But men like the middle-aged hippy on the train have always intrigued me. Why hasn’t anyone close to him ever discreetly pointed out that he looks bloody ridiculous? I genuinely do not know how someone in his immediate family has not said, “Shall we call it a day now, John? We recognise that you becoming a beach bum in Thailand is a brave protest against the jackboot of globalisation and the greedy consumerism of Western civilisation, but you’re starting to look like Leonardo DiCaprio’s grandad. Why don’t we spend this summer in the real world, eh? So have a shave, get a job and leave the peroxide in the bottle.”
The Malaysian train pulled out of the Malaysian station in southern Singapore and we were off. Well, the journey was delightful. The $2.90 one-way ticket to Johor Bahru provided a glimpse of rural Singapore that is impossible to see any other way. The tracks behind Bukit Merah were dotted with allotments, vegetable patches and handmade shelters and shacks. Knowing that the land on either side of the track cannot be redeveloped for commercial purposes, one or two squatters have moved in. Well, at least someone makes use of the land. We cut through the serious money of Singapore as we passed through the three-storey houses around Holland Road and Sixth Avenue. There were BMWs and overworked maids as far as the eye could see. Somewhere around Bukit Timah, a large sign indicated that KTMB was carrying out extensive renovations to improve the line between here and Woodlands. Then I spotted the industrious workforce—six pot-bellied Malaysian guys sitting on an unfinished track sharing cigarettes. Marvellous. The train raced alongside Bukit Timah Nature Reserve and, at one point, rainforest surrounded the carriage. Foreign visitors entering Singapore on the KTMB train must have an entirely different first impression of the island. The journey was so green. We went over a couple of railway crossings, the one at Ten Mile Junction at Bukit Panjang being the most unusual. For a few fleeting moments, we rejoined the more familiar environment of housing estates and shopping centres before re-entering the countryside once more at Kranji. Darting beneath the snaking queues at Woodlands Checkpoint was worth the $2.90 ticket alone.
Just 10 minutes later, I really had set foot in Malaysia. My passport still had not been stamped. I stood on the scruffy Jalan Tun Abdul Razak in front of the station. The air was stifling and the heat from the traffic almost unbearable. Johor Bahru, or JB, always feels claustrophobic. I scuttled from one shaded spot to another until I ended up in Jalan Wong Ah Fook. Running to the main highway out of Johor Bahru, this is the main street for shopping centres, markets, temples and money changers. I noticed a number of Western backpackers milling around. They have always been an integral part of the JB landscape whenever I have visited. The dusty town provides the perfect launch pad for the beach resorts of Malaysia and a ramshackle, laid-back alternative to the clinical, controlled island across the Straits. At least, that is the impression occasionally suggested in one or two guidebooks. And frankly, I find that hypocrisy abhorrent. Poverty Tourism is one of the most unsavoury by-products of globalisation. Trendy, young Brits or suburban American backpackers called Dwayne Eisenhower Teaspoon III love to come here to sample a little Asian exotica; the poorer, the better. Forget Singapore. It is an Asian city that has dared to emulate Western standards of living. How dare they? Try Cambodia or Vietnam instead. They have got great shanty towns. Some real shitholes. Snap a picture in front of a poverty-stricken auntie washing her clothes in a polluted river and put the framed photograph beside the baseball trophy and the signed 50 Cent album. How totally awesome is that?
But Johor Bahru is changing, even if the progress is slow. Tired of being labelled the poor Causeway cousin, there has been a discernible effort to spruce up the place. I recalled the square between Sri Mariamman Temple and the Sikh Temple being an untidy mix of market stalls selling souvenirs and the usual tat. Now it boasted a smart town garden, with the usual array of potted plants, paved and covered walkways, mini fountains and a café in the middle. Do not repeat this too loudly but it looked suspiciously like an upgraded HDB town centre. I had a decent lunch in City Square, a shiny shopping centre that summed up JB’s identity crisis as it struggles to refashion itself into a modern metropolis and shed its image of being a seedy, but exciting and cheap, coastal shanty town. Beside the impressive City Square was a decaying shopping centre where most of the shopfronts had their shutters down. Across the street was a rundown market and decaying shophouses with rusty zinc roofs. Indeed, in City Square’s enormous shadow was a stall selling second-hand shoes and trainers. The footwear had been polished, with newspaper stuffed inside to give that brand new shoe shop look. It all looked rather pitiful really.
