So let’s get back to the little things. Little things like the Sentosa Boardwalk. When I first visited Singapore’s signature tourist attraction in 1997, the task of navigating one’s way from the small island to the even smaller one was protracted and uncomfortable. There was no MRT at HarbourFront back then, so it was either on a bus, in a taxi, on foot or up above via a creaking cable car from the then deserted Mount Faber. Taxi drivers preferred trips to a syphilis clinic than Sentosa, knowing that there was little chance of collecting a customer for the return leg. There was a shuttle bus from the terminal on the other side of West Coast Highway but the queues were always long and the buses always packed. But all of the above were preferable to stumbling across Sentosa Gateway. With little respite from the sun, causeway walkers were treated to the picturesque splendour of the port shifting containers around on Pulau Brani and clouds of dust blown up by irate taxi drivers pissed off that they were going over in the first place.
Thank God then for the Sentosa Boardwalk. Opened in January 2011, the two-way, canopy-covered travelators cost $70 million (for a boardwalk? Are the timber planks filled with gold nuggets?). Green screenings alongside the travelators featured indigenous tropical landscapes. There was nothing but green on my left and the dancing spangles of Keppel Harbour on my right. Knowing that I had a bit of a hike ahead of me to get to Sentosa Cove, I was happy to let the travelator do most of the walking. In 15 years, Sentosa had never been more welcoming, literally pulling me towards the island. I arrived invigorated and raring to find the rich kids’ playground.
I found the Sentosa Visitor Centre, picked up a map and a few leaflets and sat down to savour some air con. No one else was in the centre and my body momentarily considered a nap. The sofa was most accommodating and I realised my eyes were closing.
“Yes sir, can I help you, sir?”
I opened my eyes. A smiling auntie stood over me waving a walkie-talkie around.
“Er, sorry, yes. I’m er, going to go to the ...” I stammered, still rather dazed.
“Yes sir, can I help you, sir ... Yes?”
I was being interrogated by a female Basil Fawlty. I cleared my throat and sat up straight.
“Er, yes, right, sorry. I’m trying to get to, er, the bus. Yes, I want to take one of the buses around the island, please.”
I didn’t mention Sentosa Cove. I didn’t look like someone who should be going to Sentosa Cove. I looked like an old dosser nodding off in the Sentosa Visitor Centre. In a benign but transparent manner, Walkie-Talkie Woman was trying to get rid of me. Clearly, she was rushed off her feet with all the other visitors not in her centre.
“Yes, yes, you come this way, please sir,” she said, ushering me to my feet and handing me my notepad. Short of poking me with a porcelain statue of the Merlion, it’s difficult to see how she could have got me to move any faster.
“OK, I was just wondering if ...” I began.
“This way please, sir,” she interrupted, pointing towards the exit. “You go through the door, please sir. That’s it. You go through the cave, got buses after the escalator. Thank you, sir.”
She opened the door and pointed towards the street, just in case I wasn’t sure. With a nod to Charlie Chaplin and Universal Studios Singapore next door, I’m surprised she didn’t deliver a comical kick up the arse to help me on my way.
Following her instructions, I found the fake cave, weaved through the fake stalactites and stalagmites, admired the fake, albeit pleasant, waterfall and made my way down the escalators. At least the escalators were real. I failed to locate the bus stop and got lost in the underground car park.
If hell exists, then it must lie within the depths of a Singaporean underground car park. Steamy, uncomfortable, grimy, dusty buildings with the stale air trapped within, the car park’s pollutants index is boosted by the fetid, choking fumes of vehicles performing more laps than Sebastian Vettel in the futile hunt for an empty space. There is more screeching than a Hitchcock movie and more honking than a frog chorus. Sentosa’s car park failings are compounded by the presence of The Singapore Car Park Attendant. In the words of Plato: never employ a car park attendant who actually wants to be one. And for God’s sake, never give these buggers a whistle. There are certain attendants whom I won’t name (two words: Lucky Plaza) who appear intellectually incapable of not blowing their whistles. Drivers are unaware of what the blowing means. Pedestrians waiting by the kerb are equally clueless. Does the incessant whistling mean stop, go, slow down, speed up, hold your position, turn left, turn right, pedestrians cross, pedestrians wait, none of the above or all of the above? Even the car park attendant doesn’t know. But he’s been given a uniform, a smidgen of authority and a whistle and he’s going to bloody well enjoy himself.
