Things I will miss, and won't

Things I will miss: 

The quick, cheap, easy, and refreshing availability of ready to eat, spicy, juicy meals.

The feel of a humid breeze on my skin, particularly in the evening.

The cleansing, drenching afternoon rain.

The sense of friendly community and collaboration among groups here - academics, friends, activists, artists.

The ease and spectacle.

The trees, the green.

Getting on a cheap flight to an exotic locale.

The MRT system.

My pool, palms, and gym.

Palms.

The sense of possibility here.

Learning everyday. Connecting with new people.

Bukit Brown and my other favorite places.

**

Things I will not miss:

The heaviness.

The claustrophobia.

The conformity.

The lack of bohemia.

The rules, administration, and bureacracy.

Seeing foreign workers treated like furniture.

My shitty little room and single bed.

Not being able to cook.

MSGs and oily / salty foods.

The heat between 11 and 6pm.

This shoulder injury.

Farewell Singapura

Tuesday, 26 March 2013



I have been a bad blogger, but I suppose that is what happens when you get lost in fieldwork, travel, and other distractions.

I sit here in Singapore at my desk, careful not to upset my broken collarbone, and completely in a state of disbelief that my time here has come to an end. The fastest 7 months ever. I wish time would now slow down and let me enjoy my return to London and the rest of my life.


I will come back later to fill in some thoughts about Singapore. I promise.

The Weight of the Monsoon

Monday, 19^th November

Singapore

It has been a while since I have written personal thoughts, having begun my interviews and become lost in a flurry of academia.

The monsoon enters its third week. Today was the first day without rain since, it feels like, I got back from Australia. The rain is both refreshing and oppressive; I have always liked rain, growing up I loved the afternoon thunderstorms of North Carolina. I loved disappearing into coffee shops and book places in England during the rain and drizzle, a chance I (and everyone) has often.

This equatorial, tropical rain is more persistent than any I have encountered. There is no escape from it; it even seems to wet the insides of a room, somehow. The drops are fat enough to measure with a spoon.

The air is tolerable because of the daily rain, and that helps. The sun is not one’s friend here. But still, outdoor activity becomes difficult with the daily deluge. So, in either rain or sun, Singapore is a difficult place to be, if not on a veranda with a breeze or fan, or in an air conditioned room.

**

The rain adds to the creeping… heaviness of life here. I am now nearly three months into my time here, and have dug past a few of the surface layers. I am starting to feel like I live in Singapore, and only by feeling that way, am I starting to feel that I am living in Singapore’s authoritarian system, its heavy, oppressive, strong handed system. It does not creep into one’s head after a few days, but only after several weeks or months. The policeman in my head warns me against strange or offensive behaviour, not that I was planning any.

Singapore gets into you, you begin to internalize it.

Perhaps the initial interviews and my walk through Bukit Brown, which combined, have had a very chilling effect. The impact of seeing the 4000 graves being exhumed and then not one but two very candid, critical interviews, not entirely optimistic on their views of the city-state or the future, have left me noticing things with (yet another) fresh pair of eyes.

The Straits Times, for example, which at first seems like your everyday mainstream, centrist national paper (like USA Today, the Times of London, etc), now looks more and more like political propaganda. There is a formula, people say, and now I notice things I didn’t before. All well in Singapore; all fucked in the rest of the world. And on page 3, a man won a prize for his garden. On page 4, a girl lost her scholarship for drugs.

**

I won’t go into my interviews, since they will have been transcribed and explored in my PhD text. What I came away with, so far, were two people with differing levels of criticism on the Singapore State. One was a Singaporean, battle-scarred but still fighting for equality and human rights, perhaps a believer in slow liberalisation and having lived through the 1960s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s, with the hindsight, foresight, and patience of a veteran. The other interviewee was British, having arrived within the past decade. He seems to have made a life for himself here with his family and hopes to get permanent residency, and yet had nothing but scathing, troubling views on the City-State. My question, which I didn’t ask but should have, is why he stays, why he subjects his wife and young child to this society, if it is so bad? He also claims to have ‘fallen in love’ with aspects of Singapore – the ability not to have to worry about things, to not have to be guarded as one would be in London or Dallas. Perhaps just knowing that you are being looked after, and that there is a policeman in your head, is comforting somehow.

I read the paper today. There is a serious debate going on, seemingly involving several notable academics, about ‘the maid problem’. Not so much how they are mistreated (they are) and underpaid, denied a day off and other basic human amenities; but rather about how Singapore will face a shortage of maids in coming years. (Since maids from ‘dependable’ Philippines and Indonesia will go to other places, where they are treated better and have higher wages).

What made me balk was not so much that there was a serious discussion in the newspaper about the prospect of a maid shortage, but that the solution to this problem seemed (according to consensus), to be to simply take small steps to fill the shortage, such as allowing some maids to live outside their employers homes, encourage more Singaporeans to be maids, and encouraging maids to come from other countries (such as Thailand or Cambodia).

What is truly shocking, though perhaps shouldn’t be, was that this was even being discussed at all, but more importantly, that maids don’t seem to be thought of as people who deserve a minimum wage, a weekend, and the whole host of other protections and rights they are guaranteed in other countries (including many in Asia, such as Hong Kong). Not  that being a maid is ever a glamorous job, picking up 13 year olds shit-stained clothes and mopping a bathroom floor. Moreover, is there the capability for a discussion here about whether so many maids are necessary? Can people clean their own rooms? Would Singapore be a healthier, more dynamic society, if more children were not raised by maids, more fathers cleaned the house?

