Singapore

Dearest Rachel –

Well, we’ll soon be in the last place on my itinerary that I’ve been to before. The funny thing is, the one moment I most vividly remember from this place has little to do with it as such, and was just an incident whose circumstances could just as easily have happened anywhere else along the way. I probably told you about this at one time or another, but here goes:

The class was getting ready to visit the U.S. embassy in the morning, to learn about U.S.-Singapore economic relations, and we were dressed in our best clothes for the occasions; suits and ties or dresses, that sort of thing. Somewhere along the line, I’d spilled hollandaise sauce on my tie at breakfast, and needed to change into my other tie. Unfortunately, it basically required me to switch my entire ensemble, from brown to blue, and by the time I returned to the hotel lobby, everyone else had left. However, for whatever reason, they were walking to the embassy, which proved to be my salvation; I hailed a taxicab, instructed the driver to head to “the U.S. embassy, and step on it!” (yeah, I felt like I was in a James Bond or other such movie at that moment). I got there, paid the driver, and just as I was about to head inside to look for my classmates, they came walking around the corner; I’d actually beaten them there, and apart from being a few dollars lighter, was no worse for wear – unlike them, who had to walk in the heat of even the early morning (as there is no winter in Singapore, even in January). That last bit about the heat is probably the only thing particularly characteristic of the area (although the same could have just as easily been said of Bangkok as well), but otherwise, there isn’t much about it that feels like it couldn’t have taken place anywhere else we were.

My point is, I don’t remember much about the place without checking my notes (this particular misadventure, I hardly need to say, doesn’t require me to do so), and given the ridiculously limited amount of time we’ll have here (I understand we need to be back aboard the ship by three, which seems particularly fast for an embarkation terminal), it isn’t as if we’re going to discover all that much about the place while we’re here this time around, either.

Still, I might as well touch upon a few things while I’m preparing to visit the place; whether or not these come up is hardly the point – there’s nothing more annoying than the student who constantly asks “is this going to be on the test?” It hardly matters; the more you know, the more everything you see makes sense. After Vietnam, in particular, I can speak about how not being suitably versed – not, quite possibly, being capable of being suitably versed –in the history of a place strips it of context and meaning.

First of all, one interesting point about Singapore is that, in comparison to most of the nations around it, it’s fairly young. Oh, a trading post by the name of Temasek existed there going back some eight hundred years, but it wasn’t until the early eighteen-hundreds when Sir Thomas Stamford Bingley Raffles (can anyone think of a more British-sounding name than that?) set the place up as a transshipment port (basically, a way station between one corner of the Empire and other – and the Empire at the time was busy adding lots of corners, so it was quite necessary and made itself quite useful) that the city came into its own, albeit under the auspices of the British crown as opposed to its own merits. Not that Singapore sought to be an independent country in its own right; shortly after being granted independence after WWII, it joined with the Malayan peninsula and the northwestern states of Borneo to form the Malaysian Federation. However, due to differences over affirmative action policies – future Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yu referred to it as “Malaysian Malaysia,” which sounds inherently obvious, except that Singapore’s population in particular was predominantly Chinese, with a healthy Indian population as well, both of which groups would be discriminated against under the federation’s new policies – Singapore was kicked out of the union, and left to fend for itself under Lee.

Lee then proceeded to turn Singapore into a developed country with a high-income economy, forging a highly effective, anti-corrupt government and civil service with the backing of a parliament that was heavily in his and his party’s favor. He eschewed populist policies in favor of long-term social and economic planning, championing civic nationalism through meritocracy and multiracialism as governing principles. Despite the possible taint of colonialism that might be associated with it, he made English the lingua franca (enshrining it with Mandarin, Malay and Tamil as the nation’s official languages) to integrate its immigrant society and to facilitate trade with the world, whilst mandating bilingualism in schools to preserve the students’ mother tongue and ethnic identity. While he was considered authoritarian by those in the West (consider the tales of the nation forbidding chewing gum, and the young American caned for spray painting graffiti), he embraced the label, claiming that “If Singapore is a nanny state, then I am proud to have fostered one.” Some historians have argued that his actions were necessary and vital for the country’s early development, and that while his rule could be deemed as authoritarian in aspects (and it’s not as if anywhere in Asia had any long history with democracy in any form at that point), he was a benevolent dictator who fostered social wellbeing, if not true social democracy. Lee continues to be held in high regard by Singaporeans, despite having stepped down in 1990, and passing away in 2015.

Such past is prologue, and presumably it frames the “Four Cultures” tour I’ll be taking. Presumably this covers the English influence on its former colony, the Chinese and Indian enclaves where such nationals have made their home, as well as the whole of the modern city that has a culture of its own. I may not be able to absorb much of this in just four hours, but at least it’s something to work with.

And with that being said, honey, keep an eye on me, and wish me luck. I’m going to need it.