Sentosa car park attendants not only had whistles, they also had those rectangular flashing disco lightsabre pointy things. Whistles were emitting indecipherable instructions in one direction, arms were flailing about in the other, while the flashing disco lights overhead seemed not to say “Park on the left” but rather “I came to get down, I came to get down ... So get out your seats and jump around ... Jump around ... Jump up, jump up and get down.”
Of course, frazzled coach drivers with Chinese tour parties threatening to smash through the emergency windows if they were not sitting at a baccarat table within the next five minutes did what all drivers do in such situations, they ignored the car park attendants. For all the blue-faced whistling and frantic light flashing, the attendants were largely bypassed. I was tempted to wait and see what they lost first—their patience or an eyeball from all that exhaling—but I spotted a yellow Sentosa bus across the car park and dashed past the tour buses.
For the most obvious of reasons, Sentosa Cove is not meant to be accessible to the proletariat. There was going to be some walking involved. I took the bus towards Allanbrooke Road, which has long confused because it splits at the roundabout and heads off in opposite directions with Bukit Manis Road sandwiched in-between. I got off beside a swanky restaurant hosting a wedding party in the northwest and ventured south and then west with only cicadas for company. As I watched the lizards poke their heads around tree trunks, I stopped for a breather. I dumped my bag on the ground, rummaged around for a bottle of water and took a swig just as a shiny speedster raced past, kindly blowing a smattering of grit in my general direction, much of which stuck to my damp, tacky face. There was little time to determine the vehicle’s manufacturer, but it was one of those convertible-phallic-fast-car-small-knob types; the car equivalent of the yapping Yorkshire Terrier that constantly snarls at your feet, demonstrating its aggressive hardness, while you sigh indifferently before drop-kicking the little bastard. The car roared past a speed-reading box on the other side of the road, clocking more than 80 km/h, which I presumed exceeded the speed limit for Allanbrooke Road. I also presumed the Sentosa Cove-bound driver didn’t give a shit.
Wiping the grime from my face, I heard another convertible tearing towards me. This one was a white open-top BMW. With the exception of taxis, are cheap cars banned from using Allanbrooke Road? Four blondes, hair dancing around like candyfloss in a hurricane, shot past me and I turned away for fear of being struck by globs of peroxide. The jaunty Caucasian women giggled as they thundered along. I know because I heard every snippet of their conversation. Chatting in an open-top car, at speed, must be like making a phone call in a wind tunnel. How do you sit beside someone in the back seat and take them seriously when their big, blowy hair makes them look like Marge Simpson?
Finally, I reached the double archway entrance to Sentosa Cove. A Malay security guard stepped down from his post. He was the first Singaporean I had seen in half an hour. He eyed my sweaty demeanour, bright purple rucksack and scruffy T-shirt and shorts cautiously. My presence was unexpected. No one walks in and out of Sentosa Cove.
“Hello there, I was just going in to have a wander around Sentosa Cove,” I opened brightly. “I’ve heard so much about it and, would you believ
e, I’ve just seen it from the top of Pinnacle@Duxton and thought I’d nip down and have a look at it.”
“Ah, it’s private property, sir,” he replied evenly. “They are private residences here.”
“I understand that but this road cannot be private, can it? It’s a public road, right? I can just have a stroll down the road.”
“You see that shelter there behind the little roundabout? That’s the Sentosa Cove Arrival Plaza. You can go over there and have a look, but then you must not go any further.”
And with such a warm welcome, I ventured into what has been called the world’s most exclusive address (by the people behind Sentosa Cove).