**

Another perpetual ‘problem’ for discussion here is the ‘drug problem’, which, if you believed the paper, is tearing apart Singaporean society. I have yet to see a junkie walking around or someone that I encounter that seems to be high on anything, except maybe cold and flu medicine or coffee.

Not only are drug-peddlers sentenced to death or (at minimum) life in prison (if they name names); drug users are also treated as criminals and punished severely. What is viewed as ‘rehabilitation’ here, for example, for a teenage-female heroin addict, is 12 months in basically solitary confinement. Young girl, saved from drugs, recounts her time with 2 bars of soap per month and just a squat for a toilet, which she had to clean by hand. The newspaper warns, it boasts, it chides. Never is there a discussion that maybe drug addicts are deserving of at least some modicum of human treatment, access to help rather than punishment.

Here too, Singapore differs from the leading ‘creative’ cities in the world, which are increasingly taking progressive stances toward drug users; Vancouver has realized that rather than try to social engineer heroin use out of the population (of which the Indigenous Canadian population is particularly hard-hit), drug users will at least have access to clean and sanitary facilities and methodone will be given to attempt to mediate and ameliorate the problem. Drug use has never been ‘erased’ from cities; cities can make things better, at best. Colorado voted this month to legalize marijuana.

And finally, the academy itself. Thus far and even more than a month in, I assumed that the National University, with its accolades, partnerships, and rankings, was somewhat insulated from the larger system – more connected to the ivory towers of the Ivy League and the Russell Group than to the People’s Action Party.

I assumed, in particular, that the Geography Department, which possibly produces as a cohort the most critical papers on topics such as spatial justice and human rights – would be an even more insulated group within the academy.

While this is somewhat true, I am realizing that nowhere here is insulated from the government or the ideology, and I learned this from a personal discussion with one of the senior faculty members in my field who is also a university administrator. Highly regarded, well-travelled, and Cambridge educated.

 She sounded like an automaton, hardly any different than the type of surface politeness cum wariness one might get from a civil servant or a waitress here. She seemed especially off-put with the topic of a gay-rights group I am interviewing (People Like Us). She seemed puzzled as to why they were part of my research, and managed to say, “Aren’t they -, um, a different kind – of – advocacy group?” The subtle ways that Singaporeans code-switch, channel you away from certain topics. A sensitive issue indeed, given the imminent opening of Yale / NUS college and the hesitation of Yale Faculty to associate with a university which will not openly promote alternative lifestyles in any way. Despite what is said, and despite what is agreed, I am at this juncture doubting that Yale / NUS will give rise to any sort of liberalization, any sort of ‘chipping away at the stone’ that is Singapore’s rigid value set. Not unless Yale and NUS faculty implicitly support and encourage it, which, from my observations and discussions thus far, does not look likely.

19 year-olds aren’t the bravest in the world, not these days anyway. Especially when there is a policeman inside their heads, warning them not to cause trouble.

Perhaps my forthcoming interviews will shed a different, more optimistic light, and what I feel in my heart will be proven wrong. I am open to this. I know that there are ways in which Singapore works and also ways in which it is easy to like, easy to even fall in love. There is a reason there are tens of thousands of highly-educated expatriates here. Neil Humphreys, the author, called Singapore his ‘girlfriend’ that he can’t get out of his heart. Hugh, (the British expat) I interviewed, though he called Singapore “Nazism without the anti-Semitism” (and there may be a fair amount of anti-Semitism), has chosen to remain here with his family, even saying that he would encourage his son to do National Service, the true sign of commitment to the state. He can say in the same sentence, however that 11 year olds kill themselves every year because their test results are poor.

 I don’t think he quite has figured out how to reckon with this place, or his decision to come here.He seemed almost agitated and stressed after talking to me. Perhaps the tropical calm of his garden, swimming pool, and comfortable lifestyle assuage the anxiety, ease the doubts, act as an opiate. Perhaps there was something worse for him in London, worse than a heavy-handed government in a tropical city. Perhaps there is some joy in knowing that he is different, other, can always return to England. Perhaps there is something exotic, naughty, slightly dangerous about being here. Or, perhaps, Singapore is no more rigid, controlling than anywhere else. At least it is open about it. Guantanamo Bay is still open, and London films you hundreds of times per day, can tap your phone or internet account at will. 

Nazi Germany was also seductive, and had a certain allure, attracting authors and great minds. I am not ready to compare Singapore to a fascist state, at least not that kind of fascism. Nor am I ready to make a blanket, black and white verdict – I don’t think that’s possible, and cities are too puzzling to describe without nuance and circumspection.

But every day, I feel the heaviness creeping in. And wake up with the policeman in my head. Is it fear? Anxiety?

From Singapore,

JDL

My Return to Oz

October 2012

When I was 22 years old, I arrived in Melbourne with everything I would need for a year, an excitement and freedom I had never felt before, and an open mind. Though I only spent 10 months on Australian soil, the experience changed me in profound and important ways. It would be untrue to say that I ‘grew up’, because how can one grow up in 10 months. I did, however, try things I have never tried before, and go exploring at the end of the earth, the place where the dragons live and the waters fall into space. And the fresh air and smell of Eucalypt have stayed with me for nearly 7 years.

