A Green Christmas in Singapore
When we first came to Singapore as our entry point to the region, we were blown away by the shiny and new city. The cleanliness, the futuristic skyscrapers with forests bursting forth from inside them, the diversity of religious buildings -often in a row next to one another-, and the clear indications of a thoughtful and well planned society. Singapore is a place unlike any other, and probably unable to ever be replicated. The closest place it could be compared to is Denmark, solely in the sense that it shares the communal vision of a peaceful and prosperous future for all and an uncommon sense of responsibility to care for one another. In everything else-architecture, food, weather, diversity-the cities are as distant as the space between them.
Singapore, a city-state island sitting between Malaysia and Indonesia, was established in the 14th century as a small trading settlement. After a history dotted with skirmishes with present day Java and Thailand, in 1867 the island of 200 inhabitants became a British Colony and was used as a free port-an area of trade where companies are shielded from high-or any-taxes to encourage economic activity. After a brief invasion and occupation by the Japanese during World War II, they returned to British rule for 18 years as the British Empire mishandled the nation and drove them further into poverty. By the time Singapore gained its independence from Britain (and broke with Malaysia after only a short 2 years of unification), Singapore was a city of slums and tenements-an unthinkable reality compared to Singapore today. In 1965, when Singapore became its own republic, the plans for the transformation into today's modern metropolis were laid.
Lee Kuan Yew, the first prime minister of Singapore and the “world’s most beloved dictator”, is attributed with creating modern day Singapore through his visionary economic and social plans that came at the expense of the free press and un-manipulated elections. Serving until 1990, Lee Kuan Yew-known as LKY- implemented policies that focused on aligning Singapore with foreign corporations, prioritizing multiculturalism (Singapore, seemingly, never had a true indigenous population and has always been a melting pot for people of all Asian ethnicities), and the”primacy of group interests” (AKA: community success is more important than individual).
a monk passing a stall selling fresh flower garlands in Little India
To an outsider like me, the goal of Singapore seems to be planned utopia; a peaceful, prosperous, harmonious society with the highest number of benefactors possible. And it seems to be working. Sixty years after LKY began his initiatives in Singapore, the country has the second highest GDP per capita measure in the world, following only Luxembourg (the United States ranks 14th), is ranked as the happiest country in Asia and boasts the 6th best quality of life in the world. Singapore poses an interesting question over and over again, what are individuals willing to sacrifice to have a high quality of life?
We’ve stayed in Singapore long enough for the shiny gleam of the futuristic first impression the city gives off to become more nuanced and complicated. There’s something missing here that I didn’t catch the first time we came for just two days. The sidewalks are clean enough to eat off of, but there are signs all around the city, reminding the citizens they’re being watched and that littering carries a hefty fine. This is the first place we’ve been where there haven’t been huge flocks of pigeons, pecking at crumbs on the sidewalk, covering the streets in poop. We thought it was curious until we saw the 15 foot long banners warning locals against feeding pigeons, threatening them with a $10,000 fine. To me, the threat of fines for doing things that negatively impact your home and wildlife is worth it for the outcome. But here that question pops up again: to what extent does the method matter if the desired, positive outcome is achieved? What are people willing to pay for a modern-day utopia? They don’t call it “Fine City” for nothing, after all.
The flip side of the threatening, authoritarian-lite signs about fines, are the considerate and thoughtful signs plastered throughout the city. Dementia Friendly Singapore, a city wide initiative to center care and dignity for elders with dementia through a robust, community-driven approach, posters can be found throughout the subway. A cast of silly, thumb-like characters can be found on the doors to the train, reminding riders that “a bag on the floor makes room for more” or “volume down, smiles all around” and other corny subway etiquette encouragements. And it seems to work. I can only imagine how Americans back home would balk at the reminders to be a considerate person to your neighbor. While, of course, there are considerate Americans, I can’t imagine a PSA campaign reminding them to be thoughtful and community oriented would go over well anywhere back home. I can see the lewd graffiti adorning the mascots now. I’m so curious why that is. Maybe our pride? A nagging anti-establishment resistance to authority? Are we able and willing to care for one another in our small everyday actions without a reminder? Is that something we, as a nation, even care to do? Singapore and Copenhagen have both taught me that I’m yearning for a community-and government-that cares. A city filled with strangers that are invested in one another’s happiness, safety, comfort, and general well-being.
