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Author Tay Kheng
Soon
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2000 I sit here; a cigarette in hand with an
addiction-induced sense of well being, soothed further by coffee and jazz
coming over the PA. A soft rain falls; this is tropical Asia, lands of rice,
bamboo and monsoon. The waitresses are arranging flowers in preparation for
the after-five crowds. Baby’s breath and white carnations. A touch of class
for new Asians. Two young chaps are working in the next
table, speaking animatedly in mandarin; paper scattered on table, hand phone
going. Modern Jazz Quartet on weaves its spell. The piano cuts in. The guitar
wends its way between the bass-line. Katapang and Buddha’s Ficus trees form a
screen around the Substation courtyard; guards against the encroaching city.
This is an oasis. Outside, the city’s frenetic pace pounds on relentlessly. I
can hear the rumble, it says that memories and sentiments are of little use,
shaped, as they are, by the imperatives of economics and political will. On one wall, which edges one side of
the space there, are graffiti paintings. A frog with its tongue skewered by a
baby’s soother; the best of all gags! A large half-chomped apple flagrantly
proclaims itself. Graphics on the walls are painted over and over again:
expressions of young sentiments given free reign. Once there was a drawing of
a naughty boy, now painted out, peeing near to or into a barrel. It could
have been a beer barrel. A conscientious committee member of the Museum
neighbour worried that sponsors of the Substation’s theatre may be annoyed,
insisted that it be painted out. The Substation director protests the right
to decide on such matters threatens resignation in protest. The ‘owner’ of
the wall asserted legal rights. The potentially offensive graphic was painted
out. Art on the wall however continues, the bad taste left in the mouth fades
in time, as with memories. Life goes on. Java-teak furniture gives off a warm
sense in the courtyard. Another touch of class. The yellow-ochre walls cast a
glow to warm young bones cold in the light of their everyday reality. I can hear the traffic pick up. Soon,
the city will empty save for the watering holes which draw in tourists and
stragglers reluctant to return to cosy-land. City workers head home to their
little patches of precious sky making up the new towns. Life resumes at the
food centres there and then they retire to watch family-life–on the TV.
Meanwhile the city is dead. Rats scurry across Shenton Way. An eerie silence
settles over the CBD. There is no life. Will life ever come back? No city is
just concrete, steel and glass. Cities need spirit and bodies to be alive.
Where has the human spirit gone, to the new towns? But there are pockets of life around
food and shopping centres in the city but only eating and shopping, little
more animate them. The Tuck Shop, MPH, char kuay teow, ngo hiang at Armenian
Street. The schools have all left; trailing behind the exodus to the new
towns in the thirty years since urban renewal began. Raffles Girls School, St
Joseph’s, Raffles Institution, ACS (Anglo-Chinese School) Coleman Street have
all gone to the suburbs. The old ACS is now the National Archives, a
storehouse for the debris of time. The Modern Jazz Quartet goes on
sweetly; the mandarin voices continue to punctuate the drone of the city
outside, the handphones go on, lifelines to the city’s pulse. Two Indian girls
arrive, chat in the ruins of the abandoned transformer yard which is now part
of the Substation. It too would have vanished without memory or trace had it
not been for the vision of Kuo Pao Kun who had faith that ruins and the
margins of everyday life are fertile grounds for new hope to arise. So now he
sits on the T21 private sector committee to help think through a new way
ahead for Singapore. He has to find how it will be possible
for art and poetry to be the cradles of creativity against the canon of hard
practical truth, which is money. Money that the big spending developers of
high rise office buildings will ring into the cash registers of the nation’s
coffers. Meanwhile, the dead city still has to wait for human life to course
through its streets and to activate its squares. Only a fundamental change in
the planner’s land-use policies can bring life back to the city. And so the few active places in the
city are pressured by too much of life’s diversity. How much sense do
heavy-metal kids need when they want to vent their spleen in sound and fury
at the Substation? How to risk a bust-up which may jeopardise everything
there. That was Pao Kun’s dilemma, but he had enough faith that somehow the
risk can be managed and that the hounds of public order can be kept at bay.