I have taken the opportunity while living temporarily in Singapore to devote energy and money to returning to Australia for 12 days, even though the sensible thing to do would be to explore the ‘new’ region of Southeast Asia rather than go back to a place I have been before. Yet the need to return to Oz has been in the back of my mind for years, ever since I left. I wanted to see this place with a fresh set of eyes, older, having travelled and lived abroad other places. I wanted to see if the waves of Australia would wash over me in the same ways, or differently. I wanted to revisit old streets and pass old trees, and see the dear friends I made in such a short time, many of whom I have stayed in touch with and reconnected with around the world. And, pragmatically, I wanted to do something I never got a chance to do when I lived in Melbourne: drive, on my own, from Sydney to Melbourne, around Australia’s highest mountain, Kozsiousko (over 7,200 feet and still snow covered in late Spring). I did travel around Victoria and took myself out to Broome, Western Australia in 2005/2006, but never really immersed myself in the bush on a long road trip – a quintessentially Australian adventure. In doing so, I am hoping to come full circle, to use a cliché, and finish my Australian chapter, as it were. At least for now. For me, this is something of a spiritual journey mixed with simple good times with friends, the perfect way to end my 30^th year as I approach my thirtieth birthday. I began my 20s with Australia, and, so, I will end with it.

The context is certainly different. When I was 22 and fresh out of Cornell, I was a nervously closeted, hard drinking evolving fraternity boy with no plan for the next 3 years, let alone my life. I didn’t know if I would stay in Australia for one year or thirty. I didn’t know if I would ever go back to school. I had never really dated properly and though I desperately wanted to, I was not yet equipped with the mental tools to do so. I was who I am now, but only in an earlier mould, not yet fully shaped. I had long curly hair.

I am still not fully shaped by any means. Here I am, still a student, perhaps once expected to have bought and sold a house by this time (by my younger self). To have it all figured out. To have gone to the moon.

But I have gone many places. I have learned a great deal. There is much more I want and need to accomplish in life, professionally, socially, personally, but I have progressed a great deal. I have made mistakes and have some regrets, but equally accept that these mistakes have made me smarter, sharper and more careful. I have not lost my love of life and a good time. I am still not afraid to let my hair down, even though I keep it shorter now. I am who I have always been, and I know myself. In all these things, I am extremely lucky and grateful. Were I more religious, I would say blessed. And I think I still can.

Now I have a (relatively) clear plan. The PhD is a map for 2 years. Then it becomes hazier, but I know for certain that going back to school is no longer a fork in the road. I also know that putting on a suit everyday and not being surrounded by intellectuals is also a ‘closed road.’ Whether I go into the hard, political world of Academia or remain in policy and research circles, the road is still becoming narrower, clearer, and better paved. I may not know how many miles there are until my destination, but at least I know I have one, and that I am heading toward it.

I know that I am only in Australia for 12 days. 8, in fact, as of this journal writing. This is different. I am a visitor, a tourist. I will not be a resident; will not be looking for a house or signing tax papers. There is comfort in this, but also a tinge of sadness. This land does have, as expressed in Australian art, film, and literature, a mythical, surreal, dreamlike pull. This land lulls one into a happy oblivion, if a perilous one. And already, it has cast its spell.

Australia, like myself, is different. Older now. And having gone through a remarkable economic change; it was booming in 2005-2006, but then, everywhere was. I felt Australian values imbued in everyday life: a fair deal, progressive policies, high standard of living, ‘tall poppy’ mind set. An ability to be successful and savvy without being ostentatious or callous. I fear that this, the ‘soul’ of the nation, has changed with its new wealth. Australia never got hit as hard as the West during the gut wrenching economic strife of 2008-2011. A supplier of what China needs, it has boomed as China has. Wealth, almost unimaginable wealth, has been created by a tiny elite that combines flashy, in your face living with far-right attitudes (country dwellers suddenly billionaires). One, the richest woman in the world, uses her wealth to buy air time to voice her concerns, among which is the fact that Australians are not as willing to work for low wages as Africans. Another, a man, is building his own full scale replica of the Titanic. This is ominous, always foreboding some turn for the worse, and is not the Australia I know.

**

Sydney

There is no greater modern day city rivalry than Sydney and Melbourne. The old rivalries of yore – Paris and London, Rome and Milan, New York and Chicago, et al., no longer have the fight they once had. Cities are increasingly ordered into clean divides of perceived influence and power, and regional and national rivalries have turned into the global cities system of ‘Alpha,’ ‘Beta,’ ‘Gamma,’ and so on. Cities are increasingly specialized and play different roles, complementing one another. They are also more linked than ever before, so rivalries are healthy, like two team mates both vying for the ball. They are not the Victorian duels and inflammatory rhetoric they once were, that even inspired Wars and violence.

