Future Shape of Marina Bay

A last view on Singapore, from a hotel window looking out across the Marina Bay. In the foreground you see the spiralling pedestrain footbridge, above this the emerging glass 'Conservatory Complex', which will house flora usually found in cooler climates. Clockwise round to the top right the three towers of the Integrated Resort, and in front of that the unusually shaped ArtScience' Museum. Finally and most importantly the bay itself will eventually become a source of freshwater for the city state.

spiritual high

Thaipusam worshipper @Dhoby ghaut complete with needles and ornate structure attached to his skin. First time for a while that Singapore has surprised me! Still he's safe enough behind the road barrier ...

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early divali preparations

Just shortly after the mid-autumn festival lanterns are brought down from the streets of China town, little India is getting ready for the Hindu festival of lights - but that won't actually take place for another month or so!

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happy cities

Pei Chi has her say on the wall of comments at this festival near Bugis today and around Singapore in coming days.

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Love your ride

Train ride in this instance ...



here you see the TV screen warning of terrorism then you hear the " love your ride jingle" part of a government campaign for better behaviour on public transport. It's played for every train arriving ... and a few times on each trip. There's also posters on buses and a video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5eY43Ewh9A

the golden 7-11

Only in Raffles Place MRT (i.e. underground station in Singapore's financial district) is it deemed appropriate ... you know the bankers work nearby so naturally you want to lure them in with a bit of lucre!

Gvt street lighting art

In Singapore's civic district I came across this sanctioned street art courtesy of the Ministry of Information & the Land Transport Authority. It is part of a youth arts initiative called Light-up for Arts (a reference to the Chinese mid-autumn festival lanterns ) and winning entries are emblazoned around the area on the roadside lighting.

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Church @ orchard rd

This is a curious church built in the late eighteen hundreds for Presbyterian worshipers, extended ever since and according to my cabbie the site of a gruesome murder of a husband by his wife who then got her brother to cut him up into a curry!!!

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Sign in a Singapore library

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German Division in the Form of Wolves

This exhibition in the basement of the Singapore National Museum is a truly stunning installation of 99 replica foxes by Cai Guo-Qiang. It supposedly represents the national psychological ghosts of the Berlin wall, with the circular motion of the foxes - running in a repeated circle towards a glass barrier - representing the human tendency to repeat mistakes. I like this work as metaphor of insanity, and I love the impact you get walking around it, but as someone who used to live in ex-DDR I find it hard to relate the running wolves to the ossie-wessie divide, which I do believe exists but see more as a systemic issue rather than psycho-social phenomenon. Of course there are personal traumas associated with the Berlin wall and it has left differing impacts on each side of the country (financial difficulties, and coping with change, regret and resentments) but I am not sure how these impacts can be construed as repeated human errors. Perhaps there are effects I am overlooking?

Olive-backed sunbird

I spotted this tiny native Singaporean bird right in the heart of the city in the gardens of a condo. It was incredibly bold and hardly bothered by my presence, I actually followed it around as it flitted from flower to flower. In some ways it is similar to a humming bird, brightly coloured, living mostly on nectar - drinking here from a heliconia - and as I learned later it can actually hover, but only for a little while and seems to prefer the acrobatics in the photos below. Female sunbirds (identifies by their paler heads) join the males in a monogamous pair to raise chicks, in flask shaped nests they build suspended from anything they deem twig-like - door frames, electric wires and yes even twigs.

Chinese ghost festival

Just out the back of Plaza Singapura I came across this makeshift shrine erected by the staff of one of the shops in that mall. They were good enough to tell me what it meant to them. For one month every year ghosts or souls of the departed are invited to return to earth and have fun. The ghosts include deceased family so I guess this is a manifestation of what is called ancestor worship. Shrines are erected and paper money and incense is burned in most housing estates across Singapore. But it's only on the 1st 15th and 30th day of the lunar calendar month that the bigger festivities happen so today these people are making offerings and saying prayers for, according to one older man, such things as safety at work.

