Scribbles from the Same Island Page 9

  Without wishing to trivialise major global issues, I’d rather play Foreplay on a Saturday night than watch news of the latest gig cancellation, shooting or bombing. In fact, I fancy a game right now. Do you know Ulrika Jonsson’s handphone number?

  To be honest, though, I’ve got a better chance with the minimart auntie. No slap and tickle, just lots of bloody tapping.

  NOTE: I was really pissed off when Oasis and a couple of other acts cancelled their Singaporean gigs after the Bali attacks last year. It demonstrated, once again, many Westerners’ short-sighted and blinkered views of the region. If you read the British tabloids you could be forgiven for thinking: “All Muslims bad, all Asia Muslims, so all Asia bad.”

  On a personal level, Oasis has been my favourite band for years. I even managed to somehow mention the group in the introduction of my previous book, Notes from an even Smaller Island. So, as you can imagine, I was well chuffed when I got to interview Noel Gallagher, the creative force behind the band. Two days after the article was published, however, Oasis cancelled its gigs in both Singapore and the Philippines. I felt a right prick. Luckily for me, I had a new board game to cheer me up.

  THE WHEEL

  THE screaming was deafening. As the train pulled into the Canary Wharf station in east London, the pitiful high-pitched whine drew the attention of everyone on the carriage. It was most embarrassing because the panic-stricken voice was mine. We were going to crash! Demonstrating my characteristic strengths of Jonah, this was my first time on the state-of-the-art Docklands Light Railway and I end up with a driver who thinks he’s Houdini. The bastard had disappeared.

  “Look mum,” I bellowed. “There’s no driver. He’s jumped out. We’re going to smash into the station. We’re all going to die.”

  My humiliated mother, as always, muttered something about “her stupid son showing her up in a public place” and silenced me with a subtle, but effective, slap across the face.

  I should have maintained my cool. I should’ve known that the new transport system was automated and required no driver. I mean, I was 16 at the time. But I’ve always been extremely backward when it comes to transport and technology. When I first ventured onto the archaic London Underground as a boy, I was left deeply traumatised when I discovered that the trains did not have jovial, red faces on the front with names like Thomas the Tank Engine or Percy the Pink Pervert. The surreal prospect of travelling on a driverless train could only be the work of Jules Verne as far as I was concerned. So I thoroughly empathise with the Singaporean commuters who, in October 2002, suffered at the mechanical hands of the automated LRT trains, which service the HDB heartlands.

  Before you could say, “Wheel, you are the weakest link, goodbye”, the LRT industry almost came off the rails — for six or seven minutes. That was how long a driverless LRT train travelled along the Bukit Panjang line after a guide wheel fell off, damaging the track and causing a power trip. Stranded and seriously delayed, the shocked passengers were understandably furious.

  Pragmatic officials of the SMRT system have already formulated a proposal to channel that fury. Should a train breakdown again, commuters will be able to lift individual flaps under their feet and run along the track, based on the Flintstones’ model of kinetic energy. Watch how many executives will be late for work when their destiny lies in their own feet.

  But to give the LRT network its due, services resumed within a couple of days. The repairs would have been quicker, but SMRT failed to agree terms with a certain Malcolm Higgins. In some circles, Higgins is revered as a technological genius. In other words, he’s a sad geek who should’ve got out more when he was a teenager. In April 2002, he promised to rescue the British rail industry with, wait for it, a laser gun. The inventor claimed to have developed a laser beam, which could be fitted under trains to vaporise the leaves on the tracks.

  Allegedly, he was sane when he made this bold claim. Though he whooped a lot and concluded by saying, “If lasers were good enough for Han Solo, then they are good enough for British Rail. Now, get your fucking hands off my gun!”

  But that is the fundamental difference between Singaporean and British train services. Falling leaves can bring the entire rail network of southeast England to a standstill. In October 2000, for instance, wet leaves were blamed for a train derailment in Surrey, where the train went through a red light and just missed a commuter train. Fortunately, no one was injured, but the passengers now refuse to walk under trees during the autumnal months.