Except for Sydney and Melbourne. The two cities will never go to war with one another, but they maintain a ferociously loyal following and there is a stark divide between them. Sydney: the glittering, glamorous, wealthy, beach queen; the tacky, shiny, superficial Saturday night. The muscled body and perfect hair; the water view and adrenalin. Sydney loves to talk about everything and yet nothing; it is like a pop culture feed and a constant reality TV show. It is remarkably beautiful. It is seductive. Cruel.

Melbourne is the Victorian aunt with the black clothes and cup of coffee. She is dry and sarcastic and reads books. There is something both blue blood and working class about her; she at once evokes the London literati and the Greek country village. When she dresses up, she looks gorgeous, but is equally happy to walk around in jeans and a drab, dour blouse. Look closely. Her boots are Italian and very expensive.

**

I landed in Sydney with an open mind, having spent nearly a year with Melbournians (and after, even more time) calling it trashy, vapid, overexpensive, and boring.

I went to Sydney before, for a few days, and wrote about it. Many of my observations then, in 2006, struck me again this time: it immediately feels like a ‘big’ city; a global city, a cosmopolitan and ‘important’ city. Melbourne can, at times, but largely feels like a sleepier, more regional place.

Sydney is corporate and seems to drip money, now much more so even than 2006. Luxury cars and luxury people give a sense of well being that is not even apparent in London anymore. Sydney is by some measures in the very, very, very highest echelon of most expensive cities on earth, vying for the top spot with places like (Singapore), Hong Kong, and in some ways, outdoing London.

Yet, it is, without a doubt, a most spectacular city. Maybe the most beautiful waterfront city of all time. The parks, the Harbour, the Opera House; the fine homes on the hills; the way that the beach (as a public space, as a park itself) is woven into everyday urban fabric and everyday life. The beach is for everyone. The green hues of the sea; the air. The blooming Jacaranda trees. The beautiful people. This is Los Angeles without the problems; this is San Francisco with more size and depth.

Sydney ‘feels’ like both a Georgian and a 20^th Century city, but not a Victorian one. This reflects its boom years: it was the first, and largest city in Australia from 1788 until the 1850s, with many fine sandstone Georgian buildings. The next architecture that really stands out is Art Deco of the 1920s-1930s, and the kind of early 20^th century buildings found in New York (red brick). You don’t see that in Melbourne as much… in fact, the art deco assemblage in Sydney is spectacular – even the Harbour Bridge. I am surprised not to hear Sydney mentioned more as one of the great Art Deco cities, alongside New York, Miami, London, and Los Angeles.

Sydney is also, as I noticed years ago, vapid and superficial. I know that there is a Sydney of wire rim glasses and philosophical chats, but I think that the sheer expense of the place, combined with the beauty and bacchanal culture, makes it a hard place for those people to live. I have not yet encountered a Sydneysider that I would consider to be alternative, or outside of the mainstream. Perhaps I just don’t have an ‘in’ to that subgroup

The conversations seem to revolve about pop culture and the whole host of nothingness. My friend’s flatmate boasts of being a very good writer, both of prose and of songs; an excellent singer; in fabulous shape, and working on the “advanced stages” of a screen play. He seems to know all of the top-40 radio hits, and is a travel agent who doubles as a phone-answerer at a pizza store. He lives in a flashy condominium with a rooftop sauna and pool. Thus is the life of a Sydneysider.

The life is seductive – I know that I, too, would be drawn into extreme gym routines and the general Sydney attitude. But I fear that I would be sacrificing other things. Is it worth it, for such a beautiful life, full of avocado, sun tan lotion, and blue skies? Perhaps the penultimate question for those who choose West Los Angeles or Miami over Montreal and Vienna. What is important?

The most worrying thing, though, seems to be the social relations – in Sydney there just isn’t the social milleu and patchwork of socially connected urban spaces that there are in Melbourne or London. People are very individualistic in their workout routines and high salaries; it would probably be a very nice place to be in a relationship, but hard with either a family or a single life. How can anyone build a meaningful relationship while maintaining 5% bodyfat?

If Sydney weren’t so far, and I hypothetically were considering coming back to Australia to live, could I become a Sydneysider? I think there are too many wonderful things about the city to say no. With money, and a good routine, one can live an almost ideal life, jogging in the gardens, kayaking in the Harbour, smelling the sea saline. I would have to be ready, though, to ‘give in’ and not fight the superficiality, a difficult ask.

I think everyone has a Sydneysider in them, and a Melbournian. After all, what is life without a vapid, wonderfully careless day at the beach. Likewise, how empty would life be without the occasional existential moment at a dark, back alley café.

The Australian Capital Territory (Canberra)

It was great fun to spend time with friends and take in the perfect weather and beaches in Sydney. But the real excitement for me was the prospect of my 3 day drive to Canberra, then over the Snowy Mountains and the Victorian / New South Wales backcountry, to Melbourne.

I left Sydney and after the sprawling suburbs, found myself climbing into green, crisp, fragrant hills. They must be brown and windblown in Summer and fall (bushfire season), but in Spring they are verdant and beautiful, evoking both the Appalachian country and the English countryside. It is simply amazing how de-peopled Australia becomes within miles of leaving a city. The cities are full and developed; the countryside simply isn’t. It may never be, which is the wonderful thing: people move to cities to build their lives, not the country. The farm life or the booming small town is a thing of the past, except for the mining areas, resort areas, cute retirement villages, and the very rich with their ‘play’ farms and ranches. Thus, the Australian outback may always remain an Outback of red sunsets and vistas of gum trees. That is, if it isn’t all dug up and sent to China on boats.