Built on reclaimed land, Sentosa Cove defines new Singapore: its aspirations, its direction and its desire to reposition itself on the global stage. A cost-effective manufacturing hub no more, Singapore has long coveted the pharmaceutical and technology titans. With that skills base now on board, Sentosa Cove’s role is to provide a play base. If Marina Bay Sands represents a desire to be the Monaco of Asia, Sentosa Cove is a very deliberate attempt to be the Switzerland of Asia. (If Singaporeans were just occasionally permitted to live in the “Singapore of Asia”, then there might not be such a crisis of conscience concerning national identity.) Declining birth rates require an injection of people and the nation will only accept the best: wealthy investors seeking attractive tax incentives, banking stability and—that most priceless of commodities in a dense metropolis—a private playground. The banks on the mainland take care of the former while Sentosa Cove takes care of the latter. For the discreet businessman, what’s not to like about this arrangement? An apartment downtown, dinner designed by one of the many chef hats at Marina Bay and a weekend hang-out at Sentosa Cove to pick up the yacht for jaunts around the South China Sea. With a stable government, the absence of corruption so systemic elsewhere in the region, kiasu civil servants, dependable infrastructure and every English Premier League game live on cable TV, Singapore ticks every box for the wealthiest of the wealthy seeking somewhere to dump sackfuls of cash. And how do Singaporeans benefit? Well, someone’s got to drive those Sentosa buses and man the security posts, haven’t they?
I stopped at a promenade platform overlooking Sentosa Cove and surveyed the marina. Bordered by gleaming, glassy low-rise apartments, the marina was filled with yacht masts gently swaying in the breeze. I peered down to my left and spotted, of course, the ubiquitous Harry’s Bar. Do expats and Western tourists drink anywhere else in Singapore? I’ve got nothing against the Harry’s Bar chain but moving from one outlet to another in the franchise must get repetitive. There can be only so many rugby repeats one can watch on TV whilst being surrounded by the “diddly dee” Irish tat that expat pubs so often favour. In Harry’s Bar, a decent crowd had gathered to watch one of the Rugby World Cup semi-finals. There was plenty of cheering from men constantly toasting the TV while their partners whooped in all the right places. I cannot recall the teams, other than they were two of those countries that expats will usually support in a foreign land but seldom give a shit about once they return home.
I spotted my second Singaporean. His Singlish gave him away. The young Malay guy had given a European couple a lift to Harry’s Bar—in a golf buggy. He had transported them from their Sentosa Cove apartment to the pub, a distance of no more than a couple of hundred metres, in a golf buggy. Well, you get what you pay for. And someone paid $17.9 million for a bungalow on Cove Drive, which faces the waterway, not long before I visited in September 2011. When Sentosa Cove Pte Ltd completes the complex in 2014, there will be 1,766 condominium units and 394 bungalows. There will be no further apartments added. Exclusivity comes at the highest price and foreigners, who make up at least half the buyers, are willing to pay it. Sentosa Cove is the only place in Singapore where foreigners can own land, and land that comes with a chauffeur-driven golf buggy, too.
Unexpectedly dejected, I trudged back to the sheltered bus stop beside the Sentosa Cove Arrival Plaza. A luxurious private coach was parked in the bay with the slogan “the world’s most desirable address” slapped along the side. Sentosa Cove might do exclusive but it doesn’t do subtle. There were only two Caucasians on board waiting for the bus to depart. The Singaporean driver stood chatting and smoking with other local drivers near me. An elevated four-wheel drive with tinted windows pulled up behind the coach and dropped off a couple of tanned Caucasians. Some weary Indian workers were sitting on the ground beneath the shelter, sharing a bottle of water and resting after presumably spending all day—a Sunday—building a new billionaire’s bolt-hole. Another bus parked up behind the fancy private one.
It was a Sentosa bus. I was furious.
I hadn’t noticed this bus in the underground car park, nor had I read about it in the tourist leaflet nor on the website. I hadn’t even known that it existed. That bus could have spared me a sweat soaking along Allanbrooke Road an hour earlier. Why would the ultimate seaside haven for the haves tolerate a public bus full of the have-nots? Its route was displayed on a window: a shuttle service running directly between HarbourFront MRT Station and Sentosa Cove. The bus had the potential to carry those pesky peasants directly from public transport and drop them into the very private laps of the landowners. It made no sense until the doors opened and the penny dropped. The bus was packed with Singaporeans and Southeast Asians. They were all there—cleaners, sweepers, waiters, labourers—all going to work. Sentosa Cove really was for them after all.
