Low Crime Has Its Consequences

Zoologists tell us that animals that live on islands that have no predators are usually unable to defend themselves when a predator is suddenly introduced. A mere rat that gets to the island from a vessel is enough to threaten extinction to an entire rare species.

The same applies to us humans. Singapore is a country with probably the world's lowest crime rate. Its laws are draconian, its government clean and incorruptible and its police force efficient and competent. I've seen how a thief made off with a camera bag of a Singaporean tourist in Spain. The bag contained not just his camera but all the precious photos he's taken. When I carry my backpack in front of me, friends ask me if I've got gold bars in it.

But it's not all that safe in Singapore. Recently, the Singapore Police Force has been waring the public of a rise in pickpocketing cases. There's now a growing trend of foreign pickpockets making a beeline for Singapore. They may stay here for a week or two and the loot they steal covers their trip and all expenses with a lot of money to spare. They usually steal wallets, mobile phones and cameras. Last year, a pickpocket from as far away as Brazil was convicted of theft in a Singapore court.

This morning, at breakfast, something happened that's best recounted with the help of photographs. Someone hurriedly left his table and I noticed something odd and took a quick pic.

Yes, he left his wallet literally standing on the table. I looked to see where the person had gone to and I saw that he was at a drinks stall quite a distance away from his table.

I didn't want to be meddlesome and he might very well be returning to his seat even though leaving one's wallet on the table is a rather unusual thing to do. I kept watch of his wallet from where I was seated just in case someone took it. I also kept an eye on him, for fear that he might just leave the stall and walk out of the food centre. Sure enough, he walked away from the drinks stall and was leaving the food centre when I shouted out to him.  He went back to his table and took his wallet after thanking me sheepishly.

Can such a person survive in Barcelona or Prague or Rome or any of the other major pickpocket cities of the world? I've been on the infamous Bus No. 64 and I took a lot of selfies and photos of my surroundings, much to the annoyance of the pickpockets who naturally didn't want to be photographed. I have photos of them looking shady and annoyed.

Singapore's phenomenally low crime is a testimony to the wisdom of its strict laws and the integrity of its enforcement officers. But every silver lining has its dark cloud and the average Singaporean is more likely to be a victim of petty theft when he is abroad.

365 Project

I started my own 365 project 5 days ago after seeing many other such projects by people all over the world.  It's an interesting idea and one that should be up my street.  After all, I carry a camera everywhere I go and even when I haven't got my camera with me, I'm sure to have my camera-phone with me.

The good thing about the 365 project is it acts as a photo-journal of a person's life.  The rules are clear:  you have to take at least a photograph a day and post it on the web.  You should not post a photograph taken on a different day.  That sounds easy enough.

But although I'm very much a camwhore, if you'll pardon my use of a word that sounds incredibly rude but has since gained universal acceptance, I did rack my brains yesterday as to what pic to take.  The rules for a 365 project are wide enough - it can be any pic and it doesn't have to be a photograph of a scenery.  As it happened yesterday, I had just read a novel and so I took a pic of it.  Not much artistry in that but it serves to tell a story of my life - on 26 November, I completed my reading of a novel.

There are countless books you have read in your time but you probably can't recall even a small fraction of them ever again.  With your own 365 project, it gets woven into that huge tapestry of your life.  It doesn't matter if you aren't artistic; I'm not at all artistic in my photography.  Most of the time, I use only my camera-phone and even if I use a proper camera, it's always a compact camera.  But what attracts me to this 365 project is its usefulness as a graphic record of my personal life.  I do keep a daily diary of everything that happens in my life but the 365 project makes it all come alive.  A picture does paint a thousand words.

Here's the link to my 365 project:  My 365 project

Why I love this island so!

Religious violence is something you see every day on the news.  If it's not Nigerian churches being torched by the Islamist terrorist group Boko Haram, it's probably the tension between Hindu militants and Muslim extremists in India.

All the violence we read about is absolutely foreign to us who live in Singapore.  Whatever Western critics may say about a "totalitarian" government (which isn't true at all) or the lack of freedom (I don't know about you but I can do without the freedom to get killed or maimed), my advice to the critics is this - you remain in YOUR country and I'll live here.  On the other hand, if you happen to live here and you really don't like it at all, it's a free world and you can always go where you think the grass is greener.  Lately, there have been a lot of foreigners who come to Singapore and avail themselves of the goodness of the land but post offensive and abusive remarks against the country they're milking from.  Here is where Singapore should show its "totalitarian" strength and send these ungrateful chaps packing.

Anyway, this morning, after a very early breakfast in Little India, I cycled round this lovely part of Singapore and took pics of the various places of worship.  I had intended for this post to be a wordless post with pics alone to tell the tale but alas, it's hard to remain silent when what I see through my camera lens is nothing but perfect peace and beauty.  Mind you, these places of worship are of the four major different world faiths and here they stand, no more than 100 metres from one another in perfect harmony, wonderfully tolerant and a great picture of what faith truly means as they each proclaim its gospel of peace and goodwill to all men.

It's when I see such peace and harmony of these four great faiths in close proximity to one another that I know in my heart of hearts that God is in his heaven and all's right with the world.  May God bless Singapore and its far-sighted leaders!  OK, I'll be silent from here on.  Enjoy the pics!

As I was busy snapping a pic of the Hindu temple, a bell suddenly broke the silence of the morning and religious music could be heard within the temple.  I took a quick video of the worship session from the road.  The video is a little shaky; I had to balance my bicycle against my body, remove my gloves and hold them with my teeth and use both hands to take the video.  If you watch the video carefully, you will see a guy in a pink shirt, slightly to the right playing a wind instrument but he stands in the shade so it's very hard to make out the instrument he's playing.  It closely resembles the clarinet but it's much larger and the bell is way too large for a clarinet.  But it's definitely a reed instrument because I saw the reed - placed on the mouthpiece just as in a clarinet.  It's the only wind instrument that you can hear in the video.  I really wonder what instrument it is.

Hurricane Sandy

These are photos of New York that I found on the internet taken by intrepid photographers.  It's a huge disaster.

Below is a doctored pic.  It looks better than the real pics but it's a fake.

Land of the gods

Saw 3 temples within 100 metres of one another. Here are two:

May God bless all soldiers.

A friend of mine emailed these photos to me and they have put me in a mildly depressive state.  Each of these photos has a powerful tale of woe to tell.

An overloaded bike

Look what I found!  A bike that's really cluttered with everything imaginable.

Flash flood in Central Singapore

I was out for an early morning breakfast and bike ride when I got caught in a terrific thunderstorm.

Little India

View of Little India at 8.50am

Lunched with my good friend, Lay Hoon.  Like me, she too is a photo addict but we both sinned terribly against our nature.  We failed to take a pic throughout the lunch.  As an act of contrition, I took a pic of the bicycle rack after we parted.