I passed at least 3 dead Kangaroos along the way, and lots of other dead and run over things. Some people probably think you only experience Australian wildlife in zoos. Australian wildlife is everywhere, even in the cities. The birds and bats in Sydney reminded me of prehistoric creatures, as they did in Melbourne when I first arrived there.

After lunch in Goulburn (the ‘oldest inland town’, apparently) which at 25,000 people, is larger than most inland towns, I headed down a dry lake bed to Canberra, the unique, modern planned capital.

There are few examples of purely post-war planned cities in the World, aside from Brasilia (which must feel and operate like a vastly bigger Canberra) and the British new towns (Milton Keynes, in particular). China and the other new boomlands are building new towns and new cities, but none have Canberra’s particular mix of prairie planning idyll, scale, and setting.

I say ‘prairie’, because Canberra (began, anyway) as the brainchild of Walter Burnley Griffin, the American protégé of Frank Lloyd Wright and a proponent of axial planning, with views along linear and monumental water and landscape planes. Canberra involved an artificial butterfly-shaped lake, much open space and parkland, and circular, wavy streets. There was careful separation of Federal Government, commercial, retail, and residential areas. Though Canberra strayed far from Griffin’s plan, it is heavily influenced by in, and maintains the axial vistas and segregation of use.

I haven’t yet made a verdict on Canberra. It is, like suburban Singapore, (and perhaps any modern landscape), hard to get around and find ones way. Without a clear vista there is no way to orient oneself in a sea of identical buildings and streets. It can be disorientating and frustrating, and also, on a Sunday evening, devoid of people.

That said, it is a gorgeous natural setting – a crisp, clean plateau with glittering Eucalypt leaves and no humidity. The lake and parkland are attractive and conducive to cycling and running. The urban spaces seem functional, if ordinary and boxy. I am a fan of modernist and brutalist architecture and urban form for its pure functionality and pragmatism. Yet it lacks a certain human element and color. I can see Canberra being a very bleak place at times, and I understand why those who study at Australian National University, the finest in Australia, very rarely stay. I also understand why the official residence of the Prime Minister moved to Sydney a decade ago. Canberra is isolated and somewhat aloof from even Sydney, if even more so the rest of the world.

But like any international capital and university town, which Canberra is, there is a sense of internationalism that is out-sized. Korean churches and fine-looking restauraunts; attractive people and many cultural centres. Nice houses and a certain cosmopolitan ‘buzz’ (that would certainly be lacking from a normal city of 500,000 more than 3 hours from any other large city).

I will explore more tomorrow and am excited to see some of the Federal Temples, such as the National Gallery. This is an intriguing city and worth seeing. It is so young that it will be interesting to see Canberra in 10, 20 years… as it matures and diversifies. It will change more than Sydney or Melbourne, and has the potential to be a truly interesting place as it finds itself. As Australia continues to grow into one of the leading countries of the world, Canberra will become increasingly important and visible. The question will be whether it continues to be unique in its planning and development, a true garden city, a city of avenues and axis, or if it will over time morph into a ‘normal’ city. Time, and planning, will tell.

Tomorrow: Canberra to Cooma, Jindabyn and then the Perisher Valley, over the Snowies, and descending to Khancoban.

**

Wednesday, 31 October (Halloween)

From Singapore

The Snowy Mountains and Melbourne

Reflecting back upon the latter half of my Australia return, I am unable and unwilling to write a lengthy recap of the events. Highlights included one of the most beautiful drive I’ve ever undertaken, through the dry Southern Highland plateau and then over the Snowy Mountains to the Murray River Valley. Along the way, I reached snow-capped heights, descended into green valleys full of kangaroos, emus, echidnas and dingoes, drove through strange and surreal country towns, and even blew a tire on the Hume highway, some miles north of Melbourne. I saw the Snowy Scheme, one of man’s great triumphs (or rapes) over nature but a crucial feat nonetheless, engineering the distribution of alpine water to quench the thirst of a dry nation. I drove through glistening eucalypt forests and cold, crisp air; past lakes and fields.

In Melbourne, I retraced the steps and chased the shadows of my 22 year old self, down laneways and through gardens. I saw old friends and colleagues and remembered all reasons why I fell in love with Melbourne. I also remembered why I left.

In an odd way, my 2 weeks in Australia was like a mini-version of my entire year there: I arrived, fell into dreamland, and then felt those pangs of remoteness, isolation and insularity by the last few days (that I felt in my last few months). It is hard to explain to someone not familiar with the Antipodes: even though the landscapes are gorgeous, the conversations familiar and the streetscapes vaguely European, there is a constant consciousness of distance, of being removed from the heart of the world.

To ‘be’ in Australia; to give oneself over to it completely, one has to be willing and able to start fresh completely; to cut off old attachments and sever roots. This worked for convicts, adventurers, fortune seekers and jackaroos; for refugees from war-torn lands and survivors from distant traumas. It is a land of start-freshers, planting new gardens and digging new foundations.