  I wouldn’t wish to downplay or trivialise the genuine grievances of LRT commuters of late, but if the driverless system has had just 50 problems since it began running in 1999, then it should be lauded, not lambasted.

  The London Underground encounters more difficulties and breakdowns every day. According to a 2001 survey, one in 20 peak trains don’t run, escalators remain broken for months and some stations have been neglected since they were built. The decaying, Victorian tube system is estimated to need 1.2 billion pounds worth of immediate investment and a further 400 million pounds annually just to keep it going. And then you have the additional problems that really are beyond the company’s control.

  When I was 18, I found myself virtually alone on a deserted platform at London’s East Ham station. Considering it was only a couple of days before Christmas and the high street was packed with shoppers, the empty station was slightly unnerving. The station controller asked me to leave and when I asked why, he pointed to a sports bag, just two metres away and said: “Because we think that’s an IRA bomb, mate.”

  The bag had been left under the same bloody bench that I was sitting on. It wasn’t a bomb, it rarely is, but it was the fastest working laxative I’ve ever known.

  So it is a little premature to suggest the wheels have fallen off the LRT industry. Yes, I know there was another one. But if you’ve survived bomb scares and the odd public battering from your mother, you’re entitled to the occasional pun in your book.

  Having depended on the crumbling, rat-infested London Underground to get me to school every day, I can safely say that SMRT manages the greatest public transport network I have ever known. It just needs to make its trains less impersonal. Painting smiling faces on the front and naming them Thomas or Percy has proved extremely popular. And if another wheel falls off, ‘Han Solo’ Higgins says he’s ready with his laser gun.

  NOTE: I received some criticism over this one from a Singaporean chap who thought that I was being somewhat harsh on the London Underground and that I was making an unfair comparison between the two transport models — one being modern and the other prehistoric. It’s certainly true that the London Underground, built during the Victorian era, was a revolutionary, technological breakthrough in its day. And I genuinely believe that Britain is unfairly criticised for being a pioneer in many of its social policies — for instance, the London Underground, municipal housing, the welfare state and organised football. At the time, they were all sound ideas that immeasurably improved the living standards of the working classes. The said services put a roof over my head, gave me free school milk and took me to work and school every day. Indeed, the last one gave me a hobby where I could swear at 11 grown men and not get told off by my dad. Having said that, you still have to take your hat off to the Singaporean government on this one. They retained the best qualities of all of these policies and discarded the rest (the S-League being the possible exception). Being a rather late arrival into the world of nation-states, it’s difficult to say whether this was by chance or design. (Singapore lacked the infrastructure to support a ‘from-the-cradle-to-the-grave’ system of welfare in 1965, even if it had wanted to.) Nevertheless, Britain’s welfare state, like its public transport services, needs a ridiculous cash injection just to prevent its collapse in the new millennium. Why should Singaporeans care if the London Underground came first and SMRT had the benefit of hindsight garnered from another country’s mistakes? Despite huge government subsidies, the London Underground loses thousands of poun
ds every day, while the MRT and bus services in Singapore actually turn a profit at the end of each financial year. Even if the odd wheel does fall off from time to time. But that’s the reality, so be damn proud of it.

  THE FREAK

  ONE of the most difficult aspects about living 10,000 kilometres away from England is that my annual whirlwind visit is an exhausting trek to each of the relative outposts. I’m not complaining. I’m the selfish one who chose to live in Singapore. But it does mean, of course, the incomparable visit to my grandmother. Born just after the First World War and married by the Second, she proudly boasts that American servicemen ensured that she never needed to buy her own drinks for the full six years of conflict. A remarkable woman.

  But she is a trifle off-balance. Every year, she assumes Singapore is the Asian equivalent of Hell’s Island and I’m England’s answer to Papillon, always seeking to escape.

  “Are you still out in that place?” she begins cheerily.

