Implausible City #1: Witnessing Raffles

On this historic site
Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles
First landed in Singapore
On 28th January 1819
And with genius and perception
Changed the destiny of Singapore
From an obscure fishing village
To a great seaport and
Modern metropolis

So reads the inscription on a white statue of a European, implausibly standing on the riverbank of a malarial river, implausibly decked out in Victorian tights and coat in the tropical heat, gazing with willful constipation at an implausible city in the marshy overgrowth, needing only a determined push to birth a settlement for the Company and the Crown. It commemorates the realization of the implausible, the stubborn insistence on a sliver of possibility against the legions of doubting Thomases, no doubt with the Dutch halberd as a spur, Napoleon's guillotine as the excuse, and an easy game of a sultan. The imperious patriarch frowns; there are no witnesses. A believing Thomas of the Woolner clan erected the statue 68 years late, the year 1887, when the blinding glare of the high noon of the Empire scorched scars unto the proud burdens of British officers and bent sinews of Asian coolies alike, descending from the edges of continents to penetrate into the leaping overhang of Malayan jungles in pursuit of ghosts and wealth. Their footprints have long turned to sludge in the deluge of history, their spirits a whimper in the dew and humid of whispering winds. There are no witnesses to their passing except the objects they fashioned with their hands to shackle their souls: gambier, pepper, opium, tin, rubber and palm, encircling the globe to testify to their meager time on this transient earth.

On this obscure site
And many others
We landed on Singapore soil
Since time immemorial
With our labour and toil
Changed your genius and perception
From a mere idea
To a concrete reality

So rebuts the description on a dark statue of an Asian, implausibly meeting the founder on the sinking riverbed, implausibly shrouded in the modern overalls and hardhat in the salty breeze, gazing with blasé anticipation at an implausible calling in the cricking undergrowth, desiring only a considered rush to claim a colony for his daughters and sons. It commemorates the reality of the implausible, the stillborn resistance to a quiver of possibilities and a legion of obedient Sepoys, no doubt with the Chinese disease as a spur, the Indian famine as excuse, and overall an easy game of desperation. The postcolonial patriarch frowns; there are many witnesses. An experimenting curate of Asian children raised the contrapuntal 48 years late, the year 2007, when the seething ambers of the red-dusk sun of the Nation whipped scars unto the deafened minds of emasculated citizens and double-bent sinews of Asian coolies alike, descending from the edges of the westerly ocean to perch on the leaping overhang of steel and window frames in pursuit of dreams and income. Their footprints lightly tread the concrete floors below the refuge of history, their spirits a sigh in the shock and awe of roaring exhausts. There are many witnesses to their passing except that the subjects they carry on their shoulders know no better than to belittle their souls: wafers, cables, petrochemicals, monies, talents, scholars and tourists, recycling globalization to forget their restricted time in this impossible land. And I add:

From mere possibilities
To a concrete reality and
Implausible Cosmopolis

Ethnosophy, Implausible City

Two gestures that signify the serial complementation of monumental forms in the heartland, two vectors that stream from the symbolic impositions and authoritative inscriptions on the everyday consciousness of material life lived as such.

One speaks of the eruption of heterodoxies that open up schismatic tears in the orthodox fabric of space and time. Here, random enunciations rise from the heterogeneous depths of memories and the meaningful multiplicities of bodies, their randomness the very constitution of the people's wisdom, ethnosophy. They move to the laws of embodied time and remembered space but they bounce off the inertia of each other to form the complexities of the nation and the perplexities of rulers. They give shape to the wound that pulsates in the patriarch's mind as he strives against the encroachment of desire and drive on his very existence as the law and name par excellence. The people do not curse, but they blur the boundaries of past and present and the here and there of gated time and space; the fading slide of metaphors subverts the piercing suture of knowledge, and in an instantaneous voice, there is transient freedom.


Upcoming. Ethnosophy #1: The fragrance of the winds

The other speaks of that which exists before possibility, that which holds up the flower of dreams in the cusp of one's hands, the soil slipping through the gaps of fingers. Here, systematic delineations sinks into the fertile surfaces and curves of the social body misrecognized as the city, the plausibility of which marks itself off from the implausible within its own self, the implausible city. It molds to the laws of gates, fences and tolls only to bounce the divine dice of probabilities off them to achieve the desire for possibilities. It disturbs the formless sleep of the patriarch as he wrestles with the void that exists in the history of his soul that is the city he fantasizes to be the embodiment of his immortality. Infinity does not count, but rises only to drop into itself in the perpetual loop of being; the ride of enjoyment transfigures the gaze of future pathways, and in an eternal smile, there is transcendental realization.


Incoming. Implausible City #1: Witnessing Raffles