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Heritagefest

Useful things I learned @ Singapore's cultural festival today:
1. how to carve a straight line in a piece of wood
2. the difference between Devanagari and Nepali script
3. the best eavesdropping spots in a Peranakan house
4. why Farquar went to back to Scotland disappointed
5. how to say rub your hands together in Fijian

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Gardening competition

Which wins the prize for the most weird and wonderful plant - the bright flowers in Fort Canning Park or the grim looking plants on sale at the cluster of garden centres on Thomson Road?

The first is a Carnivorous Pitcher Plant - I am equally fascinated and repulsed by it, but you have to admire it's cunning to trap insects into a pool of liquid rather than the boring old way of just taking nutrients from the soil.


The second is a Lobster Claw Heliconia, a relative of the banana, it provides the main source of nectar for humming birds and a very stylish tent for the minuscule Honduran white bat.


Third and finally, Stag's Horn Ferns (circled in red), which grow on trees or in very little soil, propagate by producing spores and 'offsets' i.e. bits that break off the mother plant, and have been around since the dinosaurs.

Scentstational

Not my joke...this is actually called a Scentstation...proudly shown off by the man who fills it every morning with different chopped up cuttings of herbs and plants. I do think it is a cool idea but I can't help feeling a little irony in the fact that the plants are taken from the gardens surrounding it, and displayed on the 14th century walk and the spice garden (see pix below) where you can blatantly smell them from the foot path in any case...still nice that someone takes an interest in our sensorial experience.

Graffiti the Singapore way!

It is graffiti Jim but not as we know it. This particular art work was the product of a competition from the national planning authority, the URA. It caused a stir when the police were inundated with calls to report the criminal offence which it would normally be (with upto 3 years in jail and 8 lashes of the cane as witnessed recently by a Swiss national who painted on a train). There's some debate in the local media as to whether the URA's project encourages 'unsanctioned graffiti' or acts as a release given the shortage of space for urban art or graffiti (and ending up spraying on the skate park floors).

There was a graffiti mural at the Night Festival a couple of weeks back which was absolutely drenched with paint ...I could not get near it for the kids ... and some digital and non-digital street art ...see pix of projections and a very funny 'slow' SMS board below...I will look out for more urban art ... formal and informal ...

Mosquito misting in Singapore

No, that strange looking man with a huge gun IS your friend! This is what mosquito control looks like in Singapore. Dengue fever is the commonest danger from mosquitoes, but vast quantities of insecticides (chlorinated hydrocarbons, organophosphates etc.) are sprayed every week around residential blocks, car parks etc.. Of course the best risk control is to avoid getting bitten, i.e. staying away from dank places where they like to breed. They spread dengue dever (aka breakbone fever because of the accompanying joint and muscle pains) from one infected person to another. Unlike mosquitoes that spread malaria which like to bite in the evening, these ones are not fussy and bite any time of day. They are found elsewhere in the world, and apparently are on the increase along the Texas-Mexico border.

more street sitting

After my last street sitting post I began to wonder if I was exaggerating. I mean people all over the world sit on streets depending on the circumstances and many of the big groups may just have to do it - Philippina maids on the traditional Sunday off, Indian labourers waiting for the a bus back from a night out in Little India ... but the more I see in Singapore the more I am convinced people here are just have a better relationship with the ground than we do in Europe. This picture shows the Saturday night crowd in Dhoby Ghaut in quite an upmarket part of town. Most people are sitting on the ground as it is shaped perfectly for sitting with an arc of steps, but look at the group of men right in the centre of this shot - one of them has chosen to sit in front of the others on the ground. It's warm dry and clean so I suppose why wouldn't he.

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Late night ping pong at orchard road

Kelvin cleaning up, at a random late night ping pong session on Orchard Road. Night life takes many forms at Orchard Road, mainly shopping and eating but also just strolling down the boulevard, and soaking up the bright lights, music and other shop displays that spill over onto the sidewalk. This next pic is taken around 11pm and it's still busy & note the Visitor Centre though shut is all lit up in the background.