  “Singapore?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Shame, really. When do you think they will let you come home?”

  “Nan, I love it there. I have a great job. We have lots of mates and it’s a great place to live.”

  “Yeah, you write books and newspapers, don’t you?”

  “Well, sort of. But we’re having a good time.”

  “Still, if they are pleased with all that work you are doing, they might let you come back early, right?”

  “Nan, for the last time. It’s a country, not a prison.”

  But I know she’s stopped listening. That’s assuming she ever paid attention in the first place. By then, she’s already moved on to her mission in life — to feed her guests until they die. In this respect, she is similar to her endearing Singaporean ‘auntie’ counterparts. She asks the same question every year and always gets the same response.

  “Would you like a sandwich, Jodie?”

  “Her name’s Tracy, nan.”

  “Sorry, Tracy. I’ve got ham, cornbeef, cheese. Which one would you like, Jodie?”

  “She’s vegetarian, nan. Remember, I told you before, right? She can’t eat meat.”

  “Did you? Oh that’s right. I forget everything now, silly old bastard I am... What about turkey?”

  “She can’t eat meat, nan.”

  “Oh yeah. Shame, really. When do you think you can start eating proper food again?”

  “She does eat proper food, nan. She just chooses not to eat meat.”

  “Does she? Shame really.”

  We’ve endured the same interrogation for seven years now, so we can usually answer the questions on autopilot. But my nan’s forgetfulness and harmless ignorance still left my poor girlfriend completely unprepared for the stunned reactions she gets in Singapore. Here, she is a freak. Informing friends, dinner guests and strangers generally that she is a vegetarian generates, at best, looks of puzzlement or, at worst, withering looks of contempt followed by an unpleasant grilling that wouldn’t be out of place at the Internal Security Department. I’ve told her before that she might as well say: “I’m a cannibal. It’s hereditary. I used to have seven brothers and sisters, but we ate them. So, please, eat everything up, so there’s more for me later.” Believe me, the horrified expressions couldn’t be much worse than those she suffers now.

  The negative reactions from aunties and uncles, like my grandmother, are understandable. As Singapore struggled in its formative years, putting food on the table was difficult enough. Asking for a soya burger with low-fat mayonnaise during the ’60s would have been rewarded with a slap from your mother, and deservedly so. It was no different for my grandmother. During the austere post-war years, which came with ration books and coupons, housewives queued for free horsemeat because it didn’t require coupons. Feeding screaming babies took precedence over saving a few well-fed hogs.

  But the response to my missus’ vegetarianism from the 30-somethings was more of a surprise. Singaporeans around my age often feel the need to challenge my girlfriend’s moral choice. And, just like a visit to my grandmother, the same, tedious questions always come thick and fast.

  “You’re a vegetarian? But why?”

  “Oh, it’s just a personal thing. No big deal,” my patient girlfriend replies.

  “Are you allergic to the taste of meat?”

  “No, it’s not that.”

  “Oh, it must be religion, right. I thought so. You’re part of a religion where you can’t eat certain animals, right?”

  “No, I’m not religious.”

  “Then why don’t you eat meat?”

  “Oh, just for the animals, you know. I don’t like eating other animals.”

  “That’s it? That’s why you’re a vegetarian? You want to save the animals. Ha.” For some reason, this always gets a big laugh and my girlfriend always gets embarrassed. Only on one occasion have I retaliated. The ‘vegetarians-are-weirdos’ jokes were getting really predictable and tiresome. One of the jokers didn’t eat certain meats on religious grounds and as the so-called quips developed an undercurrent of nastiness, the hypocrisy became nauseous.

  “So let me get this straight,” I asked. “Not eating meat on the grounds of a faith for a god we never see is tolerated. But not eating meat on the grounds of protecting actual, living creatures that we see around us every day is a subject worthy of ridicule? This hypocrisy really pisses me off.”

  The embarrassed silence that followed my little outburst told me I shouldn’t take that subject any further and I won’t here. But for many, my missus is a social freak, often treated like an invalid.

