Voluntary Prisoners of the City (and you don't know it!)
but back to snakes (in a house, not on a plane): it makes me wonder - why have we kept so strict to the green heart? we have this strict division between nature and the city when the most interesting spaces in singapore are where nature meets the city. i'm thinking of Dempsey, Portsdown Road, Tiong Bahru as well and the like. the opposite is true too: the most boring places are the shopping malls, fully air conditioned with the same mixture of shops, all "same same but different", to borrow a phrase that is turning out to be surprisingly wise.
on the subject of shopping malls: it seems to have become the default response to the idea of a central meeting point. even outside my house there is a new behemoth, and before one goes in already one can expect boredom. an atrium scheme, where line-of-sights are politely choreographed to expose a maximum of advertisments and shops. expect a 7-11 or its equivalent, expect a bread-talk or its equivalent. etcetc.
don't get me wrong, im not being all "commodification and consumption culture is bad, we should all fart roses and burp out messages of love". all im saying, is that there should be alternatives. balance. what a pity when the publics imagination has been limited to "lets go shopping" (broadly put!) and other things like going to a park or the beach or some cultural venue is an event in itself! How can something so beautiful: cities and their promise of unexpected juxtapositions and excitement, that which could be used to free and liberate, be used to enslave instead? Voluntary Prisoners of Architecture, now Voluntary Prisoners of the City but not unaware of it.
"if you don't know, just say you don't know. i just wanted to create". thank you sean, i love how you are so free.