On Day 14 of my Singapore trip (Jan 04, 2008), it was time to head
back home. It was a mixed bag for me. On one hand, I felt so liberated
experiencing a vacation which seemed overdue. On the other hand, I was
rearing to get back to my realities (well, not really, but I didn’t
want to delude myself any further).

This trip was interesting from many perspectives. For one, I had
simply no agenda. I landed in a new country with 13 days and no plan
whatsoever. I started off by reading some magazine cutouts on the
plane. Later, I figured out that the info was all
online.

I ended up going up in a hot air balloon to take in the awesome sight
of a lit-up Singapore at night, seeing more than a thousand
toys at
a toys museum, cycling in an
island, sleeping in
a library, deep in
philosophical conversations by the beach, trekking alone for 20 km in
a water reservoir area, watching a 12-year old kid strum ‘Hotel
California’, have
my roots shaken,
admire ancient
societies, saw
an Indian National Army monument, visited the world’s largest
fountain, had mouth-watering Indian food at Bombay Express Cafe,
grooved to Felix Da Housecat’s mixing skills at the Zouk Club, prayed
at the Krishna Temple on the first day of the new year, saw animals
like mousedeer, bat-eared fox, sugar glider and east african bongos at
the Night Safari, saw remote-controlled kites being flown, and so on.

There were two big things for me in this trip.

One was spending time with my friends Abishek Nair and Ashish Dantu.
Thanks a ton guys for being such great hosts, for the conversations,
for making me watch Russell Peters at 2 am, for all the fun we had,
and for teaching me so many things without ever having to say
anything.

The second thing was coming away inspired. Inspired by the pulse of
the city, inspired by their belief that “it’s possible.” ‘It’ just
needs a vision, a decision and a team to execute. On the other hand,
I’m terrified that people are progressing so fast and working towards
their dreams and I’m getting left behind.

I had a lot of time to think, inside out. Putting life into
perspective. As Einstein once said “The significant problems we face
cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we
created them.” So, it’s good to step back once in a while and think
about the big picture of your life. The challenge is to avoid getting
lost again in the daily grind, which is so hard.

In fact, it’s interesting how many people actually go through these
step-back-and-breathe phases, it’s just that it is completely
hush-hush, and understandably so, it’s a very personal thing.

On the other hand, there’s so much happening out there from things
like man-made islands to
the King Abdullah Economic
City, an
entire city being built on the sea!

This trip made me see how the world is changing and how I should
change, rather than me just being a ‘frog in the well’ and not knowing
what’s really going on ‘out there’.

Travelling is a necessity for me, not a luxury. It’s my way of
overcoming implosion. Our ancestors understood this. As an old Kannada
saying goes: “desha noDu, kosha vodu” (roughly translates to “Travel
the world, Read books”).

On Day 7 (Dec 28, 2007) of the Singapore Trip, I visited the
Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay. Esplanade
can be compared to a jumbo-sized version of our own
Rangashankara but on a much grander
scale – while Rangashankara is a place where plays are produced and
played (pun intended), Esplanade is a place for all kinds of
performing arts including music.
It has a 1,600 seat concert hall and a 2,000 seat theater. It was
opened in Oct 2002 and within 5 years, it had 5000 performances and 20
million visitors.

What I was impressed most with Esplanade was the story behind
it from
the conception to its architecture. There was a ‘Passages’ exhibition
on display explaining the story and I watched 3 videos on the TV
screens and I was very inspired.

The ideas was originally conceived in the 80s by the then Culture
Minister of Singapore. However, he realized the time was not right for
a performing arts center when they’re still building a nation. In the
last decade, the same person became the Prime Minister and got things
moving. There was a long process of conceptualizing what Esplanade
stands for, and in the end they said it’s a performing arts center
for the people, and the stress on the ‘common people’ aspect can be
seen in every decision, in every aspect of the place.

For example, the weird open-glass structure was a result of their
focus on “for the people”. How? They wanted common people walking by
to be able to look inside on what’s happening and to consider it part
of their society and that they can participate as well, and not think
of it as just some building for some crazy artists. So, the structure
had glass through which people can see, but considering the climate,
the architects came up with the leaf-like structure which can be
controlled by computers to fold. The result was that during the
daytime, people can look inside as well as the sun’s heat gets inside
the building. During night, the metal leaves are closed, and the heat
remains inside. What a beautiful design! In fact, this architecture
has won many awards.