  Yet she never complains. I’ve lost count of the times when a friend has sighed melodramatically and said: “There’s great food here. Let’s eat here. Oh shit, we can’t, can we? We can’t because I know they don’t have any vegetarian dinners. Hang on, you can eat french fries, right?” Unlike a born-again Christian, she doesn’t act like a born-again vegetarian, preaching to other Singaporeans by saying: “Come follow me, people. I’ve found the path to enlightenment. A meatless diet will provide the key to the afterlife.”

  But she is a sneaky one, burrowing away quietly and laying the foundations for the future. The five-year-old kids she teaches in Singapore must be the most environmentally aware pre-school students in the world. A parent once came in and told my girlfriend that her child had lectured her for killing some cockroaches. Another student reprimanded a friend for killing a make-believe spider. A little extreme perhaps, but these little guys might just save the world that we’ve fucked up.

  According to the academics, my girlfriend is an ovo-lacto vegetarian, which is generally the most commonly practiced dietary regime. The ovo-lacto mob won’t eat any meat or fish, sticking to vegetables, eggs and dairy. That is, food products that don’t involve anything with a face being killed.

  Don’t get me wrong, the missus doesn’t want to eat anything that’s a product of factory farming either. But drinking soya milk made her vomit, literally, and she lost weight at an alarming rate. Finding free-range products is possible here, but it’s about as likely as telling the average Singaporean that you’re a vegetarian and not getting the piss taken out of you.

  That’s why I admire her. It’s so difficult to be a vegetarian here, especially if you’re not a big fan of vegetables in the first place, which she isn’t. I couldn’t do it. In the West and Australia, a vegetarian culture has mushroomed over the last 10 years or so. In supermarkets, whole aisles are devoted to mock meats and various meals for vegetarians. Even vegans, who avoid all dairy products and won’t wear anything that is derived from an animal, are well catered for in the West.

  Indeed, it has become hip for younger Westerners to denounce meat-eating. According to a TIME survey in July 2002, some 10 million Americans consider themselves to be practising vegetarians and another 20 million have flirted with a meat-free diet. And this is a country where babies are born in hotdog buns and thrown onto the barbeque at a very young age. I
f it ain’t got a pulse, they ain’t gonna eat it. Indeed, the country certainly has the best damn steak that I’ve ever tasted. Yet 25 per cent of adolescents polled by Teenage Research Unlimited in America said vegetarianism was “sensible” and “cool”, according to TIME magazine.

  There are also health reasons. Aside from the usual additives, there is that fun stuff in meat like the E. Coli bacteria and Britain’s contribution to fine dining — Mad Cow Disease. Do you remember reading about that? Britain’s mooing population started staggering around with their underpants on their head and barking at their farmers, who were feeding them the remains of just about every other animal species on the planet. The poor cows were deranged. I remember one being interviewed on TV about the disease and he replied: “Mad cows? Never heard of it, mate. I’m an octopus. Do you want to see my tentacles?”

  To be fair, my grandmother continued to eat meat during the Mad Cows furore and there was no discernible difference in her behaviour. But then, this is a woman who would perform her Hawaiian dance without invitation and flash her knickers to anyone who was foolish enough to watch. Had she contracted the virus, it might have been nigh on impossible to spot the symptoms. Despite piles of dead cows all over the English countryside, it still took some time for the missus’ family to come to terms with her vegetarianism. But eventually they did, albeit reluctantly.

  But in Singapore she remains a social outcast. The nation has an entrenched food culture that it is fiercely proud and protective of, and rightly so. The plethora of choice at any decent hawker centre or food court puts Singapore in the food Premiership. In England, you can have fish with chips, meat with chips and chips with chips at most food courts. And when the hungry pay a visit to their local Indian or Chinese takeaway in England — they order chips. I cannot think of any English environment, where there can be at least 15 to 20 completely different dishes all under one roof. I have seen it in the United States, but not, I’m afraid, in the southeast of England.