While on the surface, Singapore seems to have a diverse and vibrant culture-a Hindu temple sits next to a Buddhist temple, down the street from a Catholic Church, next to a Methodist one-but I wonder if there’s a sterility to the diversity that mirrors that of the clean city. Singapore almost feels money-washed. Its rapid ascension to one of the wealthiest countries in the world is sure to have, in some ways, placed the all-mighty dollar above much else that exists. I’ve read criticisms of a loss of culturally important traditions for the ethnic groups that call Singapore their home and how the policy of educating in English contributes to this problem; but English as one of the country's official languages is tied to their success in business and used as a bridge between different ethnic groups in the country. They say the diversity in Singapore is more “managed” than organic, a sentiment that’s visibly echoed by the organized, cohesive look in the ethnic enclaves throughout the city. The lack of graffiti, and other random artistic expressions of identity, would shock Porto natives into a coma. Is it the embrace of foreign companies that diminishes ethnic traditions, government policy, or simply good old fashioned capitalism? How does a rapid rich-ification of a place change the people in it? It’s hard to have a nuanced understanding of the problems after just two weeks in the country. And I’m no Anthony Bourdain, I’m not walking up to strangers at their food stalls asking for a pad thai and “oh by the way, do you think Singapore is as diverse as the government claims”? But some days I wish I could.
from right to left: Chinese shophouses from British colonialism, a Hindu temple, a Buddhist temple (containing pieces of the Buddha including his tooth), a modern residential building
One approach that Singapore takes to creating a prosperous society that I wish we would adapt is in their city planning and architecture. As a city-state and island nation, Singapore faces the not-novel problem of limited space, but takes the challenge to the next level as it expands on only 720 km of land. After some early missteps, like tearing down historical buildings that should have been preserved, the city now follows rigorous guidelines. The most impactful rule that we learned about is: when a building is built, it must replace 100% of the plant life and greenery that it removes. Once we learned that, the skyscrapers with trees ripping out of them took on an air of social responsibility as well as jaw-dropping innovation.
Sustainability is an integral part of city planning in Singapore as they’re working with a tighter resource budget than most countries. We toured one of the skyscrapers that had a forest trapped inside it at seventeen and forty stories high: the Capitasprings building. Trees and bushes grew out of carefully maintained corners of the building, facing the outside world, giving the impression of a once skyscraper that nature had overtaken. Inside, 60 foot trees grew from the seventeenth story into the open air atrium cut out of the middle of the building, popping up along suspended walking paths. Their sustainability plan is proudly displayed in the lobby and on their website, as it is in many other buildings, creating a strong sense of accountability and responsibility while explaining the incredible innovations being implemented to achieve their ambitious goals.
Capitasprings captured from the courtyard of a Taoist temple
The 18th floor
We could afford to spend two weeks in Singapore thanks to a bunny named Papook that we pet sat in exchange for accommodations in the extremely expensive city. We didn’t know when we accepted the gig that what we needed most at the holidays when a place to pretend was home. Spending Christmas and New Years in a new place, in the absence of any sense of familiarity, gave me the gift of knowing what’s most important at the holidays. The Grinch was right, you guys. Christmas doesn’t come from a store. I’m grateful for the unique holiday we had: figuring out groceries for cookies in a foreign grocery store, watching the Christmas light show on the Supertrees at Gardens by the Bay, the carrot-bribed cuddles from the bunny under our host's small (plastic) Christmas tree, and collecting Chinese symbols of good fortune to prepare for the new year. Celebrating Christmas inside a prosperous urban jungle is definitely a once-in-a-lifetime holiday experience that seems unlikely to be repeated. But I’m looking forward to the next holiday season and appreciating it all the more in the light of what we didn’t have this year and who we couldn’t see.
a fiend for carrots
for money wealth! We could use it this far into the trip!