And his handling and faith fortunately proved adequate and right. The
heavy-metal kids had their fun, knew where the risks lay, now call him
“uncle”. The rain pours, this is the tropics
after all. But somehow the rain does not wash away the heavy air that sits on
the city’s soul. Only the pavements get cleaned. And the planners who do not
know about ‘air’ are now frantically tweaking the knobs and pulling the
levers to turn Singapore into a hub, a communication hub, a science hub, a knowledge
hub, it is because they fear dissolution. But only free people can
spontaneously reinvent themselves to face the new day. Tweaking mechanical
contraptions will not prevent them falling apart when the design limits of
the machine are exceeded. A leaf falls on my plate, has foreign talent
arrived? An experimental experiential house was
recently built in the courtyard of the Substation. It was about living; about
a new way of seeing. But the exhibition was attended only by friends and
curious visitors. Life passed it by; but something is better than nothing.
Have we learnt to trim avert our eyes and bind our hearts? I hope we have not
learnt too well. But to survive and prosper in material
terms, we have become the generations that remember to forget. We forget what
is prescribed not to remember. Sure, we tell no lies. It is only that the
whole truth is omitted in the telling. When history is predicated exclusively
on political imperatives, it is hard to see the reality for what it is. That
is what Janadas Devan said elliptically at a forum in the Substation once. A river must have a start and an end,
but our view of the present reality has taken the form of discrete slices of
disembodied time; sound bytes in the prescribed story line. Thus with eyes
fixed on the ever-receding horizon, consciousness is locked into a perpetual
present. We are thus cast adrift in the endless river of time where there is
nothing to tie to except fictions. Many of the young have learnt to excuse
their own inaction on the grounds that they are still learning and
experiencing. But who has stopped? We always act on incomplete knowledge. It
is the human predicament. Walls are not just walls they are contentions. Even
allies take opposite sides to protect each other from each other.
Flowers--baby’s breath and carnations have become classy kitsch. They are not
flowers; they are images with no fragrance. I just wrote a piece last night. “Reinventing Singapore” to the press,
I know they will not publish it. I leave for New York on Monday, to that
great sponge of foreign talent! To a New York that still succeeds because it
gives enough for what it takes, that is the secret of its success. The right
hands know not what the left hands do! When we know too much, we calculate
too well. Others doubt our sincerity. My mind wanders over the wall and
through the trees into the city. It briefly settles on the MPH nearby which
has become just another bookshop, a vendor. Only the initials remain of the
Malayan Publishing House, the Methodist Church’s printing enterprise for
bibles and other religious tracts and school textbooks. The National Library
is also nearby, rendezvous for many a student, a place of fond friendships
and a window to world. Now it is to give way to a traffic tunnel proposed by
engineers who cannot factor-in human sentiments. The proposition that
engineering might now perhaps obey public sentiment is a new idea for the new
generations. But if they knew that the Library also sits on grounds formally
occupied by the British Council where Art and sensibility in Malaya and
Singapore was kindled they would not dismiss the Malayan period as mere
nostalgia. Furthermore, if they knew that the British Council sat on the very
same grounds, which was once part of Singapore’s first botanical garden, they
will realise that this is truly hallowed ground, link to the neighbouring
farm-lands; added reason for breaking out of the in the agenda of
forgetfulness. In the distance, my dreaming eye sees
Katong’s tall swaying coconut trees (symbol of backwardness) along what was
once beach, now highway. On the East Coast Park which took its place are now
dwarf coconuts made legitimate in iteration of USA’s prime tropical tourism
image; Hawaii. Similarly in the west coast, Pasir Panjang’s villages vanished
to port expansion and condos, victims of progress. Clearly, pain has been
made easier to bear when we do not remember. A long-time Malayan, Johnny
Johnson, built in Pasir Panjang a resort-restaurant which conjures an
ambience of outdoor tropical dining but it fell to building regulations,
which demanded concrete structures and sanitation rules. Haw Pah Villa, next
door, turned into an Americanised theme park. Chinatown is to be more Chinese
than Malayan, Nanyang and the Vernacular. It is geared-up to be an oriental
piece of orientalism for the delectation of tourists. Failing to ignite
imagination, they all failed and will continue to fail miserably because
there is no ring of truth to them. They too become victims of the kind of
jaded progress. Only the bold and the bright re-imagine other possibilities.
Even the tourists see through the sham. The in-flight Singapore is
embarrassing. Old warriors have too many reflexes conditioned to fight demons
to take new risks including the most challenging of all; the unconditioning
their own condition. When I speak of risks I include
generosity. Not the dumb sort of hands-off giving but a smart new kind. One which sees the risks but is
willing to face up to it with kindness. Only then will it be seen as sincere.