And then there were the toilets. If Malaysia’s town planners commission the building of a colossal shopping centrepiece like City Square, then they must ensure that the public toilets inside are free. Making my way to the amenities on the third floor, I was stopped at the entrance by a convivial Indian lady who charged me 20 cents. That was acceptable. Then I went inside, locked the cubicle door and realised there was no toilet paper. That was not acceptable.
“Excuse me, but there’s no paper,” I barked at the poor woman. I went outside first. Please do not think that I shouted from inside the cubicle with my trousers round my ankles.
“It’s 20 cents.”
“I know it’s 20 cents. I already paid the 20 cents. I gave you the money 2 minutes ago. Remember?”
“That was for the toilet. Give me another 20 cents for the tissue paper.”
My impatient bowels were in no position to argue, but someone somewhere is taking the piss. When I washed my hands afterwards, I realised there was something unusual about the person at the next sink. She was a woman! And a young attractive one at that. The cleaner pointed her detergent spray nozzle at the sink while an indifferent Malaysian chap pointed Percy at the porcelain just a few feet away. In Singapore, I have occasionally encountered an intrepid auntie mopping the toilet floor while moaning about how long I am taking to tinkle, but I have never witnessed a young woman cleaning the sinks beside the men’s urinals. Not a confrontation with the opposite sex one would expect in Malaysia.
I surrendered to the oppressive heat and took a taxi to “Little Singapore” in Jalan Dato Sulaiman, a few kilometres further north. It is nothing more than a shabby, faded shopping centre called Holiday Plaza, but it rivals Toa Payoh Central for the number of Singaporeans shopping there at the weekends. If you are after anything pirated, copied or fake, Holiday Plaza is the place to go. The basement and the first floor are generally populated with shops staffed by ah bengs whose outrageously dyed hair suggests they sit blindfolded in a barber’s chair and throw darts at a colour chart to determine their latest shade. Each shopfront promises all the latest DVDs. But that is all it is—a front. There will be a handful of copies of the genuine article on dusty shelves, their token gesture of legality for the benefit of officialdom, but the real stuff is found behind a locked door at the back of the shop. Being the only ang moh browsing around the basement, I became the prime target for Ah Beng and his Technicolour Haircut.
“Hey, John, come this way,” a young Chinese guy said, beckoning me into his illegal emporium. I have been called John a few times and it is a little disconcerting. I know it is only a figure of speech, but it also happens to be my middle name. I am never quite sure if I am dealing with an ah beng or a clairvoyant.
“You want DVDs, John?” he continued. “I got the best price in JB.”
“And some say Batam?”
He did not laugh either.
“Come, come. I take you into my special VIP room. Only you can come in here, I never open this VIP room to anyone else.”
“Only me? You’ll open the VIP room just for me? Wow, that’s really kind of you.”
The same guy had ushered me into the same room on a previous trip to Holiday Plaza six months earlier. Inside the VIP room were floor-to-ceiling shelves of DVDs, including titles not due for cinematic release in Singapore for another three months. I was left in the capable hands of two younger
ah bengs. They were hilarious. It is not politically correct, but there is something endearing about the incessant sales patter of an ah beng selling illegal DVDs in Johor Bahru. They never give up, they never get offended and they will say anything to keep you in the VIP room.
“Hey, do you guys deliver?” I asked, feigning interest.
“Can, no problem. We deliver anywhere. JB, Singapore, anywhere.”
“Anywhere? Well, I want to get them delivered to a place called Ramsgate. My mum lives there.”
“Can, sure, no problem. Where’s that, ah?”