Similarly, they set up restaurants inside the complex so that the
general public can use this as an excuse to visit the place. Even the
shape of the building is like the common-in-Singapore durian fruit for
the very same reason!

On Day 8 (Dec 29, 2007), I went back to Esplanade to experience the
free weekend concerts at the WaterFront called “stage@powerhouse”,
and boy, was I impressed with the local talent.

There was a performance by ‘The Rhythm Chefs’ who make music out of
kitchen utensils! It sounds stupid, I know, but seeing these guys
performing live, their music was actually catchy.

Later in the night, they got the audience involved from tourists to
mostly kids who were excited at being able to bang away to make some
music together.

As I’ve written before, notice how Singaporeans make things as visual
and as interactive as possible. The crowd really liked the
make-your-own-music session.

There was also a stage show by bands such as the ‘Peep Show’ band.
They were decent but the lyrics were way too clichéd. I liked the tune
of one of their songs “I know”.
There was also a performance by a band called ‘Comic Strip’ (if I’m
not mistaken) and they were more of a big orchestra doing everything
from pop to salsa-like songs. They kept the crowd dancing by the bay,
although I couldn’t understand which language the singer was crooning
in (apparently it was English, no offense meant).

The best performance of all, was a performance of ‘Hotel California’
by a couple of 12-year old kids. We were so blown away, Abishek,
Srinivas and myself, we were just speechless. The kids were supported
by an experienced guitarist guiding them (but carefully and sometimes
slyly letting the kids do most of the music). He said “Please don’t
think that your 12-year old children or nephews or nieces just listen
to music, they can play well too. I would encourage you to send them
to Esplanade and help them learn to play music just like these
talented kids right here.”

It was interspersed with the singing performance of a teenager girl.
She had surprisingly good control over her voice and sung some popular
pop and rock songs.

I seriously wonder if I have any talent in anything that can match
these kids. Damn.

Even on the way back down the underground passages to get to the
subway trains, there were paintings and artwork by 5-year old and
6-year old kids all over the passage.

On Day 5 of my Singapore trip (Dec 26 Wed), Abishek and myself visited
the Greek Masterpieces from Louvre
exhibition
at the National Museum of Singapore.
This was the largest collection ever to be allowed to be borrowed from
the famous Louvre museum in Paris (which you might have heard of from
‘The Da Vinci Code’ book).

The exhibition was so comprehensive that I was amazed. I raised my
eyebrows on seeing a ‘Sports’ section and went on to read stuff like
this:

Untranslatable, the word ‘agon’ denotes a gathering, and more
specifically games and competitions, but also struggle, combat and
battle, a trial or a debate, and a critical moment even.
Personified by a winged man running, the notion underlies the whole
of Greek civilization which has been described as ‘agonistic’ that
is founded on the spirit of competition.

Then, I remembered that Olympics Games were started in Olympia,
Greece. Duh. But the important thing to note is that they started it
in 7th century BC! They gave sports so much importance more than 2500
years ago, and compare it to the situation today in India, except for
cricket (My theory is that cricket was made popular because it is the
perfect advertiser-friendly game ever, where else will you get a 15-20
second ad break after every few minutes i.e. an over!)

Next, I learned that theater was about politics and way to live, and
the audience was paid to attend including their wages for several days
since they would have to take off work to attend these plays! Now,
that is a truly modern society!

There was so much more that I just couldn’t digest it all in such
a short time: poetry, sports, religion, philosophy – Socrates, Plato,
Aristotle, schooling children with 3 teachers on specific areas of
life, religion linked to running of the state and city – including
patron deities protecting the city such as Athena for Athens, heroes
such as Heracles (Roman ‘Hercules’), Achilles, Ulysses, Paris, etc.,
Zeus was King of Gods, there were 12 Olympian Gods including
third-generation gods and goddesses, Alexander the Great was the
greatest conqueror of all time, Romans stole most of the Greek
artifacts since they were obsessed with Greek history and so they made
copies of Greek statues and much of what we know about Greece is
actually from these Roman copies.