I was suddenly conscious of my skin colour.
Whether they were table wipers, security guards, bus drivers, construction labourers or bloody golf buggy drivers, the only Singaporeans I encountered at Sentosa Cove were blue-collar workers performing largely menial jobs. As I waited in line with them, I caught a glimpse of Pinnacle@Duxton in the northeast and was just able to make out the Sky Garden. Towering above Chinatown’s history, the very public and very accessible building pointed the way forward. Pinnacle@Duxton is a Singaporean building for Singaporeans (perhaps of a certain financial means, but Singaporeans nonetheless). But who is Sentosa Cove for?
It’s for the Lycra lady who ran towards the bus stop at that particular moment. She was a Caucasian in her late forties with expensively coiffured, dyed hair and immaculately presented in head-to-toe black Lycra. Jogging stylishly towards the queue, she wore black sunglasses that had something ridiculously expensive written down their arms, her trainers appeared to be 20 minutes old and my mischievous memory is adamant that her miniscule iPod was gold-plated. Her earrings contained a pair of diamonds last seen in The Pink Panther. She was that manicured, thoroughly manufactured, vision of natural perfection that only obscene wealth can provide. Even her beads of sweat had been trained to trickle away from her face to avoid an unsightly complexion.
She trotted towards the bus queue and performed that annoying jogging-on-the-spot routine until the crowd parted slightly so she could continue on her way. And we did. Lycra lady swaggered along the street like she owned it, which in a way she did. The coach drivers smirked. A Chinese auntie muttered something. I stared at my shoes, embarrassed.
Like everyone else in Singapore, I’ve been well drilled. I can parrot the immigration mantra. I understand the fundamental economics behind foreign talent and the desire to attract the wealthiest elite to dump their fortunes here, no questions asked. But at that moment, I didn’t care. I saw only the foreign haves and the local have-nots and was struck by just one objective, rational question.
How the hell do Singaporeans put up with us?
Nine
I WAS once packed off to California to meet Han Solo. Just typing that sentence sends a tingling frisson of excitement through my fingers, indicating what a thoroughly sad man I am. Nevertheless, I gleefully accepted the media junket offer without checking flight times or interview schedules. I spent more time in the air than I did in California. I fell asleep during the media screening of Harrison Ford’s new movie on Hollywood Boulevard. When I woke up, a lovely American
film critic beside me kindly pointed out that I had dribbled down my chin. But then Ford’s thriller Firewall could do that to a viewer.
The brief trip to the home of American cinema was spent in that hazy, zombie fog of jet lag. I was there, without ever actually being there. I know I asked Ford if the proliferation of home computers and social media had the potential to corrupt young minds. He retorted with a convoluted analogy that involved smashing my head into a piano. I stared at his earring. I peered down at his waist, half expecting to see a bullwhip hanging from his belt. He caught me glimpsing beneath the table. He thought I was looking at his crotch. I asked him if he planned to make another Indiana Jones movie. He yawned. I yawned. My eyes were closing. I was falling asleep interviewing my childhood idol.
“Right, that’s all we have time for.”
It was a tall, leggy blonde PR girl calling time on the interview. I shook my head and did that eye-widening thing to stave off the droopiness. Unfortunately, I was offering Ford my hand to shake at the time and turned into an eye-bulging Roger Rabbit. I was trying to be alert, but it came off as alarming. Indiana Jones wisely left the room without shaking my hand.
Less than an hour later, I was lining up for the Back to the Future simulator ride at Universal Studios in Los Angeles. My malfunctioning body was threatening to go on strike, but my movie-mad mind was aware that this was the only opportunity I had to fulfil a boyhood fantasy of flying a DeLorean. Being on a media trip however, I went to Universal Studios alone. Men who visit movie theme parks alone often spend their weekends dressed as imperial stormtroopers running through shopping malls and shouting, “It’s them! Blast them!”
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