Other risks include the growth of self-esteem that does not need to hanker
after other people’s images. The young Singapore poet, Alfian Sa’at says in
his published book of poems, “One Fierce Hour”, that he has lost his country
to images, I know exactly what he means. The sun casts a rosy tinge on the
Carlton Hotel visible through the surrounding trees. As sun sets, a different
mood sets in. Darkness shrinks space, rouses the senses, things lose
definition. The horror of the city’s emptiness is averted, as eyes are drawn
towards the tiny bright spots of life. The rest does not matter. As the night
wears on, and as any night-bird knows, that in the progressing darkness
senses sharpen; consciousness draws ever inward until finally sleep comes and
phantoms are released to inhabit the vast void of inner space. Surely every city is also Generic City.
Not just a collection of artefacts, buildings, roads. Old cities have
urbanism, new ones only urbanisation. Urbanism is manners married to space
embodied in the fabric of the city. Thus urbanism, manners, memories, and
ambitions are what are really important in the clarity of broad daylight. At
night, urbanism is a drifting world of sense and dreams. The terrors of the
day fold away. Rationality fades with the failing light. Freedom is the
night; it is time to create. And in the full glare of daylight dreams fade
away. But planners know little of this because they operate in statistics and
imported images. The so-called “new urbanism”, is one of
these. That it is the American new middle class’s substitute for jazzed-up
suburbia is not appreciated, thus it serves yet again to confuse the issue of
our own urban project. That’s the problem of imported images and planning
bereft of living. Thus we must guard against imports
learn how to live. When we avidly buy foreign talent and foreign ideas
because we think they are chic we fail to evolve what is true to our living.
Urbanism is thus about freeing up our imagination about our civic urban
values. The specifics of our humanity, geography and history are the grounds
for real thought and creation. The Urbanism we should make is about an
authentic conviviality, which cuts across social classes, and racial
barriers, which continue to divide, polarise and bore, requiring
entertainment and rules and enforcement to make life tolerable. When we are
true to ourselves, our urbanism will become truly universal. No need to hard
sell our tourism. No need to hype the people into the 21st
Century. They will get there themselves on their own wings. Our urbanism will
not be made by the stick and the carrot. While avowing communitarian values,
individuals, not modern enough, will place a higher value on blood and family
ties. Every non-modern community places great store by blood and kinship and
not on generalised civic urban values. Only modern societies strive to
internalise public morals into private lives within the abstract ideal of a
generalised civility. In traditional societies, socialisation starts early in
extended hand-feeding the child and the curbing of young impulses. This
ensures willingness to defer present gratification for future gain in a world
perceived fraught with threatening possibilities. Our ethnic values is thus
something we need to re-look at because it is the source of our anxieties; a
brake on our urbanism. People who are fearful of the unknown and the
unconventional need hero-leaders. Thus, they group and gravitate towards
collective ideologies. They are amenable to authoritarian leadership. They
thus can move mountains through hard-work and cognitive rigidity when the
leadership is able. When it is not, the situation festers. Fear of being
disadvantaged, looked down upon, losing-out however, dominate the imagination
even as we grow materially. When the material goal has been reached, the
plateau is much more difficult to climb out of without the modernisation of
the culture of everyday life. We need modern families and a lively civic
urban culture to reach a new level. The grip of fear is loosening especially
among the young because they are bored by it. This is new opportunity for a
new imagination and a new socialisation of responsible autonomy to grow. But
as the young acquire smart-work and flexible imagination they will dream of
being in other more conducive places. People from traditional societies
blossom in the Western milieu in every field of science and art. Unless the
Chinese majority in Singapore learn new ways of seeing and feeling, Singapore
will then be able to engage its young and its talented in the unfolding new
world. Making living creative and making the
city liveability is the new challenge for Singapore. Accompanying this must
be real choices in the live-styles. The cosmopolitan centre and the
conservative fringe must be allowed their differences; as it is, there is too
much sameness. If a million people live in the city, Singapore will never be
the same again. It is possible to kick-start the New Singapore. This is Singapore’s
predicament to be solved. Equality and sameness never created creativity. It
levels down even as it levels up. This is Singapore’s success story gone
wrong. There should be spatial distinctions or
zones where natural differences are manifest. This is all the more necessary
in a small place where even-handedness has resulted in sameness at the hands
of the centralised agencies. It is time to decentralise the administration
for the sake of creativity. The trick is to ensure that each zone should be administered
and actioned separately whereby each zone can naturally respond to and
therefore provide distinctive styles of life and have environmental
characteristics in sync with each particular locale. Indeed, differences can
only come about when the milieu of each zone is different. The special
qualities of Holland Village is just such an example where a unique social
milieu which supports it has resulted in the special ambience. But this was
achieved by fluke. In a different social milieu in which we are free to
gravitate to areas conducive to them, then Singapore will naturally have many
different ambiences. And life will have some sparkle to it. The city core is that special place
where this can happen and needs to happen. Let people then chose where they
want to live, to have their children educated, to work and to play. The City
can become the crucible of the new creativity. It takes a smart, light touch
to make it happen. Sameness is to be dreaded at all costs, it deadens. And
the antidotes to wealth induced degradation are art, scholarship,
philanthropy. Otherwise, wealth merely feeds wants. When people want what
others have in terms of tangible symbols and things, there will be sameness
and intolerance towards difference. There are thus risk investments to be
made with power, wealth and culture.