I think there are two groups of those who migrate to Australia. The first are the above – those seeking the garden at the end of the world, the place where the waters fall into nothing. They arrive and live a life that perhaps would not be possible from whence they came, either that or they are able to tell themselves so. The second group, however, are never able to feel at home here at 37 degrees South Latitude. Many within this group eventually leave: as I did, after only 10 months, or after some years, even decades. They constantly yearn to re-connect with their past, with their roots, with the main thoroughfares of our world. If they stay in Australia, they spend their days reminiscing, in Anglo or Europhilia, romanticising being other places.

I know now that I would never feel completely at home in Australia. There are too many people, too many places embedded within me to ever ‘rest’ on an island so many miles away. It took perhaps a second visit to establish this fact, though I think I knew this even those years ago. My homesickness at age 22-23 sunk in only weeks after arriving, and I never for a moment seriously contemplated giving it all up and starting a life down under. Even though I could have, and what a life it would have been.

The scenery, the food; the lifestyle. Sublime in many ways, carefree, simple. European quality; migrants carried with them the best aspects of the old world and none of the worst. Flowers. Sunny skies and smiles.

Before I get carried away, I must end with a caveat: even in Melbourne, I noticed some of the same changes I felt in Sydney. A worrisome insularity, attitude, wealth and aloof-ness that I did not sense 7 years ago and that I think will corrode Australian society if not addressed. This is not pervasive nor obvious, but just below the surface is the sure-fire confidence of a society that has gotten too comfortable with economic boom and resource-riches; a cockiness that did not serve America or Britain well before they fell into decline.

Australia will change; it will grow. It cannot remain always a frontier, a land of untouched red earth and mysteries. As it does so, though, I only hope it remembers who and what it is and came from, its humility, its dreamtime, its ability to be rough around the edges and imperfect. Its warmth and kindness and its sense of adventure and reason.

There is something mad about Australia and this is a wonderful thing. I like the whimsical, dreamy madness of Baz Luhrmann and Peter Weir, of Michael Leunig and Dame Edna. I fear, however, that the madness of Gina Rinehart and Tony Abott are a new direction and their version of Australia would be a far less wonderful place.

**

Melbourne

Melbourne appears on the horizon like the Emerald City, its towers hovering faintly over rolling pastures of sheep and cattle. It sprawls. Some 50km in all directions (except the Bay). Having eschewed a GPS device and only vaguely remembering how to navigate the inner city by car, I decided to follow the old Sydney Road tram into town, which slowly led me, through rambling suburban zones and older Victorian districts, to the Thrifty depot to return my car. The angst over my blown tire aside, I was suddenly right back where I started, at the corner of Elizabeth Street and Latrobe Street, facing the office where I reported for work that August morning, 2005. And for a second, I felt like I was back there, arriving on my morning train.

When I got to Melbourne in 2005, it was the first major city I had ever lived in, and I had no real frame of reference. Since then, I have lived and spent time in New York and London and many other cities of various shapes and sizes.

So coming back to Melbourne, I noticed things with a new set of eyes. For one, the city has an unmatched Victorian fabric. With a population of some 600,000 people in 1900, it nearly matched the great British Victorian cities in size (Manchester, Glasgow, Birmingham). Unlike them, however, Melbourne never dealt with the Blitz or British-style urban renewal. Likewise with the great Victorian American cities (San Francisco, Chicago, St Louis for example). Melbourne never suffered an earthquake like San Francisco or the white flight of St Louis. British and American cities were chopped up and emptied from the 1940s to the 1990s. Australian cities weren’t untouched, but largely retained much of their Georgian, Victorian, Edwardian, and Art Deco urban fabric.

The result is that Melbourne is a Victorian and Edwardian showcase, possibly the best preserved example anywhere. The grandness and elegance of the fine buildings on Parliament Square, on Collins Street or even in peripheral suburbs matches anywhere in the world.  So too with the trams, which for ever reason were  never replaced with buses. The trams add to the historic feel of the city and must always be cherished, even if they are trundling, traffic inducing and rather inefficient.

Melbourne is also, compared to New York and London, extraordinarily vibrant in a holistic sense. The city centre pulses, yes, but so do all of the inner-ring neighbourhoods, on both sides of the river. Brunswick and Fitzroy, Carlton and St Kilda, South Yarra and South Melbourne. Here too Melbourne differs from North American cities and even many European cities, which have areas of dead zones and ‘no go’ zones. London has such large areas of council housing and industrial spaces and likewise in New York. It seems possible, in any Melbourne neighbourhood, to get a fine coffee, meal and film.

My concern for Melbourne is that it rests too much on its past. It was marvellous and it remains Marvelous, beautiful, livable and full of life. But with population growth, it is noticeably bursting at the seams. It cannot rely on Victorian infrastructure and a few new freeways. A comprehensive growth strategy seems to have been abandoned (constantly re thought and revised). Land for new housing isn’t enough; there must be new trains, an underground, bus lines, and other investment. In a country and city as prosperous, it seems foolish not to spend on infrastructure. Even debt ridden and recession-addled American cities are building new light rail and other mass transit lines, even in places like Houston and Charlotte. New York is building a new subway line, and London is awash with new rail infrastructure. Melbourne must follow suit, or it will lose it livability.

