The Fantasy and the Cyberpunk Futurism of Singapore
Singapore is a weird place. During the flight, the stewardesses walked around and handed everybody something - I was expecting a wet towel, but in fact it was a card in multiple languages which says &quot;If you are about to bring any amount of drugs into the country, you are going to be executed.&quot; Lovely first impression to set the tone.<p>Other than the omnipresent paranoia, the thing that struck me as the most bizarre is that almost nothing in the country is oriented around children. The fertility rate is basically the lowest in the world, as the way of maintaining the population seems to be simply skimming the top few percent of qualified workers from India, China, and other southeast Asian countries, people who will essentially live at the office until they have made enough money to return home, or simply retire and die alone in the country.<p>Another strange thing was the way the city is planned - everything is concentrated to a district. For instance, rather than having record shops peppered around the city, there is a the &quot;record shop area&quot;, where there are a dozen record shops in a single place. It&#x27;s like this for lots of things - books, refrigerators, etc.<p>The food was great though. I&#x27;m craving laksa just thinking about it..