Dear friends and colleagues
Void deck funerals and crooked paths.
It may often be described as boring but in reality Singapore is a strange and interesting place. As one expert on utopias said to me, ‘how could one not be interested in Singapore?’ If an intelligently planned environment, economy and society are the quintessence of Utopia then Singapore is the nearest thing on this planet to a utopia – a perfect place.
But of course, people are inherently a bit messy. And some of us are very messy. Entropy, decay and death can be arrested or hidden but, like the tide, they always flow back.
Et in arcadia ego. He may have got rid of nearly all the cemeteries that the Chinese clans or extended families had built in Singapore – he stigmatised them as an uneconomic use of valuable space – but even Harry Lee couldn’t send Death into exile with his other political opponents.
Back in 1982 Eric Fischl wrote, I would like to say that central to my work is the feeling of awkwardness and self-consciousness that one experiences in the face of profound emotional events in one’s life. These experiences, such as death, or loss or sexuality cannot be supported by a lifestyle that has sought so arduously to deny their meaningfulness, and a culture whose fabric is so worn out that its attendant symbols do not make for adequate clothing. One truly does not know how to act! Each new event fills us with much the same anxiety we feel when, in a dream, we discover ourselves naked in public.
Is that as true of contemporary Singapore as it was of Eighties America? What ceremonies, rituals or symbols are there to aid one here at traumatic moments? This is, after all supposed to be a conservative, traditional society at the same time as it is cutting edge economy. What ceremonies did those nineteenth century settlers bring from China to assuage fears and the pain of loss? Is the fabric of their original culture still intact, or worn out? Perhaps unpicked by the hyper modernity of Singapore?
An MA student of mine here recently spoke of being profoundly depressed and alienated by the void deck funeral of the grandmother she loved. It was for her an inadequate way to mourn.
What, you may ask, is a “void deck funeral?”
The public housing blocks here are invariably called HDBs (after Housing Development Board). They are mullti-storey and the ground floor is left open (void) save for pilotis and maybe a few chairs. Here people are supposed to meet, chat and hold community events. The community event that one most commonly sees is a funeral. There may be Buddhist and Taoist chanting with the beating of gongs, or Christian hymn singing – or both, for many people here hedge their bets – and there will be flowers and, of course for this is Singapore, there will be food.
Recently in Hougang, the district where I live, I saw a very elaborate one. Many, many seats laid out for the banquet. Lots of the elaborate flower displays that people also send to wish well on the opening of a new business. Banners from various clans. Businesses sent their banners too. You should never miss an opportunity to advertise!
As I have said before, Christianity, especially in evangelical forms, is booming here. As elsewhere in South-East Asia there is a revival also in Islam and Buddhism. But the traditional Chinese religions, the reverence of ancestors is apparently fading. Will a younger generation want this type of funeral?
It was being set up on Friday. On Saturday people were all having a lively time – I’m sorry, but I am too superstitious to ever photograph the actual funeral. By Sunday everything had been cleared away.
During the hungry ghost month people here burn paper money and paper cars, houses to keep their departed ancestors comfortable and happy. The government provide proper incinerators so this can be done neatly and without making a mess. But it is noticeable that the uncles prefer to light their own fires in the wrong places – on the ground, on the grass, wherever. (“Uncle” here is a polite way of referring to an older man.) I haven’t got an image of such an informal fire, but will add one when I see one. I think this could be described as “guerilla art”.
Official incinerators
Planners do straight lines, people don’t. Singapore is a straight-line sort of place. They have been told, as we all were, at school that the shortest (e.g. most efficient) route between two points is a straight line. However, if left to themselves, Singaporeans, and not just the uncles, make crooked paths. I like the unofficial path some residents have made to the local train station. It seems almost deliberately crooked and winding.
May all your paths be equally winding and pleasurable this Tuesday
Tony
