Singapore Snapshots

Busy again today so I'll select a random old letter and post that instead.

Got one.  This is from our 2005 holiday in Singapore. Mmm, yes, it's

LONG. I'll have to edit it back so you only get bits of it:

1)  We're at the world-famous Singapore Botanic Gardens when there's 

this sudden tropical downpour. We rush for the nearest shelter - the old 

hybridizing laboratory at Bilnew Villa (or some name like that). 

 Keith sheltering at Bilnew Villa.

Dripping wet, we tumble straight into a drama.  A nice Chinese woman 

with a name-tag saying Head Botanist is scolding a young Tamil gardener, 

pointing out through the rain into the V.I.P. garden where they grow 

Singapore's exquisite,priceless and rightfully world-famous  

Orchid-Diplomacy  collection. 

 Only a tinsy sample of their collection.

"Look, look." she's saying to him, pointing to a clump of those tall 

orange-flowering shrubs my baby sister Jane grows and treasures in her 

front garden. 

 The actual plants in question!

(Jane, they may be pretty 

but they are WEEDS!)

"Those are noxious weeds. You should never have let the beds get even 

one, let alone so many. Why didn't you pull them out weeks ago?"
 

"You never said." says sullen git-boy, without making a single one of

 those gestures of indescribable beauty Somerset Maugham was forever 

ascribing to these self-same Tamil gardeners.
 

"I shouldn't have to say." says Botanist-Lady.  "Use your own initiative. 

If you see something that needs to be pulled out, you pull it out. 

You don't need me to tell you everything."
 

Sullen git-boy looks even more sullen and gitty and I have a sudden 

flashback to 1978 at Burns Philips in Fiji when they used to hire Tamil 

boys to work for me during the rush-periods and they were always

 so sullen and passive-aggressive, misogynistic and nasty, and always 

did such cruel and vengeful things behind your back if you told them 

off, it never once reached noon before I'd be marching into Personnel 

saying "You get rid of that boy NOW because he's making me so angry, 

only one more thing and I'm going to hurt him."
 

Botanist-lady is getting such an angry look on her face it looks like

she's about to hurt him too but instead politely says "Do you understand 

me? Is this it? Don't you speak English?". 

He doesn't answer and just looks passive-aggressive and misogynistic

 andnasty so she calls over another older Tamil gardener and says 

"Tell him what I'm saying. Translate for me. Tell him he's got to start 

using his initiative. Tell him ..." 

Older-Tamil-gardener starts talking in Tamil and I hear him say the word 

"Gandu" and have another flashback. "He's calling the nice Botanist-Lady 

the Tamil word for female genitalia." I tell Keith. And that's when I really 

start listening and my extremely minimal grasp of Hindi is definitely more 

than adequate.

"He's not translating at all." I gasp "He's just describing different 

disgusting things she should do to her anatomy."

Both Tamils are looking impassive and I realise they do this sort of thing

all the time. Normal practise, I guess, among these passive-aggressive 

women-hating sullen-git types.
 

Anyway, the rain stops and Head Botanist leaves and we go off to look 

at the most famous orchids in South East Asia - if not the world. They're 

wonderful and I'm taking lots of photos:

 Completely gorgeous!

But then I happen to look back at the V.I.P. Diplomacy Garden. 

Those noxious weeds are still standing but the Tamil git-boy has ripped 

out all the yellow Benazir Bhutto orchids and the purple Nelson Mandela 

orchids and has just started on the golden Queen Elizabeth orchids. 

I'm not kidding; the most exquisite orchids you have ever seen, and the 

centrepiece of all Singapore's international diplomatic relationships, 

strewn all over the ground.

As you know, I'm not normally one for gross acts of violence but suddenly 

I'm willing to make an exception, so I'm marching over to do serious 

damage when Keith grabs me and says "No need." and thumbs upwards. 

There are a great many surveillance cameras surrounding these priceless 

plants. And then we see Botanist Lady and three security guards 

scramblingup the hill towards us, looking furious, obviously ready 

take care of business.

"They won't do anything to him with us watching." Keith says.

"Then let's not be watching!" I say. And so we hurry out of there.

Yeah, you GO, angry botanist lady! 

2) We're at Ginger House at the Halia Restaurant blowing the budget, 

trying the much-lauded new Singapore fusion cuisine. 

(Wonderful stuff. I had no idea that radish tasted so good, especially 

mixed with mango.) 

Anyway, at the long table next to us are four large American ladies in 

powersuits and four demure little Chinese ladies - unfortunately with 

their backs to us so we couldn't see their reactions - all dressed in 

serious Chanel, and they all having what is obviously a power-lunch. 

But then it starts: 

 "I don't know where American women get the reputation for 

promiscuity." says one particularly large and important-looking American 

lady. "I mean, we all hate sex." 

"I know I do." says another of them. 

"Yes. Me too. I have to get fall-over drunk before I can even let a 

man touch me." 

"Me too!"  It goes on and on.
 

I say to Keith "That's probably the most inappropriate lunchtime 

conversation I've ever over-heard."
 

But I was so wrong.
 

Next topic: "Oh no. I would never eat Chinese food."

"Me neither. Chinese food is disgusting." 

"It's all insects and things that make normal people vomit." 

"Honestly, I don't know how you can stand to eat Chinese food 

yourselves."
 

I say to Keith "I was wrong. That's the most inappropriate 

lunchtime conversation I've ever over-heard."
 

Wrong again.
 

Next topic: "I would never read Dan Brown." 

"Neither would I. Dreadful stuff." 

"Me either. I'm Catholic and we're forbidden to read books with the 

word "demon" in the title." 

Chinese lady wearing a sublime pink post-modern reconstructed 

Chanel suit pipes up "I'm sorry. I don't understand. What's this 

about not reading these books? I'm Catholic and I've never heard 

anything like that in my life." 

American lady replies "Oh, but you're CHINESE Catholic. That's 

completely different. It's not like you're real Catholics at all."
 

I say to Keith "OK! OK! That's the most inappropriate conversation I've 

ever over-heard, any time, any place. In fact, it's the worst thing I've 

ever heard one person say to another my whole life."
 

Wrong again.
 

Next topic: "I've been in South East Asia for eight months and I've had 

nothing but non-stop diarrhea the whole time." 

"I know. Me too. In the past six months I must have had every type 

of diarrhea imaginable." 

"Yes, I never knew there were so many different types. I've had ..." 

I will not continue with what she went on to say but just let you know 

it went on a long time and was so gross and descriptive it got straight 

into our gag reflexes so Keith and I signaled to our waitress Lydia that 

we had to have the bill immediately because we had to get out of there. 

She had in fact already prepared it anticipating our fast departure.

"Who ARE those dreadful women?" I asked her.
 

"They're diplomats with the American embassy." Lydia tells us strait-faced.

"WHAT?!" and "Oh my god!!" ... 

And that's when Keith, Lydia and I begin to grin and at that moment, 

large power-lady begin talking loudly about farting during diarrhea and 

all three of us entirely lose the plot and race outside to laugh ourselves 

stupid.

Americans abroad, huh!  And these were their DIPLOMATS! So what chance 

does that nation have to make the rest of the world like them!