Amos' Reflection

Q:  What was your impression of Singapore history and cultural heritage before going on the trail?

My prior impression of Singapore History and cultural heritage was more of a theoretical understanding. In my social studies modules in year 1 and 2, I have learnt about the purpose of conserving our culture heritage and how important it is to link our Singapore history to our conservation of cultural heritage. I had a brief understanding of the history behind little India and how it served immigrants and developed as part of the Raffles town plan and in some ways how some of the people stories intertwined within Singapore History as Little India developed over time after our independence.

Most of my prior impression was limited to my childhood days of visiting Kranji war memorial and Chinatown when I was in primary and secondary school and at I would say I did not have a deep understanding of Singapore History and cultural heritage by reading dry contents from textbooks alone. Most of these impressions were brief knowledge of World War 2, Mariah Hertogh riots, life of early settlers and not much was covered on Little India.

In the past, I was not able to fully see how every site or monument had a part to play in Singapore’s History. My prior knowledge of the Little India was that it had cultural sites and sold many unique traditional Indian food and products. My impression was more of a surface value such as celebrating racial harmony day in school to promote learning of ideas from various cultures. I also had the impression that Little India was more of a tourist location more than a cultural heritage site as part of our Singapore history story and a simple visit may have been already a way to promote cultural heritage.

Q:  How has your experience of the trail changed your perception of Singapore

History and her cultural heritage?

The trail has given me a first person experience to see what was beyond these selected sites in Little India.  With the personal encounters to the various sites, such as Little India Arcade and the temples in Little India, I saw that Singapore history is actually more differently and alive that what I had used to. The Little India Arcade used to house “The Shop of P Govindasamy Pillai” His humble life story was depicted on a National Heritage infoboard and it gives insight to the remnants of history that we are all receivers today. He contributed much to the community and part of the area’s development as part of Singapore’s history, which gave me a perception that it is so important that Singapore History has also been selected for sites that stay and sites that go.

After this trail, I could better see that Singapore history is open and many facets made up of cultural heritage of different races even if it is in a localized location compared to the past. In sites within walking distance, we found different religious areas of worship for four different religions. These sites included the Abdul Gafoor Mosque (National Monument), Sri Srinivasa Perumal Temple, Sakya Muni Buddha Gaya Temple (The Temple of 1000 Lights) and the Church of the True Light and the fact that these places not only filled with rich cultural heritage with the various diverse religious architecture, it was amazing to note that these places could thrive well together to be conserved till date as part of our Singapore History despite religious sites being sensitive and scared to their respective followers. In this aspect I saw that Cultural heritage was also about the openness of the people and how they took efforts to conserve the sites so that it can be part of our Singapore history.

More than just a site, life and meaning of the past, values and spirit that built a nation, not just developments of a race or a group where it was interesting to note that cultural heritage can survive the test of time and maintained like how the Sakya Muni Buddha Gaya Temple (The Temple of 1000 Lights) survived the Japanese occupation and these sites could be rebuilt to capture the essence that particular culture, point to the perception that Singapore History is not only made up of the past but also made up of modifications  where relevant parties select what parts of the temples to preserve and Singapore history is not just about the past alone.

As a historian, it struck me hard that if there was no strong effort placed into conserving places of cultural heritage and giving these places a lasting place in Singapore history, it would be possibly disappear away from our future generation.

Q: Share some insights (if any) about Singapore’s past and the way it is represented

(Symbolically and physically) that you have gained from the trail.

After experiencing the trail, it got me to think that Singapore’s past is for us to delve and textbooks do not do justice the surface knowledge that is represented in the textbooks as they have been “selected” to represent what the ministry would want her students to learn.

The temples, Little India Arcade Tekka Market and the selected sites seem to represent a special cultural identity of Little India symbolically as a special page in our Singapore History. This special slice of cultural heritage identity is only unique to Little India and its various sites adds on to this special identity with its unique architecture, sights and sounds of how the site has developed from a place with cattle bull carts to what it is today. It also embodies the symbolism of a precious culture and heritage that has been kept and preserved by pioneers as a gateway to remnants of the past in an ever-changing developing landscape we have in Singapore today.  

In terms of physical representation, one could see that the architecture has been conserved and parts of the buildings may have been modified like the Residence of Tan Teng Niang where additional colours have been added in stages during the post restoration phase. One must contend that these are physical remnants of the rich Singapore History that is set to remind us of how they can be interpreted. The bright and colourful paint adds a new-refreshed physical look to the streets.  As the building and temples stand together in Little India, it gives a new lease of life to these buildings to our future generation.

Overall I have gained the new insight that Singapore History is symbolically alive and non-static. Selected monuments have also been able to effectively paint the historical narratives of value in the Singapore History and conserved in our cultural heritage.

