Zaf's Nine Singapore insights

The following information about Singapore was gleaned from two walking tours with tour guides Pam (from Monster Guides) and Ping (from Getyourguide tours). 

1. How did Singapore get it's name?

In 1299 an Indonesian Prince saw a lion while hunting on the island of Temasek. Temasek was the old name for Singapore derived from the Malay word Tasik meaning "sea town". The prince decided to call the island "the lion town" using two Sanskrit words: Singha for "lion" and Pura meaning "town" => "Singha pura". British changed it to Singapore.

2. Public housing - Independence from Malaysia/British in 1965, and within 40 years has transformed itself from a developing country to a materially advanced civilisation.  90% of Singapores 6 million population own their own home and live in government built apartment blocks. Government builds the apartments, provides heavy subsidies, so that citizens can buy their own apartment for $200K outright, or can rent-to-own over several years. 

• "The government wants young people to live near their parents so that their kids can be with the grandparents in the day and young people can work for the government".

3. Multi-cultural - one of the reasons Singapore was kicked out of Malaysia was because Malaysian society valued the indigenous Malay people giving them preferential treatment for jobs and education. Singaporeans wanted equal rights whatever your cultural background and religion. Four main ethnic groups, 4 religions and 4 national languages in Singapore:

• Chinese - 75% of Singaporeans. Buddhist / Taoists. Mandarin.
• Malay - Indigenous Malay. Muslims. Malaysian.
• Indian - Hindu (also indian Muslims). Tamil.
• Eur-asians - English. Christian. Modern Singapore started by British Mr Raffles in 1819

4. No more Ice cream vendors - Previously the streets were riddled with street sellers or "hawkers". People had their shops on the ground floor and lived above the shop in two story buildings called "shop houses". In the 1970s, the government moved millions of people from their shop houses and no more street sellers. Moved millions of people into public housing, hawker street markets and basement wet markets. Now, after a 3 hour walk around the city CBD there was only one ice cream vendor we saw. The licences to sell ice creams were only given out 30 years ago to specific men from poor families to help them earn an income. Once those men die then there will be no more licences and ice cream sellers.

5. Random Chinese cultural tit bits

• Evil spirits have not feet - Chinese Temples have a large wooden beam to step over. Chinese evil spirits have no feet. They just hover around above the ground, so they can’t climb up over a high threshold at the front door.
• Opium was biggest revenue for British empire
• No flushing toilets - Poo into bucket then at night sewerage collectors would pick up bucket through front trap door flap up until 1987
• Shaved foreheads and long ponytail stopped in 1911 when Chi dynasty over thrown

6. Japan and Singapore during World War 2

1937 Japan invaded China. Singaporean Chinese business men paid millions to help war against Japan to defend China. 1942 Japan invaded and took over Singapore from the Allies. Winston Churchill called Singapore the Gibraltar of the east, so the defeat by Japan was a massive defeat for the British empire.

Why did Japan beat the Singaporean allied troops in WW2?

• Japanese had long sleeve jungle uniforms with waterproof boots but allied soldiers had North African uniforms with shorts and short sleeve shirts. No defense against jungle mosquitoes, insects and branches scratching 
• Japanese had tanks, Allies had not one tank.
• Japanese used humans with wooden planks on their back to walk across rivers 
• Japanese had the mindset that the allies had killed their parents in the China-Japan war, so they wanted revenge. But allies were volunteer soldiers.
• Japanese stole village people's bicycles to travel quicker.

Singapore Holocaust: Japanese killed Chinese Singaporeans due to them sending money to China to fight Japan. Japanese killed 50K Chinese Singaporeans in mass graves that are buried in civilian war memorial.

7. Food is so cheap

• Two bowls of rice @ $2 each = $4
• Drink for Chels = $3 drink 
• Large Fried rice for Viki and Roddy = $6
• 10 chicken/beef skewers @ $1.5 each = $15
• Beef vegetable noodle soup for Zaf = $8

Cost $36 for dinner for seven people. 

8. Trees and shade everywhere - big rain trees in the middle of the city centre. Vertical gardens with huge vines and shrubs on the walls of sky scrapers. Big grassy paddocks on the top of bus stops and shaded footpaths through out city. Even the corners of traffic lights have shaded shelters for people to wait under in the shade.

9. So clean - no gum, no smoking, no eating durians in public, no crossing the road outside of zebra crossings