Pedalled Thoughts

We have all been told the world is shrinking, a phenomenon made possible by such developments as high-speed rails, undersea cables and satellite communications. Consequently, we are made more mobile. But what if all this is simply an illusion? A phantom comfort, born of an supreme, unshakeable complacency in both technology and in our right to them? These well-peddled thoughts I entertained on Monday night as Mary and I pedalled in the dark, our bums and our thighs burning from long sedentary years away from the bicycle.

Below: a well-taken photograph is a confidence trick.

On the unfathomably endless distance between Jalan Kayu and Ang Mo Kio, the fallacy of a shrinking world seemed to have been immeasurably stretched. Our excellent road networks and fuel-efficient vehicles have made for effortless commuting. But the straightforward nature of it all also translates into mindless commuting, a state of strained passivity devoid of sentiment.

On the inconsolably empty distance between Jalan Kayu and Ang Mo Kio, we took an exquisite, harrowed pleasure at each inch swallowed up by our laboured pedalling. We felt a sense of Tolstoyan accomplishment, at how the pulses which run from our sinews through the chains and into the paved earth turn into miles. Each mile covered on naked muscle made our world that night that one extra mile bigger.

In the end, I also succeeded exceedingly in bolstering my reputation (in Mary's eyes) as a crack(ed) assessor of distance. What was (wildly optimistically) intended as a two-hour return ride in the end took us over twice as long. It was a delay we never begrudged though, aching legs aside. Our ride took us all the way to the pretty surroundings of Sengkang Riverside Park.

We rode north along Ang Mo Kio Avenue 6 towards my Anderson Junior College, my alma mater, then turned east along the mostly featureless stretch along Ang Mo Kio Avenue 5. A left turn to Yio Chu Kang Road and a traffic crossing then brought us to the path which followed the serene green waters of Sungai Punggol north-eastwards past Kampong Lorong Buangkok, the last such settlement on the mainland.

Below: Eastword ho (seh)! (From top to bottom: the lily pond at Ang Mo Kio Garden West, convenient pit-stops, this time outside Nanyang Polytechnic, and the steps along Yio Chu Kang Road leading down to the Sungai Punggol riverside path.

Sengkang Riverside Park was unlike most other parks in Singapore, for two reasons - how naturally it blended in with its riverside location and how spacious it felt. The park straddled both banks of Sungai Punggol. A bridge, punctuated in its centre by two viewing platforms, linked both sides. There, in the middle of the river, we stopped, rested and watched the world go by.

Below: Evening come, evening calm. We really needed the lifebuoy by then.

The reeds swayed in the gentle breeze. The clouds drifted across mirrored sky. A yellow-vented bulbul flitted in between the shrubbery, then another. Groups of foreign workers, out on a day off from the many construction sites in the vicinity, posed for selfies against the suburban, riverine backdrop and with our bicycles. Children amused themselves and chased each other around the round orange seats and in the giant mangosteen gazebo. We fixed our eyes on the water and hoped for otters.

Below: my yellow-vented bulbul centrefold, and then the hint of an otter.

We were very grateful that Jalan Kayu wasn't far off from where we were. Four pratas, one maggi goreng, one iced teh tarik, one teh halia and one lime juice later, the decision we postponed all dinner came back to haunt us.

Below: much as this looked like just reward for our toil, it wasn't the end of our day.

On the regrettably endless distance between Jalan Kayu and Ang Mo Kio, we did Robert Frost proud.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Lights We Cherish

After having consecutively written off two Saturdays because of work and national commitments, we were really looking forward to this weekend. We clambered out of bed at half past two in the afternoon, and decided we should be tourists for the rest of the day. That meant we only left the house at close to six in the evening.

A week before we set aside the evening to catch the fireworks from the third National Education Show, which is actually a full-dress rehearsal for the National Day Parade (NDP) for Primary Five students. But as we only finished lunch at a quarter to five, we cancelled our booking made the previous week for dinner at Southcoast, an Australian pizzeria close to Marina Bay Sands from where we could watch the fireworks as we munch on dinner. We arrived in town close to seven, and took a saunter towards Esplanade Bridge, camera in hand and tripod slung across my back. A pleasant breeze and the mellow evening light combined to produce a cool, untropical evening.

As the speakers from the celebrations at the nearby Floating Platform boomed, the people who had made it possible rested, ate and got ready for the logistical whirlwood that would descend upon all once the stands disbursed their crowds. Bus drivers picnicked and caught up with each other. National Servicemen returned to their assigned positions as marshalls and reminded each other of their instructions. Policemen with their buzzing walkie-talkies patrolled the broadwalk where another crowd was steadily building in anticipation of the colour that would fill the skies at the end of the Parade.

