Was that Singa or Singgah?

I have flown there. I have driven there. I have ridden there on a bike. I have taken a train there. So it was about time I take a bus there. And that was how I happened to end up at the second link immigration checkpoint taking me into Singapore. The bus ride was truly great as the brochure advertised. Enough food, coffee and fruits were handed out by the pretty hostess on the bus to make it a comfortable enough five-hour journey.

Just before handing over my passport to the Singapore Immigration Officer, it was a lucky thing that I chanced upon a sign saying no more than an opened packet of cigarette may be taken by Malaysians into the republic. They have changed the rule while I was not looking, obviously. After all I only go there once every three years to attend our regional meeting. Good thing too that I headed straight for the Customs Office to declare my five packets of cigarette. Sitting inside the Customs Office were a couple from Indonesia who had the same brand of cigarette I did. Having failed to declare two unopened packets they had walked through the scanner and were found out real quick by the ever diligent officer on duty. Now they were awaiting a hefty fine being worked out in addition to confiscation of the said contraband items. In the meantime their bus had left without them. Singapore punctuality and all that, you know.

I, on the other hand, having judiciously declared my cigarettes were more respectfully treated. Of course I was handed a bill amounting to more than S$70 which worked out to nearly RM150. For four packets? Dear me, that was a whole lot of money going up in smoke. Those were the most expensive 80 sticks of cigarettes I have ever smoked or likely ever to smoke ever. But it is our civic duty when visiting the island republic to help pay for its upkeep. So I dutifully handed over my credit card because that was the preferred mode of payment, said the Customs Officer. They do not like handling cash, only plastic money. And luckily I never leave home without it. I don’t have that much paper money but lots of plastic money. So what the hell, eh? There was no way I was going to ditch my cigarettes either. Just like quite a number of people I know could never ever ditch their spouses even though they were causing them quite a bit of breathing discomfort and misery.

Naturally I was given a lot of stick by my boss and Marketing Manager about it. And silly me too, because the brand of cigarette I smoke can be found in Singapore. But then I am one of those who carry Indonesian cigarettes while visiting Indonesia just so that I would not run out. Still it was a lot of money just to satisfy a craving. Serves me right, said my non-smoking friends. Poor you, said those who themselves could not last an hour without lighting up.

It would be quite a while before I visit the Lion City again and certainly not with that many cigarettes on me. Lion City, eh? How did they get the name anyway? Fable had it that one Sang Nila Utama who discovered the island of Temasik saw a lion and that was how the name came about? Now really, are Singaporeans that gullible? They, our much learned and sophisticated cousins across the Causeway believe that there were lions on the island several millinium ago? And yet there are so many Oxbridge scholars among their kin?

As far as my limited knowledge of the animal kingdom is concerned, lions are only found in Africa. Well, okay, in the zoo in Singapore as well, but that was at a very much later stage of history. I stand corrected, of course, but to me it was very unlikely that a lion was ever sighted. The name Singapura never came from the word singa or lion. More likely it was from the word singgah (visit or stop for a while). And since it was a city even in days of old and sort of a half-way house for the merchants plying the China-India trade route, the two words singgah and pura (city) got combined. From Singgahpura it became Singapura and the Anglicised Singapore.

Of course the Singapore authorities were more than happy to let the charade continue. After all if Malaysia want to have a tiger as its national symbol, Singapore must go one up and have the king of the animal kingdom, the lion, as the national symbol. But as I say, I stand corrected. For all you know there could be a well-preserved carcass of a pre-historic lion lying in some underground vault in the republic. But then again you also have to understand that the founder of Singapore, Sang Nila Utama himself, was no ordinary being, having come forth from the saliva of a holy cow. So a lion could very well have travelled from the Savanah, through Africa, much of Central Asia to Southeast Asia. Finding itself in Tanjong Pelepas, it decided to give cross-strait swimming a try and while drying its lustrous fur on the sandy beach of Jurong was sighted by Sang Nila Utama and his band of merry men.

Well, enough of history lesson for the moment. Still I must say if there is one thing I love about Singapore, it is their bookshops. They seemed to be better stocked than those in Kuala Lumpur. Even the second hand bookshops. My favourite used to be located on the second floor of Bukit Timah Shopping Complex and I used to make regular trips there while living in Johor Bahru. One day while making my way to the second hand bookshop I was accosted at the top of the escalator by a salesgirl who wanted to sell me a new brand of face cream. I do not even use the old brand of face cream, so what would I do with a new brand and told her so.

“No wonder you’re so ugly,” she retorted. I thought I noticed another salesgirl cringe after hearing her co-worker’s sales pitch.

Well, I was certainly quite bewildered. That was in fact a first for me. I have been called many names before and most are often not terribly complimentary. But UGLY? That was the first time. Several weeks after that incident I was again in Bukit Timah, this time riding pillion on a friend’s motorbike. On our way back to Johore Baru via Woodlands, we were almost sandwiched between a lorry and a car. Just when I thought my mother would have been deprived of her only child this Mat Rempet (oh, yes we also had them in the good old days, they just go by another name) friend of mine managed to avoid going under the lorry by swerving in front of the car at breakneck speed. I never rode a bike in Singapore again after that, pillion or otherwise. I could hear my friend commenting that that was what you deserve for insulting Sang Nila Utama and the spirit of Singapore’s mythical lion.