Henderson Waves provides a literal link to old and new Singapore. The sparkly Jewel Box and Sentosa-bound cable cars are now a short, direct walk away from the colonial past of Telok Blangah Hill Park. Popular with trading communities in the 19th century, Telok Blangah has a history that is represented by the restored bungalow of Alkaff Mansion. But the park is preoccupied with its future. I appreciated the foresight of the Sembcorp Forest of Giants as I wandered among its saplings. A simple but effective initiative, the arboretum, a living collection of trees for education and research, comprised 600 trees that had once dominated the island before old Stamford popped in. Called emergents, these jolly green giants, such as the tualang and the jelutong, will eventually reach heights of 80 metres. Planted in early 2010, they will take 50 years to mature. My mother has always said the same about me.
As I continued through Telok Blangah Hill Park, I realised I was slightly out of step with the forest. I had been away too long. I jumped at everything. Every rustle made me retreat. A squirrel scurried across the path and I made a noise that a mouse might make if it were inflated by a bicycle pump. I spent five years in Australia and found kangaroos, wallabies, possums, koalas, echidnas, platypuses, emus, dingos, snakes, dolphins, manta rays, seals, sharks and whales in their natural habitats. Not many Australians could say that. They probably wouldn’t want to. Still, I once swam over a basking shark in Port Philip Bay, tracked southern right whales along the Southern Ocean, watched a seal swim through my legs, followed a tiger snake as it slithered in front of my daughter’s pushchair and narrowly missed hitting a kangaroo in the bush three times (and no one wants to hit any animal in the bush three times).
And here I was in Telok Blangah Hill Park shitting myself over a squirrel.
I had spent too much time in casinos and theme parks and needed to get back to nature. NParks, however, made my attempt a little difficult. I reached the Forest Walk, only to find sections of the Earth Trail closed for slope stabilisation (they reopened in early 2012). The repair work was unfortunate because the restricted access that was still available was an easy meander through the secondary forest canopy via a steel structure that reached 18 metres. As the usual, more enjoyable route to Alexandra Arch was not an option, I retraced my steps and found Depot Road and the incongruous HDB block of 106B. There was nothing wrong with this particular block. On the contrary, I rather envied its setting, backing directly onto the forest. But I found the sudden transformation most peculiar. One moment I was alone in the forest with only squirrels and raptors for company, the next I was in a FairPrice queue behind an uncle buying 16 jars of bailing mushrooms. Standing in line with an uncle buying 16 jars of bailing mushrooms is disorienting at the best of times, doing so only two minutes after trekking through a deserted forest was mind-blowing.
I had stumbled upon the fascinatingly eerie Depot Heights Shopping Centre, a quiet retail centre at the foot of the hill dwarfed by the encroaching jungle. I noticed a FairPrice employee preparing a display of Christmas decorations. She needed a rocking chair and a duelling banjo. It was The Hills Have Eyes up there.
I rejoined the superb Forest Walk at Preston Road, having passed some wonderfully scruffy black-and-white bungalows, and crossed Alexandra Arch. Well, Marble Arch has nothing to worry about. Alexandra Arch was always going to be something of an anticlimax after the curvy lines of Henderson Waves, which was shortlisted for the World Architecture Festival Awards under the transport category in 2008. Crossing both bridges in the Southern Ridges was like going on a single, spectacular date with the high school heart-throb, only to end up with the slightly shorter, dumpier cousin the following week. Measuring 80 metres long and 4 metres across, Alexandra Arch’s steel and granite design resembled an open fig leaf and provided a pleasant stroll between Telok Blangah and HortPark, but my heart belongs to Henderson Waves.
I had high hopes for HortPark (crap capital letter in the middle of the name aside). I even ignored the unfortunate jargon that such well-meaning initiatives are always lumbered with in Singapore, with HortPark touting itself as a one-stop gardening hub, i.e. a gardening centre. (I cannot recall having to visit one garden centre in Geelong to buy a shovel and then needing to drive to another for a pitchfork. Most garden-related tools, books and equipment tended to be under the one roof. Really, it’s not that remarkable an achievement.) But I was intrigued by HortPark’s emphasis on communal gardening. I expected to return to the allotments of my childhood that were populated by glue-sniffing skinheads.