“Where’s what?”
“That place ... Ram’s Head?”
“Ramsgate? It’s in Kent in southern England. About two hours from London.”
“Oh, that one, ah? Can, no problem. We deliver to Ram’s Head all the time. You buy plenty, we give cheap delivery.”
“But what if some of the discs don’t work. Then how?”
“No problem, John. Each one got a 10-year warranty.”
Although I could have listened to them all day, I pushed on, promising to revisit the VIP room with my mother from Ram’s Head.
I discovered for the first time that Holiday Plaza actually had three floors. I had already visited the shopping centre several times but had never gone beyond the first floor. But then, other than pirated software, cheap phone and car accessories, shoe shops and the odd bakery, there is not much else to buy here. Indeed, Holiday Plaza represents a real legal dichotomy for the authorities. Publicly, they are utterly determined to crack down on the rampant piracy and copyright infringement that bedevils the country and makes it the bane of companies like Microsoft. And there are occasional, token raids on warehouses that manufacture pirated discs to pacify Bill Gates and his corporate pals. But the reality is harder to swallow. Crack down too hard on the DVD and software piracy in Holiday Plaza and visitors from Johor and over the Causeway will go somewhere else and the place will die. Indeed, its precarious position was discernible on the almost deserted upper floors, where a number of units that once sold legitimate products had closed down. There were fewer illegal DVD shops on the upper floors, so there was not an incentive for most shoppers to take the escalators. As a result, a blind eye is frequently turned at Holiday Plaza to ensure the customers keep coming back. Indeed, when I walked past the Crocodile menswear shop, I saw two Malaysian policemen trying on shirts. Beneath their feet, ah bengs were encouraging browsers to visit their VIP rooms. The cops could have apprehended the lot without breaking into a sweat. Perhaps it was their lunch break.
My next destination was supposed to be Lido Beach. As it faces Kranji Dam across the Johor Straits, I had planned to make poignant comparisons between the two countries. But the taxi driver insisted that was not where I really wanted to go.
“You don’t want to go to Lido Beach,” he said, as if playing a Jedi mind trick. “There’s nothing for you to see. You want to go to Danga Bay. I take you there instead.”
In no position to argue, I allowed him to take me to a place I had never heard of. It proved to be a wise move. Danga Bay is a half-finished waterfront city that spreads out over 25 kilometres and will eventually be home to residential and commercial centres, an education hub and sports facilities. Building work started in 2001 and the RM15 billion project promises a cruise terminal, a marina and a spa village, among many other things. The location is not unattractive. Overlooking the sea, it boasted one of the most picturesque food courts I had ever seen and was complemented by a couple of beach bars, a street bazaar and a mini fairground, most of which were closed. But the taxi driver assured me that locals flocked to Danga Bay on weekends and I believed him.
When it is finished, Danga Bay will be a cross between East Coast and Sentosa Cove, with yachts and boats docked at its jetties, children playing beach sports and tourists having a drink by the sea. That is, if it ever meets its 10- to 20-year completion date. Pardon my pessimism, but I have visited several neglected Malaysian beach resorts in the last 10 years. Looking more like ghost towns than a seaside playground for holidaymakers, these sad, peeling relics are dotted all over Malaysia and Indonesia. For Danga Bay to survive, it clearly needs Singaporeans to pop over on the odd weekend with their families to patronise the eateries and play on the beach. There are certainly worse places to have a cold beer and a plate of tasty chicken rice.
When leaving, I noticed a surreal attempt to attract the attention of Singaporean visitors. It was one of those guys who sketched your portrait while you waited. For a few dollars, this artist painted in oils on a half-decent canvas. Normally, these painters display their talents with illustrations of international celebrities such as Brad Pitt or Julia Roberts. Not this guy. No, he had proudly pinned up portraits of Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Now, PM Badawi I could just about understand, but PM Lee? The painter clearly expects Singaporeans to admire the portrait and say, “Wow, I’ve never seen such a likeness. It could be my prime minister standing there right now. I’m so overwhelmed by the patriotism that I can almost feel a verse of ‘Majulah Singapura’ coming on. If the artistic genius can do that for my country’s leader, just think what he could do for me. Show me where to sit!”