Although efforts have been placed in our cultural conservation in Little India, the key question is how much deeper than the surface can we explore and how much real learning is taking place by just visiting sites as cultural heritage and Singapore history is more than just visiting these places and “behavioral” levels of understanding may be more useful for learners like ourselves to deepen our understanding, though such deep levels of learning may be challenging and has to involve various stakeholders of our community.

Q: Think of the names of the roads, the buildings etc in the area you are at. What

significance do you think they hold? Remembering pioneers?

A number of the road names and buildings seen carry the names of our early pioneers. Since the original buildings may not have been there and restoration would not have made the buildings exactly the same as the original, the names carry a reminder of a legacy or special place that these particular pioneers had on Little India. Places such as “Buffalo road” where it was a place where buffaloes were kept reflect the significance of the activities that occurred in our Singapore History. As for buildings like the residence of Tan Teng Niang, it paints a valuable narrative of the love this man had for his family and wife when he built the particular buildings and personal stories of the past haven been intertwined more than just remembering these pioneers with unique stories of the Singapore History.

Q: Look at the architectural styles. How different are the buildings and what do the styles suggest to you in terms of the ages of the buildings, the conservation process etc?

Architectural styles of buildings such as Little India Arcade, residence of Tan Teng Niang and some of the places of religious worship suggest that these buildings were build considerably long ago with some close to a century old. The conservation process has been very intensive to be able to replicate the almost original outlook of the various building and conservation may have actually modified these buildings to a certain extent in terms of outlook, structure and possibly colour like in the case of the residence of Tan Teng Niang. Buildings for religious worship carry designs that represent the various deities and all these buildings have been carefully selected for conservation, just like the Abdul Gafoor Mosque where it was selected as a National Monument for its rich past.

Q: Along the trail, consider how significant, historically, are the sites that have been chosen for conservation. Did you come away with the feeling that you have learnt

something or you just carried out a tourist jaunt around an area of no historical

significance whatsoever?

After some research and reading up of the information boards around the selected sites, there is a good mix of roads, important buildings, places of religious worship that have been chosen for conservation. These sites collectively hold a rich mixture of personal and representative narratives of our early settlers forming our Singapore History. The Abdul Gafoor Mosque for example had its original mosque demolished but the new brick mosque with Saracenic and Roman influenced architecture was rebuilt between 1907 and the 1920s. These were mosques that served Tamil Muslim immigrants from South India and the Baweanese horse groomers. Religion was also an integral part of the life of many early settlers and these places of worship have been significant in building part of the rich cultural heritage of Little India and have been chosen for conservation. I had felt that these places allowed me to learn better of how we have developed as a nation, more of our early settlers and the importance of conserving our cultural heritage.

Q: Do you think the sites serve their purpose of educating the general public about the

history of Singapore?

I think that these sites do serve their purpose of education the general public about the history of Singapore. With the extra effort to properly conserve these sites and informative boards near these sites detailing the narratives and historical stories of various people, it gives the general public a good overview of what these sites entail and a physical site to see and feel the rich history of the area itself. Area Trail maps have also been provided by the National Heritage board to tie in these sites to educating the public about the history of Singapore. However, to some this may be seen as the “Concrete” level of cultural education where visits and surface understanding may not bring about a holistic manner in educating the public about Singapore’s history and our history may be more than just how these sites looked like and how they have been important in the past.

Selected sites and religious places of worship for different communities in an area usually associated with one ethnic community in Singapore also suggest that the multi cultural heritage and mutual respect and tolerance for each other’s religion has been present in the past and now. Early settlers live in communal areas and they could live harmoniously together with some form of inter religion tolerance and these ideas could also be part of educating the public on our Singapore history.

Q: Relevance and applications in the future as a teacher:

As many primary schools also have selected trails or learning journeys to these places of cultural heritage or historical significance as part of their national education or social studies curriculum, it is important to rethink and see how I can add value to these trips apart from students reading up on these places from their textbooks. Apart from ensuring that my future students have a good understanding of our rich Singapore history and cultural heritage better, it would be important for me to engage them holistically with the help of E learning. Trails that have been run with I-pad guides have also been carried out in various school learning journeys and the multidimensional learning features such as e video, geo-tagging, voice clip recordings can be harnessed to engage these future tech savvy young learners. This Little India Trail has certainly opened up my mind to show me on the many sides of little India and the deep cultural heritage that lingers within the various sites. My challenge would be to make use of these knowledge of understanding the various site narratives and present them to my future students in a much more engaging manner, possibly above the concrete level towards behavioral or symbolic long term learning and understanding. This would also come with its own set of challenges to bring about learning beyond the classrooms, such as learning of other languages and practices of peers of other religion more than just celebrating racial harmony day by playing games or just tasting different types of food. It would possibly require the partnership of various stakeholders, parents, students, the community and community partners to build a deeper “symbolic” understanding of various cultures and heritage, adding onto the better appreciation of our Singapore History.