And on that note, a final thought: it has become prohibitively expensive! New York and London are less livable because they are inordinately expensive places to live. Melbourne must find ways to make itself affordable both to visitors and residents or it will become (like Singapore or Hong Kong), an Antipodean Switzerland, sterile and untouchable except by (and for) the wealthy. I fear this is already underway, with the poor being pushed to the periphery, a trend evident in other areas of the developed world. Affordable housing must be provided within easy access to the city and jobs and on key transit nodes and I did not see evidence that this is occurring.

But marvellous it is, a very lucky place indeed. Were it closer, I would move back. But were it closer, would it be so wonderful? I will leave on this final thought. 

The Beach

Sunday, 7^th October

Sentosa – Tanjong Beach Club (TBC)

Disneyland with a death penalty. Sentosa, ostensibly Singapore’s answer to a seaside park, is an “experience” rather than a place.  First a concession. It isn’t at all unpleasant. Like Singapore’s other slick, manicured spaces, Sentosa is well-landscaped, green, easy and cheap to get to, open to the public and altogether attractive. It is nice to sit by the sea with a cold beer, feel the breeze, watch the ships in the queue to the port. Listen to the relaxing beach beats, a little piece of Ibiza. Look at washboard abdominals, bronzed breasts and rippling pecs, on Singaporeans and Westerners alike.

And yet.

Compare this to say, Toronto’s Island Park, or any one of London’s great, rambling parks. (Or Chicago’s lakefront, or.) There is a universal studios here and about a dozen other for-profit attractions, not to mention a monorail and giant merlion. There is a W hotel and some other resorts and an enclave of exclusive residential neighbourhoods.

Beach music is piped in on hidden speakers, and a DJ says “Sentosa sounds” and extolls the many attractions on the island. This is a place meant to be experienced as planned, a scripted experience. Nothing left to chance. And yet.

The beaches though are public spaces, and are being used as such. Spontaneous ‘pockets of interaction’ occur. Here, an impromptu date on the rocks, with a kiss. There, a Muslim family gathers with a picnic, shrouded in headscarves and hijabs.

Different races and classes, belief systems and backgrounds rub elbows and share sand.

Some are buying expensive beers from the beach club, others having brought picnic lunches. There is a pleasant lack of exclusion here, that is often found in similar places in North America or Europe. A sort of harmonic egalitarian feel that is, I believe, one of Singapore’s unique attributes.

There is a free tram system that takes visitors to various parts of the island, from the “beautiful people” to the more average and workaday. It may be fake – but at least it is fair.

Sentosa seems to embody Singapore’s paradox:

It is hyper planned, sterile, somewhat ersatz, and evoking other places (it reminds me of the “Polynesian” resort at Disney World, which is meant to mimic this part of the world… the Irony!). But it is at the same time not a place that repels, but a sensory and experiential feast. One wants to dislike it, to judge it, but it is likable, easy, safe, clean, and enjoyable. This is Singapore’s duality, its contradiction.

**

Tanjong Beach Club is about half Asian and half Eurasian, slanted toward the middle and upper middle classes. Australian accents, British, and European tongues. Some Americans. Age mainly 20s and 30s, some families with young children. People that seem to come here often and know what they are doing, know each other. This must be a Sunday routine.

Very low bodyfat. Half of these people could be models. Maybe some are. There is also, a definitive queer presence here, as one would also find on a Balearic beach such as Ibiza. This is a cruising spot, thinly disguised. The kind of place spread by word of mouth, with some notoriety. Not obvious, but can be sensed nonetheless. There is something camp not only about Tanjong Beach, but about the whole island… down to the mer-lion.

This is sort of an island in drag.

An emasculated, bejewelled, caricatured island, dressed to the 9s. A bright tackiness. A beer pong table. Beach volleyball. Some femme types. No hippies. Does this erupt into a gay club at a certain time?

Or into a subversive place? Is it, by its very nature, unplanned and surprising? Or scripted, like everything else? Contested?

Is it for everyone? The shrouded, quiet Muslim family over there, having a picnic. How do they feel about the abs, buttocks, and booze of the beach club?

Appropriation of space, use of space, strategy, tactics. Foucault, LeFebvre. I am realizing I am out of place sitting and writing – someone just came up to me and seemed amused that I was doing so. Perhaps I am the odd one out. Why even think about these things?

*

China - Sept 19th to 23

The dragon.


First impressions:

1. Natalie Portman. She was the first advertisement I saw in the Shanghai airport, even before immigration control. Dior's Jewish princess. Welcome to China!

2. Brutal efficiency. Both the flight, and at the airport.

3. What is communism? Is this it? Or if not, what is this?

**

Is China old fashioned? Or is it the future?

I feel like anything I write about China will not do the place justice, and I only saw one corner of one massive (23 million person) city in a nation of many ethnicities and stories and over one billion people. So it is unfair for me to make observations. Only some thoughts from my brief visit.

Being in China made me realize how ... 'light' Singapore is. Singapore, as they say, can 'look' Chinese due to its 75% Han Chinese majority, but it is far, far from China. It is a garden city, it is a colonial city.

China is a great modern empire built upon thousands of years of influential history with its very own, roaring soul.

I was bamboozled, awed, offended, exhausted, invigorated, enlivened, weakened, strengthened, inebriated, and fucked by Shanghai. Not sure what else I can say, other than I would like to go back and slip more deeply into the city. If Shanghai is a pair of clothes, I only picked it up, smelled it, and looked at the price tag. I didn't put it on.

