dengue Fever and departing Thailand. I have been lacklustre, fatigued and not eating. Please don’t be alarmed, in general I am fine and maybe the travelogue mentions how I felt too often for dramatic effect. When I re-read the entries the overall impression is a tad over exaggerated. However, at this point in my travels my mood was down, I was not eating and preferred to just lie in my hotel room. When I reached Singapore I decided to take a break from traveling and fly back to the UK for four weeks. There I could fully recover, see Carol and coincidentally, my daughter, Savannah was holidaying in England so I would be able to catch up with her too.

I dozed in my hotel room for a couple of hours to catch up on some sleep I had missed on the train the previous night. After this I headed straight for the shopping mecca of Orchard Road. Every block on both sides of the road is a pristine upmarket shopping mall. Testament to just how much disposable income Singaporeans have. I had heard that airline tickets are relatively well priced in Singapore and was searching for travel agents. I shopped around three agencies for prices of return flights to London. Eventually I settled on a very friendly agent, HNK Tours in the Far East Plaza on Scotts Road (just off Orchard Road). I got a return flight to London for S$1100 (�1 = S$2.60).

Again I was not up to doing much that evening, preferring to watch Men in Black (that’s the original film not the recently released sequel, which incidentally I had already seen too) on the TV in my hotel room.

Next day I had a late start and only just managed to make it out of my room by the 12 Noon checkout time. Singapore is a very hot and humid place, being only 120km from the equator. So you don’t want to be doing anything to strenuous during the day. I guess that why the locals spend so much time wandering around those lovely air-conditioned shopping malls. I went in search of a mall with a cinema complex which was showing the new Tom Cruise film, Minority Report. Now I am not a Tom Cruise fan, but I think the fact that I had read some excellent write-ups on the film coupled with its director being Steven Spielberg, of whom I am a big fan, meant that I wanted to see this movie. The reports were correct, go see this movie, highly recommended.

After the movie, I found a pub called The Dubliner, “an Irish bar” I hear you ask? Well you guessed right. I had a beer here to kill a couple of hours before collecting my bags and catching the 36 bus to the airport.

I checked in with the minimum of fuss and caught a flight back to Bangkok. Here there was a 3-hour layover (more beers) before the flight to London departed. Just after midnight I was well on the way back to the UK. So after five months of traveling through India, Nepal, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia Malaysia and Singapore, I left Asia.

Posted in: Singapore