Singapore Sling

I was walking along a covered walkway between a mass-transit train station and Chinatown in Singapore. A well dressed middle aged man in front of me threw a paper bag towards a bin. The bag bounced off the bin and fell on the floor. He wasn't looking and continued walking straight ahead.


The sky didn't fall. He wasn't instantly arrested. No one said anything.


Litter is sometimes dropped in Singapore. I saw it happen.


I was only in Singapore a few days before catching a flight to Manila in the Philippines. To a casual observer Singapore appears to be a city that works. Its multi-cultural population lives amicably side by side in a modern, clean, high tech metropolis, full of state of the art air conditioned shopping malls. A shopping paradise!


I also suspect that it would be a very pleasant city to work for a few years as an ex-pat in one of the gleaming high rise offices; with a efficient public transport system.


Singapore's authoritarian governance isn't to my taste but in the brief time I was there its governments authoritarianism didn't impact on me.


I'm not forgetting that Singapore's race-relations weren't always so amicable. The riots of 1964 were a serious shock, which probably led to Singapore leaving the Malaysian federation. I noticed government adverts on the public transport system against racial bigotry and in favour of the country's cosmopolitan, multi-cultural diversity.


I didn't do a lot during my few days in Singapore. I hung around the malls and visited the sites in the old colonial quarter. Singapore has been part of a global world since its founding as a city.


The city was founded as a trading port by Sir Stamford Raffles when he bought the island on behalf of the British East Indian Company. Talking of Raffles, I had to visit the Raffles Hotel.

A Singapore Sling in the Long Bar of the Raffles Hotel is very expensive, it set my back about $US12. I didn't stay in Raffles for more than one drink at those prices!

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Part of trip: Asia

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