A very interesting section of the exhibition was the “Dress like
a Greek” section. There were a couple of robes kept, just like the
ones you see the Senators wear in ‘The Gladiator’. There were
directions in a poster on the wall. People took interest in trying it
out and taking snaps. I was amazed at how they make everything visual
and interactive in Singapore. This idea was a masterstroke in my
honest opinion, because it makes something like history that can be so
dry to be accessible and understandable for a layman. There were more
sections such as a huge wall for kids to write their own sequels to
the story of Troy (basically where Odyssey by Homer took off), and
there were many hilarious writings by the kids.

(more…)

I never really could imagine what Utopia could be like, but having
stayed in Singapore for more than a week, I can say I don’t need to
imagine it, it’s already here.

To be frank, it’s spooky, it’s eerie. I think it’s something taken
straight from ‘Demolition Man’ script and something’s going to happen
now. But it’s for real, and I can’t stop wondering WHY!? Why and how
can things work so smoothly here?

Actually, a better description is the last scene in Ajnabee movie
where Bobby Deol exposes Akshay Kumar’s password (in big bold
letters): “EVERYTHING IS PLANNED.”

For example, let’s just consider the online component to Singapore
which is jarring for the sheer depth of information available.

Want to visit Singapore? Sure, just head out to their Itinerary
Planner,
tell them how long you want to visit and who you’re coming with, and
they’ll tell you what you can explore each day! Uniquely Singapore,
indeed.

On the same note, everything has a website here:

• whether it is a mall
• whether it is an island
• whether it is
  a library
• whether it is a river cruise
• whether it is an upcoming garden
• whether it is a new year
  countdown
• whether it is a competition to paint dust bins to raise
  awareness
• whether it is a weekend bazaar
• whether it is podcasts from the national
  radio
• whether it is the latest
  events
• whether you want to figure out why or how you should
  visit/live/work in Singapore! (they
  even have a site specifically for Indian
  tourists)

Phew.

Oh, and the simplest best way to get around is to consult the Street
Directory and it’ll tell you the best
way to reach from anywhere to anywhere (including the exact building
number) via the bus, metro, walk or driving directions.

That brings me to the topic of the well-planned metro which they call
MRT (Mass Rapid Transport), you just need to check out the MRT
map to figure
out how to get to any place and since every train has a frequency of
6-8 min, you can always get there fast.

You can travel by bus as well and you’ll reach there fast too. In
fact, the roads are so good that there will be a Formula 1 race in
Singapore on the public streets. This is going to be the first ever F1
race in the night!

What I still do not understand is how such cleanliness, discipline
(especially traffic) and order is maintained when there are no cops
around! (I have seen them only once so far in the past 9 days).

I guess it has got something to do with this
fact:

Singapore legislation requires every able-bodied male Singaporean
citizen and second-generation permanent resident to undertake
National Service for a minimum of 2 years upon reaching 18 years of
age or completion of his studies (whichever comes first), with
exemption on medical or other grounds. After serving the two years,
every male is considered operationally ready, and is liable for
reservist national service to the age of 40 (50 for commissioned
officers). More than 350,000 men serve as operationally-ready
servicemen assigned to reservist combat units, and another 72,500
men form the full-time national service and regular corps.

That is amazing. In case of any kind of emergency, every Singaporean
man can face the problem and solve it then and there instead of
wasting time waiting for “a cop”. Probably also explains why they are
all so fit!

All this for just an island which is 42×28 km in size. It is one of
the 20 smallest countries in the world and at the same time they are
the second most densely populated country in the
world.

And they’re still charging
ahead.

The past month, I have been experiencing what I can only describe as
a burnout). When
I think about it, I have been juggling too many things, but they
were not extraordinary tasks, so I wonder why I felt ‘stressed’.

Things have been so hectic that I even missed foss.in this year (I
have attended every year since 2003) but good to know that it went so
well.

The good thing was that the vacation was right around the corner which
kept me going. Even an hour before leaving from home for the flight,
I was struggling to complete chores.

I am now in Singapore, staying with my friends, and exploring the
place since the last 5 days.

Singapore is a really amazing city to live in. Everything is
streamlined. Even the fish in the Underwater World at Sentosa Island
are RFID-tagged!

IIRC, I once saw a board that said there’s a 1000 SGD (singapore
dollars) fine if you are found sitting on the stairs of the
underground metro. I need to get one of those T-shirts that says
‘Singapore is a fine city’. Heh.

P.S. If you’re in Singapore too and want to meet up, give me
a holler.

Update: Looks like Ben Rockwood is going through a strikingly similar phase.