For Mary and I it was a case of thoughtfully reacquainting ourselves with a thoughtless familiarity on a stroll we have taken so unthinkingly so often before - the parkside path along Connaught Drive on the fringes of the Padang, past the Tan Kim Seng fountain and its weathered classicity, the Cenotaph in its inviolate ivory and on the lawn next to it, with each step towards the Esplanade Bridge and its dancing evening lights on the river, a splendid view of the Singapore skyline emerging like steel shoots out of the low canopy. These are vistas forgotten in the purposeful haste with which we lead our lives, revealed in its stark glory against the night.

Below: City lights. City we love, lights we cherish.

All along Esplanade Bridge people waited. An army of photographers had already been encamped all along its length. Tripods had been set up near the rails, on the parapet between families and even on the verge dividing the walkway from the road. We managed to secure a spot close to the Esplanade itself. It didn't proffer the best view, but then again nowhere did. Another bridge was being constructed right in front of it.

Below: mind the gap; lights on water atop the Floating Platform.

There we waited for time to stop, as it does five times every year at eight in the evening when independent Singapore's birthday lights explode in the sky. Against the red-green afterglow the angular silhouette of the crane on the unfinished bridge before us cut a sharp contrast, a reminder that we can never finish writing the story that is Singapore. And that when time moves again at ten past eight we move again. We build again. We toil again. And then come August once more we wait again. Not just for the NDP fireworks, but for the lights in our own hearts. For the lights in our lives. The lights we celebrate. The lights we cherish.

Above: Not the best pictures, but certainly the best fireworks display on our little island.

State of Johor, state of Johor

On our Labour Day holiday a couple of months ago, a group of us from church decided to take a road trip to Johor. Some of us like to drive north, some of us just like to drive, some like to hike, and all of us wanted a break. The date was set for 5 July. The preparations intensified as it drew closer - supplies were purchased, maps acquired, tyre pressures checked and partners assured.

An early start meant meeting at Woodlands Centre at about 5.30 in the morning, and by then the Causeway was already starting to get clogged up. Breakfast we took at Taman Sentosa on the other side of the Straits of Johor in a familiar setting amidst Singaporean number plates and accents. At about 7.30 we began our journey to the east coast.

Our first destination was Hutan Lipur (Recreation Forest) Gunung Arong, to scale the 274 metre hill that lends it name to the reserve. It was a pleasant two-hour drive on Highway 3 all the way to Mersing. For long stretches, we saw little else but oil palm and rubber plantations - the wealth of the ersatz British Empire and of the State of Johor. We also passed several unused pillboxes, reminders of the feeble attempt by the British at imperial defence over seventy years ago. To the north, on our left, hovered the hint of greater adventure in the shape of the distant southernmost peaks of the Titiwangsa range.

Below: Palm riches along Highway 3.

As we searched for the trailhead once past Mersing, a right turn brought us to the tranquil beach of Tanjong Resang. We arrived at low tide to a gloriously empty stretch of sand. Eastwards on the horizon stood the faint silhouettes of the Seribuat islands. Jayson, after a brief survey, decided to bring his Subaru Forrester down to the beach. Allan followed and coaxed his own car down the same way. Soon we had two cars cruising along the coast and revelling in the wide open space before us.

Below: posing with our tank, Jayson humours us.

Below: Rally at Tanjong Resang.

Later we resumed the search for the trailhead and retraced our way to the highway. We found the visitor centre shortly after, only to learn very belatedly that the gates to the reserve were closing in an hour (noon) and that we needed a permit to actually enter it (no mention of it in the online accounts we read of people making the climb previously though). This permit could, apparently, be obtained either at Johor Bahru or Mersing, and on Friday, Saturday and Sunday the relevant office closes at noon. We were told of another closer option - that of getting to the top of the hill from Tanjong Resang where we gamboled earlier, and where a similar permit can be provided by a nearby resort. There remained the small issue of finding the trailhead, which we failed to earlier. And so Gunung Arong had to wait. We adjourned to Mersing for lunch, and decided to head back towards Kota Tinggi after that.

Mary and I had long known about the waterfall at Kota Tinggi, amongst the closest to Singapore that we could get to. Our lack of familiarity with Johor and the paucity of transport conspired to put off a visit until that weekend. There was a water theme park feel to the whole place, with weirs built across the stream to create wading pools and fibreglass slides installed along the concrete banks for human tubers (stuffed in a float ring this is what people generally look like) on rubber tubes. The main falls, however, remain blissfully unmolested.

We also saw little of the attraction's fabled weekend clutter, where both throng and trash were concerned. On a quiet Ramadan afternoon we could still manage photographs of the falls without people, courtesy of some creative positioning and the grace of our fellow visitors who lent us their spot in the sun for the half-minute we needed for our vanity.