In the UK, allotments are small parcels of land rented out by local councils to provide a quiet corner for residents to grow crops. Or, in the cases of some of the allotments along the District Line between Dagenham and Barking, provide a place to hide stolen electrical goods in ramshackle sheds. Allotments have long been the domain of the working class. Indeed, the modern allotment really took off in the 19th century as an attempt to calm civil unrest by giving the landless poor a “field garden” to potter around in. After the unexpected results in Singapore’s general election of 2011, perhaps every HDB estate in the country will soon end up with its own HortPark, complete with silly capital letter in the middle.
Growing up in Dagenham, my best mate Ross and I often hung out at the local allotments that ran alongside the London Underground tube lines. Not because we had any interest in growing anything or had a penchant for hanging out with old-timers reminiscing about the Blitz whilst spilling tea from battered thermos flasks onto their tartan blankets, but because we were busy being Stig from Stig of the Dump. Clive King’s modern children’s classic was turned into a TV series in 1981 and, for a brief period, kids were often found running wild around allotments and rubbish dumps with dirty faces and matted hair, substituting tea towels for loin cloths. In truth, Ross and I looked like Stig of the Dump all year round so an extreme makeover wasn’t required.
Using corrugated iron scraps, dumped council house windows and doors and some old curtains, we recreated Stig’s dump, constructing a fine den, which served us well until a gang of skinheads sniffed too much glue one afternoon and indulged in a demolition derby with their Dr. Martens boots. The camp was destroyed and we stopped going to the allotments after that, much to my mother’s relief who thought our dog was eating her tea towels.
I expected a more sedate, sanitised environment at HortPark and it certainly was, to the point of being a bit dull. Once I’d had a polite look around the themed gardens (I lost count after 10, but enjoyed the cheeky Car Park Garden), I was half hoping the skinheads might pop in to liven the place up a bit. HortPark has noble intentions, encouraging all Singaporeans to maximise their gardening potential by showcasing how green spaces can be utilised in any abode, be it a balcony, a hallway or inside an apartment. There were some terrific parks for children and a butterfly garden, outside which I called my wife who confirmed again that they would all be dead in the morning. But the six glasshouses, which provided prototypes for the Gardens by the Bay, neatly summed up HortPark. They were educational research centres, but the science had obscured the fun.
HortPark was almost at odds with nature. There was no anarchy, no real Darwinist wildness at work. Like the gardens of a typical HDB estate, every showcase was perfectly groomed, pruned and manicured, not a plant leaf or flower petal was out of place. Despite its truly admirable attempts to bring green-fingered gangs together for some communal digging and planting, the one-stop gardening hub bore little resemblance to the scruffy allotments of my childhood. A controlling hand was still at work, a stubborn reluctance to really allow residents to be let loose on the project, cultivate their own plots independently and take ownership of the land. Instead, the park had the feel of any other government hub, albeit a pretty one. HortPark was closer to a gardening museum than a living, evolving green space.
By the time I had zigzagged my way up the steady ascent from HortPark to Kent Ridge Park, I was done. My first gentle stroll across the southern hills of Singapore had been an exhilarating one, but my sore ha
mstring was contemplating industrial action. I nodded to some construction workers carrying out some repairs (probably slope stabilising) and stopped for a drink.
And that’s when I heard the bird.
I knew the bugger was coming before I saw it. The faint swoosh of its wings indicated that it was close and it was big. Indeed the raptor flew so close that I instinctively ducked, which was probably just as well as a rather confused lizard, still very much alive, was trapped between its talons, the reptile’s whip-like tail slashing through the air in a futile protest against its capture. The raptor swooped effortlessly despite the persistent wriggling of its prey and landed on an almost horizontal branch not 10 metres from where I was standing. No doubt the laborious hunt beforehand had left the lethargic raptor less fussy about where he stopped to make the kill. The bird of prey, possibly a sparrowhawk but difficult to determine in the dusky forest, glared at me, calculated the distance and his lofty position and figured its dinner was not about to be disturbed.
