A week-end in Singapore

Let me tell you two stories which I think are quite telling about life in Singapore. Saturday, I played golf with a French guy who runs Channel in Asia and an Indian business person that travels 200 days of the year. We played at the public course in Marina Bay which is where the big race is to-night. They both thought the course was fantastic, but it was so Singaporean I could not believe it.

First of all, I think it was something like $250 to play a public course. I think that there was a mistake or my partners payed for me because I only paid $90. You had to take a cart and at the bottom of the screen it told you how many minutes you were behind and since we started a few minutes late we never seemed to catch up. They also had paid advertising on the screen so you never felt you were on a golf course in the middle of nowhere. In fact, you knew you were not in the middle of nowhere because from the first tee you could see the whole course it was that small. Land is valuable in Singapore and time is money, both characteristics in full disclosure on this course.

There were marshals everywhere. Whenever you got too near a green or bunker, the screen told you to back off and a marshal was not far behind. I really felt like I was in the middle of the F1 race. First of all, you could hear the engines roaring literally roaring around the course just beyond and secondly there was construction everywhere. You were never out of eye-site of either a construction zone, cars, or buildings. The exact opposite of the ocean course I use to play in Costa Rica where every hole was surrounded by ocean.

And...it rains intermittently in Singapore almost every day (and this is the the dry season!) so we had our rain for about three holes which made it miserable, in my opinion. The Singaporeans simply put on their raincoats, pulled out their umbrellas and carried on.

To-day, Sunday, I went down to Orchard Road and stumbled into Lucky Plaza. It looked like a typical Bangkok mall except for one thing. There were more Philipinas than in Manila. The Philipina domestic workers have Sunday off and they all congregate in this mall to send money home, buy air tickets home and eat typical Philipino fare. There had to be ten of thousands of Philliipinos on six floors. I could not believe the line-ups around the hallway to send money home. I am just reading Ayaan Hirsi's latest book and she makes the point that immigrants who constantly send money home consign themselves to a life of poverty and the cycle continues for generations. She suggests they save and change their lives being in Holland, United States or Singapore.

I keep wanting to get to the Bird Park and other 'tourist' places, but people places are just so much more interesting.