Below: reliving our childhoods, note where it says Awas.

Below: the main falls from the top.

Rain started to fall when we drove out of the waterfall carpark and back towards Johor Bahru. As a grim grey evening descended, it was almost natural to recall that the thick jungle and tall hills all around were the scenes of the most recent conflicts in our short history. The images of the highway pillboxes earlier in the day returned to my mind, as did the single-minded fortitude of the Japanese soldiers who advanced so rapidly over such terrain all the way from northeastern Malaya. Later on, I was also reminded that Kota Tinggi witnessed fighting during the Konfrontasi too. The 8 1SIR soldiers who were ambushed whilst on patrol duties lost their lives just north of the waterfall.

Back in JB, we re-learnt a sobering truth over dinner at the Aeon Shopping Centre in Tebrau City. Security warnings aside (these were of course legion), we were turned away from a near-empty Manhattan Fish Market and waited for an hour for our order at Nando's despite being amongst the earliest to arrive.

There is a State of Johor. And then there is a state of Johor. It is a beautiful place, beyond the alarm which the name of its capital raises amongst some Singaporeans. We will visit again, of course. But we won't linger in JB.

Making a Mountain out of a Molehill

We achieved a major milestone today, although incomplete preparation shorn it of its full glory. Mary managed her first successful ascent of Bukit Timah, all of 163.8 metres high. But having forgotten to pack any form of insect repellant, we kept to the sealed road that led to the summit and eschewed any of the jungle trails that might have provided a little bit more adventure, and that might also have added some gloss to our chest-thumping.

It's been a while since last I was at the Nature Reserve. The intention was to start a regular walking programme that is meant to gradually condition Mary for our year-end trip. Furthermore, we recently learnt the reserve would be closed for a year starting September to allow the vegetation time to recover from the impact of mass access. And it was pretty crowded by the time we arrived at about half past nine in the morning.

One of only two tracts of primary rainforests left in the world which are situated within municipal boundaries (guess the other, answers at the bottom), Bukit Timah is a biodiversity hotspot in Singapore. However, my previous visits have hitherto only yielded sightings of the ubiquitous long-tailed macaques. Sticking to the main trail this time round would significantly reduce the chances of spotting anything else. We got lucky this time, as we spotted a Malayan colugo not long more than five minutes into our walk.

Below: I -don't- like to mov'it, mov'it. Spot the colugo.

This particular individual seems a fixture in that particular part of the forest. It was visible from the main trail, not far from a plastic information board which enjoined walkers to look out for colugos. We could have ignored it for just another blotch of brown in the woods, but for a second glance and the zoom from my Dad's trusty Nikon (which I've adopted because its 30x optical zoom helps it act as a reliably functional binoculars - for birds, the kind that'll interest ornithologists).

The largely herbivorous colugo is also known as the flying lemur, although it is unrelated to its eponymous terrestrial namesakes from Madagascar. With its skin membrane with stretches between its front and hind limbs, it possesses the ability to glide between trees, reportedly over as long a distance as 100 metres without losing more than 10 centimetres of height. Most of this takes place at night, at which time the colugo does most of its foraging. The most significant action we espied was it turning its neck for a quick scan of its surroundings.

The rest of the walk yielded little more than rustlings and the calls of unknown birds, which we stopped to investigate inconclusively - often just us peering blankly into indistinguishable shades of green. We were up and down the hill in about 40 minutes, without counting the many minutes we spent ogling at the colugo. The maiden wildlife sighting was well-timed, particularly as the undiminished possibility of a second trip, and of more such sightings hopefully, meant we got off to an auspicious start.

Below: take a bough, Singapore's very own Hundred Acre Wood.

Five Taipeis, One Taiwan, How Many Chinas?

Taipei - what can I say? No, we've not been hopelessly captivated. There seems to be little beyond that oft-repeated summary of the quintessential Singaporean experience in Taipei - 买东西, 吃东西, 买东西, 吃东西. (This translates to "shop, eat, shop again, eat again".) But there are several other Taipeis in the traveller's imagination, beyond this consumer's epicurean paradise.

One is Television Taipei, portrayed in the epic drama serials which many follow religiously back in Singapore. Another is Green (clean, too) Taipei, loved by both locals and expatriates alike, who enjoy the long rambles in the wilderness on its very doorstep. Finally there is Cultural Taipei. The term here is contentious, because everything and nothing written about here could fall under this very heading. There are two principal, intertwined strains here - the Taipei which originated from imperial Chinese times, another modern Taipei which had its roots in the post-war regimes of the two Chiangs. It might be more helpful here to speak of a Historical Taipei and a buzzing Creative Taipei with its proud monuments to modernism and its bold postmodern doodlings. Again, these aren't discrete categories, for neither could exist without the other. We partook of all the above, in varying measures, to varying degrees of satisfaction.