I heard the flesh being ripped from the lizard’s neck as its tail continued to thrash around pathetically. The sparrowhawk (I’m going with sparrowhawk, no one else was there to contradict me) pecked away with its bloody beak at the back of the dying reptile’s neck in a methodical, clinical fashion that was utterly engrossing despite its obvious brutality. No one puts on a bloodier, more macabre show than Mother Nature. The distinct sound of skin and gristle being torn from the bone was reassuringly familiar, sharing the aural qualities of a plate of chicken wings being devoured at a coffee shop table. Pinned to the trunk beneath the sparrowhawk’s vicelike talons, the half-eaten lizard refused to succumb. The mortally wounded creature’s pointless efforts to cling to life were almost humbling. Eventually, its tail fell and hung limply over the side of the trunk. The merciless sparrowhawk continued to feast.
And I watched the raptor’s 10-minute audition for National Geographic from the front row, thoroughly enraptured. With a cast of thousands and the greenest of set designs, the Southern Ridges puts on one hell of a show. But the flamboyant fauna had definitely saved its best for last. For the first time, I felt like I was truly back in Singapore. My Singapore at least. Marina Bay Sands and Sentosa have unquestionably elevated the island’s entertainment value, but they will never be able to put on a production as authentic as that one.
Thirteen
THE voice on the other end of the telephone line provided the clearest indication yet of Singapore’s newfound sexiness. It wasn’t one of those phone services. No matter how desperate, I have always refrained from calling sex chat lines. Not because I am a moral, upstanding citizen who refuses to wallow in a filthy pit of parasitic perverts but because I am a tight-arse. Have you seen how much those phone calls cost per minute? Half an hour is more expensive than a night in Geylang. No, I was aroused by three otherwise nondescript words that highlighted how bright the little red dot now shines.
“Hello, Lucasfilm Singapore.”
It doesn’t take much to get me going.
But the idea of dialling the local telephone number of a rented Changi office and speaking to a Singaporean auntie who works for someone, who works for someone, who works for someone who once bumped into the bearded guy who made Star Wars in his office toilet is about as sexy as it gets. Incidentally, I referred to the telephone receptionist as a Singaporean auntie for no other reason than she sounded like one: polite, friendly and jovial but always to the point. In my head, I pictured Mon Mothma in Return of the Jedi (which I appreciate is a reference that could lose many readers and scare one or two others).
“Er, hello, yes, have I really gotten through to Lucasfilm?” I replied to Mon Mothma, surprised that the most perfunctory of online searches had come up trumps first time.
“Yes, this is Lucasfilm Singapore. How can I help?”
How could she help? How about by sending an email to George Lucas expressing my deepest gratitude for fundamentally shaping my childhood? Or by simply telling me where I can get one of those stormtrooper costumes tailored so I can spend weekends tapping on taxi drivers’ windows at Changi Airport and ordering them to move along.
“Er, yes, right, well, I’m looking for the Star Wars Sandcrawler,” I finally sputtered.
“I’m sorry. What are you looking for?”
I pictured a red light marked “nerd alert” suddenly blinking on her office phone as her pointed finger hovered over the receiver.
“No, no, it’s not what you think,” I insisted, desperately distancing myself from the grown men who collect Star Wars toys, watch the films endlessly, attend conventions and live with their mothers.
I no longer live with my mother.
“I’m interested in seeing the Sandcrawler Building, the new offices for Lucasfilm Singapore that will be shaped like the sandcrawler from Star Wars. I’m standing here right now at one-north, you know, Fusionopolis, trying to find it.”
“Oh, I see,” a relieved Mon Mothma sighed, realising I wasn’t standing outside her Changi office in a hooded robe. “You’re in Buona Vista.”
“That’s right. I’m in the middle of Fusionopolis and there’s construction at two building sites.”
“Yes, one of those is ours.”
I was crestfallen. I had read reports that the future permanent home of Lucasfilm Animation Singapore, to be modelled on the Jawa sandcrawler from the first Star Wars movie, was scheduled to open its doors to the world’s most talented artists in 2012. So I had expected to be confronted with a near completed glassy sandcrawler and, at the very least, a stone statue of Yoda or something.