With an overabundance of malls and stores, ranging from the curious goods in Chinatown to the boujie designer goods and everything in between, Singapore is an excellent place to come if you love to shop and have money to blow. For Christmas, we agreed to spend less than $20 on one another; the gifts had to be cheap but not trash and small enough to take up little to no space in our suitcase (the hottest real estate market in town). A Christmas miracle to pull off. After window shopping luxury goods and beautifully designed items, we split up and descended into the city in search of gifts for one another. Not surprisingly, we ended up buying each other the exact same thing: jewelry making supplies. And, in a city bursting with stores, from the very same shop no less. We missed each other by minutes.
The day after Christmas, we caught a ferry to nearby Lazarus island, an undeveloped, white sandy beach island inhabited only by curious monkeys and Jurassic monitor lizards. Despite my best efforts to avoid a sting-especially by the nearby highly venomous box jellyfish- the moment we got into the tepid, blue waters, our skin began to prickle and burn; the red imprints of tentacles wound around my leg, across Grants back, punctuated by patches of raised bumps. I’ve never been stung by a jellyfish-my favorite animal-but, as expected, the pain didn’t dampen my admiration for the beautiful, evolutionary oddities. But, we did decide to get out of the water for the rest of the day.
The Chinese temple dedicated to merchants
Wandering through the lush green island, we came across long-tailed macaques sitting under a gazebo by the water, sitting in a row while they combed each other, their tails swinging in the sticky breeze. On the other side, a Chinese temple dedicated to merchants; sitting on stilts above a lagoon that filled at high tide, the empty sand revealed mud dobbers, scurrying fiddler crabs, fish darting across the remaining shallow puddles, and a monitor lizard lumbering across the expanse, making her way to the grass to search for bird eggs to munch on. Across the water, we could see the shiny skyline of Singapore, cargo ships pulling in and out of the harbor.
Thirteen hours ahead of everyone back home, we rang in the New Year sweating in the humid Singapore streets with a hundred thousand others, watching the exploding fireworks reflected in the glass of the infamous Marina Sands building. We were shocked to exit the consistently empty subway station to see walls of people, orderly filing into the roped off routes to get the best view of the show; curiously un-crowded, there hadn’t yet been any indication that 6 million people actually lived in Singapore until that night. Ringing in 2025 in a place I never in my wildest dreams imagined I would be gave me a moment of clarity and gratitude for the year behind me and the adventures that lay ahead of us.
Note the cameras at the front of the crowd- a typical sight in Singapore. Lots of phone screens.
While we couldn’t afford the shopping in Singapore, we could afford to eat. I can’t speak to the restaurants, as they were far out of reach for our meager budget, but the hawker stations, where we found ourselves eating almost every meal, are cheap, diverse, and delicious. Hawker stations are scattered all throughout the city and an excellent foray into Asian food from all over the continent. Manageable food courts are chocked full of small stalls, each one selling a different regional cuisine, a different country’s cuisine, or a single dish they’ve sometimes spent their life perfecting. As a white westerner, we often didn’t know anything about what we were selecting on the board other than that it looked delicious. Out of every country we’ve been to, we consistently ate the best, and for the best value (often the cheapest price too) in Singapore. I’ll be thinking about the $2 mango lassi that changed my life until my dying breath.
In our two weeks in Singapore, I’ve left with an understanding of new possibilities for a harmonious society and a new understanding of what people are willing to pay to create it. The US is not Singapore and could never be, but there’s still a lot we could learn from a society that systemically cares. And I’m learning just how important that is to me and the life I hope to build.
I’m sending this newsletter from Kyoto, Japan, possibly my favorite country of the entire trip-and that’s saying something. We have a jam packed 8 days here, trying to fully absorb the country and I’m so excited for it.
-Amelia
Sayonara! (Did you know this was Japanese for goodbye? I sure as hell didn’t!)
