Singapore, again
It’s the festive season in Singapore. Deepavali and Hari Raya Puasa (Eid ul Fitr) occur within days of each other (some dub this “DeepaRaya”), and next month it will be Christmas. To say the least, everything is hectic here with a lot of shopping and generally a lot of people everywhere. Singapore is a country approximately 40km across, and 30km from top to bottom (approximately the size of Vancouver, I think). And it has 4 million people in it! The whole population of British Columbia is 4 million, and it can fit in thousands of Singapores. It’s hot, and very humid – standard fare for being an equatorial country.
I was born here, but left 17 years ago with my family to British Columbia. This is my first Eid back in the old country (but the 10th time I have come back to visit), and on every visit Singapore has changed. It seems that every available space has been taken up by commerce. Even the walkways between buildings have been taken over by shops, there are shops everywhere. On one visit there is an empty field allowing a cool breeze to hit you, on the next visit it has been taken over by a shopping mall. It seems like everything is very dense here, also people’s sense of personal space. I am figuratively swimming in my own sweat whenever I walk outside, thank God for air-conditioning everywhere, even on the buses. My favourite hangout is of course Tampines Mall and Century Square, which is just a stone’s throw away from my wife’s house. This shopping area, on any given day, on its slowest period will rival downtown Vancouver in its peak period. Suffice to say, there are a lot of people in Singapore, everywhere 
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