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Home to Kang Ha Pheng Sim Kok, a Chinese clan association, this Geylang shophouse features Art Deco-Moderne etched into colonial architecture unique to Southeast Asia and garnished in Singaporean hybridization — wooden Malay framework, glazed Peranakan tiles, louvred French windows, neo-Classical cornice work, Indian soldiers carved in Chinese fashion.
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When I was a few apprehensive steps away from my first birthday, as family folklore goes, just before bed I would park a pedal car outside the room I shared with my parents. My tricycle would be banked by the potty. The point of this toddler triathlon was to never just totter about when you can traverse the length of your extended family’s rented Geylang shophouse in style.
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As a very poor excuse for a Chinese person, I’m not fond of rice. As a 12-year Chicagoan, I can live on bread, and just bread alone, if bread includes pizza, which it should, and does.
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Marina Bay this evening was as breathtaking as ever, moonbeams descending upon where the newest part of the city waterfront hugs the Singapore River, the river gazing back up, reflecting starshine. “S G ❤” splayed across the Sands hotel’s three columns was the showstopper that snapped my head to the right for an OMGape as I arc’d over the bridge, and made me brake at the bottom, break my journey, and swerve over to the bay side to properly let the MBS light sparkle in my eyes. (All of the above would have been lethal at the same time, 7.15pm, on any regular evening with vehicles surging homewards out of downtown.)
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My favorite superhero is Nancy Drew. When I turned 10, my aunts Khim and Reggie gave me The Clue Of The Tapping Heels (#16) and The Mystery Of The Tolling Bell (#19) for my birthday, and a literary best friend for life.
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We were supposed to have pancakes to celebrate my birthday and Easter. We were going to fete the rising of Jesus from the dead, the rising of another digit in my age, me still very much alive. We code named it Pandemicakes.
3
An amazing woman shows up every morning at the gym for the day’s session, whether cardio, HIIT, resistance, strength, or everything, even though she’s fighting breast cancer on her own, in a country she’s just moved to. When she’s done, she feels like she’s earned the right to another day.
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Covid-19 has been all about distances: social of one to two meters, the Coronavirus’ four-meter airborne span, global affliction of economies projected to last more than 12 months.
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The mechanical, communal and spiritual process of dismantling Singapore’s Covid-19 circuit began with rain at the break of dawn, a cleanse. Never too late for a clean slate.
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Singapore is a country where we greet, “Have you eaten?” instead of, “How are you?”. In the last few days, that has been sublimated for, “What will your last hawker center meal be?”
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It’s fitting that a stew of oxtail signaled the end of days as we knew it, that bullish attitude of, “Life, we got you.”