**

Sunday, 23

Shanghai Pudong International Airport

Just took the 300 km / hour 'Maglev' train to the airport, which felt like flying.  Not sure if it is necessary, but cool nonetheless. Can't see a maglev in New york or any other America now or in the future. 20+ miles in 7 minutes.

Some concluding thoughts on China / Shanghai, ending my first (and not last) visit.

Shanghai may not be the 'real' China, as the capitalist, global gateway with so much historical (Western) baggage and artifacts. But it certainly has parts of it. Just as New York City may not be the 'real' America, it is, quintessentially, a very American city.

Shanghai feels like 20 world cities jammed into one. New York, Paris, Moscow, Tokyo.

Maddening, frenzied, beautiful, frightening, electric, ugly, creepy, exciting, sad. Futurist. Old fashioned. Dirty, sleek. Fast. Layered. Alive. Excessive. Neon. Obscene. Fantastic.

Shanghai is like an erotic slap in the face when coming from languid, shiny, fine-scented Singapore. Singapore is the nice girl you met at the cotillion, and Shanghai is the whore you keep going back to.

Talk about 'spontaneous pockets of interaction'. Anything goes.

Art deco mansions next to a tea house. Ming dynasty doorway next to a Citibank. An impromptu bluegrass band announcing songs about Nashville in mandarin and then again with an Appalachian twang.

"To what do we compare China?" (ask Logan and Fainstein).

To everything. To ourselves.

Little India and the Arts District, 18th Sept

Smells, colors. Saffrons, reds and blues.

Little India is almost everything Singapore isn't. Messy, gritty, dynamic, full of shouts and sensations. As Sharon Zukin might say, "authentic."

Is it this way by accident, or on purpose?

Arts spaces (theatres, studios) coexist with bazaars and jewelry stores and immigrantspaces.

There is a palpable tension here, at least I sensed it - I was yelled at by a visibly agitated and probably insane  African woman who said something like "British cannot come here! British passports not welcome here!," looking at me. Good thing I'm not British.

There are surprises here. A beggar in a ditch. Backpackers and hawkers give a somewhat and refreshingly grimy edge that I haven't seen elsewhere on the island. This isn't so different than the (former) Lower East Side of New York or part of East London, with more tropical colors and heat.

That arts groups have 'seeped' into Little India is no accident. The adjoining district is the main Arts District, home to many large museums, galleries, studios, and "SOTA" - Singapore's School of the Arts, in a monumental, architect designed building. The creative vibe probably sought out the Colonial architecture, diversity, and comparatively low rents of the shop-houses as compared to the CBD and Chinatown (which gentrified earlier and more completely).

The museums and the Art School probably have a similar effect on Little India as the Covent Garden / Central St Martin cluster does on surrounding neighbourhoods in London, or the fashion and design schools of the Garment District / Chelsea in Manhattan. Seep, creep.

The "Stamford Arts Village" is a NACS (National Arts Council) sponsored space for performances, rehearsals, props, and storage room for a variety of creative groups that seem to need to audition / submit bids to get space in a competitive process.

Nearby, behind a gallery, I saw graffiti! Real, actual graffiti! albeit in a contained, designated space.

Still, the area and surrounding districts has a certain aura of artistic expression that one does not find on the Esplanade or at Marina Bay, or even in Chinatown, with its chic bars and 'experiential' economy.

These were always the ethnic quarters - Chinese, Indian and Malay, yes, but also Arab, Jewish, Armenian...

History of loud, multi-cultural exchange and dialogue and occasional shouting has left its imprint here and perhaps the embodiment of this history is the Bugis covered market, sort of the Covent Garden of Singapore, with hall after hall of bric a brac, food, colors, sex shops. Altogether wonderful. And delightfully NOT an air-conditioned, marble mall.

**
The tension I wrote about. TC Chang found that there is a tension between the immigrant (working class and poor) community and the hipsters, creative types and backpackers who coexist, each vying to use and even own the space.

Does this represent a Jane Jacobsean healthy mix, or the beginnings of entropy?

This area WILL change - construction indicates the arrival of a new metro line with a number of stations opening in the next 5 years. This will no doubt make the area more accessible and more popular with business types, and may cause a cleaning up of the facades, the replacement of immigrant shops with Starbucks and day spas. I hope this does not happen. I like this chaos and Singapore needs it.

**

Some other observations:

1. Singapore is a small island, but it is bigger that it seems at first! It takes longer to get places than one might expect - upwards of 40 minutes in some cases.

2. One DOES get used to the heat. I have, but only after many back to pack days of being outside. Now I hardly sweat. The weather does seem to have cooled, though, probably due to the beginnings of the (slightly cooler) Northeast monsoon.

3. Singapore can be expensive, but it is fair - tapered to assist those on low incomes, from students to the poor. Food at food stalls is cheap (2-3 pounds) and other things, from phone plans to the public transportation, seem subsidized and much cheaper than I'm used to. It all seems very 'pay as you go' - if you have the money, you can live lavishly, but if you don't, you can live. I like it - very utilitarian. And extends to the housing system, which I've written about already.

That's all for now. Off to China.