Below: five Taipeis but one China? I bought this set of figurines (together with one of Teresa Teng, who I suspect had little to do with any form of political dialogue in this or any other parallel universes) from a Ximending souvenir store.

Green Taipei and Television Taipei shared some broad similarities. This is particularly evident in the tireless recycling of plots in the intractably lengthy local soap operas that never seem to end. Moreover, one cannot escape either within the confines of the city, as ample visual reminders of green hills on the city edges demonstrate. We got more than enough of our fair share of Television Taipei in the hotel room. If you thought either 爱 ("Love", the 787-episode series which polarized its Singaporean audience) or 夜市人生 ("Night Market Life", its 940-episode successor) was too much to handle, Taipei cable television ran simulcasts of three or four of these, on different channels, at any one time. Needless to say, our Taipei experience lacked the unquenchable bathos these serials offered.

We had, on the other hand, a more earthy and ordinary experience, especially where Epicurean Taipei and Cultural Taipei. Those who know me know I'm not much of a foodie. And while Taipei contains many stops for those here on a gastronomic pilgrimages, what I remembered more was the ready availability of street snacks - a packet of muah chee here, a bowl of ice shavings with fruits and syrup there, and after another mere hundred metres emerging from another shop with a whole bag of tau sa (red bean) buns with meat floss and a cup of bubble milk tea. On our penultimate day in Taipei, Mary convinced her mother to visit a Hello Kitty-themed cafe on the pretext of sating my obsession with the character. My protestations that I very much prefer cats with mouths fell on deaf ears.

Below: Large Fried Chicken Skin and Dough. My camera lens wasn't wide enough to capture the rest of the signboard.

Below: We stumbled upon this in the Dinghao shopping district (顶好商圈), one of the few places in the world where you can dismember and devour cats at your leisure.

Then there was the shopping. Amongst the three of us I had, predictably, the lowest purchase to shops ratio. The different per unit measurements in this indicator run the entire gamut of consumer behaviour from restrained to rampant. The lowest rung is the purchase per country, then per city, per shopping district, per mall, per level, per shop, per section and finally per shelf. There exists also a range of eco-systems to satisfy every sort of shopping preference. You had your upmarket air-conditioned mall, your utilitarian underground malls located right next to the subway station and your bustling night markets filled with bargain-hunters. A plane full of Singaporeans flying home from Taipei often weighs more heavily than a plane headed there from home.

Below: the perennially-crowded Ximending shopping district, and that unmistakable Taipei landmark, Taipei 101 (a facet of both Historical and Creative Taipei too?)

Regrettably, we did not have more a couple of fleeting glances at Historical Taipei. At least not this time. Historical Taipei, you could say, was everywhere, given our location at the heart of the old city. For us its most recognizable face was the Tianhou Temple (天后宮) on Chengdu Road which we passed everyday on our way out and back. A friendly middle-aged lady who approached me as I was fumbling with my camera in the temple courtyard also provided a brief history of the temple - that it was established in Qing times by merchants when Chengdu Road was (and still is) a trading street. Devotees come to worship Mazu, the Goddess to whom many communities in the Fujianese diaspora previously gave thanks for safe passage. We forget sometimes that Taiwanese isn't completely Chinese.

Below: Tianhou Temple, wedged between modern shophouses in Ximending.

It would be fitting to round off with a description of Creative Taipei, which my cousin, herself a fine artist, goes on and on about. While we comparative philistines lack that finer appreciation, two particular moments revealed Taipei's more cultured persona. The first occurred at the Zhongxiao Fuxing (忠孝复兴) subway station, on the first of our several train changes in Taipei. Mary drew our attention to the colourful walls and some interestingly lit panels. I had earlier instinctively dismissed these as space given over completely to garish over-advertisement, as they would have been done in subway stations the world over. The second was the couple of harpists in Ximending who were dressed as elegantly as their instruments provided a melodious antithesis to the brash consumerism on blatant display all around. On the one hand we felt mightily reassured that harps did not only exist on Guinness mugs. On the other, we recognized full well that these were only velvet cultural trimmings on the edges of what remained an unmovably iron structure of capitalism. After all, Chinese have historically been both shrewd merchants and faithful patrons of the arts at the same time.

Below: great walls of Taipei, and one of our harpist virtuoso.

It was a testimony to the prodigious energy in this pulsating city. As with most urban circadian rhythms, life really begins at sundown in Taipei. But while much of our shopping in Singapore winds down close to ten, in the ceaseless hives of the night markets this carries on deep into the wee hours of the morning. Our wee bit of travel this time just wasn't enough. But then, it almost always isn't.