But most Western tourists, on the other hand, will spend several puzzled minutes staring at the portraits of the two prime ministers before one of them is brave enough to ask, “Excuse me, I don’t mean to be rude and I certainly don’t wish to denigrate your talents, but who are these two meant to be? I don’t think I’ve seen any of their movies.”
Two hours later, I was ready to kill the Marco Polo of Johor Bahru’s taxi services. Danga Bay might have been a welcome diversion, but it was also miles from the town centre and the Causeway. I limped along Jalan Skudai beside the Johor Straits as the warm, sea air melted my skin. Buses sped past at regular intervals, but there appeared to be no bloody bus stops. The public transport accessories that I usually take for granted in Singapore are apparently unnecessary in the orderly, functional world of JB, along with public benches and shelters from the merciless sun.
My fractious mood took a turn for the worse when I struggled through the public toilet that was Lido Beach. Being so close to the town centre, this coastal spot has long been a popular picnic spot for locals, but it was difficult to see why now. Drains filled with the most repugnant and smelly sewage imaginable trickled down sandy trenches and into the open sea, much of which will wash up around Kranji’s mangroves. The lack of subtlety was almost laughable. There were no discreet pipes or tunnels involved, just puddles of black, treacle-like sludge all over the beach. To complement the putrid smell, there was a dead cat on the pavement, across the road from the Straits View Hotel, which easily won the title for least original hotel name. The poor cat had obviously been knocked down several hours earlier and mini-beasts of all shapes and sizes were gleefully ripping its exposed organs to shreds. And this was on a main street, opposite a hotel, in the middle of a scorching day. In the same week, Malaysia had unveiled a typically ostentatious plan to build a new scenic Causeway bridge on its side of the Straits (the project was eventually halted, even though millions had been spent on the foundation work). But in generating headlines with such grandiose schemes, municipal planners still neglect the very basics of public services, like clean streets and decent sanitation.
Sidestepping the dead cat, I eventually found the spot I was looking for. I took out my binoculars, sat on the concrete wall above Lido Beach, surveyed the horizon line and there it was— Kranji Dam and the very bench I had earlier been sitting on to peer over at Johor Bahru. Staring across at my home for the past 10 years left me with a very sentimental, and very obvious, thought. In geographical terms, Singapore is nothing. It barely qualifies for that little red dot status. From certain angles within Danga Bay, most of the country was obscured and here the miniscule island looked so unremarkable. Singapore really is nothing more than a remote island of four million castaways. It is dislocat
ed from the natural resources of the Malayan hinterland and, apart from its advantageous location for shipping fleets, it has very little else to offer. To call Singapore a mere success borders on an insult. It is a bloody economic miracle and the envy of most of its neighbours, including those who lived behind me. Singapore does not come up with daft, extravagant schemes to rebuild half a bridge, but it keeps its streets clean. For most people, that is more than enough.
But the Malay fisherman who sat beside me at Lido Beach was not impressed. He eyed my binoculars suspiciously, waiting for me to give an explanation.
“Singapore. I live there,” I said to the fisherman. He could barely contain his indifference.
“I don’t like it.”
“Don’t like what?”
“Singapore. I don’t like it. Everything need a permit. I want to fish, need permit. Want to work, need permit. Drive a taxi, need permit. In Singapore, I need a permit for everything. In Malaysia, if I want to fish, I fish.”
The tide was out by at least 100 metres and would not be in for another two hours. My fisherman friend clearly had too much time on his hands.
“Since I got retrenched, I come here to fish,” he explained. “At my age, very tough to find work. So I sit here and fish, and I don’t need a permit.”
“No, that’s true. You don’t need a permit to do nothing. Well, I’ve got to get to the Causeway now. It’s time to go home.”
And I really meant it.
Final Notes From a Great Island Page 15
