SG50 The Heart of Singapore
It has been a really fulfilling long weekend celebrating the nation’s Golden Jubilee with half the local population, and another half with residents and visitors from other countries.
Over the course of the last one month, we had journeyed through Singapore’s past, present and possibly getting a glimpse of the future.
We started with the Labrador Park trek to understand our WWII past. Then skipped forward to a visit to the Istana to understand current governance.
We visited the National Museum last Friday to take a look at the “Singapura: 700 years” exhibit. It was particularly interesting for Joel as this was almost a life sized social studies textbook walk through for him. But having appreciated our past I felt what was lacking was a commentary of how this would change or direct our future.
The next day we visited the Science Centre, checking out Snow City first then Kidstop (an experiential learning ground for younger children to understand weather, human body, food and nutrition and engineering). For the Science Centre itself we did a short walk through the exhibits but they seem dated. Of interest is the Mind’s Eye section and the incubator where one can actually witness chicks hatching.
On National Day itself, we took a visit to our newest museum and apparently the first ArtScience museum in the world though I have no idea what is special about that. The museum was hosting the Dreamworks Exhibition: From sketches to screen and this particularly interest the children who are TV junkies and have a fond love for Kung-fu Panda and How to train a dragon. What I really hope is that this would inspire Joel to envision how his love and talent in drawing can become something bigger and meaningful for others.
And perhaps that is where I see the future for our nation and maybe our family. My children tend to be more creative, imaginative and exploratory and I would love to keep that way. This is the ingredient that is missing in my generation but would be the future of my children’s generation and what would bring Singapore beyond the 21st century.
After leaving the museum, we found ourselves unwittingly cordoned off outside Marina Bay Sands where we got almost front seat views of our National Day Parade along the bay front of the Marina Basin. From there, we were able to have unobstructed views of the aerial display and fireworks. Praise the Lord for the beautiful turn of events.
It was beautiful to see the entire Marina Basin lit up with lights and colors and tens of thousands if not more people gathered together to celebrate the nation’s 50th birthday like one heart beating together. Joel asked if this was the Singapore River as he had read in his social studies that the river was the heart of Singapore.
I pondered, when we first gained independence that may have been so since our beginnings were in entrepot trade. Fifty years on, the Marina Basin may now be our our heart, surrounded by evidence of finance (Marina Bay Financial District), retail and tourism (Marina Bay Sands) and the arts (Esplanade). Now that I see the final product of years of land use planning I realised that the government had done a beautiful (hopefully sustainable) job about it.
Lastly, a big thanks to the National Museum, Science Centre, Artscience Museum and Marina Bay Sands for opening its doors free for pink IC holders during the weekend.