“No, I don’t think the building will open now until very late 2012 or early 2013,” Mon Mothma pointed out. “But thank you for showing an interest.”
I was initially rather flattered by her closing remark, a sincere gesture of gratitude from a colossal corporation that still recognises where its power derives. But then I thought the line was too quick, too rehearsed. It was more like a cynical crumb of comfort to pacify the anoraks and dissuade them from turning up at Lucasfilm offices, waving Toys “R” Us lightsabres and shouting, “The force is strong with this one.”
Still Star Wars has most certainly come to Singapore and will soon take up residence in an office complex that provides a highlights reel of classic science fiction and dystopian cinema. Fusionopolis is part Blade Runner, part Minority Report, part Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (the area is a dead ringer for Century City in Los Angeles) and even part Robocop.
Opened in October 2008, Fusionopolis is a member of the “opolis” groovy gang that marks its territory around the mushrooming research and development business park of one-north. Developed by JTC Corporation, the once quiet colonial corner of Buona Vista is now a magnet for the finest foreign and local brains to nurture those developing across the road at the National University of Singapore. The focus of Fusionopolis is on IT, media, physical sciences and engineering so the attraction to a company like Lucasfilm Animation Singapore, whose 400 employees have outgrown their rented Changi home, is obvious. A public and private partnership, Fusionopolis already plays host to the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) and SPRING and, apart from Lucasfilm, will be joined by dry and wet laboratories to test new technologies.
It’s all very groundbreaking and commendable, but do all the names have to be so geeky? From the Lucasfilm site, I peered up at Fusionopolis’s current focal point, a pair of towers joined by what can only be described as a giant silver gym ball (all that was missing was a giant tai tai wobbling around on top under the instruction of a personal trainer). The buildings are named Symbiosis and Connexis respectively and the etymology of both words is fascinating, deriving from the Ancient Greek for “too much time in labs and textbooks”.
I wandered into the lobby that connected the two towers and onto a Kubrickian movie set. Ironically, Lucas complained that sci-fi movies usually depicted a clean, sanitised and largely deserted universe and Star Wars was a dirty, cluttered congested reaction
to that utopia. Fusionopolis was a pre-Star Wars creation: glassy, spotless, spacious but vacuous. Apart from the armed and numerous security guards and the lovely girls at the information counter, there was no one around. The emptiness recalled childhood evenings watching Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, a post-modern metropolis that had forgotten to include people. Fusionopolis was quite similar. All that was missing was that metal robot that waddled behind Buck and said, “Biddi-biddi-biddi.”
To its credit, the complex was trying to foster a work-live-learn, all-under-one-roof environment. I noticed a couple of preschools and crèche-type facilities catering presumably to parents working upstairs in the same building. That was if anyone actually worked in either of the towers. I saw not a soul. With Lee Kuan Yew’s long-held belief in the irrefutable inequality of genetics, I imagined Fusionopolis’s workforce being engineered in incubators on the higher levels, fed mathematical formulae through drips and forced to listen to English in one ear and Mandarin in the other whilst having subliminal images of science experiments flashed at their eyeballs. For some, that’s a dystopian nightmare. For others, that’s the average Singaporean tuition centre.
I hurried quickly along Portsdown Road and then Biopolis Road before a deceptive drizzle turned into yet another flash flood. The geek’s hand was present on the side of every building in Biopolis. I passed Centros, Chromos, Genome and various other monikers that must have been put forward by biomedical scientists who spend more time with Bunsen burners than human beings. Of course, my cheap potshots stem from my innate envy of those in the life-saving business. A couple of smaller blocks, Neuros and Immunos, were homes to neuroscience and immunology research. I also passed a humbling sculpture. Called SARS Inhibited, the outdoor artwork celebrated the incalculable achievements of the Biopolis scientific community in tackling the SARS virus in 2003. The sculpture is based on the sub-molecular data of SARS, allowing visitors to literally walk through the virus. This is what these guys really do when they’re not coming up with silly names for their buildings. Had I keeled over beside the sculpture, there would have been no shortage of scientists with the basic knowledge required to keep me alive. No one ever says, “There’s been a terrible accident. Quick, send for the novelist.”
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