Boston, same size as Singapore has 50
universities within a 50-mile radius, the Gardner Museum shines its generous
spirit despite its record of scandal. Isabella Steward Gardner lived above
her Museum; an heiress who knew how to live; worked to prevail against the
degradation and dissolution produced by wealth. She knew that the human
spirit’s tendency towards corrosion and art, intellect, scholarship and
philanthropy and the feeling that duty towards others must first be gained
through duty towards oneself as these are the only things that can mitigate
meanness and greed. Then a community of spirit will arise to give rise to a
true spirit of community not needing inducements, punishments and mobilising
to act in the common good despite differences. The vitality of Route 128 in
Boston, a rival to Silicon Valley, testifies that scientists and engineers
are not mono-dimensional creatures, they too need to breath the fragrances
provided by art and the humanities to inspire their creativity and their
inventiveness. A bit of discipline helps bolster a
creative society. Discipline without sensibility confirms a society to
uncreativity. Mayor Guiliani, New York’s Lee Kuan Yew, puts in the discipline of late, it does
good, makes the place better. New York re-invents itself once again. Seeing ourselves is easier from a distance. We travel to see ourselves afresh.
Many people however, travel in a hermetically sealed bubble to confirm their
prejudices. They see New York for its mess not its vitality. Here I am in New
York City. Peeling away the
images that make up our Singapore reality is like tearing away at a life of
habitual thinking. But we need to start with the here and the now and then
zoom out to a different vantage. Zooming to the past is to realise the
tapestry of our time; the construction of the collage of our life, its
shoring and gummed-up seams, colours, fragrances and wounds. There is so much
debris and unfinished business and it will make you want to do something
about it, not just soak in it.
We can drown in your own consumption and our self-made iterations made
bigger, brighter, louder and more. Finally, the development of language is crucial. Realisations
will remain vague urgings unless there is language to shape thought. Diction
is an indicator of content in language. From the disparate peoples who
gravitated to this place, a Malayan/Nangyang culture came about. These new,
modern people created a new voice. The Nanyang/Malayan voice. The
Nanyang/Malayan diction thus embodied thoughts and sensibilities grown from
the land inspired by a universalistic modernity even though one part of it
was focussed on China the other on the West. But from a rootedness in the
land a new sensibility came about. It was unfortunately truncated by
political events beyond control. And as Modernisation took over Malayan
modernity the mechanisation of language in the nation building years,
especially in Singapore cut off the roots of its own modernity and its
aesthetic of place. Thus, Singlish is the orphaned child of displaced
Malayanism and our newscasters feign an American twang. The prattle of
everyday speech is cosy but unedifying. It contains no ideals. Tommy Koh and Kuo Pao Kun best
exemplify the displaced Malayan/Nanyang voice. Their diction and their
generosity of spirit are evident. They both speak in a natural manner that is
distinctly identifiable and their thoughts and sensibilities speak of and for
the place even though one speaks English and the other Chinese. This is the
voice to rediscover. And so when I heard the voice of young
Alfian, I was struck by the fact that the Malayan/Nanyang voice has
spontaneously come through him even after thirty years of dormancy. It is a
hopeful sign indeed. And though Alfian speaks of local things, the universal
and the cosmopolitan concerns in his voice come through. Soon, night will fall again over the
Substation courtyard and human perception draw inwards. Will the Substation
be absorbed into the Singapore night where phantoms stalk? When the SMU
campus takes its place in the city, will this bring new illuminate or just
add only more clamour? Will the peace be drowned out by bigger, louder,
brighter and more because we need to know what is ‘better’. |
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