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Published: October 2nd 2006
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The Merlion of Singapore
A very rare creature only found on this small island This might turn out to be a bit of a history lesson but bear with me because I think it's interesting and kind of explains very well British colonisation in general in Asia and why Singapore is the way it is now (please don't yawn!). Using what I remember of parts 1 to 3 of the Discovery Channel's history of Singapore shown on the plane and a smattering of the Lonely Planet I shall begin...
Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, a young employee of the East India Company (EIC) landed his ship on a small jungle-covered island at the southern tip of the Malay peninsular in 1819. Did a dodgey deal with the Sultan of Malay's brother which meant the Sultan's bro received a substantial payment so that in return the EIC had pretty much the right to do anything on the island they wished. Raffles was an ambitious sort and from these humble beginings he set up the first free trade port in Asia (i.e. no taxes, VAT etc.), an enlightened city where people were free to practice whatever religion they wanted. Within 3 years the population on the island of Singapore had grown from a handful of farmers and
sea pirates to 10,000 traders drawn from largely China, India, the Persian Gulf and Malay seeking fortune and escaping religious persicution and famine. Singapore benefitted from being slap bang in the middle of a British trade route between China and India. The EIC got tea from China and the Chinese in return received opium from India. The EIC grew very rich (richer than the UK government in fact) and the Chinese got addicted to opium - good old fashioned exploitation fully at work there! Raffles was only in Singapore for a few months but in this time he planned the five foot walkways to shade pedestrians from the sun and rain, and divided the city into distinct areas for commerce, government, and community areas for the Europeans, Chinese, Indians, and Malays. The areas are still there today, Chinatown is very Chinese with stalls bursting with cheap stuff just off the boat from their homeland, while Little India only needs a few sacred cows strolling down the high street to make the locals really feel like they are home from home.
Anyway back to the story...After a couple of decades of rapid population growth things got a bit hairy in
the city. Without any tax revenue, not enough was being spent by the EIC on policing. Murders happened daily and gambling, opium use and prostitution was rife. To raise revenue the EIC sold the distribution rights of opium to the highest bidder and taxed the vice trade. This encouraged the growth of criminal gangs, particularly from China so law and order got even worse! To save the day in 1869 the Suez Canal was opened, meaning that trade between Europe was quicker and more ships travelled between the Malacca Straits than around the bottem of Indonesia. Therefore within months the amount of ships passing through Singapore doubled. Added to this rubber tree seeds stolen from Brazil were found to grow very well in the Botanical Gardens in Singapore. As a result rubber plantations sprang up in nearby Malay, the sap was extracted, sent to Singapore for processing then shipped onto British factories. Malay was also minned for tin which was taken to Singapore and shipped to the UK to be made into tin cans. By this time the fortunes of the EIC was going downhill as milky tea from India became more popular to Brits than the black Chinese stuff.
Writing home
Going a bit sticker crazy With the growth in significance and wealth of Singapore and the decline of EIC, the British Crown gladly took on full responsibility for the colony in 1867. The problems of Singapore then stabilised as the UK government pumped in money for public infrastructure, law and order.
Bristish rule continued along relatively uneventfully until the events of Pearl Harbour and the subsequent bombing and invasion of the City by the Japanese in 1942. The Chinese were in for the most brutal treatment by the occupying forces having had a long history of disliking the enemy. Each and every adult of chinese discent in the city was rounded up and screened. Tens of thousands were murdered in the jungle. With the sudden end to the war in the far east in 1945, the British returned and the Japanese were deported. With few Japanese executed, the weak response by the British was not not well received by the population and this discontent sowed the seeds for independece. In the decade following the war neighbouring Malay was granted independence in 1957 but for strategic reasons Singapore was kept on by the British but given powers of limited self government. China's communist revolution during
the late 1950s encouraged the city's chinese workers to be difficult and scarred the British into conceding further power to the City's ruling moderates. This culminated in Singapore's merger with Malay to form Malaysia in 1963. The only problem was that the Malays did not generally get on with the Singaporian Chinese and after much bloodshed in 1965 Malasia dumped Singapore out of the federation and left it to swim on her own. A cut in ties to Malay, no natural resources, insufficient land, threat of invasion by Indonesia and high unemployment (the British Navy shipyard was soon to close), the city was in a bit of a pickle. With its back to the wall, national service was made compulsory, and the government became extremely business friendly by encouraging hi-tech corporations to relocate and to supress any type of union activity/workers' rights. The Asian Tiger emerged and the rest is history...
Sorry about that, had to get it down on paper. Singapore is a fantastic place, truely one of the most cosmopolitan Cities in the world, a country that is a city. It has all the culture, colour and flavour of Asia without the dirt and smells! You can go from India to China by using only a few stops of the airconditioned tube. We walked for ages soaking in all up without being hasled by hawkers for taxi rides, we had a great time!
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